For those without a piloting license or a bachelor’s degree in a STEM field (like this writer), the Indeed posting for the Clear Lake City reffing gig might be worth checking out.
Pay starts at $12 an hour and all that’s needed is some experience and the gumption to enforce “NASA’s flag football rules, policies, and procedures.”
The job posting gave no clue as to whether or not the reffing outfit comes with the iconic NASA patch.
Apparently the week that country music’s biggest and brightest stars are honored at this year’s Country Music Awards seemed as good a time as any for Jimmy Kimmel to bring those same stars on his show and have them read mean tweets about themselves.
The “Country Music Edition” of Jimmy Kimmel’s “Celebrities read mean tweets about themselves” series included Willie Nelson, Kacey Musgraves, Luke Bryan, Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisely, just to name a few.
As in “Mean Tweets” past, the tweets ranged in meanness and most of the celebrities were able to laugh about the terrible things said about them.
Watch Nelson laugh off someone who wished he was dead:
Were you an astronaut for Halloween? Want to be one for real? NASA is looking for applicants, as evidenced in a new social media campaign tagged with the hashtag #BeAnAstronaut:
“In anticipation of returning human spaceflight launches to American soil, and in preparation for the agency’s journey to Mars, NASA announced it will soon begin accepting applications for the next class of astronaut candidates,” reads a statement posted to their website today.
NASA has turned to its 448,000-plus Twitter followers and 13 million Facebook fans to pique application interest and fight off myths that becoming an astronaut is out of reach.
No need for an advance degree, perfect vision, military experience or piloting experience, according to a GIF-heavy post on NASA’s Tumblr today. (Yes, NASA has its own Tumblr)
NASA social media posts have boasted that there are actually only three “straightforward” base requirements:
The above checklist seems simple enough as long as you know what “related experience” is in this case (we don’t) or you have “at least 1,000 hours of pilot-in-command time in jet aircraft.”
Still don’t believe that NASA is waiting on you to apply? Then maybe consider tuning into their live chat today in which they suggest that they are going to dispel whatever remaining fears stand between you and applying:
If you’re convinced, remember to bookmark Dec. 14, the date applications open. Also, get ready to be patient: the astronaut class of 2015 won’t be announced until June 2017.
Matthew McConaughey has said “Alright, alright, alright” to hosting Saturday Night Live for the first time since 2003, according to Entertainment Weekly.
ARLINGTON, TX – SEPTEMBER 28: Matthew McConaughey, founder of the Just Keep Livin Foundation, speaks to the media about its partnership with The Texas Rangers Baseball Foundation before a game between the Texas Rangers and the Detroit Tigers at Globe Life Park in Arlington on September 28, 2015 in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Sarah Crabill/Getty Images)
Back then, the sometimes Austin-based actor was just coming off “How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days” and “Sahara.” 12 years later, McConaughey makes his return to the long-running show with an Oscar (“Dallas Buyers Club”) and a number of nominations for award-winning shows and films (“True Detective,” “Interstellar” and “Mud” just to name a few) under his belt.
The actor and UT alum has never truly been absent from the show, however. As you may remember, Jim Carrey has filled in for him a number of times, like last year after McConaughey debuted a series of dramatic commercials for Lincoln:
The show, set for Nov. 21, will feature Adele as a musical guest. This will be the award-winning singer’s first time on the show since her first appearance in 2008, thought by many to be one of SNL’s best musical moments ever.
(Photo by Mark VonHolden/Invision for HTC/AP Images)
New Yorker Jay Z doesn’t think much of Texas pizza.
While interviewing on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” earlier this week, Jay Z fielded a question about his wife Beyonce’s eccentric pizza tastes.
Apparently, Queen Bey likes her pizza with extra sauce and jalapenos, a rare combination that to say the least is not widely regarded, especially by Brooklyn natives.
“She’s from Houston first of all, and they don’t have pizza there… That explains everything,” Jay Z tells Kimmel when confronted.
The good nerds behind Google Trends have set up a Halloween-specific page with all the Google trends data regarding Halloween costumes they have lying around.
Screenshot
Their one-stop shop data summary page will show you real-time data for what’s couple costumes are trending, what “Star Wars’ costumes are trending and even what dog costumes are trending.
In other words, if you dress up as Minion on Halloween and run into someone else dressed similarly, you’ve been warned.
As if that wasn’t enough, Google has also built an interactive map, which they call “Frightgeist,” so you can see what costumes are trending across the country.
By the way, as of this writing, the trending costume in Austin was a dinosaur.
Frightgeist will also provide historical data for each costume and estimate your chances of running into that costume on Halloween.
If you have a few minutes and no Halloween costume, it’s worth checking out:
Looking for an original costume this year? Then you might heed a new study by Estately, a real estate website and blog.
Credit: Estately
Though it conceded that the data would not in fact help any of their clientele make real estate decisions, Estately recently went about identifying the most “googled” costumes in the 50 states.
The most searched costume in Texas? Real life person Caitlyn Jenner.
The costume, modeled after Jenner’s first public appearance on Vanity Fair as “Caitlyn,” has been the subject of much controversy over the last few months. Nearly 20,000 have signed a Change.org petition asking the costume maker to “stop exploiting Caitlyn Jenner with a transphobic costume.”
Some might cringe at the fact that the controversial costume is Texas most searched costume, but it should be noted that Estately’s findings only indicate Internet interest, not what people are actually wearing on Halloween.
Estately, which used 11 years of Google Trends data for their findings, also found that Texans were searching in large quantities for:
ant, barbarian, Bigfoot, Caitlyn Jenner, Cat in the Hat, Cowboys cheerleader, Dalmatian, Daphne (Scooby Doo), Dr. Who, Duck Dynasty, Flintstones, football, Fred Flintstone, Freddy Kreuger, gingerbread man, goat, good witch, hillbilly, hobo, Honey Boo Boo, Klu Klux Klan, lizard, luchador mask, movie star, NASCAR, Nazi, Pacman, Pebbles Flintstone, Predator, Rainbow Bright, Rainbow Dash, rock star, Roman soldier, saloon girl, Tooth Fairy (tie with New York), white trash, Wilma Flintstone, 1950s
The diversity of Texas’ findings prompted Estately to note:
“The funniest part about Texas costume party is when the people wearing KKK and Nazi costumes get beat up by those in Rainbow Bright and Rainbow Dash costumes.”
What do you think, Texas? Do Estately’s findings ring true?
This year has already seen its fair share of Halloween costume controversy. A “Cecil the lion” costume and a costume mocking Caitlyn Jenner‘s debut as a woman on Vanity Fair’s cover hit stores this past summer.
The most recent costume to raise eyebrows this year is that of a Texas schoolboy.
Dallas-area Muslim teenager Ahmed Mohamed first made headlines mid-September when he was arrested for bringing to school a clock that was mistaken for a bomb.
Since the incident, which drew a national discussion about Islamophobia and race, Mohamed has gone on to garner worldwide recognition and support, including from President Obama and NASA.
Cool clock, Ahmed. Want to bring it to the White House? We should inspire more kids like you to like science. It's what makes America great.
For $79.99, the “Clock Boy Meme” costume will get you a NASA shirt, glasses, fake handcuffs and a case with electrical parts that to some recall a clock and to others, a bomb.
If you don’t think the fact that adults are dressing like a real-life kid isn’t controversial, you might note that tagged in Costumeish’s tweet introducing the costume is comedian Bill Maher, an outspoken critic of Islam and defender of those of who arrested the 14-year-old.
How important is it to use good grammar? How important is it for candidates running for our nation’s highest office to use good grammar? What about their supporters?
(AP Photo/Mark Zaleski)
Though it was guaranteed to ruffle feathers, an online grammar website called Grammarly recently went about ranking presidential candidates based on their supporters’ grammar skills, in the name of “intelligent discourse.”
For their sample, they took positive comments left on each candidate’s official Facebook page and ran them through both their own online grammar checker as well as a team of live proofreaders.
Not counting common slang, serial comma usage or the use of numerals instead of spelled-out numbers, Grammarly dialed in instead on what they call “black-and-white mistakes” like misspellings; wrong and missing punctuation; misused or missing words; and subject-verb disagreement.
Overall, supporters of Democratic candidates came out on top, making fewer mistakes per 100 words. Grammarly also found that Democratic supporters use a wider vocabulary.
The best grammar prize ultimately went to longshot Democratic presidential hopeful Lincoln Chafee, whose supporters made an average of only 3.1 mistakes per 100 words. Of the 19 supporter bases evaluated, Donald Trump’s did the worst, recording 12.6 mistakes per 100 words.
You can find the full rankings below and more of Grammarly’s methodology here.
We don’t always cover Justin Bieber, but when we do, it’s because he has said incredibly odd things about tacos.
Photo by Theo Wargo/NBC/Getty Images
The 21-year-old Canadian singer recently appeared on Complex magazine’s cover and gave a “comeback” interview of sorts.
In between opening up about the rocky years that followed his sudden fame at age 16, ex-girlfriends, his pet monkey and his recent hits, the Biebs offered up some words to explain his faith and relationship with God.
In explaining that his faith is important but that he doesn’t necessarily feel the need to go to church, Bieber offered:
“It doesn’t make you a Christian just by going to church. I think that going to church is fellowship, it’s relationship, it’s what we’re here on the earth to do, to have this connection that you feel there’s no insecurities. I think that’s where we need to be. Like I said, you don’t need to go to church to be a Christian. If you go to Taco Bell, that doesn’t make you a taco.”
What do you think, humans? And how do you feel about what Bieber said, tacos?
If one were to become a taco, where would one go in Austin?
