Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

In Southern California, there's a bubbling mud pot which is apparently unique in that it moves, leaving a trail of devastated terrain in its wake. It also emits toxic and suffocating gases. It began to menace a road, train track, natural gas pipeline, but engineers were unable to stop it. No one really knows why it behaves so oddly, or when it might stop.

Which is, of course, why you want to use the details in your game, wrapped around a setting-appropriate cause. Perhaps a natural hazard for a new colony (space or historical) that doesn't have a lot of engineering resources. Or a fantasy game has an immediate option for appeasing earth elementals or contacting kobolds (not the D&D sort, the earthy kind) to barter for their aid in saving the village. Is it a mad scientist run amok in your Weird West game -- or worse, the remains from the old Indian burial ground have begun their march for revenge?

YouTube video, ~11 minutes for pictures, background, etc.

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

https://news.yahoo.com/two-planes-co...200447188.html

Some PC took the advantage, "Luck," that's for dam' sure. :)

It does raise the question, though.
What cargo did that twin-engine puddle-jumper have aboard that made it so imperative to bring it down?

And what do you mean, "nobody knows" who actually owns the small craft that hit it?

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

Less weird than just cool -- how Victorian era factories and prevailing wind patterns effected and still effect English cities.

https://www.economist.com/graphic-de...ar=nl_weekly_8

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

18-elephants-killed-in-lightning-strikes-in-assams-nagaonSounds like poachers with electrolasers to me.

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

Here's a version that doesn't require a login or relevant pop-up blocker plugin.

You'd think they could have found one that died in a little more dignified posture for the cover image of the story.

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

Half As Interesting did a video on the same topic.

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

So I learned today that "zombie" was British slang for a policewoman in the 1950s (and likely earlier). Anyone know why?

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

Best I can find is a contemporaneous usage of "zombie" to mean an extremely dour and joyless prison guard; possibly it derives from a perception of female coppers as likewise dour and joyless

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

I think this is an unfair stereotype. I know many zombies and they are party people. Who do you think does the Dance of the Dead?

Re: Real-Life Weirdness
 

Man, "British Invasion" becomes a totally new meaning.