A Web of Dumb Laws and Paper Clips

The World Wide Web is a great place to turn when you’re looking for a diversion. Cutting Edge readers certainly know this--they’ve sent us scores of interesting recommendations. Based on their suggestions, this week’s column is another random walk through cyberspace:

* If you made a New Year’s resolution to live healthier, stop by VegSource Interactive at https://www.vegsource.org. This site, produced locally, includes two dozen message boards on topics ranging from gardening to veganism to bio-spirituality. An online magazine presents alternative views about diet fads, artificial sweeteners and more. There are charts of nutritional information on all kinds of foods (including such non-vegetarian items as beef, poultry and fish), along with book reviews and more than 5,000 recipes. There are even tips for new vegetarians (Step 1: Reduce intake of meats and give yourself larger portions of rice, potatoes and vegetables).

* While the economy is booming, it’s a good time to step back into the Great Depression via historical photographs commissioned by the Farm Security Administration--Office of War Information. The collection, “America from the Great Depression to World War II” (https://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fsahtml/fahome.html), includes works of migrant workers in California, dust storms in Oklahoma, cotton pickers in Arkansas and dispossessed city dwellers in New York. You can search the images according to their photographer, including such greats as Dorothea Lange and Walker Evans (biographies are included of each). You can also peruse the most popular images and those recommended by experts. More than 55,000 images are part of this Library of Congress exhibition.

* If you don’t know how your VCR works and you want to find out, stop by How Stuff Works (https://www.howstuffworks.com). This site won’t show you how to set your machine to record “ER,” but it will tell you how it can fit hours of video data on a flimsy piece of tape. You can also find out how car engines, wireless phones, smoke detectors, toilets, the power distribution grid, radar, digital clocks, modems, the stock market, your immune system and even Web pages work. There’s also a fascinating section that shows the inside of household items such as TV remote controls and bathroom scales.

* The MIDI Studio Consortium (https://midistudio.com) is like an online jukebox. Select an artist, then choose the song you want to play. Music styles include pop hits, contemporary, jazz standards, easy listening, classical, patriotic, big band and bluegrass. A section called the Faculty of MIDI Music includes a library with tips for enhancing and editing your own MIDI files.

* Read up on the history of one of America’s greatest icons, the Star-Spangled Banner, at https://www.historychannel.com/starspangled. You’ll learn that although Continental Congress decided the American flag should have 13 red and white stripes and 13 white stars on a blue background, it didn’t specify how they should be arranged. As a result, there were several versions of the Stars and Bars for 40 years. You’ll also learn that the 42-by-30-foot flag on display at the National Museum of American History took six weeks to sew and attracts 5 million visitors each year.

* If you’ve got a RealNetworks RealPlayer, you can download files of articles read out loud from the New Yorker, Harper’s, Wired and other magazines at Assistive Media (https://www.assistivemedia.org). The site is designed for people with “print reading/access barriers,” and the American Foundation for the Blind allows them to download RealPlayer for free.

* Did you know it is illegal to drive more than 2,000 sheep down Hollywood Boulevard at one time? Or that it is illegal to curse on a mini-golf course in Long Beach? How about the law that says horror films may be shown in Glendale only on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays? These and other dumb laws are listed at https://www.dumblaws.com.

* If you don’t have enough challenges in your life, stop by Puzzability at https://www.puzzability.com/puzzles/index.html. There are crossword-style puzzles, hangman-style games, a variant of Boggle and puzzling quotations. Here’s a sample question: “Take a seven-letter word that could be defined as ‘gathered some liquid.’ Move the L currently in the fifth position to the second position and you’ll get another word that could be defined as ‘gathered some liquid.’ What are these words?” Answer: “Bottled and Blotted.”

* Read up on the intriguing history of the paper clip at https://www.acco.com/office/html/history.html. A Norwegian named Johan Vaaler invented the indispensable office supply in 1866, although the standard double-oval shape (known as the Gem clip) didn’t come along until a few decades later in England. For a more tongue-in-cheek paper clip history, check out https://www.net-effect.co.uk/clipit/history.htm. This site includes paper clip pictographs in the famous caves of Lascaux, France.

* The Brunching Shuttlecocks (https://www.brunching.com) are self-described purveyors of satire. “So if you see famous names or trademarks,” their site explains, “that’s why. Non-famous names are a coincidence.” Other random bits of humor include reviews of Schoolhouse Rock tunes and of “the worst unseen movies of 1998.” An aerospace engineer’s proposal to spend 500 years building an interstellar spacecraft elicited several other humorous suggestions of ways to spend 500 years. There’s also the Alanis Lyric Generator, so that visitors can just type in a few words and write a song like the angst-ridden Generation X crooner Alanis Morissette.

Karen Kaplan can be reached at karen.kaplan@latimes.com. Send Internet site suggestions to cutting.edge@latimes.com.