“My many-year-old rain jacket has a smooth, somewhat flexible, seemingly plastic object sewn into the upper arm of the right sleeve only. What is it?”
“Radar reflector for avalanche rescue purposes.”
“I bought this dish in a thrift store, thinking it might be good for tacos. It wasn’t ideal. What’s its actual purpose?”
“Looks like a toast rack to me.”
“Curved metal piece with purple gem on one end and a ball on the other. Found in a jar of buttons. Gem maybe plastic. The only identifying mark is the stamp ’E Ira R.’”
“That’s an old cufflink.”
“Hinged rods above windows in the sunroom of a 1968 home. Rods able to turn, about 7 inches long.”
“They’re towel hangers. No idea why someone would install them over their windows, though.”
“A heavy wooden block with a metal front and silver welding.”
“Looks like it’s some schematic for some sort of device that uses a pendulum to time when pictures should be taken.”
“What is this round, frosted glass thing in the corner of the ceiling of every room in our Airbnb?”
“Looks like motion sensors to me for a security system. I’ve had the same ones installed in my last house. They would be at least 15 years old. Modern ones are far subtler.”
“This is a lump of green glass with white inclusions or spots in it. The glass has sharp and smooth edges and appears to have been shattered.”
“Lovellite. In the 1920s, in Lovell, Wyoming, a glass factory had a devastating fire. Exact dates vary depending on source and lore. What is certain is what it produced in the aftermath. The mineral wollastonite developed in the globs of glass that melted in the fire. Inclusions from spherical to octagon crystallography developed in the green-blue glass. Locals gathered the material and sold it to tourists and travelers passing through. Word got to the mineral collector community, and popularity peaked because of the uncommon mechanism that caused it.”
“Round ceramic object, approx 8 inches in diameter.”
“Cat slow feeder"
“Blue rubber object found in the kitchen after someone stayed here.”
“It’s a silicone hot plate picker-upper from the Bacchanal buffet at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas.”
“Found these clumps of fibers in my apartment and at first thought they were cat hair, but they are too thick and break easily when bent.”
“It was deer hair from a cat toy — my cat sitter brought this attachment, and my cats stole/destroyed it. I had no idea they made cat toys with deer hair!”
“Metal shards inside the shower head of the place I’m renting? What are these, and why are they in there?”
“Surely they are solder from copper plumbing. If you overheat the pipes while soldering, long strands like this can form on the inside. Definitely a sign of improper soldering, if that’s what they are.”
“Pottery found at the thrift store. It has metal hooks inside.”
“So I phoned the shop that sells her work, and it’s 100% for paintbrushes.”
“Strange tool. About 7” long and made of stainless steel."
“It is used for cutting bonsai trees.”
“What is this thing I inherited from my grandparents? What I know is that it’s Scandinavian, over 40 years old, made of glass, spoon-shaped, hollow, and about 1m tall.”
“It was used to heat portions of food in the olden days.”
“Small plastic object. Has a cap that covers 2 small nubs on top.”
“I was over here assuming it was for 2 part epoxy.”
“This came out of an 18-wheeler trailer. No one in the warehouse knew what it’s for. It’s roughly 40 inches long and all metal. This is the second one we’ve found.”
“Battery cable retractor.”
“Black liquid that appears to have dripped from the ceiling, right underneath a light.”
“Bad ballast, they are potted with that goo.”
“Hollow small glass object with a weird opening. What is it?”
"Glass vase/flower holder."
“Spoon type thing with a metal plate and hole?”
“That is a soup spoon for mustachioed gentlemen.”
“What is this weird rubber penguin thing? It’s about 7 inches tall.”
“It’s a dive stick. Throw it in the pool. Dive down and get it.”
“I found it in a forest in Sweden, about 1 m from the ground, roughly 20 cm in size. Hard to the touch, but drips liquid when knocked.”
“Looks like a polypore fungus that is exuding excess moisture, called guttation.”
“I got a bag containing 6 of these from China. I have no idea why! What are they?”
"Rose of Jericho (Resurrection Plant, Dinosaur Plant, Jericho Rose)"
“Husband’s truck exploded, this came out.”
“It’s the inside bits, the catalyst, of a catalytic converter.”
“My colleague gave me this. I have no idea what it is. It’s about 5 cm high and 4.5 cm whide. At the bottom is a suction cup.”
“Looks like a phone stand.”
“These lead blocks were found in a UK river. 125 g each. Can anyone positively identify them?”
“They are reminiscent of the Kuberakolam.”
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Not so much as a stamp, as a printing plate. Before ink jet printers, they would ink these up, and press paper against them.
The dial on the right sets the resistance in Megaohm as far as I can read. If I see that correctly its the printing plate for manual for an old X-Ray machine. Only those kathode tubes (at the bottom) would akquire such high voltage (200V)