Everybody just stop. Stop what you're doing and watch this amazingly accurate recreation of the 6-minute car-chase through the mall scene from The Blues Brothers. Even if you haven't seen The Blues Brothers. Even if you don't like Legos. Because it is amazing.
    
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Need a fix of shape-shifting robot assassin action, in a hurry? 1A4STUDIO has you covered, with this one-minute synopsis of Terminator 2: Judgment Day. So sit back, relax and let the adorableness wash over you.
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Nerd-related “texts from last night” tumblrs might be my favorite thing ever. The newest addition to my tumblr dash? Texts from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Enjoy a sampling…
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Far more exciting than a walking treadmill or elliptical machine, this infinite rock wall brings the challenges (and hard exercise) of scaling sheer cliffs right into your local gym or living room.
The Climbstation can be rotated between a slope of 15 degrees and negative 49 degrees, simulating everything from relatively generous slopes or dizzying upside-down climbing experiences.
The device can also rotate through different slopes, speeds and durations on demand, in response to programmatic difficulty levels or in a pre-selected sequence. As in typical bouldering rooms at climbing wall centers, a mat placed below the device will cushion any fall.
Between climbs, users can swap out 90 holds that come with each machine between 600 potential positions, dynamically changing the landscape from one session to the next to keep things interesting and challenging.
The mid-five-figure price tag will be enough to put off casual users, but could also be sufficiently low for these to start showing up not just at the homes of the rich and famous but also at regional fitness centers – a great way for recreational climbers or professionals located far from mountains to train or simply stay in shape.
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[image via JBT AeroTech]
Your correspondent managed to travel via subway this Thanksgiving, avoiding the car-clogged roads, the train-jammed tracks and most importantly, the airplane-choked skies. But this past weekend, I departed for Autodesk University on the other side of the country, meaning there's a plane ride in my immediate future.
On the jet bridge, I'll be looking out for that little wheeled thing in the photograph above, which I've not noticed (so much for being an observant industrial designer) on the numerous flights I've taken in my lifetime, probably because during the boarding process I'm more concerned with if there's any overhead bin space left. Slate, however, has been kind enough to point the object out and explain its function. Can any of you guess what it is, and what it does?
(more...) 
Here's a gallery of photos from the amazing new book The Library: A World History by James W. P. Campbell and Will Pryce, published in October. It's the first comprehensive history of library buildings through the ages by Cambridge University's James Campbell, and its centrepiece are the magnificent photos by Will Pryce.
Shhh! Take a peek at the world's most exquisite libraries [CNN]
(via Hacker News)
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Let's be honest, those of us who were youngsters when Home Alone came out thought it was pretty awesome, but once you see it as an adult, you realize it isn't just cheesy, but pretty terrible all around. Of course, if you haven't seen it recently, you might not realize just how terrible it is until this Honest Trailer reminds you that it's about a little sociopath with a horrible family who decides he needs to torture to non-violent criminals who are inexplicably obsessed with breaking in to one specific home -all of which makes for one delightfully bad movie and a great Honest Trailer
Via Laughing Squid
Warning: Do not watch this video within the first hour of waking up. It will break your brain.
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Photographer Sophie Garnand has a project capturing dogs in the midst of their bath-time routine. These dogs are strong. They are statuesque. They are so sad and soaked it’s just too adorable.
In Sophie’s words, “‘Wet Dog’ is part of a project about grooming and the way we alter our dogs’ appearance to fit standards of hygiene and beauty.” I would also like to add that it’s about how completely ridiculous dogs look when they’re getting a bath, but who am I to say?
There’s the ones where they seem so overwhelmed by their own fur it just doesn’t seem fair:
And the spiked-up rebels:
The ones with the ‘tude:
And, my personal favorite, THIS:
All images via StrikingPaws.com
From scientific miracles to literary criticism, by way of bodily functions and failures of common sense.
Many moons ago, I wrote about the art of the humorous Amazon review as a modern masterpiece of parodic genius, embodying Arthur Koestler’s seminal “bisociation” theory of how humor and creativity work. It turns out this peculiar micro-genre of satire is surprisingly expansive — here is a sequel-selection of amusing, absurd, preposterous, and plain funny reviews, spanning everything from literary classics to industrial equipment.
Some take advantage of Amazon’s tendency to mash up the brand name and product description in the same title field, which often makes for some inherently funny propositions — like the Pelican 1510-004-110 Case with Padded Dividers, Black, on which “Teddy Picker” pounces elegantly:
With others, it’s hard to tell whether the person was aiming for comedy or was simply displaying a tragic level of learnedness — which, arguably, makes it all the funnier. From a one-star review of Lolita titled “Wake Me When It’s Over” (with Proper Capitalization) to an unambiguously titled one-star review of Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, these “literary critics” employ Koestler’s bisociation in juxtaposing personal preference and cultural credence to a comedic effect, whether intended or not:
Some are doubly amusing not only by virtue of the humorous review but also by the sheer absurdity of why such an item would be sold on Amazon in the first place. Take, for instance, the Cyclone 4006 Ultra High Pressure Hard Surface Cleaner — a giant machine weighing 28,000 pounds and used primarily at airports for removing paint and rubber. A reviewer who goes by Wandrwoman ‘Wise as Aphrodite, Beautiful as Athena…’” — a name that already promises amusement — writes:
Some seem wholly earnest — but, between the nature of the product and the language of the review, they produce an irrepressible chuckle. There’s Body Mint and its ultimate fan, a woman named Anita (who, Amazon kindly informs us, is using her Real Name):
Others reap the irresistible low-hanging fruit of an especially questionable product, such as the AutoExec Wheelmate Steering Wheel Attachable Work Surface Tray. Just when you might think this is intended as a gag gift for that common-sense-defiant teenage driver, you realize this is a serious “ergonomic work surface” “designed to be used in a vehicle’s steering wheel” and “developed for the mobile worker on the road needing support for their tablet or a great place to write” … in an age when it’s both idiotic and illegal to text-and-drive, let alone type-and-drive. Some reviewers go for the meta:
Others take it a satirical step further:
I just picked uuyp my laptop hoder from the post offfice and I’m ddriving home now. It’s OK Iguess, but the bumpy road majkes it hard to type. And theree’s a lot of pedeestrians and traffi c that keep distracti9ng me fromm my computer.
It’s prolly OK ffor web browsing or email, but I don’gt think it will be so useful for mmore complex tasks. Oh, and yyou can’t make any sharrp turns. So when you turn right, somnetimess you have to use the oppsing lane of traffic.
Another reviewer points out the obvious:
Adding this desk to my car’s steering wheel has been baby Jesus awesome. I love emailing the Highway patrol while I drive to let them know the tag numbers of cell phone using drivers. Lordy!
Some reviews weave entire micro-novellas around the product, such as this three-star treatise on the Denon AKDL1 Dedicated Link Cable by none other than Star Trek star George Takei:
Another reviewer offers a different, equally entertaining twist on the cable:
After I took delivery of my $500 Denon AKDL1 Cat-5 uber-cable, Al Gore was mysteriously drawn to my home, where he pronounced that Global Warming had been suspended in my vicinity.
Yes, I had perfect weather: no flooding, no tornadoes, the exact amount of rain necessary, and he pronounced sea levels exactly right and that they were not going to rise within five miles of my house.
Additionally, my cars began achieving 200 mpg and I didn’t even need gasoline. I was able to put three grams of cat litter into the tank and drive forever.
What’s more, the atmosphere inside my home became 93% oxygen and virtually no carbon dioxide. In fact, I now exhale oxygen.
One heck of a cable.
Didn’t notice any improvement in audio quality though.
The $800 Apple iCable is clearly superior.
Then there are those that simply defy categorization, such as this one-star review for the Accoutrements Horse Head Mask:
But my favorite remains this brilliant gem from the first installment, wherein an Edgar Allan Poe impersonator reviews a humble jug of milk in the style of “The Raven”:
Read the rest in all its full Poe-tastic glory here, then revisit the original omnibus here.
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In another episode of Improv Everywhere's Movies in Real Life series (previously at Neatorama), someone orders a drink at Starbucks and says his name is Spartacus. As they do, the barista writes the name on the cup. If you are familiar with the movie Spartacus, you can see where this is going. When the barista calls out for Spartacus, the iconic final scene is re-enacted, much to the delight of the crew and other patrons. No lives were at stake, but wait until you see who really gets the coffee! -via Viral Viral Videos
Middle school and high school level English teachers are forever asking students to look for symbolism in the classic novels they read. The assignments are so ubiquitous that you have to wonder how this much symbolism actually gets written into so many great novels. In 1963, 16-year-old Bruce McAllister decided to get to the bottom of that question by writing to 150 novelists and asking them if they intentionally wrote symbolism into their works. He asked four questions altogether, and received replies from many of those authors.
“Do you consciously, intentionally plan and place symbolism in your writing?... If yes, please state your method for doing so. Do you feel you sub-consciously place symbolism in your writing?”
Jack Kerouac: "No."
Isaac Asimov: “Consciously? Heavens, no! Unconsciously? How can one avoid it?”
Joseph Heller: “Yes, I do intentionally rely on symbolism in my writing, but not to the extent that many people have stated…No, I do not subconsciously place symbolism in my writing, although there are inevitably many occasions when events acquire a meaning additional to the one originally intended.”
Ray Bradbury: “No, I never consciously place symbolism in my writing. That would be a self-conscious exercise and self-consciousness is defeating to any creative act. Better to let the subconscious do the work for you, and get out of the way. The best symbolism is always unsuspected and natural."
John Updike: “Yes—I have no method; there is no method in writing fiction; you don’t seem to understand.”
But that's just the beginning. Read what other authors said about this and McAllister's other questions at mental_floss. You have to wonder how many aspiring writers were discouraged by the unnecessary idea that good writing must be infused with symbolism. From what I've seen and read, good writing comes from practice more than anything else.
Los Angeles recently reported that the end of the world had begun...or that it was raining. Apparently, L.A. news stations can't tell the difference. Watch how Jimmy Kimmel brings the situation down to earth in his usual humorous fashion.
Submitted by: Unknown (via Jimmy Kimmel Live)
Besides reboots, it’s not often we find ourselves writing news stories about 80s films. And now we’ve gotten two in the same month about the same film – The Princess Bride. We recently learned it was being turned into a stage production but today, it’s a book. A book actor Cary Elwes will be writing about his time working on The Princess Bride.
The book will be appropriately titled As You Wish: Tales From the Princess Bride. The Hollywood Reporter writes, “Elwes says he was inspired to delve into the past during a cast reunion at the 2012 New York Film Festival, when the film was recognized on its 25th anniversary.”
THR says it will be co-written with collaborator Joe Layden, but besides Elwes own memories, he’s planning on filling the book with interviews from others in the cast. Robin Wright, Billy Crystal, Carol Kane, Christopher Guest, Chris Sarandon will all speak with the actor, as well as writer William Goldman, while director Rob Reiner will provide the foreword.
“It was a joy to work on such a magical film with an amazing cast of talented actors and friends,” Elwes said in a statement. “It will be great fun to revisit The Princess Bride and to share my fond memories of the unforgettable experience we all had.”
As You Wish: Tales From the Princess Bride is being published by Simon & Schuster’s imprint Touchstone and is expected to be released Fall of 2014. What do you think, best seller material?
(via The Hollywood Reporter)
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This chart of mental diagnoses for the characters on Sesame Street has been making the rounds today, but it's not exactly new. It appeared about a year-and-a-half ago at Fo'Drizzle, but sometime after that lost its three watermarks and was passed around all over.
Even then, this is not the first attempt to diagnose all the mental problems of Sesame Street characters. Here's a post listing the Sesame Street character's various diagnoses from 2007. Another tried it in 2011. Even Psychology Today got into the act! You might notice that none of these lists agree with each other completely. The Muppet Show cast got the treatment, too. It's all speculation, of course, and highlights how we tend to label every kind of personality quirk as a mental disorder.
If you've been watching the very weird, enjoyable sketch/interview series The Pete Holmes Show — which, given the guests it's featured so far, might as well be called Comedy Podcast: The Series (not a criticism!) — you've probably already seen a few installments of "Ex-Men," in which the titular Pete plays Professor X, across from an X-Men character, and explains to him or her why he or she is about to be fired from the team. They're all pretty funny, but I think this one, from last night, is my favourite. Because when you think about it, Iceman's powers are pretty lame...but that's not the only thing that makes the sketch funny. Please watch to the end to see what made me laugh out loud, kind of a lot.
[ NOTE: If your RSS reader does not show a video here, please click here to view it on Previously.TV. ]
Watch Professor X Fire Iceman appeared first on Previously.TV
YouTube is infamous for its annoyances and its cluttered interface. If you want to just get down to watching videos without all the junk, Adblock Plus has added support for a new, streamlined YouTube experience that gets rid of all kinds of cruft.
Much like Adblock's Facebook customizer, all you need to do is head over to the YouTube Customizer page with Adblock Plus installed. You're shown four options for customizations, including options for blocking comments, suggestions, and more. You can block:
Once you pick which option works best for you, you're directed over to your AdBlock Plus options. Click the "+Add" button, and you're all set.
Pure YouTube Video Experience | Adblock Plus
What the celebrated composer’s relationship with food reveals about the inner conflicts we share.
This is a culture where our relationship with food, though sometimes a canvas for creativity, has mutated from a source of sustenance to a grand arena for our moral struggles with willpower, a tyranny of habits we seek to rewire, a currency of status in the world’s hierarchy of haves and have-nots. At its most tragic, it can rip the psyche apart under the conflicting, unrelenting impulses for indulgence and control. While for most of us, these daily dramas play out in private, for public figures they offer source material for that sad excuse for journalism we find at the newsstand and the supermarket checkout aisle. And yet something about it — about those shared demons of our ambivalent relationship with food as a metaphor and voodoo doll for our inner contradictions and oscillations between self-loathing and self-pleasuring, between quenching and control — holds immutable allure for even those furthest removed from tabloid culture.
Perhaps it is the confluence of these curious cultural phenomena that makes for one of the most interesting parts of Terry Teachout’s fantastic new biography, Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington (public library) — Ellington’s relationship with food. In many ways, it presents an amplified version of the inner struggles we face daily — amplified to the point of caricature, which is what makes it both so powerful and so unsettling, in the same way we tend to be uneasy around or profoundly dislike those who exhibit exaggerated versions of our own worst traits.
Ellington, who was exceedingly concerned with how he looked on stage, went to great lengths to reconcile and conceal his conflicted appetites for pleasure and for appearance. He wore show-stopping ensembles when he performed — but with a twist:
Beneath it all he wore a corset, a useful tool for a performer whose appetite for food was as gargantuan as his appetite for sex. One of Ellington’s nicknames was “Dumpy,” and Tricky Sam Nanton paid awestruck tribute to his capacity: “He’s a genius, all right, but Jesus, how he eats!” Some of his best-remembered quirks had to do with food, such as his practice of wrapping up a leftover chop in a handkerchief or napkin, then tucking it in one of his pockets after a meal. It was a habit he had acquired in his early days, when food, like money, was harder to come by. “After a while, you eat in self-defense,” he told Whitney Balliett. “You get so you hoard little pieces of food against the time when there isn’t going to be any.”
Fashion plate: Duke Ellington in his dressing room at New York’s Paramount Theatre, photographed in May 1946 by William Gottlieb. In the thirties, he traveled with five trunks of clothes plus a separate trunk for his shoes. Ellington’s hair, as always, has been meticulously straightened, a look that he never abandoned, even after it became unfashionable among younger blacks
But his struggles with food cut deeper than a mere quirk. Teachout cites one journalist’s account of how Ellington’s notorious compulsion for controlling his image backfired in the most tragicomic of ways in his diet:
Duke, who is always worrying about keeping his weight down, may announce that he intends to have nothing but Shredded Wheat and black tea. . . . Duke’s resolution about not overeating frequently collapses at this point. When it does, he orders a steak, and after finishing it he engages in another moral struggle for about five minutes. Then he really begins to eat. He has another steak, smothered in onions, a double portion of fried potatoes, a salad, a bowl of sliced tomatoes, a giant lobster and melted butter, coffee, and an Ellington dessert — perhaps a combination of pie, cake, ice cream, custard, pastry, jello, fruit, and cheese. His appetite really whetted, he may order ham and eggs, a half-dozen pancakes, waffles and syrup, and some hot biscuits. Then, determined to get back on his diet, he will finish, as he began, with Shredded Wheat and black tea.
For a closer look at Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, dive into the story of how Ellington engineered his own image.
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Brain Pickings has a free weekly newsletter. It comes out on Sundays and offers the week’s best articles. Here’s what to expect. Like? Sign up.
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Thank you for calling technical support. I’m sorry sir, but our dumb game only works with 3dfx Glide. Yes, I’ll transfer you. Please hold.
Today’s feature revolves around two inventions that have nearly been lost to the sands of time: game manuals and telephones. Developers used to be able to presume of gamers some willingness to study, so instead of making their games as idiotic as possible they packaged them with instruction manuals. I’ve got a big box full of these paper relics, many of them more fun to browse than their respective games are to play.
Phones, if you’ll recall, were originally for voice chat–with people other than your parents, even. Back in the ’90s plenty of developers did their own tech support in-house, and before everyone had Internet access they published their phone numbers for people to call in.
Somehow I got to wondering: which game manual has the oldest still functional phone number? So I spent a whole afternoon browsing my manuals’ fine print for digits, dialing them and recording the results. It was tedious work: there was no telling if any given manual would even contain a phone number, much less on which page to find it. Then I had to omit duplicate numbers derived from different manuals but from the same developer or publisher.
I wasn’t expecting much, seeing as how most of the companies represented in my box-o-manuals either closed shop or got bought out long ago. The results are interesting for their predictability–a sad testament to studios long dead. Here they all are, presented in the same order I called them.
Developer: Microprose. Source: X-Com: UFO Defense manual, 1994. Result: no answer.
Developer: Microprose. Source: Falcon 4.0 manual, 1998. Result: wrong number; diabetes care clinic.
Developer: Impressions Software. Source: Lords of the Realm manual, 1994. Result: fax machine registered to Biomed Realty Trust.
Publisher: Interactive Magic. Source: Great Battles of Caesar manual, 1997. Result: generic voicemail.
Publisher: Activision. Source: Quake II manual, 1997.
I think you might have just stabbed the helpline operator.
Developer: Apogee Software. Source: Wolfenstein 3D Hint Manual, 1992. Result: wrong number; Guardian Health Care company.
Publisher: Sierra On-Line. Source: Half-Life manual, 1998. Result: busy signal.
Publisher: Sierra On-Line. Source: A-10 Tank Killer manual, 1989. Result: generic voicemail.
Publisher: Ubisoft. Source: Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six manual.
Developer: LucasArts. Source: Star Wars: Dark Forces manual, 1995. Result: number disconnected.
Developer: TalonSoft. Source: 12 O’Clock High manual, 1999. Result: number not in service, but an AI offered to connect me to one of two computer shops in the area. How did it know my call had anything to do with computers? Somehow a vestige of TalonSoft remains, like a wisp of smoke on the wind.
Developer: Blizzard. Source: Diablo manual, 1996.
Publisher: Electronic Arts. Source: Centurion: Defender of Rome manual. Result: Private voicemail.
“Psst… Galba. You’re not following the call script.”
Publisher: Electronic Arts. Source: Ultima Collection manual, 1998. Result: “The person you are trying to reach is not accepting calls at this time.”
Publisher: Hasbro Interactive. Source: Worms Armageddon manual, 1999. Result: It’s a cruise ship scam! “Congratulations! You’ve won a complimentary two-night cruise! Your only responsibility is a nominal port fee of $59 per person…”
Publisher: Interplay. Source: Baldur’s Gate manual, 1998. Result: number disconnected.
Publisher: GT Interactive. Source: Heretic shareware tech support insert, 1994. Result: number not in service.
Publisher: GT Interactive. Source: Unreal manual, 1997. Result: nonworking number registered to Cytel, Inc.
Publisher: GT Interactive. Source: Unreal Tournament manual, 1999. Result: busy signal.
Developer: Looking Glass Studios. Source: Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri manual, 1996. Result: private voicemail.
Developer: Paragon Software. Source: Dr. Doom’s Revenge manual, 1989. Result: number not in service.
Publisher: Nintendo of America. Source: Kirby’s Adventure manual, 1993. (Why this was in my PC box is anyone’s guess.)
Publisher: Microsoft. Source: Age of Empires manual, 1997. Result: number disconnected.
Developer: Bungie. Source: Myth: The Fallen Lords manual, 1997. Result: unknown voicemail.
Developer: Origin Systems. Source: Jane’s AH-64D Longbow manual, 1996. Result: number disconnected.
Developer: Access Software. Source: Links LS manual, 1996. Result: oddly soothing muzak.
Developer: SSI, Inc. Source: Gateway to the Savage Frontier manual, 1991. Result: number disconnected.
Developer: Maxis. Source: SimCity Classic manual, 1993. Result: private voicemail.
So Nintendo wins the contest: it’s been using the same tech support number since 1985. That just figures, doesn’t it? On a long enough timeline, Nintendo wins at everything.
Somewhere around here I’ve got another box-o-manuals of comparable size that I still can’t find. I checked the closet, under the bed, even beneath my big pile of unwearable winter clothing (the Tampa climate being what it is). If I ever do find it, expect a sequel post, or at the very least an addendum.
If you thought that the head-rolling had come to… er… a head in the last run of HBO’s Game of Thrones, here’s a clear indication that the blood will keep flowing and the pile of bodies will carry on stacking up, higher and higher.
Shame that there’s no way of knowing just how many characters George RR Martin is snuffing out at each of those tags. It might sometimes be a good number.
Thanks to Waterstones Dorking for their labours in bookmarking.
See Every Death In The First Five Volumes Of A Game Of Thrones. Sort Of. Not Quite
What is the furthest one human being has ever been from every other living person? Were they lonely?
Bryan J. McCarter
It's hard to know for sure!
The most likely suspects are the six Apollo command module pilots who stayed in lunar orbit during a Moon landing: Mike Collins, Dick Gordon, Stu Roosa, Al Worden, Ken Mattingly, and Ron Evans.
Each of these astronauts stayed alone in the command module while two other astronauts landed on the Moon. At the highest point in their orbit, they were about 3,585 kilometers from their fellow astronauts.
You'd think astronauts would have a lock on this category, but it's not so cut-and-dry. There are a few other candidates who come pretty close!
It's hard to get 3,585 kilometers[1]Because of the curve of the Earth, you actually have to go 3,619 kilometers across the surface to qualify. from a permanently inhabited place. The Polynesians, who were the first humans to spread across the Pacific, might have managed it, but this would have required a lone sailor to travel awfully far ahead of everyone else. It may have happened—perhaps by accident, when someone was carried far from their group by a storm—but we're unlikely to ever know for sure.
Once the Pacific was colonized, it got a lot harder to find regions of the Earth's surface where someone could achieve 3,585 kilometer isolation. Now that the Antarctic continent has a permanent population of researchers, it's almost certainly impossible.
During the period of Antarctic exploration, a few people have come close to beating the astronauts, and it's possible one of them actually holds the record. One person who came very close was Robert Scott.
Robert Falcon Scott was a British explorer who met a tragic end. Scott's expedition reached the South Pole in 1911, only to discover that Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen had beaten him there by several months. The dejected Scott and his companions began their trek back to the coast, but they all died while crossing the Ross Ice Shelf.
The last surviving expedition member would have been, briefly, one of the most isolated people on Earth.[2]Amundsen's expedition had left the continent by then. However, he (whoever he was) was still within 3,585 kilometers of a number of humans, including some other Antarctic explorer outposts as well as the Māori on Rakiura (Stewart Island) in New Zealand.
There are plenty of other candidates. Pierre François Péron, a French sailor, says he was marooned on Île Amsterdam in the southern Indian Ocean. If so, he came close to beating the astronauts, but he wasn't quite far enough from Mauritius, southwestern Australia, or the edge of Madagascar to qualify.
We'll probably never know for sure. It's possible that some shipwrecked 18th-century sailor drifting in a lifeboat in the Southern Ocean holds the title of most isolated human. However, until some clear piece of historic evidence pops up, I think the six Apollo astronauts have a pretty good claim.
Which brings us to the second part of Bryan's question: Were they lonely?
After returning to Earth, Apollo 11 command module pilot Mike Collins said he did not feel at all lonely. He wrote about the experience in his book Carrying the Fire: An Astronaut's Journeys:
Far from feeling lonely or abandoned, I feel very much a part of what is taking place on the lunar surface ... I don't mean to deny a feeling of solitude. It is there, reinforced by the fact that radio contact with the Earth abruptly cuts off at the instant I disappear behind the moon.
I am alone now, truly alone, and absolutely isolated from any known life. I am it. If a count were taken, the score would be three billion plus two over on the other side of the moon, and one plus God knows what on this side.
Al Worden, the Apollo 15 command module pilot, even enjoyed the experience:[3]BBC Future interview with Al Wolden (April 2, 2013)
There's a thing about being alone and there's a thing about being lonely, and they're two different things. I was alone but I was not lonely. My background was as a fighter pilot in the air force, then as a test pilot–and that was mostly in fighter airplanes–so I was very used to being by myself. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I didn't have to talk to Dave and Jim any more ... On the backside of the Moon, I didn't even have to talk to Houston and that was the best part of the flight.
Introverts understand; the loneliest human in history was just happy to have a few minutes of peace and quiet.
It's a TV ad for Volvo trucks; a clever way to demonstrate the vehicles' precise computer-aided steering. [Video Link]
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John Brownlee explains 
