Here’s a star made of ice.

To you and yours, a very good one.

Because you will at some point need a briefcase full of sausage. // The Möbius bagel. // The LED menorah. // 10 long tracking shots. // On comic book colouring. // “I’ve successfully privatised world peace.” // Demon lamp. // Local globes. // World toilet info. // At last, a pram with firepower. // Artificial eyes. // Change blindness. // Jellyfish. // Snowflakes. // Alice. // The Uppsala Analogue Synthesizer Orchestra. // A brief history of video games. // The golden age of board games. // A scale model of the solar system. It’s over half a mile wide, so some scrolling is involved.

Cuban television sets photographed by Simone Lueck.  

Waiting for Armageddon. // Galactic chromoscope. // Egypt’s garbage city. // A boneyard of neon. // Defaced Iranian banknotes. // Art made with paper. // When hamsters make sweet music. // Synth Britannia. // A history of the boombox. (h/t, Coudal) // LSD blotter art. // The microscopic Bible. // Marilyn Monroe, pleasantly stoned. // Medical scaffolding. // Manhattan street corners. // A microwave that plays YouTube videos. // Star Trek gets abstract. “You and me in Japan. Watch me dance.” (nsfw) // And trust me, you’ll want a marshmallow blaster. 

Speaking of things festive, here’s the world’s smallest snowman. At just 0.01 mm across, he’s slimmer than a human hair. Strictly speaking, he’s also made of tin.

The eyes and smile were milled using a focused ion beam, and the nose, which is under 1 µm wide (or 0.001 mm), is ion beam deposited platinum.

The object was built by Dr David Cox of the National Physical Laboratory’s Quantum Detection Group. The video below should give you some idea of just how small the snowman is.

Faithful in sentiment, if not materials or size.

With the season of good cheer fast approaching, I feel it’s time for some of these.

Underwater time-lapse. // Vespa rocking horse. // Roller coasters and chess. It’s a thing, apparently. // TV series intros. // “Teachers of the future, this is what you will think.” // Science fiction blueprints. // Magnetic heat shield test. // Atmosphere. // Smoking booths. // Smoking may void your computer warranty. (h/t, The Thin Man) // Marijuana harvest. // Hunting albinos for body parts. // Vodka pills. // Pork grown in the lab. “So far scientists haven’t tasted it.” // When playhouses go too far. // A valley of tyres. // The Veritas RS III. // The trendiest of dentists. // And, via The Thin Man, it’s Mr Wilfred Josephs. 

The video below is by Robert Hodgin, whose digital animations I’ve mentioned briefly here and over at Eye. Hodgin is one of the artists featured in the V&A Museum showcase Decode: Digital Design Sensations. The soundtrack is from WNYC’s Radiolab broadcast Touch at a Distance. A real-time audio responsive version will appear at Decode, which opens on December 8th.

 Via Pixelsumo.

Ken Habarta has a collection of notes written by unarmed bank robbers. They range from the polite and apologetic,

Please place all the money on the counter. No (dye) packs or tricks. I am armed. Thank you! I’m sorry!

To the blunt,

I have a bomb, put all your money on the counter.

And grandiose,

You have 15 seconds to put at least $9,000 in $100s & $50s in front of me. Alarms, dye packs, bait money, tracking devices, or follow me out, will equal death. My briefcase will inflict a deadly wrath on all of you in this bank if you follow me. Time starts now!

Others attempt emotional blackmail,  

Give me money or I will blow up a school.

This example, written by Mr Kevin Pinto, may seem unremarkable,  

This is a holdup. Give me 100s, 50s, 20s. Hurry up.

However, the “hurry up” has an almost comedic aspect given that Mr Pinto, who robbed ten banks over a period of six years, committed each robbery during his lunch break. Pinto was employed as a financial compliance officer by the investment firm Paradigm Capital. He was sentenced to six years in prison.

Ken Habarta’s book Bank Notes may also be of interest. Apparently Tuesday and Thursday mornings are popular robbery times. Via Coudal.

With Christmas in mind, Anna directs us to Vulva Love Lovely, foremost retailers of “handmade feminist love.”  

We make many different types of feminist body positive products: beautiful, hand sculpted vagina pendants, uterus plushies, vulva portraits, vagina pillows, and reusable cloth menstrual pads.

Sadly, the graphic nature of certain “body positive” items prevents their display here. This is, I maintain, a classy joint and the swooning couch is still in storage. However, I can draw your attention to the impressive range of uterus plushies, lovingly detailed with smiles, ovaries and facial hair. Behold, for instance, the Frida Kahlo Uterus Plushie, which features an imposing mono-brow and “an unyielding creative presence.” As you can see, it’s a celebration of womanhood: