Tag: gift-for-geeks

7 Weird and Wonderful Facts About the Wizard of Oz Books

The new movie Oz the Great and Powerful opens today in theaters nationwide. The backstory of the wizard is loosely based on the L. Frank Baum book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz . Baum went on to write 14 more books about Oz, because the public kept demanding more. An interesting fact I didn’t know -one of his granddaughters was named after an Oz character!   Baum had a granddaughter named “Ozma,” and his 11th Oz book, The Lost Princess of Oz (published 1917), was dedicated to her shortly after her birth. The story begins with the disappearance of Princess Ozma, the ruler of Oz.    Read more interesting facts about Baumm’s Oz books and see artwork from all of them at Tres Sugar. Link   -via Holy Kaw!

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7 Weird and Wonderful Facts About the Wizard of Oz Books

Circular Beam of Electrons

Beam of electrons moving in a circle, due to the presence of a magnetic field. Purple light is emitted along the electron path, due to the electrons colliding with gas molecules in the bulb. (Photo: Marcin Bialek ) Oh, how I love you guys. In our recent post A Fiery Dance on the Sun , Neatoramanaut PlasmaGryphon kindly took the time to explain to us the physics behind solar flares. In the explanation , there was a link to Wikipedia article on Lorentz force , where I found this fascinating image of a circular beam of electrons in a Teltron tube . Neat, huh? ( Thanks PlasmaGryphon! )

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Circular Beam of Electrons

Bees Can See the Electric Field of Flowers

Flowers are pretty and colorful to you and me, but to a bee, they’re downright electrifying. You see, bees can sense the electric field that surrounds a flower: Dominic Clarke and Heather Whitney from the University of Bristol have shown that bumblebees can sense the electric field that surrounds a flower. They can even learn to distinguish between fields produced by different floral shapes, or use them to work out whether a flower has been recently visited by other bees. Flowers aren’t just visual spectacles and smelly beacons. They’re also electric billboards. Learn how a flower’s electric field is actually also useful for bees as it tells them whether other bees have visited it before. Ed Yong of Not Exactly Rocket Science explains: Link

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Bees Can See the Electric Field of Flowers

The House with a Pop-up Roof

It’s like a giant’s lunchbox! This house, which is named Shadowboxx, is in the San Juan Islands in the state of Washington. Olson Kundig Architects designed the 16 by 20 foot roof over the bathhouse to open and close with the push of a button. Link -via Dornob

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The House with a Pop-up Roof

Office Depot and OfficeMax to Merge

Well, at least they don’t have to change the first part of their names! The Wall Street Journal reported that OfficeMax and Office Depot are merging: OfficeMax Inc. and Office Depot Inc. are in advanced talks to merge, people familiar with the matter said, as the retailers of pens, paper and desks try to fight off tougher competition from rivals like Staples Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. A deal would combine two companies that have been hammered in recent years by weak economic conditions, falling sales and rising online competition. Office Depot’s market value is just $1.3 billion, and OfficeMax’s is about $933 million. Still, the two chains have a substantial retail presence. Office Depot, based in Boca Raton, Fla., has 1,675 stores world-wide, annual sales of some $11.5 billion and about 39,000 employees. OfficeMax, based in Naperville, Ill., has about 900 stores in the U.S. and Mexico, roughly $7 billion in annual sales and approximately 29,000 employees. OfficeMax is scheduled to post its quarterly and annual results Thursday. Link What do you think we should call the new entity?

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Office Depot and OfficeMax to Merge

Medieval Cat Paw Prints

Does your cat walk all over your desk? It’s’ nothing new, cats have been walking all over humans since, like, forever as this photo from Emir O. Filipovic of the University of Sarajevo’s History Department shows. Emir was working on a 15th century manuscript when he ran across this medieval cat paw prints: Link – via The Weasel King

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Medieval Cat Paw Prints

Hotel Het Arresthuis: Jail Turned Into Luxury Hotel

Most hotels have bars, but you’re probably not thinking of these ones on the window. The Hotel Het Arresthuis in the Netherlands was actually a jail that was converted into a luxury hotel. Now this is one jailhouse we don’t mind checking into! Take a look.

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Hotel Het Arresthuis: Jail Turned Into Luxury Hotel

Florida Man: the World’s Worst Superhero

There’s Batman, Spider-Man, Superman, and of course, Florida Man. Florida Man is in the news constantly, with headlines enshrined in a Twitter feed dedicated to “the world’s worst superhero.” Link   -via Metafilter

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Florida Man: the World’s Worst Superhero

Opalized Dinosaur Tooth

Photo: Carl Bento/Australian Museum Surely you’ve seen fossils in museums, but what about this: opalized dinosaur tooth. Opalized fossils occur when silica settled into cracks in the dinosaur bone and then hardened into opal. This one above is a particularly fantastic specimen: an opalized theropod dinosaur tooth from the Australian Museum.

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Opalized Dinosaur Tooth