“THAT’s a word?”

If you play Words With Friends and are frequently demoralized by opponents scoring very big points using very small words, this list will help you up your game. If you don’t play Words With Friends, perhaps you can work these into conversation.

Aa – Noun of Hawaiian origin describing volcanic rock consisting of angular blocks of lava with a very rough surface.

Ae – A Scot adjective meaning “one.” (The game appears to have an affinity for the Scots.)

Ag – An informal noun, short for “agriculture,” or an informal adjective, short for “agricultural.”

Ai – An “ai” is one of four species of three-toed sloth. They are native to Central and South America and one-degree toeier one than two-toed sloths.

Ar – The most likely definitions of “ar” that this could represent: a variant of “are,” or the spelling of the letter ‘R’ (see “ef” below for further commentary).

Aw – An interjection expressing sympathy, tenderness, disapproval or disbelief. (As in, “Aw, a rookie player unfamiliar with the fact that ‘qi’ is likely to be used in all our games. Poor thing.”)

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John Nance Garner, FDR’s first Vice President, either said the VP position wasn’t worth “a warm pitcher of piss” or “a warm bucket of spit.” Whatever body fluid and receptacle he really used, you get the idea.

But being Vice President puts you in a special category of people listed in the backs of American history books. How many of the 47 men to hold the office of Vice President can you name in ten minutes? When you’re done, let us know how you did, which ones you were surprised you missed, and which ones you’ve truly never heard of.

Take the Quiz: Name All the Vice Presidents

With its user-generated reviews and recommendations, Yelp can be great for trying to find a fun spot for dinner. But there are plenty of profiles that aren’t so helpful, and not just because of the quality of the reviews. Pages have sprung up for fake restaurants, jokes from Onion articles and even websites. Check out these strange Yelp reviews and be sure to chime in in the comments with your most bizarre Yelp sighting.

“Great sea urchin ceviche”

Dorsia, in New York’s Flatiron district, is one of the hottest and most exclusive restaurants. Judging by the reviews, it’s almost impossible to get a reservation and even if you do, it’s still a pricey meal (four dollar signs). That said, the sea urchin ceviche is great and New York Matinee hailed the peanut butter soup with smoked duck and mashed squash as a “playful, but mysterious little dish.”

Fans of American Psycho will of course recognize Dorsia as the ultra-exclusive haunt of Patrick Bateman. And while some of the locations visited in the movie are real (check out this blog’s slightly NSFW tour of Patrick Bateman’s New York), Dorsia is not. The entire Yelp page (which lists Dorsia as closed) is full of references to the movie and inside jokes about how difficult it is to get a reservation. Some of the lower-rated reviews even touch on the fact that “nobody goes here anymore” and recommend Texarkana, another fake restaurant from the movie with a very real Yelp profile.

“The line for the Lazy River was crazy packed”

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Do you remember which classic cop comedy each quote came from? Let’s find out.

Take the Quiz: The Naked Gun, Dragnet, or Super Troopers?

While efforts are continually made to stop poachers of endangered species, the reality is that many of these hunters are desperate people. They can make a fortune if they get their hands on an animal with a high value on the black market. A more effective approach might be to curtail the demand for these rare animal parts, but unfortunately, that hasn’t been as easy as it sounds.

The Rhino and Lion Nature Reserve in Krugersdorp (South Africa) has taken a new approach to putting an end to the demand for rhino horns. The park started applying a parasite poison to protect their rhinos from bugs—and the treatment has had some unintended effects that should make horn smuggling and use a little more difficult.

Anyone who obtains a rhino horn from the reserve has to deal with a substance that causes serious headaches and convulsions when used as a medical remedy. According to Tim Wall at Discovery.com, “The mixture also contains a dye that makes the horns glow neon pink in an airport scanner, even when ground into powder.”

[Image courtesy of Topato's Flickr stream.]

While Geocities is now the target of frequent jokes about how primitive and ridiculous its pages now seem,Geocities was an enormous success at the time—popular enough to fetch more than $3.5 billion when it was purchased by Yahoo! in 1999.

It must have really stung the screaming search engine when they ultimately turned off its United States Geocities operation just 10 years later. Additionally, the shutdown threatened to forever wipe away millions of pages created by Geocities users throughout the years.

Thankfully, a group called The Archive Team (site contains some NSFW langauage) was determined to prevent that from happening. They stepped in just before the shutdown occurred in 2009 to make a full backup of all content. In total, the cache of information took up 650 Gigabytes of space – all of which was offered up for public consumption in the form of a bittorrent file.

Check out the website of The Deleted City to find out more about this preservation project.

After you do that, I’d love to hear about your old Geocities page. What was the topic of the page? What did it look like? Please spare no embarrassing details.

(Via The Awesomer)

This is why we love you, Internet! My post on odd foods eaten in Japan that I published earlier this week led me to these gorgeous photos of artworks created in Japanese rice fields. Scroll down to see their take on the Mona Lisa, plus some close ups so you can see how the images are actually created.

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Each week Miss Kathleen provides links to a variety of stories about libraries, authors, and books. If there’s something noteworthy going on in your local library, leave us a comment!

Product placement abounds in movies and television these days. Ever wonder what it would be like in books? Here are some possible titles. Add your own in the comments!
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One artist’s forte is working with cut paper, and she is often inspired by classic children’s books (and who wouldn’t be?). Check out her gorgeous work. (Thanks for the tip, Sara!)
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Happy Banned Books Week! But is banning books still a hot topic? The Annoyed Librarian is playing devil’s advocate by declaring a new name for the week: “Librarians Trying to Make Themselves Feel Important.” Yeeouch.
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Maybe we should be worried, though—check out this story from Alabama, about a prisoner denied a certain book prison officials deemed “too incendiary.”
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Amazon made a lot of library employees and users happy last week when they announced library lending for the Kindle. Finally!
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The New York Times wants to know, what were your three favorite novels as a teenager? I’ll go first! The Vampire Diaries by L.J. Smith (oh yeah!), The Firm by John Grisham, and Flowers in the Attic by V.C. Andrews. I have much better taste now, thank you very much.
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Maurice Sendak has written and illustrated a new book, his first in many, many years. But why do they always have to be so scary? Do you think they are too scary for kids, or should we all just lighten up?
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Seattle’s most beautiful building is a library, yes, but not the one you are thinking of! Take a look.
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If you write for a living, you have to make your last words good ones. No pressure, but here are some great examples.
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Here’s a handy applet that you can use to publish a list of your favorite books. Named after a librarian—how wonderful!
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Say hi in the comments and, as always, email me with all the great library news you discover!

Good news, dog lovers and Potterheads: the dog that played Sirius Black’s animal form in the HP movies is up for adoption. The German Shepherd’s owner is a stuntman who feels he’s traveling too much to take proper care of the dog, whose name is actually Shadowberry, not Padfoot. I’m sure the 10-year-old Berry will have no problems finding an owner to take care of him in his twilight years, but what happened to some of the other famous dogs from movie history?

1. Lassie from seven Lassie films. The first animal actor to play the iconic collie was actually a male dog named Pal. Pal portrayed Lassie in Lassie Come Home, plus six other movies and two television pilots. Though the show was picked up, Pal was ready to retire after 11 years in the industry. His three-year-old son, Lassie Jr., stepped in to pick up the family business. From his retirement in 1954 to his death in 1958, Pal lived with his trainer, Rudd Weatherwax. Years later, Rudd’s son commented on how devastated his father was when his best friend died: “It hit him very hard when Pal died. He buried him in a special place on the ranch and would often visit the grave. Dad would never again watch an MGM Lassie movie. He just couldn’t bear to see Pal. He didn’t want to have to be reminded of just how much he loved that dog.”

2. Brandon from Punky Brewster. As I mentioned last week, Punky’s buddy Brandon was named after then-NBC president Brandon Tartikoff – onscreen, at least. The golden retriever’s real name was Sandy. After Punky, Sandy went on to star in The Watchers with Corey Haim. He was later adopted by a family that just happened to have a little boy who grew up to be a cameraman for TMZ, the Hollywood gossip show. He mentioned it to Soleil Moon Frye, the star of the show, when he ran into her at a book signing. Check it out.

3. Benji from Benji. The dog behind Benji, Higgins, was one busy actor. (more…)

It’s Free-for-all Friday in today’s mentalfloss.com Brain Game. Last Friday was the “State Eight.” Today, its the “State Six.” Good luck!

What specific trait do the names of these six U.S. states (but no others) have in common?

GEORGIA, KANSAS, NEW YORK,
TEXAS, UTAH, VERMONT