UFOs are no longer a fringe subject of interest. Unidentified flying objects—or unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), as they’re officially known—have received serious attention from the U.S. government in recent years. Now, NASA is organizing a task force that will determine how the agency studies such incidents in the future.
Following the announcement of the panel in June, the space agency recently shared who will be serving on it, CNN reports. The 16 members offer expertise in a variety of fields, such as astrobiology, oceanography, planetary science, and data science. David Spergel, the former head of Princeton University’s astrophysics department, will serve as chairman. Scott Kelly, the retired astronaut who spent a year onboard the ISS, is also joining the team.
Over the course of nine months, the group will study unclassified UAP data in the public domain. By examining the unexplained sightings, the panel plans to come up with “a roadmap of potential UAP data analysis by the agency going forward.” Their first report will be published some time in mid-2023.
The new initiative may sound like science fiction, but NASA emphasizes that it’s not an endorsement of alien conspiracy theories. The agency made their position clear during the June announcement, stating, “There is no evidence UAPs are extraterrestrial in origin.” NASA has numerous incentives for studying UAPs beyond discovering life beyond Earth, including keeping U.S. airspace secure.
This new effort is distinct from the Pentagon’s recent inquiry into unidentified aerial phenomena. Like NASA, the Pentagon has also avoided pinning such sightings on non-terrestrial origins, but as one official put it, they’re willing to “go wherever the data takes us.”
The woman delivered her story anonymously in a news conference with Gloria Allred, the celebrity lawyer. The New York Times could not confirm the account.
Novelist Stephen King has contributed a number of villains to our shared (and scared) public consciousness, from the rabies-infected Cujo to the demonic Randall Flagg of The StandandThe Dark Tower fame. But King’s greatest achievement in terror is likely Pennywise, the sadistic clown from his mammoth 1986 opusIt.
Pennywise is not, strictly speaking, the villain of It. The clown is merely one guise the malevolent creature takes on to terrorize the children of Derry, Maine, who believe they’ve vanquished him only to see him return 27 years later. But Pennywise has nonetheless seeped into popular culture, stoking a widespread fear of clowns while living his best life beyond King’s pages in a cult classic 1990 miniseries as well as two big-budget features. For more on Pennywise, look no further.
Coulrophobia, or the fear of clowns, had been around long before King began writing It in the early 1980s. Why are clowns perceived as scary outsiders? Some historians point to the role of the court jester, who could evade punishment from the royal courts and was therefore perceived as being exempt from regular social standards. On the outskirts of normalcy, it was no great leap to consider clowns had a malevolent streak.
While there are benevolent clowns like Ronald McDonald, there was also John Wayne Gacy, the notorious ‘70s serial killer who worked as a clown for birthday parties. In 1912, clown/con artist Charles Conway strangled a roommate in Chicago. He was convicted of her murder, but then escaped a prison farm. In short, clowns have been scaring people for a long time.
For It, King wanted to devise a villain who could take the shape of several indelible monsters of the 20th century. “I thought to myself, ‘I’ll get [as many] of the monsters together as I possibly can; I’ll get the Vampire, I’ll get the Werewolf, and I’ll even get the Mummy,’” King said in 2013. “But then I thought to myself, ‘There ought to be one binding, horrible, nasty, gross, creature kind of thing that you don’t want to see, [and] it makes you scream just to see it.’ So I thought to myself, ‘What scares children more than anything else in the world?’ And the answer was ‘clowns.’”
In the dense narrative of It, Pennywise seems to embody some of the most vicious evil in the universe. His counterpart is Maturin, a benevolent turtle that Losers’ Club member Bill Denbrough meets while traveling in the “Macroverse,” where Pennywise supposedly came from. Maturin advises Bill on how best to challenge Pennywise. None of the screen adaptations have incorporated the turtle, though 2019’s It Chapter Two does name a hallucinogenic root Marturin, which helps Bill achieve some clarity on defeating the evil clown.
Like most of King’s books, It was optioned for an adaptation. Originally, it was due to be directed byNight of the Living Dead director George A. Romero, with whom King had collaborated on 1982’s anthology movie Creepshow. But Romero flinched at the four-hour limit set by ABC for a limited series adaptation—he wanted closer to eight hours—and left the project. He wound up being replaced by director Tommy Lee Wallace (Halloween III: Season of the Witch), who set about casting Pennywise.
Actors Roddy McDowall and Malcolm McDowell, along with musician Alice Cooper, were considered for the role, which ultimately went to Tim Curry based on his scenery-chewing performance in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. (McDowall, oddly enough, had already starred in a horror movie titled It!, about a vengeful golem on the loose in a museum. The movie was released in 1967.)
Thanks to his outsized performance, Curry may have done as much for Pennywise’s reputation as King. The actor, who has rarely spoken of It in the intervening years, told Fangoria in 1990 that he believed Pennywise was a master of psychological torture. “Pennywise turns out not to be that physical, actually—it’s mostly mental cruelty,” he said. “What’s fun about him is that a clown is traditionally a very cozy, comforting kind of cheery image, and Pennywise is none of these things. I think of him all the time as a smile gone bad—that’s my image for him.”
Reflecting on his time a Pennywise in 2017, Curry said that he managed to scare Tony Dakota, the child who played the ill-fated Georgie Denbrough. “There’s the classic scene where little Georgie floats his paper boat down the gutter and puts his hand down to try and get it back, and is grabbed by Pennywise, who says: ‘Down here we float,’” Curry recalled. “The boy playing Georgie yanked his hand away and said, ‘You’re scaring me!’ I said, ‘I’m sorry, I’m supposed to.’”
Despite being vanquished at the conclusion of It, King has trotted out Pennywise in other titles. The most notable is in his 1987 novel The Tommyknockers, where a character travels through Derry and believes he sees a clown lurking in a storm drain. In Dreamcatcher (2001), another character spots a spray-painted “Pennywise Lives” across a water tower in Derry. King has made allusions to the events and characters of It in other books, but these two appear to hint that Pennywise may not be completely done eating children.
It was inevitable that It would become a Hollywood franchise. Director Cary Joji Fukunaga joined the proect in 2012, with Will Poulter (Midsommar) filling the clown’s red shoes. That idea sank when Fukunaga left the project in 2015. When director Andy Muschietti brought the first of a two-part adaptation to screens in 2017, actor Bill Skarsgård portrayed Pennywise.
“I was very, very intrigued by the prospect of working with Will,” Muschietti told Deadline in 2017. “I always thought that he would be an amazing Pennywise. We talked a little bit about it, the idea of making the movie even though that Cary wasn’t there. Will basically expressed a feeling that he had slowly disengaged from playing that character, that was so dark and terrifying. It was a personal decision I respected, but I was eager and willing to find my own Pennywise and that’s what we did.”
Tim Curry and Bill Skarsgård are widely believed to be the only two actors who have played Pennywise for the screen, but the villainous clown has been portrayed by a third person. In 1998, a production was made for television in India. Titled Woh, it starred M. M. Faruqui (a.k.a. Lilliput) as the clown. Writer-director duo Ankush Mohla and Glen Baretto had actually never read King’s novel: Mohla was just intrigued by the synopsis on the book’s dust jacket. The setting was moved from Maine to the Indian town of Panchgani; Pennywise was not quite the sum of all evil, but instead a man who was taunted for being too short.
Incredibly, the production ran for 52 episodes. Mohla and Baretto took liberties with the narrative: Georgie meets his demise in a swimming pool, not a sewer.
Gacy, who was brought to trial for a series of more than 30 brutal murders in early 1980 and garnered headlines for his stint as party clown, was executed via lethal injection in 2018. Prior to his demise, he passed the time in prison by painting. Among his works: a portrait of Pennywise.
Proving that the maniacal jester has staying power, HBO Max has plans to revive Pennywise for an ongoing series. In March 2022, the streamer announced plans for a prequel show titled Welcome to Derry set in the It universe that explores how the clown terrorized the Maine town prior to the events depicted in It. Andy Muschietti, director of the It movies, will produce the show alongside wife Barbara Muschietti. Perhaps this time there will be a turtle.
Recent research proves that cats can understand humans and do know their own names, even if they sometimes choose to not respond.
Kelly Bowden/Getty ImagesA series of experiments on 16 domesticated felines found that cats can understand humans and are able to recognize their owner’s voice.
If you’ve ever felt like your cat was intentionally ignoring you, you’re not paranoid. In fact, a new study shows that they are fully aware that you’re talking to them — they just sometimes choose not to respond.
As the Telegraph reports, a series of experiments on 16 cats belonging to veterinary students in France studied the cats’ reactions to different audio recordings played through a speaker.
The four-part recordings featured each cat’s owner saying its name and speaking to it affectionately, the owner speaking to another human, a stranger speaking to the cat affectionately, and the stranger speaking to another human.
Scientists from the Université Paris Nanterre observed the cats through video cameras, looking for various telltale signals that would indicate the cat’s attention had been grabbed — generally, signs like blinking, twitching their tail, purring, or their head or ears moving.
What they found was that the cats did not respond to strangers or to the voice their owners used while speaking to other humans.
But when their owners’ voices called their names or directed speech at them, the cats displayed behaviors that lined up with those telltale signs of recognition: Their ears twitched and rotated towards the source of the sound, they moved around more, and their eyes dilated.
“Our results suggest that cats can discriminate speech specifically addressed to them from speech addressed to adult humans,” the researchers wrote in their study, published in the journal Animal Cognition. “Interestingly, this pattern of discrimination was found only when sentences were uttered by the cats’ owners.”
Contrary to the popular belief that cats are independent and ungrateful, they said, the animals “are in fact very well capable of creating and fostering attachment bonds with humans, as uncovered by recent research.” This revelation, the researchers said, “brings a new dimension to previous considerations of this reciprocal relationship.”
Ana Rocio Garcia Franco/Getty ImagesPrevious research has also shown that cats prefer cuddling with their owners to food, and that cats miss their owners when separated for long periods of time.
Per Science Alert, the cats responded best when their owners spoke to them in higher-pitched, short utterances — or, in other words, “pet talk.”
Fascinatingly, the cats only responded when it was their owner’s voice gushing over their pet’s toe beans, for instance, or calling them a cute little fluff ball. When a stranger’s voice made similar remarks in the same tone of voice, the cats showed no signs of affection.
They also seemed unaffected when the audio recordings played speech that clearly was directed toward other humans.
This lines up with past research that showed dogs also prefer “pet talk,” responding to it with more attention and affection than they did to the lower-register speech typically used in human-to-human conversation.
Cats, however, seem only to decipher the verbal nuances of their owners, suggesting that the closeness of a cat-human relationship may be based more on experience rather than some innate preference for “pet talk.”
Austin HarveyA picture of the author’s cat, Comet.
The new study also focused on cats that primarily lived indoors with one owner, mostly in studio apartments. The question remains whether more social cats — such as those in cat cafés, for example — would be more welcoming of strangers’ voices.
As IFL Science notes, other recent research into human-cat companionship offers further evidence that the allegedly cold creatures may indeed be more loving than commonly thought.
Research has shown that cats actually prefer cuddling with their owners to food, and another study found that cats miss their owners when separated for long periods of time.
Researchers from the new study also noted that pet cats regularly modify their own vocalizations when addressing their owners and purr at a higher pitch than feral cats. Supposedly, this higher vocalization garners more sympathetic reactions from pet owners, so cats keep on doing it.
So while your fuzzy friend may not seem like they’re giving you the time of day, they’re not as indifferent as you might think.
In August 1628, a hulking warship called the Vasa (named for Sweden’s royal family) began its highly anticipated maiden voyage from Stockholm. To say it didn’t go well would be the understatement of the 17th century: King Gustav II Adolf had wanted the vessel to be massive at an unprecedented scale, and builders never quite landed on the correct proportions for such a task. The future crown jewel of the Swedish navy sank before it even hit the one-mile mark.
Its sister ship, Äpplet (“the apple”), had better luck. Taking notes from his recent failure, master shipbuilder Hein Jakobsson tweaked the shape of the hull and widened the whole ship to better accommodate its bulk. Overall, its size wasn’t exactly a selling point: As Sweden’s Vrak – Museum of Wrecks explains, huge vessels required costlier upkeep and were also harder to sail than their smaller counterparts; thus, Äpplet likely spent a considerable portion of its naval career just sitting around. But it did at least stay afloat well enough to participate in the Thirty Years’ War and remain in service until 1658. After that, it’s believed that the ship was intentionally sunk to help create underwater spike strips, forming a barricade in the waters off the coast of Vaxholm that could damage enemy vessels.
The precise location of Äpplet’s final resting place has been a mystery for the last few centuries. So in one respect, the Vasa made out slightly better than its intrepid younger sibling: The wreck was unearthed back in the 1950s and is now on display in its very own, very popular museum.
The ‘Vasa’ at the Vasa Museum in Stockholm. / Macduff Everton/GettyImages
But now, at long last, Äpplet’s remains have been found, too. The discovery was made by maritime archaeologists from Vrak – Museum of Wrecks as part of Stockholm University’s “The Forgotten Fleet” program—an initiative that maps and studies ships from Swedish naval history. The researchers first spotted Äpplet’s then-unidentified wreck in December 2021 after teaming up with the Swedish navy to survey a strait off Vaxholm.
“Our pulses spiked when we saw how similar the wreck was to Vasa,” Vrak maritime archaeologist Jim Hansson said in a press release. “Both the construction and the powerful dimensions seemed very familiar. The hope of finding one of Vasa’s sister ships was sparked within us.”
Then, earlier this year, they tested some timber taken from the wreck and learned that certain oak samples hailed from the same area (and roughly the same time period) that the Vasa’s wood had come from. With that detail—and other archival evidence and design similarities—the team concluded that the anonymous Vaxholm shipwreck was, in fact, Äpplet.
In order to preserve the wreck, there are currently no plans to remove it from its grave. Instead, archaeologists will study digital data collected underwater. A key focus of the research is to pinpoint exactly how Äpplet differed from its ill-fated predecessor.
“This will help us understand how the large warships evolved, from the unstable Vasa to seaworthy behemoths that could control the Baltic Sea—a decisive factor in Sweden’s emergence as a great power in the 1600s,” maritime archaeologist Patrik Höglund explained in the press release.
Anyone who goes to the trouble of carving a pumpkin likely does so with the intention of displaying it on a front stoop or in some other prominent spot.
But the jack-o’-lanterns in the images below are hidden inside the house—one in the kitchen and another in the bedroom—and it’s up to you to draw them out. After you’ve ID’d the two grinning gourds (or given up), scroll on to reveal the answers.
Would you eat these baked goods? / Online Mortgage Advisor
Some of these ghosts are not excited about their new roommates. / Online Mortgage Advisor
The puzzles were created by Online Mortgage Advisor, a UK-based service that matches people with mortgage brokers. It doesn’t take a paranormal investigator to tell you that this house is haunted, as it’s very clearly overrun with ghosts—whose emotions regarding new (living) residents appear to run the gamut from elated to distraught.
Were the specters responsible for welcoming guests with the fresh pies and other pastries suspended in the kitchen, or did the chef’s hat–clad rats do the bulk of the baking? Does this scene take place in the Ratatouille universe? Are the ghosts making everything float, or does the house itself possess anti-gravitational powers? Unfortunately, the answer key doesn’t address these questions, so you’ll just have to accept the existence of unexplained phenomena in the world.
The Democratic nominee’s performance in Pennsylvania thrust questions of health to the center of a pivotal Senate race, adding uncertainty to the contest and worrying some in his party.
You can end the month of October with a bang and save some money along the way, thanks to Wayfair’s Way Day shopping event. Ahead of Black Friday in November, the retailer has slashed prices on all sorts of household goods, such as kitchen and dining furniture, living room seating, bathroom upgrades, and more. In fact, you can save up to a whopping 80 percent on household essentials across the site.
The sale goes from Wednesday, October 26 through the end of Thursday, October 27. There are only two shopping days to save big with deals on tabletop and cookware items, as well as bedroom furniture (like nightstands and headboards), small appliances (including coffee makers and mixers), and other top-rated finds. There’s even a closeout deals section where you can find rock-bottom prices on all kinds of products, plus open-box deep discounts.
Tacos de canasta (or “basket tacos”) were not the first tacos ever made, but their origin is inextricably linked with the history of that culinary classic.
The word taco originally meant “plug” or “wad” in Spanish, and it was used by miners to describe the gunpowder-filled parcels they would stuff into rock faces to excavate precious ores.
Silver was Mexico’s top export for most of the 19th century, and the workers who mined it needed quick, satisfying meals they could eat on the job. A hearty stewed filling—or guisado—tucked into a tortilla ticked these boxes. It’s easy to see why these snacks reminded miners of their own explosive tacos—especially if they had a spicy kick to them. Instead of paper wrapped around gunpowder, these edible tacos consisted of tortillas wrapped around savory fillings.
Silver Miners / Three Lions/GettyImages
The edible tacos had to travel well, so miners stacked them and wrapped them tightly with napkins to keep them warm. And that simple but effective transportation method may well have contributed to the street food revolution that Mexico saw in the 20th century.
In the latest episode of Food History, host Justin Dodd connects those early “miner’s tacos” to the “basket tacos” that can be found on Mexico City street corners today.
Tacos de canasta being served / CC 4.0 Wikimedia Commons (Superjorch)
It’s a story that includes an innovative entrepreneur, massive intra-national immigration, and more than a few ladles full of hot fat.
To stay up-to-date with new episodes of Food History, subscribe to our YouTube channel here.
Ask a hundred people their favorite Christmas song and you could potentially hear 100 different answers, as there are literally thousands of tunes to choose from. Halloween, on the other hand, has little more than “Monster Mash” and “Thriller.”
It seems odd when you compare the two holidays in other ways: Just like Christmas, there’s no shortage of Halloween-themed movies, candies, or costumes. Revelers get just as overexcited for Halloween as they do Christmas; they also tend to overeat just as much, and decorate their yards just as gaudily for both holidays. Yet there’s not a vast catalog of Halloween music.
Halloween-themed playlists often go desperately off-topic really quickly, as if they’re based on keywords rather than the songs themselves: “Ghost Town” by The Specials, for example, is about unemployment, not ghosts, and Shakira’s “She-Wolf” is about being horny, not turning into a werewolf. So just where did the spookiest holiday go astray, musically speaking?
As NPR music writer Stephen Thompson wrote in 2014, while both Halloween and Christmas are commercially-driven holidays, Christmas is part of a whole “season,” whereas Halloween is a single event. “I don’t think of [the] weeks [leading up to Halloween] as ‘Halloween season,’” Thompson said. “And I don’t think of my trips to the grocery store and various online retailers to be part of ‘Halloween shopping.’ There’s precious little Halloween music for the same reason there’s precious little Super Bowl music; neither marks a major holiday so much as an event.”
As a result, Thompson points out that the Halloween-specific music that does exist—including “Do They Know It’s Hallowe’en?,” a spooky remake of Band-Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?,” and Ryan Gosling and Zach Shields’s formation of Dead Man’s Bones for a single, self-titled album of Halloween music in 2009—is equally fleeting. While recording a Christmas song or album has become a rite of passage for hundreds of well-known musicians (Mariah Carey is currently getting flak for trying to trademark the name “The Queen of Christmas”), the lack of Halloween music that exists makes the idea of recording an entire album a major undertaking (as covers of classic holiday tunes are largely out of the question).
The darker connotations of the holiday also don’t help. Halloween has changed a lot over the years—much more so than Christmas. While the holiday’s origins go back thousands of years to the Celtic festival known as Samhain, a lot of Halloween’s more prominent iconography and traditions, such as trick or treating, are significantly more recent developments, as divination rituals have given way to costume parades.
While Christmas isn’t a universally celebrated holiday, its existence as a holiday doesn’t tend to offend a lot of people—something that can’t be said of Halloween. Some Christian groups are extremely opposed to people frivolously enjoying what they see as a celebration of evil forces—a factor that could be extremely detrimental to would-be record sales.
Jack Chick, the fundamentalist cartoonist whose tiny comic books (known as Chick tracts) were distributed to millions of people each year, was a prominent anti-Halloween activist who once stated: “Satan loves Halloween because it glamorizes the powers of darkness, drawing little kids into his camp.” While this is hardly a mainstream view, there has been enough suspicion around Halloween over the years to potentially put off some artists and companies from investing too much time in finding creative ways to sing about ghosts, goblins, and other supernatural villains.
When the Great American Songbook was established in the first half of the 20th century, radio very much tended toward the conservative side, so Christmas is the only holiday that made it into the codified canon of standards.
Bobby “Boris” Pickett’s “Monster Mash” is undoubtedly king of what few Halloween songs there are. The song, which was first recorded in 1962, topped the Billboard charts upon its release and has risen from the dead to reclaim its place on the charts several times over the years as October 31 approaches. While the song never explicitly mentions Halloween, and was originally released in August, Pickett’s decision to impersonate 1940s horror icons Boris Karloff and (briefly) Peter Lorre make it a cheerful celebration of horror archetypes. Best of all, it’s catchy, silly, and fun—and not scary in the slightest.
Probably the greatest contender for the throne that has long been occupied by “Monster Mash” is “This Is Halloween,” from The Nightmare Before Christmas. It is an excellent song that, for those among us without the vocal talents of the great Danny Elfman, is quite hard to sing in its entirety—it goes both very high and very low and requires a lot more flair to pull off than an amateur rendition of “Jingle Bells.” Perhaps the answer is to adopt the sing-along-ability of Christmas classics by simply replacing the words.
In 2020, Maria Asimopoulos summed up the simplest reason for the lack of Halloween music for The Daily Fandom by concluding, “Christmas is a holiday associated with happiness and joy. At the same time, Halloween embodies terror and death, so it makes sense why Ariana Grande isn’t jumping at the chance to darken her brand of pop with the grim reaper.”
Physicist Stephen Hawking was known for many things. But those who knew him well knew had had a wicked sense of humor. Despite his lifelong battle with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS, also called Lou Gerig’s Disease) which left him paralyzed, he was still a fan of practical jokes.
Stephen Hawking had wicked sense of humor
While he used technology for just about every function, including speaking, his humor managed to shine through. For example, according to Biography.com (cited below):
“Prior to the February 2015 Academy Awards, for which his biopic The Theory of Everything had garnered numerous nominations, Hawking said he was happy to let leading man Eddie Redmayne use his signature computerized voice box for the film. ‘Unfortunately,’ he added, ‘Eddie did not inherit my good looks.’”
Hawking’s practical joke
Hawking was also a fan of practical jokes. After the physicist died in March 2018, BBC science correspondent Pallab Ghosh told a story of a joke he played at Cambridge University in 2004. It’s one that probably stopped a few hearts – but not his own.
“Seeking to adjust his lighting, the camera operator yanked a cable from a socket, at which point an alarm sounded and Hawking slumped forward as if unplugged from his life support. The anxious visitors rushed over to find Hawking very much alive and giddy at his joke – the alarm was simply over the office computer losing its power supply.”
That’s right, he pretended to fake his own death!
We’re sure more than a few people relived that joke in their heads afterward!
Hawking often called his sense of humor the secret to surviving such a terrible disease for so long. He was one of the longest-living ALS sufferers, diagnosed at the young age of 21.
We all love our cats. They might be grumpy creatures that would knock things over around the house, nestle and curl up on our laps when we’re down, and sometimes even when we’re busy!
We like to think they would always be there for us since they have nine lives, right? But, sadly, this is not the case.
As much as we want our feline companions’ nine lives to be true, it is a myth. Truly heartbreaking, we know.
This begs the question, where did this myth start? Let’s break it down, and maybe we can find solace in the facts.
The legend of the cat’s nine lives.
No one knows who started the myth of the nine lives of cats, and there are no actual historical recordings of when and where it was first created either.
Such is the trouble with oral history.
What is known, though, is that the first mention of the cat’s nine lives is in an English proverb that states: “A cat has nine lives. For three, he plays; for three, he strays; for the last three, he stays.”
The proverb’s origins might remain a mystery, but we have an estimated timeline at the very least.
In one of William Shakespeare‘s most famous plays, Romeo and Juliet, he wrote: “Good king of cats, nothing but one of your nine lives.”
The bard wrote the tragedy in the 16th century, making the myth of a cat’s nine lives predate the 1500s.
Why do cats have nine lives?
Our feline friends are known to be very agile animals; they’re fiercely independent and intelligent creatures.
They can fall from high elevations and still land on their feet. There’s even a documented case in New York where a cat fell from a 32-story building and survived, suffering only minor injuries.
Feats like this are possibly where the idea of cats having nine lives came from. This is all thanks to the cat’s fantastic anatomy, of course.
Like most feline species, cats evolved from living in trees.
The years of evolution before they became domesticated ensured that they adapted to the height from where their species started living.
Cats have a “righting reflex” where they can twist their bodies as they fall, ensuring that they securely land on their feet.
Their large body surface area reduces the force of the fall.
At the same time, the impressive flexibility of their ligaments and bones helps them sustain as minimal injury from the impact as possible.
So, you can say that a cat’s nine lives come from millions of years of evolution.
Why is it specifically nine lives?
We always asked why and how cats have nine lives but have you ever thought why an odd number like nine exactly? Let’s find out.
Numerology states that the number nine is very significant because of its composition of three groups of three.
In religious cultures like Islam, Greek, and Roman Catholic, the number nine is symbolic and has mystical properties.
For example, in Islam, the significance of the number nine is much like in the Indian thought of Sanatana Dharma, which states, “nine openings for man as also the nine months of gestation period of birth.”
In Greece, the number nine has been referred to as the trinity of trinities, similar to numerology’s composition.
What’s more fascinating, though, is in different cultures, the myth of the cat’s nine lives has different variations, specifically with their number of lives.
Some regions around Spain believe that cats only have seven lives, while in other Arabic and Turkish legends, cats have six lives.
All this fascination with cats goes way back about 12,000 years ago.
The ancient Egyptians believed these animals were sacred and divine beings with supernatural powers.
People would often dedicate mummified cats at the sanctuary of the cat goddess Bastet as offerings.
To sum it all up, no, cats don’t have nine lives, no matter how much we would want them to.
Our feline compatriots tend to cheat death though that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be taking extra care of them, no matter how snobbish they can sometimes be.
They might also be godlike creatures worshipped throughout history, and that’s why they like lording themselves around our house like they own the place!
Is there a bear sense of beauty? How do we explain wild bears who are seen at scenic spots staring off into the mountains, trees, forests, and river vistas? We may never understand this behavior. But if we use our own behavior as a reference point (which humans so often do), it may be that bears – just like us – enjoy a really good view.
Do bears have a sense of beauty?
Let’s start with one thing we do know – bears are smart. Their brains are difficult for us to understand because they’re not organized in a familiar way, but their size and complexity indicate that bears have a capacity for intelligence that was previously unknown to most humans.
Now, not every bear will share the same behavior, especially when it comes to something subjective, like beauty. But the fact that some bears seem to be able to scout out a good view for the day is fascinating. Some also build their dens near scenic points (and not just the ones that humans and their picnic baskets frequent). You know what they say about real estate – location, location, location.
So, does a bear staring into the beauty of the mountains mean there’s a bear sense of beauty though?
Sharing beauty with bears
The staring behavior was first noticed by people studying bears in the wild. After all, a bear showing up at a scenic parking lot in the Smokies is not going to arouse the same level of interest – just terror.
Canadian artist Maureen Enns and rancher Charles Russell have long been advocates of living alongside bears. They’ve also discussed the penchant for beauty they’ve witnessed from the creatures. They aren’t scientists, but they have gotten up close and personal with grizzlies and found them to be quite serene when they’re not threatened. Enns was one of the first people to publicly suggest that bears appreciate beauty. This was after seeing them gaze at a stunning view one day.
Since then, others have remarked on similar behavior. But investigating the bear’s sense of beauty doesn’t appear to be on any major research agendas right now.
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At the 2001 licensing show at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in New York City, among the wandering Pokémon andSesame Streetcharacters, something of an anomaly lurked, right in plain sight. KISS bassist Gene Simmons was there to plug the latest in a long line of authorized and licensed merchandise from the band. Not a toy, not a set of bedsheets, but the first-ever fully endorsed coffin.
The waterproof, deceased human storage unit was officially dubbed the KISS Kasket. According to Simmons, it could double as a drink cooler until the owner departed from this mortal plane.
“It serves two purposes,” Simmons said. “You can have your last ride with your favorite band. But while you’re living, you can have a cold one.”
It’s no stretch to state KISS may be the most commoditized rock band in the history of music. Not even The Beatles and their myriad of box sets can compete with the sheer tonnage of KISS merchandise out there, much of it using their on-stage iconography to great effect.
Gene Simmons (L) and Tommy Thayer (R) rock out. / Francesco Prandoni/GettyImages
It’s quite a feat when you realize the band could barely give their early albums away. Formed in 1973, KISS was originally comprised of lead singer Paul Stanley, bassist Simmons, guitarist Ace Frehley, and drummer Peter Criss. (Simmons and Stanley had tried forming earlier groups like Wicked Lester to no apparent effect.) Their first three albums (Kiss, Hotter Than Hell, Dressed to Kill) were underwhelming, failing to crack the top of the sales charts.
The problem was that KISS was first and foremost a live experience. Clad in kabuki-style make-up and outfits considered outlandish even by rock standards, the band literally breathed fire and spat stage blood; Criss rode a harness 10 feet in the air during drum solos. The energy in concert was hard to replicate on a studio album, which is why Neil Bogart, CEO of the band’s label Casablanca Records, had the idea to record a live album, complete with screaming fans and banter between songs.
It worked. Recorded and released in 1975, KISS Alive! spent 110 weeks on the Billboard chart, ultimately selling over 9 million copies. The KISS Army, as fans were known, enlisted in massive numbers. And thanks to their distinctive comic book look, KISS seized the opportunity to market more than just records.
A Marvel comic—printed with a few drops of their blood—was a smash success. So were the KISS make-up kits, toys, and apparel. In the ‘70s, KISS’s licensing program was second only to Star Wars. At one point, Simmons figured KISS merchandise had brought in about $500 million.
Not all of the band’s ideas worked. A 1978 made-for-television movie, KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park, was a critical flop. A 1999 feature film, Detroit Rock City, didn’t fare much better. But KISS die-hards could always be relied upon to scoop up whatever licensing efforts the band pursued.
Then someone had the idea to pursue a new KISS demographic: dead people.
Simmons debuted the coffin at the Licensing 2001 International trade show in New York City. And while he was forever the KISS salesman, even Simmons agreed this was a step beyond. “The idea was a little bit morbid,” he told MTV in 2001. “Obviously, caskets are all about death, and they’re not reusable. It’s a no-deposit, no-return policy. So I came up with the bright notion that if death was so awful, why not celebrate life? In other words, why not have a daily use for the caskets? Why not watch your favorite ball game on TV, invite your friends over and open the Kasket to get a drink?”
Gene Simmons beckons fans to spend the afterlife with KISS. / KMazur/GettyImages
The KISS Kasket, with a suggested price of $4700, launched in 2001 via the band’s official website. “The KISS Kasket is completely covered with a specially laminated photomural that features the KISS logo and the images of the band members,” the ad copy read. “The words ‘KISS Forever’ are imprinted on the side of the casket. In addition, KISS Kasket can also be used as a Giant KISS Cooler, enabling fans and their friends to enjoy ice-cold sodas and beer served directly from the ice-filled, completely waterproof KISS Kasket. The KISS Kasket is autographed and signed.” (Unsigned, the coffin ran between $3300 to $3900.)
Naturally, the KISS Kasket was targeted at those looking for the ultimate novelty item for their collections, though it appeared to be perfectly suitable for submerging in dirt. Nor were “fun” coffins unheard of: A casket for golfers emblazoned with the slogan “Fairway to Heaven” sold 800 units nationally as of 2001. Whitelight, maker of the KISS coffin, also made a box for NASCAR fans. Another casket was designed to resemble the interior of a Cadillac. KISS even issued an urn for those preferring cremation.
But did anyone actually buy a KISS Kasket? Sort of. In 2004, onetime Pantera co-founder “Dimebag” Darrell Abbott was murdered by a disturbed fan during a show in Columbus, Ohio. A devout KISS fan, Abbott had requested in his will that he be buried in a KISS Kasket. (Pantera had once opened for KISS in 1997.) Simmons donated the prototype to Abbott’s family.
In 2018, Abbott’s brother, musician Vinnie Paul Abbott, died at age of 54 of natural causes. At the family’s request, he was also laid to rest in a KISS Kasket, once again donated by Simmons and Paul Stanley. By this point, the coffin was being made by Nashville Casket Sales, who had picked up the license. (Another company, Eternal Image, had produced two KISS coffins in 2011.)
Ace Frehley was asked about the Vinnie Paul funeral on The Cassius Morris Show in 2020. After admitting the KISS Kasket was a product that had made him cringe a bit, Frehley said the service felt slightly odd. “Vinnie Paul was buried in a KISS coffin, and I had to make a little speech outside at the cemetery, and it was weird,” he said. “Vinnie was inside this box and my face was on it.”
Not every decedent looking for the KISS experience opts for the fully licensed version. In 2017, KISS fan Kenny Miller of Newfoundland asked to be buried in a KISS-themed coffin, which was customized with a KISS Army logo and flames on the exterior. Miller also received a call from Simmons, as per one of his final wishes.
Nashville Casket Sales recently produced aGhostbusters casket designed to resemble the Ecto-1, complete with the Ghostbusters logo and the Eco-1 license plate. Inside, the visages of Bill Murray, Harold Ramis, Dan Aykroyd, and Ernie Hudson smile down upon the occupant for eternity. Made to promote Ghostbusters: Afterlife, it’s still available on eBay for $5000.
They still offer the KISS Kasket too, which is said to be made from 20-gauge steel with a “bad ass” interior adorned in black velvet.
Christmas is coming up faster than you may think, and each year that passes, it feels harder and harder to pick out presents for folks on your list. When everyone’s already got their hands on the next big thing, then what do you do?
Luckily, there are plenty of neat tech products on the market. Available at a variety of price points, these are unique and thoughtful items that your friends and family may not have stumbled upon themselves. From the newest Apple accessory to gaming must-haves and beyond, here are 12 of the best tech gifts this year.
Apple Watch Ultra / Apple / Amazon
The Apple Watch Ultra has everything you love about the original series, but is built to serve those who are harder on their equipment. Great for athletes, first responders, or others who work extended shift times, the Ultra model has a battery lasting up to 36 hours, or up to 60 hours on low-power mode. Additionally, the corrosion-resistant watch face is made with a titanium casing and features more accessible buttons, plus it offers up to 100 meters worth of water resistance.
Several apps have been upgraded as well, including the GPS, compass, and workout app, which now features “advanced metrics” like Heart Rate Zones and Running Form. Every single model has the option to add on cellular service, too. Anyone for a run through the woods?
Holy Stone Foldable GPS Drone / Holy Stone / Amazon
There’s really nobody on earth that couldn’t have fun with a drone. Featuring a 4K camera built with image stabilization, this gadget offers everyone from professional videographers to curious kids the chance to shoot footage from the sky. Your giftee will be able to check out the neighborhood from new angles, up to 3000 feet high!
The drone comes with a GPS so that you’ll never lose it, and it returns to you on its own when the battery runs low. Better still, it’s foldable, making it easy to transport to and from wherever you’re looking to explore.
What’s better than an aesthetically pleasing water bottle to cover in all of your favorite stickers? One that also sanitizes itself, for starters. This self-cleaning bottle uses ultraviolet (UV) light to sanitize the water inside and neutralize bacteria on the inner walls—all you have to do is tap the button to start the process, but it activates itself every couple of hours, too. Batteries should last you up to a month, but they’re easily rechargeable with the included MicroUSB cord.
The stainless steel bottle comes in six different colors and two different sizes (17 ounces and 25 ounces, respectively), but each combination is double-walled and insulated to keep your water cold for an entire day (or hot for up to 12 hours, if you’re into that kind of thing).
Official Creality Ender 3D Printer / Creality / Amazon
When it comes to innovative tech, 3D printing really is the future. College students are out here printing prosthetics for kids, scientists are experimenting with artificial organs, and good Samaritans are designing medication aids for Parkinson’s patients. But that is just the tip of the iceberg, because there are tons of fun little projects families can come up with, too.
With a resume function, this 3D printer will never lose a project due to a power outage. The company also offers a lifetime of technical support in case you ever need it.
JBL is rated very highly across the board on Amazon and they offer portable speakers at a variety of price points, depending on what you’re looking for. While this one in particular is on the higher end of things, it’s well worth it for the customizable light display it comes with.
Your gift recipient can control the color of the LED light display with the accompanying app, or let the light show change with the music, then sync several speakers together to really get the party started. Plus, there’s no need to worry about getting rained out or sitting too close to the splash zone, as these speakers are waterproof for up to 3 feet.
For the students or other furious notetakers in your life, this sustainable notebook comes in 14 different cover colors with reusable sheets. Using the specialized pen and companion app, you can upload your notes to any cloud service of your choosing, and then wipe the pages clean to start fresh again.
With 42 pages total across seven different layouts (including a task list, planner, calendar pages, lined sheets, and more), you’ll be able to track whatever you need easily, without wasting trees to do so.
Fulllight Bluetooth Beanie Hat / Fulllight / Amazon
For the outdoorsy types in your life, this beanie is a thoughtful choice. It comes with Bluetooth headphones inside of it, making it a great accessory to have on hand for chilly winter hikes or early morning runs. And the headphones are removable, making the hat easily washable. Another reason to appreciate it? The batteries are good for up to 20 hours of use.
The price on this nifty pen varies quite a bit due to the various materials you can choose from. While a bit expensive for a pen on its own, the basic (available in four different colors) and 18-karat, gold-plated models are available for between $99 to $129, and the engineering behind them make it worth the splurge.
Magnets keep the pen suspended in its cradle, offering a futuristic design that will elevate the desk space of any science nerd. For space lovers specifically, consider upgrading to the Hoverpen with pieces of actual meteorite embedded in the body for a near one-of-a-kind collector’s piece.
Game Boy Color – Atomic Purple / Game Boy / Amazon
The Amazon Renewed store refurbishes previously used technology, like this older generation gaming system. The Atomic Purple Game Boy Color is an incredible call back to earlier consoles and classic video games for those who grew up on it, but it also makes a great vintage gift for newer gamers.
She’s Birdie Personal Safety Alarm / She’s Birdie / Amazon
This keychain doubles as a little alarm system that your gift recipient can carry around wherever they go. If they ever feel unsafe, they just need to remove the top pin to activate a loud siren alarm and a strobe light to both draw attention from passers-by. Silencing the alarm is as simple as replacing the pin, and each set of batteries should last your giftee for about 40 minutes in total.
She’s Birdie is available in five different colorways, and five percent of the profits are donated to organizations supporting women’s safety.
Kodak Mini Shot 3 Retro Portable Instant Camera & Photo Printer / Kodak / Amazon
Talk about an all-in-one! This miniature digital camera allows your giftee to print photos on demand, import them to their phone via Bluetooth, or cancel altogether if the shot wasn’t what they were hoping, rather than wasting the film. Using the Kodak AR App, they can edit all their images—and add fun stickers or other effects—prior to saving or printing anything. Once it’s all set, recipients can print photos from their phones and select a bordered option for that classic Polaroid feel.
This Bluetooth-equipped Rubik’s Cube pairs with an app to help your giftee finally learn how to solve the seemingly never-ending puzzle. The app will show them the orientation of the cube in real-time and tracks their stats as they progress.
It also comes with mini-games, going above and beyond the old fashioned Rubik’s experience. Once your gift recipient has upped their game, they can also opt to connect with other players around the world and compete against them to see who can finish first.
The United States, Japan and South Korea warned on Wednesday that an "unparalleled" scale of response would be warranted if North Korea conducts a seventh nuclear bomb test.
