Yes, exactly. Astronaut Don Pettit is on the International Space Station, and he demonstrates some fun yo-yo maneuvers. He also gives a bit of a science lesson, and explains how to use physics to succeed in life. For a little background, and some more videos, check out Yo-Yos in Space! on MentalFloss.com. Read More >>

As a UCLA physician and Los Angeles Zoo consultant, Barbara Natterson-Horowitz began to notice striking similarities between health problems in humans and animals. Cougars, for example, are susceptible to breast cancer; elephants, birds, and even dogs can become addicted to psychotropic berries, plants, and, no joke, the toxins from the skin of toads. The… Read More >>

I've been making my favorite tomato dish for the last two weeks: Take good bread, add a skim of mayonnaise, top with a thick tomato slice and sprinkle of coarse salt, and eat. Die of summer happiness and go back for more. But after 20+ sandwiches, I'm ready to try something different: eggs baked in tomatoes, Caprese dip, savory tomato shortcake. And cute… Read More >>

A new effort from TiVo, the media company famous for pioneering DVR, is looking to help war veterans find a place in the workforce through internships. Tom Rogers, TiVo Inc.'s CEO, and Tom Wolzien, a Vietnam veteran and member of TiVo's board of directors, detailed the program in an editorial published Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal.

"Since we have internships for college students, why not vets?" they wrote. "A resume credential 'buffer,' such as the internship, answers the critical question of whether a veteran can successfully transition to civilian employment."

TiVo hired 10 veterans out of a pool of hundreds for the inaugural term this summer, and the initiative has shown success so far: "a number" of the interns will actually be hired on a permanent basis after the program, Rogers and Wolzien announced in the Journal.

Given the serious difficulties veterans face when transitioning into an already tough job market—difficulties Reader's Digest explored in a recent feature in our June issue—we applaud TiVo not only for launching their Summer Veterans Intern Program, but for continuing to bring attention to the cause on a national platform.

Now we want to hear from you as we continue to follow this story across America. If you're a veteran or are making efforts to help employ our veterans at work, email editor@rd.com, or comment below.

For more: Read "You're Welcome, America, Now Hire Us" »

What if Kurt Russell, and not Harrison Ford, had been tapped to play Han Solo in Star Wars? What if George Lucas had passed over Mark Hamill in favor of William Katt, he of the massive head of yellow hair? Would the movie still seem the same to those of us who revere it (I’m not one of them, mind you, but I do feel for others)? Well, here’s your chance to find…

Even before he stepped into the election spotlight as Mitt Romney's running mate, Paul Ryan, the young blue-eyed Republican Representative from Wisconsin, was gifted dreamboat status with "Hey Girl, It's Paul Ryan," the latest political Tumblr sensation based on the viral "Hey Girl" meme featuring Ryan Gosling.

The original idea was inspired last May by a detail from a New York Times profile of Ryan that mentions his penchant for fishing catfish with his bare hands. Three 20-something friends set a Tumblr account in action, pairing pictures of Ryan with good-natured pick-up lines playing off his budget plan and GOP policies. Although the girls stopped posting after Ryan appeared uncomfortable with…

As we inch towards November and the campaigning intensifies, it will be fun to see if Ryan follows Hillary's lead, and submits a "Hey Girl" of his own.

Photo credit: United States Congress/Wikipedia Commons

Every now and then a great writer finds his ideal subject. Herman Melville on whaling. F. Scott Fitzgerald on the American Dream. Joseph Heller on World War II. I would add to that list the crazed genius Dr. Hunter S. Thompson on the 1972 presidential campaign. With the 2012 race heating up right on schedule, now’s the time to crack open Thompson’s…

“Unlike most other correspondents,” Thompson writes in the book’s intro, “I could afford to burn all of my bridges behind me—because I was only there for a year, and the last thing I cared about was establishing long-term connections on Capitol Hill.”

Burn he did. On Democrat Hubert Humphrey: “When he ran for President four years ago he was a hack and a fool, but at least he was consistent. Now he talks like an eighty-year-old woman who just discovered speed.” On Maine Senator Edmund Muskie, also a Democrat: “Sending Muskie against Nixon would have been like sending a three-toed sloth out to seize…

Yes, it’s over the top, way over the top. And, be warned, there’s a lot of offensive language, too.  But Thompson was a first-rate journalist who mixed his feverish “Gonzo” fantasies with some of the best political and cultural reporting of that or any time. So if you want to know what the country was like back then, when the Vietnam War was still…

I got into the wrong end of this business.

Seriously. Publishing is made up of two groups, the folks who write the books and the folks who get them to the public. I am of one of the latter. I edit books for a living, and to be honest, I thought I was doing pretty well until I read the Forbes list of the world’s top earning authors. At the very top is James Patterson, a perennial in this spot. His income last year? $94 million. And his books…

I didn’t make anywhere near $94 million last year, and most of my job I had to do myself.

Stephen King, who almost quit writing for good after he was practically killed by a minivan while taking a walk in 1999, made the right choice to hit the books again, coming in second with $39 million. Then again, that is less than half of Patterson’s take. Steve, I would suggest some co-authors.

Janet Evanovich pulls down a plum $33 million in third place, nipping right at King’s heels. The other women in the top ten are veterans Nora Roberts and Danielle Steel, and relative newcomer Suzanne Collins. In fact, according to Forbes, the story this year is indeed the rise of women. There are more Hunger Gamesmovies still to hit the silver screen, so look for…

Sigh. If this doesn’t make you fire up Word, nothing will.

If you hit it big, you become a meme like Feminist Ryan Gosling. If you make it huge, you are transformed into a toy like the Nicki Minaj Barbie doll. And when you become a legend, you are crafted into a coloring book. That's right: Bill Murray is currently the luckiest man alive and it's not because he got to kiss Scarlett Johansson in Lost In Translation. The Thrill Murray Coloring Bookfeatures 24 quirky illustrations that depict the actor playing his classic… Read More >>

Tomorrow marks the 25th anniversary of one of the worst disasters in U.S. aviation history: On August 16, 1987, Northwest Airlines flight 255 crashed in Romulus, Michigan shortly after takeoff while en route to Phoenix, Arizona. All on board were killed except one, the sole survivor Cecelia Cichan. Dubbed the "miracle child," the four-year-old suffered a… Read More >>