Bowling has never been so much fun...

Can I be 5 again and have one of these please:



It's human bowling alley water slide thing!

(via craziestgadgets)

June Talks

Dana Centre plans for this month:

9 June - Move Me On - Curious idea getting a scientist and choreographer to work together. I'm fascinated to know what the result is and what they say about the reasoning behind it.
11 June - Season of Life - Seasons certainly seem to effect our general feelings,etc, but other than the obvious I don't know a lot about this.
17 June - Dinner@Dana: Deciphering the Cosmic Number - Must admit I don't find 137 anything special, but fascinated to find out why Pauli and Jung thought differently
18 June - Economy and Me - I'm not convinced capitalism is a good thing (but am failing to see what viable alternatives there are given the number of other systems which have been tried and failed).
30 June - Carole Dane is Sexually Selected - The science of sexual attraction seems an excellent subject for comedy.

If anyone fancies joining me at any of these, they are free, you just need to email tickets@danacentre.org.uk to book a place.

Also, there's this one a Gresham college, which I'll probably aim to go to:

22 June - London's Lost Rivers: The Hackney Brook and other North West Passages - I've posted about the lost rivers before, so it will be interesting to see what he has to say about them.

Beer Gives Us Some Strange Ideas

I like this idea, even if the chances of it ever happening are slim to none.



The map represents a collaboration between beer tycoon Freederick Heineken and 2 historians to split Europe into states of fairly small population size (approx 5-10 million each) with the idea that larger number of smaller states would be easier to govern within a European Union. The states each have some historical basis and are generally ethnically homogeneous.

A full key to the states is given here

As far as I can see the main issue the EU faces is countries defensively promoting their own self-identity causing other countries to act similarly with the fear that the larger countries will have the loudest voices. Splitting these down somewhat may certainly help, although I can't see that it would eliminate the issue altogether and some of the splits will be controversial. One of the major ones I notice from the map above is that Ireland has been unified, which although it would please some, would be less welcome by others.

All in all, I'd be curious to see this happen, but don't think it ever would.

(via strangemaps)

Yes, Japan has no bananas!

It's amazing how big fads can get. The latest fad diet in Japan has apparently increased demand for bananas by around 25-27%, according to inventorfeed.

The general principle behind the morning banana diet, is unsurprisingly, that breakfast basically consists entirely of bananas and water.

No idea whether there's any scientific grounding for this or even if it actually works, but it does have this amusing promotional video:

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(via inventorfeed)

Filling In The Gaps

I've heard of bricking in holes, but never really thought of it like this:



Part of the work of Jan Vormann and his friends in Berlin. They've also done similar work in Bocchignano near Rome and Tel Aviv

(via betsy_stardust in legos)

Some People Can Just Play Too Many Things At Once...

This is an interesting (and very impressive) variation on the idea of a one-man band:

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There's a bit more about him on his website

(via starlyn_monster)