Surfing the net at work for pleasure actually increases our concentration levels and helps make a more productive workforce. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
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Around the World in 80 Telescopes is a 24-hour webcast involving astronomical observatories around the world. Live streaming video will be available, plus links for each participating observatory and the times they will be online in Universal Time (GMT) Friday. (via Metafilter)
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Mock Duck is “a delicious assortment of thrift store cookbooks”, with scanned pictures and descriptions that will make your mouth water… NOT. (via Everlasting Blort)
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There are only around 1,000 Bonobos left in the world, all in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Now a flu epidemic has hit their sole sanctuary.
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Housing Homeless Drunks And Letting Them Drink Saves Millions. And savings might not be the only benefit.
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A Life Without Left Turns. A lovely family memoir about living and driving.
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When Superheroes Go Bad. Eight incidences where we like our good guys even better when they’re more human.
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Spanish Influenza: One of Of Five Infamous Epidemics We Hope We Never See. It killed 50 million people, making the plague look like a childs game.
Comments (8)
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I’m all about the WILB, as I do tend to concentrate more after a dose of mental floss, etc.
posted by Johnny Cat on 4-3-2009 at 1:57 am
Please, can’t we all agree to stop using the phrase “…NOT!” It’s just not funny anymore. See what I did there? I put “not” in the middle of the sentence to denote a negative. Try it.
posted by TBV on 4-3-2009 at 9:29 am
I loved the story “A life without left turns”
Also enjoyed the piece on Housing Homeless Drinks.
@TBV – I’d have to say “My bad” irks me more than “Not!” :-)
posted by Meri on 4-3-2009 at 10:13 am
My Grandpa refused to make left turns also. That story reminds me of him. He read an article in Time Magazine about how UPS spends millions of dollars routing their trucks so they don’t have to make left turns unless absolutely possible.
UPS does it because it saves gas, Grandpa was just chicken.
posted by Witty Nickname on 4-3-2009 at 10:23 am
Good call, Meri. But “NOT!” stopped being funny 15 years ago. “My Bad” has a much shorter “irritating half life”.
On the subject of left turns, there’s a book titled “No Left Turns”, written by a former FBI agent. Its title is from the rumor that J. Edgar Hoover hated taking left turns, so whenever an agent had the task of driving JEH, he had to map out the trip so no left turns were taken. The author made a point to say that nobody knew if the “no left turns” rule was true, but they were all so terrified of “Mr. Hoover” that nobody had the guts to ask him.
posted by TBV on 4-3-2009 at 12:03 pm
I didn’t think you kids would even be familiar with the phrase, much less hear it too much these days.
posted by Miss Cellania on 4-3-2009 at 12:19 pm
After I read the no left turns story, a song from Dr. Demento’s radio show got stuck in my head.
“Two wrongs don’t make a right, but three lefts do…”
posted by nikki on 4-3-2009 at 1:19 pm
The No Left Turns story reminds me of a lady I used to work with – we all thought she was a little nutty because she would have her husband map out routes for her that specifically avoided left turns…maybe she was on to something!
posted by C on 4-3-2009 at 6:10 pm