The Shaker Project – Many people enjoy collecting stuff. My mother collects Gourds, my uncle Beanie Babies, and I recently started collecting Balls. The Shaker Project is a salt & pepper shakers collection, offering a peep into one person’s amazing collection. To be completely honest, this website doesn’t have a whole lot of added value, but I personally found it intriguing and fun. Below are my favorite shakers. Shake it!

The National Geographic Image Collection – The National Geographic Image Collection is “an unparalleled treasury of iconic images and groundbreaking photography. The National Geographic Image Collection gathers together more than 11 million images chronicling the world from the end of the 19th century to the first decade of the 21st.” Although National Geographic does not offer us full access to the entire archive, the free access collection is a remarkable, mesmerizing photo mass. The images that made my day are just below, and if you like it so much, why don’t you treat yourself and buy the latest edition as a coffee table book?

Sh*t My Dad Says – At 28, Justin Halpern found himself girlfriend-less and back home with his 73 year old dad. That alone is considered by most an inconvenient reality. Instead of ranting about his miserable circumstances, Justin decided to make the most out of his dad’s hilarious presence and daily caustic anecdotes. Although these short Twitter-like quotes and statements contain an abundance of curse words, it’s absolutely funny and memorable.

So what kind of quotes will you find on Shit My Dad Says? Here are a couple of my favorites: “I didn’t say you were ugly. I said your girlfriend is better looking than you, and standing next to her, you look ugly.” “A parent’s only as good as their dumbest kid. If one wins a Nobel Prize but the other gets robbed by a hooker, you failed.” Simply irresistible to read!

Hail The Villain – This is going to be a short post: Not telling you what this cool, metal rock-ish quest game is about. Although you can play this game with or without your webcam, I strongly encourage you to choose the former because the enhancements are sweet perks. This is a well made, thrilling click-on-everything adventure game everyone will enjoy. Just make sure your volume is up high enough — you’ll appreciate it!

Pixel Basher – Pixel Basher is a remix of the classic Breakout game play. This time you have to break apart retro block characters. I love the old school aspect of the game, but I still prefer playing this Breakout version. By the way, we are in the process of transferring all our games to our new Games design. Check it here: Old vs. New.

I ♥ GAMES. Feel the love, too!

Welcome to the Weekly Games post, our weekly feed on the very best and newest games buzzing around the Web. Think of it as the perfect kickoff to your weekend; a sublime collection of excellent games, updated every Thursday.

We hope you enjoy these as much as we did, and now the game experience is even better with our new individual game page design (once you click on a certain game, you’ll be redirected to the new format).

Doeoriki – Doeo teams up with Gogoriki. Go, go! Doeriki! A collab between 4Kids TV and Raitendo.

Cursed Treasure – Defend the gems from the thieving enemy. Build towers along the path. Upgrade them to increase their powers.

Super Mario Crossover – Play classic Mario levels as other retro game characters. Watch your step!

Ninja-Pi-Ro – Be a Ninja, a Pirate and a Robot in this cool point and click adventure! A rare and valuable diamond has been stolen. This is a job for Ninja-Pi-Ro!

Pixelknight II – Jump ‘n slay through 16 maps filled with traps, treasure and evil monsters. Which of the 8 different weapons will become your favorite? Are you strong enough to fight till the end?

Destroy the Village – Control the missile as you try to blow up the children in different action scenarios.

Mr. Runner – Mr. Runner runs. Fast. It takes some serious skill to run him through the lava, ice, anti gravity while grabbing gold coins.

Radioactive Jack – Help hero Radioactive Jack to push all plutonium boxes on the indicated areas to deactivate them. Radioactive Jack can advance to the next room once all needed items are collected and all boxes are safely deactivated.

Graffitis – Meet the Graffitis: they’re cute, colourful and filled with paint! Squish a red, blue or yellow Graffiti to create a nice paint splat on the canvas. Explore different themes, mix colours, unlock achievements and… make a mess!

Torus – When you play Torus, a Tetris-based game. Instead of stacking and eliminating bricks on a flat surface, you’re now building a cylindrical tower of blocks.

iFixit – Guided by the underlining premise that “throwing things away when they break is unsustainable,” iFixit aims to bring us all to the electronics refurbishing field. Offering numerous manuals for many different devices and electronic products, iFixit believes every one can fix just about anything, with clear step by step guides anyone can understand and edit.

What do I mean by edit? iFixit invites its user community to contribute its technical know-how to perfecting the existing guides on the site, and even went as far as explaining how to write effective manual repair guides. I am absolutely thrilled with everything iFixit offers and stands for, and I always appreciate branching out to the global community for the sake of making the world a better, more sustainable place for all of us. They also support some serious causes you should check out. To get a glimpse of the iFixit effect, see the rightly hyped iFixit manual below, for the iPad 3G Teardown.

Truthdig – Tired of biased, superficial articles and posts? Feel like you’re getting lip service from the media giants? So do I, more often than not. That’s why I urge you to visit this wonderful, truly in-depth news source, Truthdig. As the name suggests, Truthdig’s goal is “to provide you with insightful and accurate reporting on current subjects and on issues that need to be brought to your attention. We want to challenge conventional wisdom.”

I’m always for provocative, iconoclastic news providers, but I find that the mere goal of such providers often overshadows their actual content quality. This is definitely not the case with the award-winning Truthdig. Their editors and team of writers should get the recognition they deserve; they offer superb and engaging articles, reports, even podcasts on relevant current topics. If you’re interested in tapping into the actual reality of current affairs, Truthdig is your main stop.

I especially enjoyed reading the insightful report on The Good Ol’ Days Before Anesthesia by Eugene Robinson.

Shmoop – Don’t let the somewhat silly name mislead you in terms of this site’s manifesto and power. According to their About page, Shmoop is here “to make learning and writing more fun and relevant for students in the digital age.” Equipped with an expert team of Ph.D.’s and Masters’ from ivy league institutions, Shmoop is dead set on making every student and teacher shine in class and more importantly, in their own mind. The Shmoop modus operandi is simply beautiful, and I suggest starting with their tour.

To really see Shmoop in action, see their many different entries and interesting info on Native American History for example. At first, you get a ‘nutshell’ overview, brilliantly written of course. Next, you have many other insightful features you can choose to dive into, such as the timeline, related citation, people, facts, even a test review! Add the almost infinite collection of subjects and guides, and you end up with one of the Web’s best learning and teaching resources ever! You’ll also be happy to know Shmoop has an app available for various mobile devices.

moneyStrands – How do you keep track of your money and expenses? There’s the online bank account of course, the necessity of which is obvious. There are also numerous budget and money organization software tools out there, but most require paid subscriptions. I personally believe that personal finance aids should be free for all. Don’t you? Fortunately, there’s one amazing personal finance website that agrees with me: moneyStrands.

What’s so special about moneyStrands? It “automatically pulls together data from your checking, savings, credit card and loan accounts to provide an accurate, up-to-date picture of your financial life broken down by meaningful automatically identified categories along with flexible user defined transaction types.” And the best part about it is that it’s 100% free. Now you’re talking! This online tool is an absolute must, offering a sleek, fun and extremely easy to use interface. For more personal finance resources, visit our Business page and scroll down alphabetically to Personal Finance. Start saving today!

BoostUp – This is a unique non-profit organization aimed at one thing: giving positive feedback and encouragements to high school students. The rationale behind this action is simple; good encouragement by other students, teachers and parents increase high school students’ chances of graduation. The BoostUp website is beautifully executed, offering simple Boost options (you can send those via email or text message), swanky design and totally right-on reasons why to Boost in the first place. This site is especially important for parents. Why? Find out. So what are you waiting for? Do it.

Liquid Generation – Liquid Generation “has been corrupting the internet since 2000. We make funny, irreverent entertainment for web junkies and procrastinators of all types. From cartoons to videos, from games to online pranks, we do it all and we do it awesome.” Don’t be offended by the content here, they just want to make us laugh. I especially enjoyed Hollywood Farts, Oh My Gosh and 100 Greatest Movie Lines of All Time!