This week was mostly notable for just how unbelievably, unforgivingly cold it was. Across the US Midwest, temperatures plummeted to a level usually reserved for the depths of Siberia. While snow and ice filled our screens, there was still plenty of other stuff going on, from political developments in Washington to our usual mix of tragedy and weirdness elsewhere. 10 The Midwest Froze So that’s what it feels like to live in Antarctica....

This week was one of those weeks that will go down in political history. For the first time since it became a separate state, a sitting US president met with the leader of North Korea, at a special summit so improbable that Kim Jong Un joked it was like something “from a science fiction movie.” More on this epoch-shaking event below, along with the other stories you may have missed while the media was focused on Singapore....

We all have a pretty good idea of how a stereotypical medieval person looked, largely thanks to TV. Unfortunately, a lot of it is completely wrong. For one thing, razors have been around for thousands of years and wouldn’t have been hard to find, even for someone who didn’t have much money. The Crusaders brought back soap from the Middle East (along with many other things), so after 1200, cleanliness was better than we might imagine....

10Lyndon Johnson Was Nearly Shot By A Secret Service Agent November 22, 1963 was a dark day in American history. Just 30 minutes after the noon hour on a short Dallas road with the unpretentious name of Elm Street, President John Kennedy was shot and killed in the back of his limo. On JFK’s elite Secret Service detail was four-year veteran special agent Gerald Blaine. Fifty years later, what Blaine remembered about that day was how suddenly the detail had to change their focus from the Kennedy family to that of Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson....

10Cramped Mobile Home Mayhem In 2013, a Georgia jury convicted Guy Heinze Jr., 26, of beating eight people to death in a cramped mobile home. The conflict allegedly began over prescription pills. The victims included Heinz’s father, cousin, along with his father’s four children. A half sister and her boyfriend were also slain. Their three-year-old child suffered head trauma but survived. To avoid a hung jury, the prosecution settled for life in prison rather than the death penalty....

The government of Singapore launched the Speak Mandarin Campaign in 1979 to promote, as the name implies, the speaking of Mandarin amongst Chinese Singaporeans. This policy has come under heavy criticism, especially since the majority of Chinese Singaporeans are from southern China, where mostly non-Mandarin Chinese languages are spoken. As part of the campaign, the government banned non-Mandarin Chinese languages in local broadcast media, and foreign media in those languages is limited....

10Recognition Of The Wyrm We have talked before about the pervasive belief in elves in Iceland, where concerns over the habitats of these invisible people have affected highway construction. But elves aren’t the only mythological creatures enjoying official recognition in the country. Lake Lagarfljot near Egilsstadir in eastern Iceland is home to Lagarfljotsormurinn, a legendary sea serpent or wyrm monster that has been the subject of folk tales since the 14th century....

10 Mark Bridger Mark Bridger spent his days drinking, watching pornographic videos, and looking at indecent images of children. After he had spent a typical evening drinking in 2012, he drove around to find a young girl. He stumbled upon five-year-old April Jones. Jones went into Bridger’s car, and she was never seen again. Bridger was arrested the next day. He admitted that he had killed Jones. However, he claimed that it was an accident....

10Novmichi TosaOtamatone If you’ve spent much time on the Internet, you’ve likely encountered the otamatone. Created by Novmichi Tosa, the otamatone is an electronic, note-shaped instrument with an adorable face. To play the instrument, the user presses down on the neck and squeezes the instrument’s mouth to create an obnoxious squeak or a booming groan (depending on the instrument’s size). Despite creating one of the most annoying instruments on the planet, Novmichi Tosa and his art collective, Maywa Denki, are actually musical maestros....

Many have died and went missing in the wilderness over the years, often with little or no explanation. This list takes a look at some of these enduring mysteries—and if you have any theories on these cases, mention them in the comments below. 10 Aaron Hedges The Crazy Mountains of Montana have long been seen as a harsh, rugged range of wilderness with a sense of mystery. Aaron Joseph Hodges, 38 years old, ventured into the Crazies on an elk hunt in September 2014, but he separated from his friends and wandered off-trail....

10Chestnut Ridge Park Located behind a waterfall in Shale Creek Preserve south of Chestnut Ridge Park in Northwestern Pennsylvania lies a strange natural flame that is made even more beautiful and odd because you can see it through the falling water of the waterfall. Legend has it the flame was first lit by Native Americans thousands of years ago. Though we know the Chestnut Rige Park’s fuel source (ethane and propane), scientists do not know where it is coming from or how it gets to the rocky enclosure....

Upon receiving such a warm welcome when arriving in what appears to be paradise, many visitors let their guard down completely in order to make the most of the time they have available. This list, however, is a reminder that we should always remain vigilant, no matter how beautiful our surroundings are. Here are 10 nightmarish murders that happened in dream holiday destinations. 10 Sarah Groves—Kashmir, India Sarah Groves was a 24-year-old fitness instructor from the UK who was traveling around India when she arrived in the southern city of Goa....

10 Glass Armonica The glass armonica was invented by Benjamin Franklin in 1761. It was widely played by musicians and famous composers; Mozart and Beethoven even wrote lines for it. Things began to go downhill for the instrument when musicians playing it began to complain about its vibration, which they claimed entered their bodies through their fingers and left them with mental illness and muscular pain. The complaints were so serious that some musicians even stopped playing it....

But despite its general malaise, the Hermit Kingdom exports things of some value for foreign currency. There are both legitimate and illegitimate items North Korea sells abroad. 10Coal When we think of China’s largest foreign source of coal, we do not think of North Korea. However, that’s exactly what North Korea recently became. Coupled with an overall fall in China’s coal imports from other nations, shipments from North Korea jumped 25 percent to a total of 1....

This week, mathematics gets a fair bit of attention, both good and bad. There are a few strange stories involving animals and new discoveries made regarding old places. And let’s not forget a great moment in firefighting history. 10 Fields Medal Is Stolen Daring thieves were particularly active this week. First, the Swedish crown jewels were stolen in a brazen speedboat heist. Then, a villain purloined the most prestigious award in mathematics just minutes after it was awarded....

Even humble Fred Rogers, the charming, mild-mannered man who graced our childhoods with his soft smiles and cardigan sweaters, has been mercilessly pulled apart. In the absence of any real dirt on the man, people have taken to making up stories to make him sound like everything he wasn’t. But Fred Rogers wasn’t a hardened criminal, a secret pedophile, or anything else you may have heard. He was, in the words of one who knew him, “essentially the same guy off-camera as he was on-camera....

See Also: 10 Paranormal Events Linked To Mass Tragedies 10. Magic Bullets Charles Fort is famous for four books he wrote in the early 1900s that collected what he called “damned data”… stuff that is now usually labeled as ‘paranormal.’ Fort’s books were instrumental in creating continuing interest in such matters, but, of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean everything he printed was truthful. In Fort’s 1932 book Wild Talents, he presents examples of people being found shot to death with no bullet holes in their clothing, a somewhat perplexing problem....

Helen Porter Mitchell (1861-1931) began her opera career and became a famous singer under the stage name Nellie Melba. While staying at the Savoy Hotel in London in 1897, Auguste Escoffier invented Melba Toast in her honor (this is very thinly sliced and toasted bread which is served usually with soups). A great fan of Melba, Escoffier had invented Peach Melba for her four years earlier (1893). It was during this period of time working at the Savoy, that Escoffier and César Ritz met....

See Also: 10 Horrifically Botched Executions [DISTURBING] 10 Miraculous Malfunctions During the early morning hours of November 15, 1884, a woman named Emma Keyse was found dead in her home near Torquay, Devon, England. She had been murdered, and the house had been set on fire. The only man in the house at the time was John Lee, often referred to as John “Babbacombe” Lee. Due to a cut on his arm, he became a suspect and was charged with Keyse’s murder before long....

Not only is sexual reproduction quite costly for the organisms, evolutionarily speaking, but we also don’t quite know for sure why we find so many things, like breasts, for example, sexually arousing, especially when other animals that also reproduce sexually aren’t like this. Now, we’re not saying that we’re closer to figuring out the evolutionary reasons for sexual reproduction than qualified scientists, but we can certainly look into the various theories that try to do just that....