The pickles in the jar represent the headlines we passed on, but still want to preserve.
The pickles in the jar represent the headlines we passed on, but still want to preserve. Public Domain

Often, before pressing the publish button on one of our stories, we’ll do a quick headline brainstorm. Sometimes, said brainstorming yields phrases we wish we could share with you, dear reader. But there is only room for one headline atop every post, so we simply say goodbye to the excess words and move on.

Until now.

Here’s a look at some of the headlines that weren’t this past year, but could have been.

The Questionable Rewards of a Visit to Inaccessible Island

  • The Aptly Named Inaccessible Island Is Really Rather Hard to Visit
  • Welcome to Inaccessible Island, the Island That Hates You
  • Maybe Inaccessible Island Is Inaccessible for a Reason
  • It Looks Cool, But Don’t Bother Trying to Go to Inaccessible Island
  • We Usually Give You Places to Travel to, Here’s One Place You Shouldn’t
  • Inaccessible Island Is Like Jurassic Park Without the Dinosaurs: Not Worth It
  • Inaccessible Island Didn’t Ask You to Go There
  • Inaccessible Island Does Not Deserve Your Scorn
  • Inaccessible Island Doesn’t Care If You Visit or Not
  • People Keep Calling Inaccessible Island Aloof But Maybe It’s Just Shy
  • Well, Hell, I Love You Inaccessible Island
  • Island: I’m Not Inaccessible, You’re Inaccessible

96 Rare Baby Sea Turtles Just Hatched in Queens, New York

  • If Little Turtles Can Make It There, They’ll Make It Anywhere
  • World’s Rarest Sea Turtle in Limited New York Engagement
  • Hardened New York Sea Turtles Waddle Their Little Butts to Water
  • Heroes in a Half Shell Survive the Sands of New York
  • Everything Is Bad, Except These Wonderful Baby Turtles
  • Watch Rare Baby Turtles Be Evicted From Manhattan
  • Maybe You Need to See Some Baby Turtles Today
  • Baby Non-Mutant Non-Ninja Turtles
The great auk, in its element.
The great auk, in its element. JOHN GOULD/PUBLIC DOMAIN

After the Last Great Auks Died, We Lost Their Remains

  • How to Find Great Auk Skin
  • How Do You Lose Extinct Bird Skin?
  • Who Let the Aux Out?
  • Losing the Remains of Extinct Birds Can Be Auk-ward

Margarine Once Contained a Whole Lot More Whale

  • The Secret to Old-Timey Margarine? Whales
  • I Can’t Believe It’s Not Whale Oil
  • Surprise! Your Toast Was Buttered With Whale Oil
  • The Rumors Are True, Margarine Was Made From Mammals
  • Is Margarine More or Less Disgusting When It’s Made With Whale Oil?
  • Margarine’s Mammalian Past
  • There Are No Whales in Your Margarine… Anymore

All the Bizarre Things Our Readers Have Found on the Beach

  • We Asked What You Find on the Beach, and It’s Mostly Dentures
  • You All Found Teeth On The Beach, You Freaks
  • If You Can’t Find Your Dentures, Have You Checked the Beach Yet?
  • Did the Beach Steal Your Teeth? Our Readers Found Them.
  • “Found Your Dentures” and Other Things We Thought We’d Never Say at The Beach
  • What Kinds of Beaches Are You All Going To? Jeez
  • We’re All Beach Trash, In Our Heart of Hearts
  • Our Beach Trash, Ourselves
  • What Your Beach Finds Tell Us: Fixadent Doesn’t Work
Is this an island?
Is this an island? Public Domain

What Is an Island, Exactly?

  • Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Islands (But Were Too Landlocked to Ask)
  • Am I an Island? And Other Important Questions
  • What to Do If You Think You Might Be an Island
  • Hang On a Sec, What IS an Island?
  • Aren’t We All Islands, When You Think About It?
  • Islands, Youlands, We All Are Ignorant About Islands
  • Islands: Not Just Beaches and Whaling

Cool, There’s Water on Mars. But Does It Make Good Pickles?

  • So You Want to Make Pickles Out of Martian Water
  • Martian Water Is Your Sandwich’s Missing Ingredient
  • Trend Alert: Organic Martian Pickles
  • Red Planet, Gross Pickles
  • Today in the Hubris of Man: Should We Make Martian Pickles?
  • There’s Water on Mars, but Don’t Use It to Make Pickles
  • What Sort of Pickles Would Martian Microbes Make?
  • A Short Guide to Pickling on Mars
  • Who Cares If There’s Life on Mars; Are There Pickles on Mars?
  • Mars’s Briny Water Makes for a Real Pickle

The Only Mammals Reckless Enough to Eat Hot Peppers Are Humans and Tree Shrews

  • Tree Shrews Keep It Spicy
  • Tree Shrews Cannot Be Tamed… In Their Love of Hot Sauce!
  • We Are Not Special Even In This One Way
  • Tree Shrews Could Outlast You in a Hot Sauce Eating Contest
  • The Flaming of the Shrew
  • With Shrews I Share This Spicy Stew
  • Tree Shrews Love Red Hot Chili Peppers
  • Blood Sugar Sex Tree Shrews
Upper ivory denture with human teeth.
Upper ivory denture with human teeth. WELLCOME COLLECTION/CC BY 4.0

When Dentures Used Real Human Teeth

  • Would You Wear Corpse Teeth in Your Mouth?
  • Waterloo Dentures, For a Mouth Full of Secondhand Teeth
  • For Every Set of Waterloo Dentures, There Was Someone Walking Around Without Their Teeth
  • Smile, Your Head Is Full of Corpse Teeth

The 17th-Century Nursery Rhyme About Kneading Bread With Your Butt Cheeks

  • Cockle Bread Probably Never Existed, Butt We Can Dream
  • This Bread Will Warm the Cockles of Your Butt
  • What Better Way to Impress Your Love Than Kneading Bread With Your Bottom?
  • When You Knead Dough With Buttocks, You Get Cockle Bread
  • The Legend of Cockle Bread Involves Butt Cheeks and Rhyme
  • Cockle Bread Is a Bawdy, Butt-Built Carb

Dispatches From Inside a Record-Breaking Bird Migration

  • 721,620 Warblers Can’t Be Wrong
  • 721,620 Warblers: How Do You Measure a Day in a Life
  • 721,620 Warblers Is a Strangely Specific Number to Have Countered
  • Let the Sound of 721,620 Warblers Drive You Mad
  • How Many Warblers Is Too Many? 721,620
  • ‘I Don’t Think Anyone Got Pooped On:’ Dispatches From Inside a Bird Migration
  • ‘Three Species Flew Between My Legs:’ Dispatches From Inside a Bird Migration