Weird Universe Archive

April 2013

April 26, 2013

Brendan O’Connell, Wal-Mart Artist

Artists find inspiration in all kinds of unusual places. Brendan O'Connell got inspired by shopping at Wal-Mart and started painting scenes from inside Wal-Mart stores. He's achieved quite a bit of success, to the point that his paintings now fetch up to $40,000. Which means they're not going to be on sale at Wal-Mart anytime soon. However, the company has purchased one of his paintings. [msn.com]

Posted By: Alex - Fri Apr 26, 2013 - Comments (5)
Category: Art, Shopping

April 25, 2013

No water for 25 years

On July 4, 1935, Dr. Walter G. Kendall, 81, drank a glass of water. It was the first glass of water he had drunk in 25 years. He reportedly "suffered no ill effects," and followed it by several cocktails.

In addition to being famous for abstaining from water, Kendall was also a well-known dentist, bicyclist, and horticulturalist. That's him in the pictures below. [image source: here and here]





Posted By: Alex - Thu Apr 25, 2013 - Comments (14)
Category: Eccentrics, Soda, Pop, Soft Drinks and other Non-Alcoholic Beverages, 1930s, Alcohol

Skywald Comics

image

The image above is the first cover from one of the more oddball comics firms of the 1970s, Skywald Publications.

You can read the whole of issue number one of Nightmare here, at the Internet Archive, which also features several other full comics from Skywald.


Posted By: Paul - Thu Apr 25, 2013 - Comments (5)
Category: Business, Eccentrics, Comics, 1930s

April 24, 2013

Universal Translator Already Here

It doesn't have Klingon yet, but this demonstration shows the technology exists to make your own Universal Translator, ala Star Trek.



I barely understand all the pieces used in the assembly, much less how it is done.

A version for all of us could be just around the corner.

What language would you want translated?

Posted By: gdanea - Wed Apr 24, 2013 - Comments (9)
Category: Inventions

Los Angeles 100,000 years in the future


A headline in the Los Angeles Times, Apr 15, 1923. The author of the article, Ransome Sutton, elaborated:

Hairless, toothless, earless, toeless, head-heavy, all the useless scaffolding removed from the body, all the animal instincts erased from the mind, man will sit in a cushioned chair — a Jovian brain in a simplified body, like a dynamo housed in papier-mache — wielding thunderbolts.

So much concerning the inhabitants of Los Angeles in the year 101,923 AD.

Within the memory of old men, Los Angeles has grown into a city of some 700,000 inhabitants. Barring earthquakes, glaciers, acts of God and the public enemy, it should continue to grow, at an increasing rate, so long as mouths can be fed and the inhabitants housed. For it affords attractions of everlasting value — summery sunshine, health, rare air, good soil, scenery, the mountains in the background and in front the sea. Railroads extending to the eastward like a fan, and ocean routes radiating to the westward. Here, more surely than almost anywhere, continuous growth is insured.

Of course, he failed to foresee how bizarre many of the residents of Los Angeles would have become a mere 90 years later, let alone 100,000 years in the future!

Posted By: Alex - Wed Apr 24, 2013 - Comments (11)
Category: Utopias and Dystopias, 1920s, Yesterday’s Tomorrows

Antique Bedpan Collections



1) Stella Downing.

image

2) Eric Eakin.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Apr 24, 2013 - Comments (4)
Category: Eccentrics, Kitsch and Collectibles, Body Fluids

April 23, 2013

Go Diaper Free Week

The week of April 21-27 has been declared "Go Diaper Free! Week." Next week will be "Scrub Your Carpet Clean Week."

Posted By: Alex - Tue Apr 23, 2013 - Comments (12)
Category: Babies, Holidays, Hygiene, Body Fluids, Excrement

April 22, 2013

NightGlow Toilet Seats

Thanks to this new product, your toilet seat can now light up your bathroom like the inside of a nuclear reactor. But this thing looks so bright I'd worry about getting radiation burns from sitting on it.

Posted By: Alex - Mon Apr 22, 2013 - Comments (9)
Category: Bathrooms

Giraffes at Play

Posted By: Paul - Mon Apr 22, 2013 - Comments (3)
Category: Animals, Recreation, Surrealism

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Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction books such as Elephants on Acid.

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Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1.

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