Month: March 2019

Posted on

Massive Hermit Crab Uses a Doll’s Head for Its Shell, and It’s Insanely Creepy

Hermit crabs are fairly common, easy-to-care-for pets that you’ve likely seen in a child’s classroom or at your local pet store. Interestingly, hermit crabs are not actual crabs because they have soft, exposed abdomens that leave them vulnerable to predators. That’s why they’re always looking for a new shell to call home.

They move in and out of shells – usually sea snail shells – as they grow.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

The coconut crab differs from a regular hermit crab in two important ways: first, it’s quite large – it can grow up to three feet long and weigh nine pounds – and second, when it outgrows the largest shell it can find, it grows a shell of its own.

Isn’t nature weird?

Image Credit: Wikipedia

One particular coconut crab, though, isn’t going to be growing his own shell anytime soon, since he found a lovely (meaning totally creepy) discarded doll’s head to live in instead of a shell.

A redditor shared a photo of the crab found on Henderson Island. Part of the Pitcairn Islands, the remote Pacific spot is vulnerable to human litter (obviously).

Image Credit: Reddit

There’s just something about dolls that creep some people out (including me), but I suppose the crab is perfectly happy living inside one – maybe he even considers the eyes cool little peepholes?

Image Credit: Reddit

I have no idea what I’m talking about, but hey, there’s got to be some reason he likes it.

The photo is also making people recall the mutant Toy Story toy that was a doll’s head on top of a crab’s body. A strange coincidence to be sure.

Image Credit: Disney

Not as strange as reality, but close.

The post Massive Hermit Crab Uses a Doll’s Head for Its Shell, and It’s Insanely Creepy appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

15 Bartenders Reveal the Weirdest Things They’ve Heard on the Job

Bartenders hear all sorts of things. People don’t usually sit at a bar to be sober and quiet, so between being the patient ear to some poor guy’s sob story and hearing some drunk couple plan out the rest of their evening, you know they’ve heard some absolute doozies.

In this AskReddit article, bartenders reveal the weirdest conversations they’ve ever heard on the job.

#1. Categorize them

“I overheard a woman who worked for a New Zealand online dating service, and was basically a profile censor. She described her job as being 80% dick pic removal, and had seen so many she could divvy them up into a few distinct categories.”

#2. Sounds fun

“I once heard a guy tell his buddy, “It’s fun, it’s like laser tag but with real guns” That was twenty years ago and to this day kick myself for not getting the whole story.”

#3. These are on the house

“A customer is on the phone in the middle of the bar, not too crowded but a long bar. Guy couldn’t have been more than 25. I go to help someone at the end of the bar and on my way back I overhear:

“No, I don’t care! She’s my sister, she is THIRTEEN and there is no reason she should be doing cocaine! At all!”

Gave him a few drinks on the house that night.”

#4. Shady business

“I heard some chick say “and the worse part about it, is that lucky bastard got a whole gram of crystal out it for free.”

#5. Now I’m in love with myself

“I hated myself until I discovered masturbation.”

#6. Classy

“Had a husband and wife who were by far the most rude people I’ve ever encountered, talking with a traveling business man. By the end of the night the business man was propositioning the woman to go back to his hotel room for some money.”

#7. Lots of cheating

“Lots and lots of cheaters. It’s weird that serial cheaters take their girls to the same spot.”

#8. Heated argument

“I’ve bartended but my favorite conversation was overhead while I was on the other side of the bar. “Look all I’m saying is Grand Theft Auto severely ruined our generation’s perception of how many police helicopters exist.” Sounded like they were getting really heated over the matter haha.”

#9. Awwwww

“Even though we were busy, I clearly heard a women say to her friend, “Hey look, the bartender’s really cute.”

Friend: “No he’s not!”

Response: “Oh yeah, you’re right.”

#10. Negotiations

“Work in a downtown hotel bar right across from our convention center. I’ve heard way too many negotiations between businessmen and escorts.

Last one I heard involved the guy asking the lady how much extra she would charge to let his friend watch.”

#11. Tennis ladies

“I bartended at a country club, and there was this one group of tennis-ladies that would always sit at the bar and get absolutely sh*tfaced on weeknights at our wine nights. They took a liking to our main bartender and kept calling him exotic (he’s Mexican), they would say how love his beard, would talk about their fav (not tennis related) positions, how they kept their nether-regions tidy, slip him their numbers, how sh*t their husbands were, etc. Gave me death glares every time I’d be bartending/bar backing with him lol.”

#12. So obvious

“On Valentine’s Day this year, we had a guest who accepted a FaceTime from his girlfriend while his side-chick was with him at the bar. He angled the phone so his girlfriend wouldn’t see the girl, but it was so obvious.”

#13. Hahahaha

“Two businessmen having after work drinks on a Friday, where the conversation built up to one of the sweetest sentiments I’ve heard. At first the usual “Lemme tell ya, you’re a good person. I love you man.” Later on (still fairly basic): “Fuck the wives! Hey, you and me, we buy motorcycles!”

To finally this gem: “If a tornado were to blow you away… I would fly after you.”

#14. Adorable

“Guy: “I think I’m going to need a coke chaser for this one.” Girl, presumably SO: “we already did all the coke…” Guy: “Coca Cola, you idiot!”

Not even the most memorable, just the most recent. For sure, a real snapshot into their relationship.”

#15. Wonder how that worked out…

“I once listened to three people have an in depth discussion about how they were going to kill the “local vampire” and the steps to take to protect themselves from the coven that said vampire is surely from.

My favorite though what a heated debate over whether the first Robin would be a crime fighter if Batman hadn’t picked him up and trained him.”

The post 15 Bartenders Reveal the Weirdest Things They’ve Heard on the Job appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

15 Things People Didn’t Realize Were “So American” Until They Traveled Outside America

Americans: you may not realize it, but there are a lot of things you do that are considered totally weird around the rest of the world. Things like smiling all the time, or tipping. Who knew, right?

Here are 15 more things you might not realize make you stand out as “totally American” in countries across the pond.

#1. Constantly refilled.

“Having your drink constantly refilled ay restaurants. I just wanna drink a ton of water alright?”

#2. Being loud.

“The stereotype about us being loud is true. I never thought of myself as being loud until I went abroad and would hang up the phone after speaking in what I thought was appropriate volume to find everyone around me was staring at me, and realized how much more quiet they were lol whoops”

#3. Smiling and being friendly.

“I moved to England from Texas about six years ago. One of the major things that I noticed was that smiling and being friendly towards strangers was considered bizarre. This is a bit true in any metropolitan area, but especially in the UK. In Texas I was used to smiling at people, asking for directions if I needed them, and being friendly towards strangers. I learned very quickly that smiling at someone on the tube, or asking someone for directions on the street immediately makes someone think you’re trying to scam/rob them or you’re crazy.”

#4. Drive-thrus.

“I’m from northern europe but have visited USA couple of times. Their love for SUV cars and drive-thru is unreal, like there is a dunkin, subway and three kinds of fast food place next to each other and all of them have a drive-thru.

Edit: meant drive-thru, not drive-in.”

#5. A made-up crime.

“Jaywalking. The rest of the world thinks this is a made-up crime you only see in movies with corrupt cops.”

#6. Yes it is.

“I’ve never been abroad. Is that American enough?”

#7. Violently American.

“Tailgates. I’ve lived in the states my entire life, but when my Spanish girlfriend came to visit I wasn’t sure what I could show her that really exhibited American culture. There are plenty of American stereotypes you see on TV, but it wasn’t until I took her to a tailgate that I realized how violently American the whole experience is. A huge parking lot full of drunk twenty year olds bouncing on trucks bigger than most European apartments, with half the trucks blaring country, and the other half blasting rap. Solo cups and beer cans all over the place, grills, corn hole, etc. I’ve traveled to quite a few different countries, and I can’t really see a tailgate happening most other places.”

#8. American flavored.

“Ranch flavor Doritos in the Netherlands are called “Cool American” flavor.”

#9. How large grocery stores are.

“how large grocery stores are here. My wife is not american and we lived in China and were in HK all the time… they had large international stores that were great and she didnt really grasp the size of american grocery stores till our first week in the USA and there’s 150 feet of cereals on one aisle”

#10. Ketchup isn’t free.

“At a buffet in Germany, I had to pay for ketchup.”

#11. The size of cars.

“I did an art history course in Italy. What really stood out to me was the size of cars over there. Over here you have a mix of mid sized sedans and pick up trucks/SUV’S, with the occasional compact car (back when I went compact cars here were incredibly scarce). Over there, it seemed like most everyone drove a compact car, with the occasional sports car. I remember counting six pickup trucks in the 10 days I was there (for comparison, I can name more than 6 people I know with a pick up here).”

#12. The whole of Ireland.

“Massively wide roads/lanes. The whole of Ireland made me feel claustrophobic, but when I got back home the roads felt like way too much wasted space.”

#13. Portion size.

“Portion sizes.

My high school senior trip to London, as a typically ravenous appetite 18 year old, I couldn’t get over how small everything was standard.”

#14. I think you underestimate the size of our avocados.

“Small avocados.

Went to puerto rico. Was like, ‘yo ill have like 6 of those stuffed avocados’. Buddy was like, ‘yo gringo, i think you underestimate the size of our avocados here. Just have one and ill being you more if you want after’.

I had half of one. It was like a football.”

#15. Types of soda.

“Getting to choose from like 50 different types and subtypes of sodas.​

Hearing commercials advocating you to go to the doctor and demand a prescription for whatever fantasy pill is new to the market on the radio like it is no big deal.”

Go ahead and travel anyway. People are generally forgiving.

The post 15 Things People Didn’t Realize Were “So American” Until They Traveled Outside America appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

We Can’t Get Enough of This Adorable, Blind Kitten Name Merlin

I’ve never seen a cat quite like Merlin before – but I must admit, his name is honestly perfect for him. This tiny lil’ fella with the ice-blue eyes is stealing hearts everywhere.

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Nathaniel and Elliot Green were just married, but back in 2017 they were a newly minted couple and in the market for a cat they could call theirs. “Free Cat Friday” at the Lynchburg Humane Society seemed like the perfect opportunity to pick one up, and even though Elliot admitted he had gone looking for a Siamese kitty, Merlin fell right into their laps instead.

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Merlin is a fairly new and rare breed called a Napoleon, which is a mix of a Munchkin and a Persian cat, though his eyes are his alone – he’s mostly blind, but, according to the Greens, his eyesight doesn’t stop him from being a regular cat most of the time.

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Image Credit: merlin.giriffith

They describe Merlin as affectionate and sweet-tempered, a lover of cuddles and scratches on the face.

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

He loves guests and other animals, though sometimes he gets bullied, especially by other cats.

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

I mean, they’re probably jealous. Just look at that face!

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Their Instagram is dedicated to their ball of fluff, and the gorgeously set and framed photos have earned the Greens – and their Merlin – more than 28k followers.

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Image Credit: merlin.griffith

Click here if you want to be one of them!

The post We Can’t Get Enough of This Adorable, Blind Kitten Name Merlin appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

6 Incredible Ancient Finds Discovered by Workers Expanding the London Underground

The funny thing about people is that we’re kind of lazy. Instead of making entirely new cities out of scratch, we’re just like “Hey, why not just build right on top of this existing city? Way easier, amirite guys?”

As a result, digging around in cities can reveal all kinds of interesting things from the past. That’s what happened during the 2009-2018 expansion of the London Underground. Here are six totally neat things that came out of England’s latest modernization.

#1. A rare Roman medallion

Image Credit: Crossrail

Archaeologists who excavated Crossrail’s Liverpool Street uncovered more than 100 copper Roman coins and a bit of silver currency that ranged from 43 CE to 348 CE.

There was also a rare bronze medallion issued to mark the new year 245 CE. It was presented by Emperor Phillip I to a high-ranking government official and is the only one of its kind to date.

#2. A 55-million-year-old piece of amber

Image Credit: Crossrail

Engineers found the piece of amber from 50 feet below the dock bed beneath Canary Wharf before construction officially began – it’s the oldest amber ever to be found in London.

Don’t worry, no one has reported a mosquito containing dinosaur blood (yet). It did contain bubbles of trapped gasses that could yield new scientific insights about climate change.

#3. Victims of the Black Death

Image Credit: Crossrail Site

Archaeologists unearthed dozens of Black Death-related skeletons beneath London’s Charterhouse Square back in 2013 – the remains indicated that the people died during 14th and 15th century pandemics. Their teeth contained DNA traces of Yersinia pestis, the bacteria that caused the bubonic plague, and carbon dating indicated the burial ground had been used from 1348-1350 and again during the 1430s.

Not all of the skeletons were plague victims, however, suggesting the burial ground was for dead in general.

#4. A humorous Victorian chamber pot

Image Credit: Crossrail

When you’re poo-ing in something that has to be dumped manually, a sense of humor seems to be a no-brainer – and this chamber pot found during Stepney Green Station in East London verifies my assumption. It was found in a 19th-century cesspit filled with tobacco pipes and fragments of pots like this chamber pot that contains a cartoon of a grimacing man and the phrase “Oh what I see/I will not tell. …when you in it want to p*ss/remember they who gave you this.”

Ha!

#5. A cluster of Roman skulls

Image Credit: Crossrail

In 2013, workers at the Liverpool Street station site dug up Roman pottery and around 20 Roman skulls. Similar skulls have been found in the area, and some archaeologists suspect they belonged to rebels led by the Iceni warrior-queen Boudicca, who revolted against the Empire during the 1st Century CE.

These skulls, however, appear to date after the uprising, and likely washed out of a Roman cemetery long ago.

#6. An 8,000-year-old tool

Image Credit: Crossrail Site

At North Woolrich, in southeast London, scientists discovered a Mesolithic-era site near the Thames where early humans crafted tools 8500-6000 years ago. There were traces of campfires, flint pieces, and an 8,000-year-old stone tool.

The find is only one of a handful that confirms humans lived in the Thames valley after an Ice Age hiatus.

I’m all for progress if it means finding more delightful things like these!

The post 6 Incredible Ancient Finds Discovered by Workers Expanding the London Underground appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

This Man’s ER Experience in Taiwan Shows How Truly Messed up American Health Care Really Is

No matter what side of the political aisle you belong to, chances are most of you would agree that America’s healthcare system, as it currently stands, is pretty broken. Even if we can’t all agree about what the right solution may be, we definitely agree that it could certainly be better.

The fact is that, when it comes to healthcare, America actually lags behind the rest of the civilized world. We spend more exponentially more money to get significantly less coverage.

Most other first world countries offer government-funded universal healthcare – and that is also true in Taiwan, where one Kevin Bozeat has been living as an ex-pat. But unfortunately, he didn’t qualify for their healthcare and had no American health insurance, either, when he found himself super sick and in need of a trip to the emergency room.

He sucked it up and let his roommate call him a taxi, figuring he’d work out the payment when it came due (the way most of us regular people do here in the States).

Here’s what happened.

Image Credit: Facebook

tl;dr: His experience was awesome and even with no insurance, it cost him $80.

Of course, since this is the internet in America, people had to try to find every which way to prove that his experience was singular, or reasons why it wouldn’t work in the States, or to insinuate that Taiwan is somehow a poor, third world country (it’s not; their GDP is higher than Denmark’s).

So, Kevin did some legwork for us in the form of arguments against all of the “good points” people made about his original post.

Image Credit: Facebook

To sum up:

  1. The cost of living in Taiwan is about 50% of the cost of living in the U.S. Good luck going to any emergency room here for any reason and getting out of there for less than $160.
  2. Doctors do make less, but they’re still solidly middle class (and there are plenty of people willing to go into the field).
  3. The taxes in Taiwan do pay for healthcare but they’re not high – if you have their national healthcare it works out to about $70.53/month for a person who makes $60k/year.

He acknowledges that no system is perfect, but quotes the Ministry of Health in saying that “…the Taiwanese government believes that healthcare is a right for all of its citizens, rather than a privilege for those who can afford it.”

Everyone in Taiwan is covered (along with foreign permanent resident) is entitled to coverage regardless of employment status, and no citizen goes bankrupt due to medical bills.

It sounds like a utopia, but it’s not – most of the world has figured out how to make it happen. And according to Kevin, it’s time for his home country to stop making excuses.

The post This Man’s ER Experience in Taiwan Shows How Truly Messed up American Health Care Really Is appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

14 Cringeworthy Tweets That Single People Will Definitely Relate To

I remember my single days. The freedom, the thrill, the uncertainty, the loneliness. It was… a lot. Sure, there were times when I loved that I didn’t have to answer to anyone, but if I’m being honest, that feeling never lasted.

If you don’t believe me, these tweets have all the proof:

1. Oops!

Photo Credit: Twitter

2. Accurate

Photo Credit: Twitter

3. BUR BUR BUR BUUUURRRRNNN

Photo Credit: Twitter

4. Umm you know what that is really an excellent point

Photo Credit: Twitter

5. Exactly my point

Photo Credit: Twitter

6. Only if you post pics, lady

Photo Credit: Twitter

7. And then they’re like “Whoaaaaa…” and I’m all “Whoooooa….”

Photo Credit: Twitter

8. Dogs are people too ya jerk

Photo Credit: Twitter

9. Ugh that always happens to me

Photo Credit: Twitter

10. “Interviews”…

Photo Credit: Twitter

11. Gurl same

Photo Credit: Twitter

12. OMG PREACH

Photo Credit: Twitter

13. Wait what??

Photo Credit: Twitter

14. But do you LIKE like it?

Photo Credit: Twitter

If I haven’t convinced you by now, we having nothing more to discuss. So.

Byeeeeee…

The post 14 Cringeworthy Tweets That Single People Will Definitely Relate To appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

The appropriately dubbed….

The appropriately dubbed ‘boss of all bosses’ of the Italian Mafia has been on the run for 26 years, and has been so successful at it that not a single picture exists of him from that time, despite being one of the worlds top 10 most wanted criminals.