Various & Sundry: Wild Things of various types

Hey, anybody graduating out there?  I forgot to post this last week, but you really ought to read 10 Things Your Commencement Speaker Won't Tell You--though you may have seen it already.  It's been making the rounds.  My personal favorite is number 3: Don't Make the World Worse.  Although of course I have a soft spot for #6: "Read obituaries. They are just like biographies, only shorter. They remind us that interesting, successful people rarely lead orderly, linear lives." Well, duh.

Even if you don't read the obituaries, you probably heard that Maurice Sendak died this week.  I loved this anecdote about his response to a fan letter from a little boy--and how the boy responded in turn.  There's a sermon in there, if you're a sermonating type.

Also in obituaries: Vidal Sassoon!  I had no idea what a revolutionary he was, and how he changed hairstyling. Thank you, Vidal Sasson, for saving us from so much teasing.  And talk about an unorderly, unlinear life.

How about a fashion spread to go along with the Vidal Sassoon 5-point cut?  Tom & Lorenzo featured this spread from Ponystep Magazine (I'd never heard of it), featuring the models Ratka Mayor, Vivien Bridson, and Edna Mathieson, who are totally fabulous. How could you not adore them?  Also: I want that coat.  And the handbag.  Shoes...not so much.  But I want to look that good wearing cats-eye glasses like that.

And now, for something completely different.  I loved this story about the Kenyan boy named Richard Turere who, at the age of 11, figured out how to keep the lions away from the family cattle. Check this out!

He observed that the lions never struck the homesteads when someone was awake and walking around with a flashlight. Lions are naturally afraid of people. He concluded that lions equate torches with people so he took the led bulbs from broken flashlights and rigged up an automated lighting system of four or five torch bulbs around the cattle stockade. The bulbs are wired to a box with switches, and to an old car battery charged with a solar panel that operates the family Television set. The lights don’t point towards the cattle, or on any property, but outwards into the darkness. They flash in sequence giving the impression that someone is walking around the stockade.

Voila! No losses by lion.  And the neighbors have come calling for his help.  AfriGadget is looking for a way to scale up his idea.  I hope young Richard, there, is amply rewarded.

Have a great weekend.