Adorable panda cub Bei Bei—pronounced "bay bay"—made his media debut on Wednesday at the Washington National Zoo, CNN reported. The four-month-old cub is already a media darling, giving a friendly wave to the camera.
These pics will have to hold you over until January 16th, when Bei Bei makes his first public appearance. The giant panda cub currently lives at the zoo with his mother Mei Xiang and his big sister Bao Bao, who is about two years old. Bei Bei is a surviving twin, as the other baby panda died a few days after birth.
This little girl by the name of Elyse might not be great at following choreography instructions—but her spirited moves to "Watch Me (Whip/Nae Nae)" as Santa shuffles in the background is the perfect metaphor for the holidays. Why? Because really, isn't the point of the holiday season to stumble through with as much joy and panache as you can muster, even if you aren't getting it quite or at all right? It's about the feeling, right?
Have you heard of the Holderness family? They're one of those YouTube families that are inexplicably wildly popular online, kinda like Sam and Nia, except with real kids. Two years ago, they released a cringe-worthy Christmas video called "#XMAS JAMMIES" and they've been unstoppable ever since. Now, they've returned with "#ELFED" (this family finds hashtags hilarious). It's a holiday family-friendly rap set to the tune of Kendrick Lamar's "i," even though they couldn't be any more an embodiment of everything Lamar hates if they were police union leaders ghostwriting for Drake. Warning: this video is excruciating to watch and you will be embarrassed and dismayed for everyone involved.
Photographer Tamar Shugert resents when people suggest that she breastfeed her baby in the bathroom, so she took a photo to succinctly demonstrate why. She submitted the image to 52Frames' "Make a Statement" photo challenge back in February, and it has since gone viral. If you can't figure out Shugert's point from looking at the image, you're probably someone who regularly eats on the toilet and has bigger issues than not understanding a photograph.
Basically, of the 1,018 departmental heads at the top 50 National Institute of Health-funded medical schools (which includes top private universities, because everyone loves that government grant cash), 137 are women, or about 13%. 190 of those positions are filled by dudes with mustaches. How do they define a mustache? So glad you asked. They looked at pictures of every one of the 1,018 leaders and evaluated them based on this criteria:
We defined a moustache as the visible presence of hair on the upper cutaneous lip and included both stand alone moustaches (for example, Copstash Standard, Pencil, Handlebar, Dali, Supermario) as well as moustaches in combination with other facial hair (for example, Van Dyke, Balbo, The Zappa). Department leaders with facial hairstyles that did not include hair on the upper lip (for example, Mutton Chops, Chin Curtain) were considered not to have a moustache.
What about ladies with that certain extra-dignified lip fuzz?
We evaluated each leader for the presence of facial hair regardless of sex.
Dang. Obviously, as amusing as you may or may not find this, it speaks to major hurdles left in the medical field when it comes to integrating and accepting women at the highest level.
There is a counter-argument, of course, and to ignore it would be to let its proponents think it can't be faced. The argument is simple: babies. To achieve a high position in the medical field requires giving up your twenties to study and your early 30s to climbing the departmental ladder, the argument goes. It holds that many women, facing the biological clock, simply drop out. Here's the thing—even if that argument were true, it's highly unlikely that it would result in men occupying 87% of leadership positions. It's like how there are more men named John running Fortune 500 companies than there are women. The gap is simply too huge to account for the difference. Women make up 30% of physicians. Even 20% of Senators and 19% of Representatives are women, and that's a terrible figure compared to many OECD countries.
Wait, this study was supposed to be funny. Is mad the new funny? Is that the real finding here? As for the authors themselves, they limited their outrage to the absolute minimum, calling for schools to try to achieve women/mustache equality:
Conclusions Moustachioed individuals significantly outnumber women as leaders of medical departments in the US. We believe that every department and institution should strive for a moustache index ≥1. Known, effective, and evidence based policies to increase the number of women in leadership positions should be prioritized.
A Redditor found all these professional wedding photos of happy couples on very dangerous-looking cliffs, which is bound to trigger both your fear of heights and your fear of commitment. In some cases, it actually looks like the groom is going to push the bride off the cliff, which is a great metaphor for how even progressive men tend to burden women disproportionately with housekeeping and child rearing responsibilities, or something. Still less disturbing than most of these photos, by the way.
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Honestly impressed that they could climb in those dresses.
To celebrateThe Force Awakens, Jimmy Fallon and The Roots brought some fan-written Star Warsraps to life on Thursday night's show. Fallon reached out to fans on Twitter, asking them to send him their best rhymes along with the hashtag #StarWarsRaps. The people delivered, channeling Biggie and Drake to recap the Star Wars universe with perfect flow.
After a cute Christmassy bit, the rap action starts at 2:13.
Songs are pretty good, but isn't it boring when a song becomes a hit on the radio and you always know exactly how it's going to sound and who's going to be singing it? Where's the surprise? Where's the intrigue? That's why covers are so fun—they offer a break from the torturous, dismal monotony of listening to a song you like that you've heard before. Also, as you'll see from many of the covers on this list, they often offer significantly less whining than the original. Below are the 13 best covers from the past year. They'll remind you that you're not the only one who likes to belt out Taylor Swift and Adele.
1. Kelly Clarkson covered"Blank Space by Taylor Swift, who publicly approved (yet didn't invite her to join the squad).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWFdduODs3Y
2. Joe Jonas emotionally crooned Adele's super hit "Hello" while dressed as a sad clown because...because that's what he did.
4. Before her album came out, Demi Lovato sang "Take Me to Church" by Hozier and reminded people that in addition to being BFFs with Iggy Azalea, she's also a singer.
https://youtu.be/mjXB2PT8bh8?t=1m20s
5. New Jersey band Screaming Females did a punk version of "Shake It Off," introducing Taylor Swift's music to an audience who may not have heard of—just kidding, everyone has heard of her.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zm1-bVYio1k
6. The only thing that could be better than this doo-wop reimagining of Celine Dion's Titanic ballad "My Heart Will Go On" would be if Leonardo DiCaprio finally won an Oscar.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyiWQ3l66Nk
7. The vintage edition of Radiohead's "Creep," as sung by former American Idol contestant Hayley Reinhart, is highly moving for anyone who has ever wanted a perfect body and/or soul.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3lF2qEA2cw
8. When Florence + the Machine covered Skillex and Diplo's "Where Are Ü Now," it really emphasized how much songs can benefit from decreasing the percentage of Bieber.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVTBOVl-3lY
9. They Might Be Giants did their own take on "Bills, Bills, Bills" by Destiny's Child while visiting The A.V. Club, while also paying respect to the original, which requires a lot of respect.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIoDSuVFWVg
10. The metal version of "Bad Blood" really captures the visceral hostility between Taylor Swift and Katy Perry.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxBTwMYkCBI
11. This video proves that "Hello" is so powerful, it will always elicit the same angsty feelings even without words and with a bunch of college students playing instruments.
To round out 2015 in manipulative style, Jimmy Kimmel brought back one of his most beloved features, Lie Witness News, on Thursday night's show. In this segment, Kimmel sends a correspondent onto the L.A. streets to ask ordinary Angelenos for their take on the latest news stories, which they've totally made up. But sure enough, people are more than willing to pretend to have heard of these completely fake stories just to get on TV.
For this special edition, correspondents asked passersby to comment on the biggest stories of 2015, which makes it even more embarrassing that they didn't see through it. This is some cringeworthy stuff. Enjoy!
A confluence of gossip and tweeting has resulted in a speculation storm about the romantic entanglement of former Friend's co-stars Matthew Perry and Courteney Cox.Woman's Day reported this week on a story from Star Magazine, in which a "source" said:
It’s no surprise that Matthew was one of the first people Courteney called when she ended the engagement...They’ve leaned on each other before, during her infertility struggle and his battle with addiction. Matthew invited her over to talk one night, and they ended up hooking up!...There isn’t any pressure to put a label on it yet, but they’re excited to see where this might go.
And that fantasy may be spurred by this very popular tweet that surfaced at the beginning of December (and their natural chemistry, of course):
The Independent reports that the photo on the left is actually from 2005, when Cox was still married to David Arquette (see her wedding ring?). They are really FRIENDS, even years after their show ended. But Entertainment Tonight is reporting on another "source" who is close to Chandler and Monica who says the rumors are untrue. Sad. Celebrities should have sex with each other whenever their fans wants them to!
However, the above tweet has already done its damage, and the rumors are spreading and multiplying:
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge tweeted a new family photo on Friday as an adorable Christmas gift to their subjects. The only better holidays bonus would be a reimbursement of all the tax dollars that go to fund their lifestyle. This chill photo of a casually dressed royal clan shows that their happy family is just like yours—except that half the people in this picture will go on to be kings of England.
The older generations of the Royal House of Windsor are not a particularly photogenic group. (Just imagine how the UK will react when the Queen dies and Prince Charles' face is printed on the money.) The world has Princess Diana and Kate Middleton to thank for infusing the royal gene pool with some much-needed cuteness.
Seriously, only the cheeks of Princess Charlotte could justify the existence of a monarchy in 2015. And the infectious smile of Prince George can almost distract you from William's ever-expanding bald spot.
Stoner Sloth is a series of anti-weed PSAs made by the Australian government. The campaign features the stoner sloth: an animal version of humans demonstrating how slow they are when they're high. It also includes the hashtag #stonersloth, because nothing proves you're hip to the younger generation more than using a hashtag. Now these ads will totes go viral!
The trouble with PSAs is that they're often unintentionally hilarious. Even the format is easily lampooned, like this PSA warning against the dangers of dad jokes. Stoner sloth is indeed unintentionally hilarious, and anyone that sees it or hears the sounds it makes will have a giggle fit for the ages:
https://youtu.be/7rHm8GbTHyE
Many thanks to the Australian government for this gem. Hopefully they'll go on to produce more anti-drug PSAs with Australian animals, like meth kangaroo and molly koala.
A little girl from New Jersey named Kimber is better at pretending to be Adele than any Vegas impersonator, because she really feels her feelings. "Hello" is all about feelings and so is Kimber. Look at her, in this video from earlier this month, with her fake guitar and footie pajamas, crooning from the depths of her personal experience of love and loss. You live a lot in three years of life when you feel things like Kimber does.
Kimbers rendition of Hello.With Kalynn Cooke and Reece Cooke
A little girl thought she saw Santa Claus at a West Virginia Walmart, and the Kris Kringle look-alike adorably played along. A large man with a big white beard should know better than to wear a red shirt in public in December, but he made up for his accidental Santa Claus cosplay by taking on the part.
When the adorable little girl asked, "Santa?" he replied, "Santa? I've been called a lot worse." Instead of crushing her dreams, he put on a one-man improv show for her, and made her Christmas. This guy is even better than Santa—he actually exists.
18 years ago, the popular TV show Seinfeldintroduced a magical holiday known as Festivus, a wacky alternative to Christmas made up by George Costanza's father. What most people don't realize is that Festivus is actually based in reality. Seinfeld writers Dan O'Keefe and Jeff Schaffer told Uproxx the origin story of the holiday fans have come to love, and it's not what you think.
Here are a few things you didn't know about Festivus:
1. Festivus was a real holiday that O'Keefe's Dad made up.
“It is a fake holiday my dad made up in the ’60s to celebrate the anniversary of his first date with my mother, and it was something that we celebrated as a family in a very peculiar way through the ‘70s, and then I never spoke of it again,” O’Keefe said in the interview.
2. The original Festivus wasn't based on Christmas, it wasn't even in December.
On Seinfeld, the Costanzas celebrated Festivus on December 23, but actually, the magic (or the horror) of the holiday could happen anytime.
“It was a floating holiday, it actually didn’t have a set date in real life, you could have it at any time. The only warning we got was coming home and getting off the school bus, and there was weird sh*t on the walls and strange music being played. But sometimes he said, ‘It’s starting to look a lot like Festivus,’ in a sort of ominous voice. That usually meant it’s going to happen in the next hour.
3. The Festivus pole was added by writers.
“The reality of the holiday was too peculiar to show on television,” O’Keefe said. “The real symbol of the holiday was a clock inside a bag nailed to the wall and nearby a sign that says, ‘F*ck Fascism.’ That doesn’t fly on network TV."
4. The airing of grievances, was however very real.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R60z_7vZ0YI
“Airing your grievances was a large portion of the original and it was done into a tape recorder,” O’Keefe explains.
5. Everyone prefers the Seinfeld version of Festivus to the original.
O'Keefe may have wanted to block out Festivus from his memory, but the Seinfeld version strikes a chord with people. The fictional holiday is still being celebrated almost two decades later.
Many photos were taken in the year 2015, and many of those photos were shared. There were selfies, baby nudes, and throwbacks. But these pictures? These are the mind-blowing pictures that blew the most minds.
Photographer Atif Saeed was taking wildlife photos in Pakistan and got out of his jeep to get closer to the lion. He told The Daily Mail:
I was sitting in front of him just near my car and the door of my car was open. I was sat on ground few feet away, so he was treating me like his prey… I was laughing at that time, but now when I think back about the incident I don't think I would be able to do it again. It was a pretty close encounter.
Worth it.
3. This two-faced cat.
https://www.instagram.com/p/-UUBRZggmS/
Venus, the "two face" cat, is indeed a real cat. The half black cat, half-tabby is an Instagram star, and hopefully will not team up with Harvey Dent anytime soon.
Holy sh*t. This past August, lightning struck a Delta Boeing 737 inches off the ground in Atlanta. Thankfully nobody was injured, but holy hell, that seems like a still from Independence Day.
Earlier this fall, the Internet went wild for the optical illusion coming out of this woman's cocktail, emphasis on the first syllable of "cocktail."
7. This tattoo that started a discussion about depression.
Bekah Miles is a 20-year-old college student who was diagnosed with depression, and her tattoo is a powerful encapsulation of what it feels like to suffer from a mental illness. To onlookers, it says, "I'm fine," but from her perspective, it says "save me." It speaks to the stigma and shame associated with depression, and that openness is the antidote.
8. This "Japanese Harry Potter."
https://www.instagram.com/p/1X94ExpUDA/
Japanese artist Halno dreamed of flying around the world by broom. While he unfortunately couldn't deny the laws of physics, he used the magic of jumping and optical illusions to live his dream, posting broom-flying pics from all over the world.
9. This pitbull/dachshund mix.
With the head of a pitbull and the body of a wiener dog, real dog Rami is trippy.
Astronaut Scott Kelly was chillin aboard the International Space Station in June when the noticed the reflection of the Mediterranean Sea truly highlights the cheekbones.
While celebrity selfies rarely blow minds (the celebs are almost always in full makeup, just happening to recline so glamorously), this pic of Chris Hemsworth is genuinely startling.
A two-year-old bear in Colorado was living the dream when he climbed up a tree to take a nap. To get him down, wildlife services tranquilized him and had safety mats handy. But the result is a soaring bear, the stuff Winnie the Pooh's dreams are made of.