Author: Caitlin Schneider

The beauty of technology is that it can bring people together over great distances. It can also bring people and animals together—specifically, you and the insanely adorable sled dog pups that reside at Denali National Park & Preserve in Alaska.

The dogs have been part of park tradition pretty much since it was established in 1917. Harry Karstens, the first superintendent of the preserve (back when it was Mount McKinley National Park) was an experienced dog musher who first employed a team of canines to get around. Since then, the kennel has continued to provide valuable transportation—helping rangers to patrol, carry supplies, and create trails, even in the biting cold. They’re a particularly valuable resource as the federally protected area does not allow motorized vehicles.

But before they can get to work, they need to grow up. A new litter was born at the end of July, and thanks to the park’s Puppycam, you can check in on them whenever you like. The tiny huskies—Happy, Party, Piñata, Cupcake, and Hundo—were festively named in honor of this year’s National Park Service centennial.

Jennifer Raffaeli, the park’s kennels manager, told CBS Sunday Morning: “We always joke that they’re the happiest government employees you’ll ever meet.” Based on a few minutes of webcam footage, we think that seems about right.

For even more sled pup goodness, check out Denali’s dog blog, meet the pooches online or in person, and even consider adopting one once their government service has come to an end.

[h/t CBS Sunday Morning]

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A lot of things can affect how well your phone is working, but it might be news to you that one of those things is your own body. A recent report (PDF) commissioned by the Nordic Council of Ministers examined the antenna performance of different smartphone models and found that both the hand you hold your phone in and the ear you hold it up to can dramatically change how well it’s picking up radio signals.

In the chart below—created by Quartz and shared by Digg—you can see some of the specifics (dBm stands for decibel-milliwatt). In brief: iPhones do not fare well. The iPhone SE, 6S, and 6S Plus all rank pretty poorly overall, and those models operate particularly poorly if you hold them in your left hand and to your left ear.

While this might seem like some 21st century subtle discrimination against southpaws, it’s actually just a failure of tech when it comes to antenna placement, which varies from phone to phone. It’s not all bad news, though. The Microsoft Lumia 640 has the best call transmission strength overall, regardless of which hand you hold it in, and some phones—like the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge—do actually work better in your left hand. In general, though, the right hand and right ear combination is your best bet for a clear call.

So next time you’re in the middle of a conversation and switch hands, only to find that the call has suddenly become a little fuzzy, it’s not just in your head. We might not be able to manually futz with the antenna like we used to, but it’s still a fickle piece of hardware.

[h/t Digg]

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If you’re an early riser and want to start the day in an Empire State of mind, the iconic New York building has an enticing opportunity for you.

From October 1 through November 20, you can watch the sunrise from the top of the 1454-foot Midtown Manhattan landmark. Tickets for the “Sunrise Experience” are $100, and no more than 100 of them will be sold for each viewing experience. Aside from the inherent awesomeness of greeting the day high above the Big Apple, the Instagram appeal is notable: the 86th floor Observatory offers 360-degree open-air views of the city.

To give you a sense of what your body will actually have to endure—stop rolling your eyes, morning people—the sun is due to rise at about 6:53 a.m. on October 1 and 6:49 a.m. at the end of the run on November 20. (Those who really want to maximize their shut-eye should aim to get in right before Daylight Saving Time hits on November 6—sunrise is a 7:32 a.m. on November 5.)

Guests will also have access to a $25 “Empire State Building Sunrise Breakfast” if you’re worried about morning hunger pangs.

Tickets are on sale now at the Empire State Building website. While the current run only extends to November 20, out-of-towners might not need to book tickets to Gotham just yet: the press release seems to hint at the possibility of an extended run.

For most of us in the United States, showers are such a common luxury, we hardly ever think about them. Elsewhere around the world, things are a little different.

In the infographic below, from High Tide Technologies, you can see how much a shower costs residents in countries around the world—from China and Argentina where it’s only three cents, to Papua New Guinea where it’s $3.38 (calculating for a 17-gallon, 8.3-minute rinse). Those prices are based on a 2012 report from the International Water Association, and for residents in Papua New Guinea, that number means a shower costs about 70 percent of an average person’s daily income. In the United States, a shower costs around 16 cents.

In places like Ethiopia, the price of a shower is also paid in time: some residents—usually women—spend hours of their day traveling to get clean water to bring back home. Around the world, about 780 million people don’t have access to clean water at all.

To learn more, check out the infographic below. It’s a good reminder of the extravagance that is sanitary H2O, and might make you think twice about how you use this precious resource.

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To say the name “Claude Monet” is to conjure images of water lilies, bridges, and ponds in soft greens, pinks, blues and purples. The French Impressionist painter is as tied to that series as Edgar Degas is to ballerinas.

In this silent 1915 short film, Monet is seen in his garden at Giverny—first talking with a man as dogs frolic in the background, and then at his canvas painting with a cigarette dangling from his lips. The sight of the world-famous garden is arresting, though it’s stripped of its signature hues in the black-and-white footage. 

It’s also incredible to watch Monet work en plein air, creating one of the 250 oil paintings showcasing the lilies that, in the 100 years since, have become artistic icons in their own right.

[h/t Kottke]

Not everyone has what it takes to be a model, but wildlife photographers face a different problem entirely—their subjects don’t even know they’re posing. As such, sometimes the experts behind the camera need to employ some tricks of the trade, and as National Geographic reveals in the video below, that sometimes means pulling out a pricey fragrance.

In the short movie “How to Catch a Tiger with Joel Sartore,” NatGeo photographer Joel Sartore attempts to get the perfect shot of a South China tiger at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Filmmaker Morgan Heim documents the struggle, which results in the use of a Prada perfume after two-and-a-half hours of failing to capture the attention of the uninterested wildcat.

Turns out, zookeepers often use fragrances to keep all kinds of large felines happy and healthy. Eau de toilettes—along with spices and essential oils—often serve as sensory enrichment for wildcats in controlled environments who are less exposed to a variety of olfactory experiences. In the wild, researchers use perfumes to lure the animals, with mixed results, though they’ve proved to be helpful in drawing the cats to hair traps or snares, which collect follicle samples when animals rub against them. With the hair, scientists are able to perform DNA tests, which can aid all sorts of research.

It’s not just perfume either: in 2010, Wildlife Conservation Society researchers at the Bronx Zoo in New York identified Calvin Klein’s Obsession for Men as one of the more popular scents among its cheetahs. (It wasn’t the favorite among cats in the wild; they declined to reveal which scent was.)

Louise Ginman, the Unit Supervisor for Carnivores at Taronga Zoo in Sydney, Australia told Scientific American that they’d found lions and tigers to be the most receptive—snow leopards were as well—and that Obsession for Men was indeed one of the favorites.

Pat Thomas, a general curator at the Bronx Zoo, described fragrance testing to National Geographic, in which the big cats behaved a lot like your kitty does after breaking into the catnip: “Some would encourage this really powerful cheek rubbing behavior where these big cats would literally wrap their paws around a tree and just vigorously rub up and down. Sometimes they would start drooling, their eyes would half close, almost like they were going into a trance.”

Scientific American reports that the big cats’ attraction to fragrances isn’t just about them having high-end taste—it’s because of a chemical compound in perfumes called civetone, which was originally taken directly from civets but is now produced synthetically.

See how the power of perfume makes for a stellar snapshot—like the one here from Sartore—in the NatGeo video down below.

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If you’ve ever fantasized about wandering down an endless, winding road of sweet-smelling flowers, a farm on Lake Michigan can help make your dreams come true.

Cherry Point Farm and Market in Shelby, Michigan is home to a lot of fanciful (mostly edible) things, like cherries, pies, breads, jams, fudge, and even summer fish boils. The fruit and farm market has been in operation since 1961 and is currently run by the fourth generation of the founding family. As if a homegrown roadside cherry shop wasn’t meditative enough, in 2001, owner Barbara Bull started work on a lavender labyrinth, which is now a popular attraction that’s large enough to be seen on Google Earth.

With the help of artist and architect Conrad Heiderer, Bull designed an asymmetrical flower maze with an herb garden at its center. It takes about an hour to walk to the center on one long, meandering route. “Walking into the labyrinth is only half the journey,” Bull told MLive. “You need to walk out again.”

While it might be way too late for the primary flower season—the labyrinth’s French lavender peaks in the springtime—it continues to bloom throughout the summer, and then dries up at the end of fall when it’s collected. The space is also home to other seasonal flora like apple, peach, and cherry trees—which are ready for harvest in the autumn—and all kinds of plants that are endemic to the area, like black-eyed Susans and wild hollyhocks.

A journey into the labyrinth is free and doesn’t require reservations, so you can drop in and take a walk among the flowers anytime you like.

Know of something you think we should cover? Email us at tips@mentalfloss.com.

If you’ve ever fantasized about wandering down an endless, winding road of sweet-smelling flowers, a farm on Lake Michigan can help make your dreams come true.

Cherry Point Farm and Market in Shelby, Michigan is home to a lot of fanciful (mostly edible) things, like cherries, pies, breads, jams, fudge, and even summer fish boils. The fruit and farm market has been in operation since 1961 and is currently run by the fourth generation of the founding family. As if a homegrown roadside cherry shop wasn’t meditative enough, in 2001, owner Barbara Bull started work on a lavender labyrinth, which is now a popular attraction that’s large enough to be seen on Google Earth.

With the help of artist and architect Conrad Heiderer, Bull designed an asymmetrical flower maze with an herb garden at its center. It takes about an hour to walk to the center on one long, meandering route. “Walking into the labyrinth is only half the journey,” Bull told MLive. “You need to walk out again.”

While it might be way too late for the primary flower season—the labyrinth’s French lavender peaks in the springtime—it continues to bloom throughout the summer, and then dries up at the end of fall when it’s collected. The space is also home to other seasonal flora like apple, peach, and cherry trees—which are ready for harvest in the autumn—and all kinds of plants that are endemic to the area, like black-eyed Susans and wild hollyhocks.

A journey into the labyrinth is free and doesn’t require reservations, so you can drop in and take a walk among the flowers anytime you like.

Know of something you think we should cover? Email us at tips@mentalfloss.com.

It’s been proven that owning a cat has real scientific benefits, but it turns out, they’ve also been a benefit to science. Over 40 years ago, a Midwestern feline co-authored a physics paper.

As Atlas Obscura reports, in 1975, Michigan State University professor Jack H. Hetherington had just completed an academic study called Two-, Three-, and Four-Atom Exchange Effects in bcc 3He, which focused on atomic behavior at high and low temperatures. He was ready to submit the writing when a colleague noted a bit of a problem: Hetherington had used the plural pronoun “we” throughout, though he was the only author. That might seem like a minor infraction, but the intended publication, Physical Review Letters, would likely not approve.

Hetherington wasn’t too keen to rewrite his work, which had been drawn up on a typewriter, and tacking on another human author was problematic for a number of reasons. So the professor did the only logical thing and employed the identity of his Siamese cat, Chester. The name “F.D.C. Willard” was added (the first name stood for “Felix Domesticus, Chester” and “Willard” was the name of the cat’s father).

The article was successfully published in Physical Review Letters, but the charade didn’t last for long. However, there wasn’t much fallout for the scientist or his feline faux-author. In fact, Hetherington capitalized on it—releasing copies of the paper with autographs in the form of a signature and a pawprint. In 1980, Willard published a paper on his own, written entirely in French. (A real Renaissance man, this cat.)

MSU’s Physics Chairman, Truman Woodruff, even asked Hetherington if Willard would be interested in a full-time staff position, writing: “Can you imagine the universal jubilation if in fact Willard could be persuaded to join us, even if only as a Visiting Distinguished Professor?”

[h/t Atlas Obscura]

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Pringles—and other stackable chips like them—are known for their distinctive concave shape, good for making an impromptu duckbill, eating as many as you can in a single bite, or just shoveling into your mouth as is normal with all manner of endlessly snackable treats.

So just how do they get that perfect curve? Machines, of course. In the video below from the Science Channel’s How It’s Made, you can see the full journey of the stackable chip (in this case, Chip Flix), from a potato-flake-and-water mix, to a big potato sheet, to a delicious fried chip. Along the way there are cutters and a rolling mold and even a real, live human being to make sure the individual pieces are as perfect as can be. The whole process only takes about 20 minutes, and while you probably already knew that these delectable creations weren’t the most natural or organic of food products, watching this might make you think twice next time you want to pop open a can.

A bit of bonus canned-chip content: the name Pringles is sort of random. When Procter & Gamble introduced the snack in 1968, they wanted a name that started with a “P,” so a brand manager used a Cincinnati phonebook to make a list of street names that began with the letter. Pringle Drive in Finneytown, Ohio had a nice ring to it and, more importantly, was available as a trademark.

[h/t Digg]

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