Ben Etherington

kellyfromthecity:

benetherington:

saltykisses:

A boy left his bike chained to a tree when he went away to war in 1914. He never returned, leaving the tree no choice but to grow around the bike. 
Photographer Unknown

 Submitted by nessastooshort

This is no doubt a beautiful installation, a wonderful photo and a moving caption, but it is not very likely to be true.

Trees grow outward, not upward. You can carve a mark on a tree three feet above ground and in thirty years or longer it will still be three feet above the ground. The wheels of the bike should be touching the grass, and the rubber tire on the front wheel should be weathered. I’m not sure, but I believe the plastic handle grips are too modern as well.

THAT SAID, this is a really great photo.

So I googled this, and this is what Snopes found: while the photograph is real (apparently the tree is a popular tourist destination on Vashon Island), the description is inaccurate. It was not left by a boy who went to war, but by a local resident in the mid 1950s. 

Source: http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/bicycle.asp

Should have been my first step, thanks Kelly!

1950’s explains the plastic and rubber. I think the height is explained by the bike NOT being on the ground to begin with. You can see a branch a bit higher up that looks like it is being overwhelmed by the trunk. I’ll bet the owner wedged the bike in that when it met the trunk lower. It’s an unusual growth pattern, but the branch probably died shortly after the bike was hung on it.

englishbeijinhos:

explodeyfaces:

 #this is an accurate representation of me trying to introduce friends to a new fandom

the truest thing

Reblogging for Whit.

(Source: motdog)

saltykisses:

A boy left his bike chained to a tree when he went away to war in 1914. He never returned, leaving the tree no choice but to grow around the bike. 
Photographer Unknown

 Submitted by nessastooshort

This is no doubt a beautiful installation, a wonderful photo and a moving caption, but it is not very likely to be true.

Trees grow outward, not upward. You can carve a mark on a tree three feet above ground and in thirty years or longer it will still be three feet above the ground. The wheels of the bike should be touching the grass, and the rubber tire on the front wheel should be weathered. I’m not sure, but I believe the plastic handle grips are too modern as well.

THAT SAID, this is a really great photo.

throwing-milkshakes-at-cars:

makkon:

lavenderharmony:

rainbowdash-likesgirls:

missrebellious:

alwaysblind:

metalturtle:

kcjo:

Aerogel, also know as frozen smoke, is the world’s lowest density solid, clocking in at 96% air. If you hold a small piece in your hand, it’s practically impossible to either see or feel, but if you poke it, it’s like styrofoam. It supports up to 4,000 times its own weight and can withstand a direct blast from two pounds of dynamite. It’s also the best insulator in existence.

Chemistry at its finest

can i eat that

Why don’t we use this for everything?!?

This shit is about the coolest thing ever. 

It’s such a great insulator that a thin layer of it will protect anything from the heat of a bunsen burner.

Even though it’s incredibly light and has an extremely low density, its lattice-like molecular structure makes it able to hold objects much greater in mass.

What if you got loads of it, and made a bed, you could pretend you were a pegasus

Possibly one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen.

What if you got loads of it, and made a bed, you could pretend you were a pegasus

What if you got loads of it, and made a bed, you could pretend you were a pegasus

WHAT IF YOU GOT LOADS OF IT, AND MADE A BED, YOU COULD PRETEND YOU WERE A PEGASUS

You would NOT want to lie in a bed of Aerogel. Just handling it with your fingers dries your skin out like you wouldn’t believe. The corners can also be pretty sharp, so you’d probably end up looking like a SKINNED pegasus.

kellyfromthecity:

did-yuo-kno:

alibody:

The sky is blue because light from the sun enters our atmosphere it collides with molecules in the air.  The blue part of the light gets scattered more than the other parts during these collisions and thus makes the sky appear to our eyes as blue.  If the light from the sun took a straight path down to our eyes with no scattering or absorption in the atmosphere, the sky would in fact look much as it does at night in the day time.

…I’m a nerd.

I don’t think the ability to copy-paste something from Yahoo Answers classifies you as a “nerd”, sorry.

AAAACTUALLY you’re not disqualified from nerddom because you searched out answers but more because you’re just wrong.

This describes Rayleigh Scattering, which definitely takes place in our atmosphere. It’s the commonest smart-guy explanation for the blueness of the sky, but it only accounts for a slight amount of blueness. The real reason the sky is blue is because AIR is blue. Just like stained glass, the sky lets in a specific color and reflects everything else.

(Source: bunnyfood)

(Source: arkitekcher)

(Source: theinternetaccordingtoadrian)

God knows I’m no patriot, but I’m always suspicious when I don’t see a source. Most of my sources below come from Nation Master, and if you follow the links, there’s usually a very reliable source at the bottom of each list. I’m pretty sure Nation Master was used to generate this post initially, but looking at total events, not events per capita or per GDP. Remember, we’re a HUGE country. We’re gonna have the most of a hell of a lot of things.

1. I wasn’t able to find a total crime statistic, but per capita, we are equal 9th place in total assaults (with Sweden and Belgium) and not even in the top 37 countries in murders per capita, but we ARE in equal second place in perception of safety (with Canada).
2. We aren’t in the top 55 countries in rapes per capita. Canada, oddly, is in 49th place though.
3. We DO release the most CO2 into the atmosphere, but only in gross standards. If you consider GDP, we are in 38th place. That means that we release a ton of CO2, but only because we’re a HUGE country with lots of money generation power.
4. We DO have the highest divorce rate per person, but we’re not in the top 20 countries with the highest divorce rate PER MARRIAGE. That means that we have a high divorce rate because we have a lot of marriages to begin with, and on average, they’re pretty successful.
5. We definitely have the highest teen pregnancy rate per teen.
6. We are actually in 13th place in deaths by heart disease per capita.
7. McDonalds is an American company. No surprise we have the most of them. However, we don’t pay the most for our hamburgers. There are 7 countries that pay more than we do.
8. We’re in sixth place in number of cosmetic surgeries per capita.
9. And finally, we end on an honest truth. We DO have the most prisoners per capita. For every 100k people alive, 715 of them are in prisons. That’s more than Russia (584.)

WITH ALL THAT SAID, keep in mind that some of these things aren’t even BAD! Some people want plastic surgery, and it’s widely available in our country! That’s a privilege that most people don’t have. We also don’t make it too hard to get divorced, assuming both parties want to part ways amicably. Having a high divorce rate is no worse than having a high high school breakup rate.

As above, I’m no patriot by any measure. I’m not trying to defend the US here, just truth and good research. I really think the original poster started with an anti-US intention and tried their best to follow up on it. That makes for good TV, but not for good statistics.

(Source: jeffrey-lebowski)

(Source: to-love-day-by-day)