“These are Mexican freetail bats, but they’re in Texas. Too bad for Texas insects.”

“As we whinge about the wintry weather here in Britain, spare a thought for those living in a Russian hamlet where temperatures can plummet to -71C, so cold even planes cannot land there in winter. The valley of Oymyakon in northeast Russia is known as the ‘Pole of Cold’ and with an average January temperature of -50C, it is no wonder the village is the coldest permanently inhabited settlement in the world. This is the lowest recorded temperature for any permanently inhabited location on Earth and the lowest temperature recorded in the Northern Hemisphere. The village, which is home to about 500 people, was, in the 1920s and 1930s, a stopover for reindeer herders who would water their flocks from the thermal spring.” w/ photos

“Surgeons in Russia had to operate after a 12-month-old toddler swallowed more than 40 fridge magnets. The tot’s mum panicked when she noticed that all of the magnets from the family’s fridge had gone missing. The woman, whose name has not been released, rushed her son to hospital near her home in Chelyabinsk. ‘The child had been in the room alone with the magnets and now they were gone. She thought he must have swallowed them,’ said a clinic spokesman.” w/ photo

“The surfer’s latest breathtaking feat came yesterday, as huge waves crashed off the coast of Nazare throughout the day… This thrill-seeking surfer was but a speck on this enormous wall of water as he appeared to set a new world record for the biggest wave ever ridden. Surfing legend Garrett McNamara caught the towering wave – believed to have measured around 100ft – off the coast of Nazare, in Portugal, yesterday. If the claims are verified the U.S. born athlete will have beaten his own record, which was also set at Nazare, when he successfully rode a 78ft high break at the end of 2011.” w/ photos + video

“I like big girls, but got damn that’s ridiculous!” — BigTonyTheRapper

“This is totally awesome. It’s really great! I love trains too, especially when they go fast while it’s raining. I’m German. And I love how you made that. I love people who have dreams and who can find something special in their live.” — ghoost2015

“Lame, [he] should do that with all [his] hairs, and get an ingrown beard.” — JeTEquities

“When we think about writing books, especially the technical kind, we think about a person or small group of people hunched over their keyboards typing away. There’s a good reason for that mental image: that’s how the majority of books are written. That’s not the way it has to be, though. Philip M. Parker, a marketing professor at INSEAD, has a patented system for algorithmically compiling data into book form. Thanks to Parker’s system, Amazon now has over 800,000 books for sale from his company. Other organizations pay for this service to compile data for their reports, so the system clearly has flexibility… The technology isn’t just for books. Videos and games can be generated as well.” w/ photo + video

“It should be fairly obvious why, all technological considerations aside, there has been much more research into letting machines extract our thoughts, rather than insert them. Mind reading is a scary-enough concept all on its own — but mind writing? It calls to mind the hacker deities of cyber punk novels; skinny, trench-swathed Neos projecting e-thoughts into the skulls of passing civilians. With such basic issues of privacy on the line, it took the trusting relationship between UK scientist Christopher James and his adventurous young daughter to give us our first stab at developing real telepathic, brain-to-brain communication technology.” w/ photos

“The look before and after the reporter went down is a testament to the human spirit. But my question is, how come they didn’t fall straight down with balls that big?” — rwuh89