"Ancillary Materials"

By Anna Rose Welch, Editorial & Community Director, Advancing RNA

New year, new quality-of-life-improving shenanigans…

• Remember that time you brought a box into the house and, instead of opening it to take out whatever is inside of it, your cats immediately staked their claim to said box, and you just let them have it forever? Meet this couple’s 3 cats and their (the cats’) new, beloved Vitamix blender.
• You’re all busy and important — but why not make it seem (and sound) like you’re even busier and more important? I have just the tool for you.
• We have so many “best of” lists come the end of December, it’s actually quite refreshing to find a list of the “worsts.” MIT Technology Review for the win! Here’s their list of the worst tech innovations of 2021. You may, or may not, be surprised but what ended up on here. (*hint* pharma makes an appearance.)
• “It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a…” fossilized shark vertebrae that looks exactly like an oatmeal cookie? Thanks to rock collectors in Texas, over 383 rocks were plucked from this earth because of their startling resemblance to foods and donated to stand in as the main courses, sides dishes, desserts, and beverages of “The Rock Food Table.”
• For any of you birders out there, I really enjoyed reading this long-form essay about the rise and fall of rare bird sighting hotlines. At one point there used to be upwards of 150 different bird sighting hotlines in North America. Of these, the author only found 3 still active today — one of which in Ohio is particularly important to the Amish community.
• Sure, your labradoodle puppy is cute. But have you ever seen a Japanese dwarf flying squirrel? (O.M.G.)
• It’s another long one, but it’s a good one — after all, this Medium article profiles the meteoric rise and swift plummet of a popular Brooklyn ice cream company. Not only do some of the former flavors make me mourn this company I didn’t even know existed, but from a business perspective, it’s an interesting piece to read now, especially as many CGT companies are raising impressive amounts of funding and making infrastructure investments earlier than ever used to be possible. (FYI — one of the nails in the coffin were some missteps in building an ice cream facility…)
• Why lick an ice cream cone when you can lick your TV and taste whatever food is appearing on the screen? This “Taste the TV” prototype is truly, truly bizarre, folks.