Saint John’s University and the monks of Saint John’s Abbey are creating a handwritten, illuminated Bible - this will make it the first time that a handwritten Bible is commissioned by the Benedictine Monastery.
They’re making full-sized reproductions, too (limited run of 360) - yours for only $115,000!
In his neat blog, Real Estate Mathematics, Enten Eller dissected the mathematical relations between price changes and inventory changes of real estates:
Looking at the bottom red circle, we see that inventory started to fall in month 27 and price started to climb in month 31 — approximately a 4 month lag. At month 47, there was a drop in inventory and in month 50 we see a major jump in price, a 3 month lag. At month 51 there was a jump in inventory (or at least a reporting of such) and in month 57 there was a major drop in price (a 5 month lag). In that same month, there was the start of a run up in inventory rate of change and in month 60, the drop in price rate started to decrease..
In short, rate of price change is lagging inventory by about four months. So what does that say about the next four months of prices in Seattle? They should be pretty flat (that is the same prices as seen a year ago) and may actually start to decline.
Angler Todd Hughes of Olympia, Washington, hooked and landed a giant 90-inch-long, 405-pound halibut while fishing in Alaska:
Alaska is famous for giant halibut, and anglers have a system for landing giant, mad fish.
A 100-pound halibut loose in the boat can break anglers’ arms, legs or worse. A big fish thrashing around will also trash the boat.
A 405-pound fish can easily kill an angler.
Alaska guides usually shoot the fish before it comes about. But Glacier Bay is a National Park, so firearms are not allowed. It took a few whacks from a lead-filled aluminum baseball bat to kill the fish, and it took three men to pull it aboard.
The world’s youngest mother gave birth at the age of five - yes, FIVE!
Regardless of our squeamishness, we have to note that the claim of a five-year-old girl giving birth is apparently true. Her name was Lina Medina, a Peruvian girl from the Andean village of Ticrapo who made medical history when she gave birth to a boy by caesarean section in May 1939 at the age of five years, seven months and 21 days. Lina’s parents initially thought their daughter had a large abdominal tumor, but after they took her to a hospital in the town of Pisco physicians confirmed that her abdominal swelling was due to pregnancy. Lina was eventually transferred to a hospital in Lima, where she delivered a six-pound baby boy by Cesarean section on 14 May 1939 (coincidentally the date on which Mother’s Day was celebrated that year). Lina’s father was temporarily jailed on suspicion of incest, but he was released for a lack of evidence and authorities were never able to determine who fathered Lina’s child.
Postman Roger Annies hated delivering junk mail, so he told the people in his route how to opt out - his bosses at the Royal Mail (who made millions of pounds a year from junk mails), however, were not amused and sacked the 10-year veteran!
Mr Annies decided to act after receiving dozens of complaints from householders who were fed up with the piles of junk mail dropping through their letter boxes everyday.
So, hoping he may have the answer to their prayers, he delivered his own leaflet to residents in Barry, South Wales, explaining how they could opt out of getting mailshots known as ‘door-to-door’ items by filling out a form. …
Within days his local sorting office was inundated with at least 70 completed forms demanding an end to junk mail. Curious, his bosses decided to make a few inquiries and discovered the leaflet produced by Mr Annies. He was then suspended on full pay pending an investigation into alleged misconduct.
About 500,000 trash bins across England has been fitted with an electronic bug that monitor the homeowner’s waste disposal habits:
With the bugging technology, the electronic chips are carefully hidden under the moulded front ‘lip’ of wheelie bins used by householders for non-recyclable waste. As the bin is raised by the mechanical hoister at the back of the truck, the chip passes across an antenna fitted to the lifting mechanism. That enables the antenna to ‘read’ a serial number assigned to each property in the street.
A computer inside the truck weighs the bin as it is raised, subtracts the weight of the bin itself and records the weight of the contents on an electronic data card.
When the truck returns to the depot, all the information collected on the round is transmitted to a hand-held device and downloaded on to the council’s centralised computer. Each household can be billed for the amount of waste collected - even though they have already paid for the services through their council tax.
Of course, it’s all hush hush. Must be part of the war on terror. The terror of stinky garbage, that is:
Until now, the majority of bins have been altered without the knowledge of their owners. In many cases, councils which ordered the installation of the devices did not even debate the proposals publicly.
Photo taken on August 28, 2006 show a giant mooncake with a diameter of 220 centimeters and a height of 40 centimeters in a resraurant in Haikou, capital of south China’s Hainan Province. The mooncake, made with 344 kilograms of lotus paste, 34 kilograms of salted egg yolk, 34 kilograms of peanut oil, and 100 kilograms of flour, is expected to attract hordes of eaters as the Mid-autumn Day draws near.
If you spend more on soft drinks than on gasoline, then you should cut back - but if you can’t, at least save some money by buying non-brand name sodas. But how do you know which ones to get?
American Inventor Spot has the result of a taste test of cheap, off-brand sodas: Link - Thanks Michelle!
What to give a pizza lover who has everything? How about the Kalamazoo’s Outdoor Artisan Pizza Oven, so he (or she) can bake his very own backyard pizza?
Never, ever, touch a wild seal (they’re mean), especially an injured one. Just ask Elsie van Tonder, who got her nose bit off:
A shocked Elsie van Tonder, who saw her mutilated nose for the first time on Tuesday, said she’d never again try and touch a wild animal.
A seal bit off the tip of her nose on Saturday when she tried to help the animal lying on the beach at Herold’s Bay. The seal also bit her on the thigh.
"I’ve learnt from this that one should never try to touch such animals. Rather walk away. This is what happens when you try to help," Van Tonder said while pointing to the large wound to her leg and softly stroking the bandages over her nose.
She and about 15 other patients were transported at about 04:00 on Tuesday morning from George to various hospitals in Cape Town. The trip took about six hours.
Sanju Bhagat’s said he felt self-conscious about his pregnant belly. OK, kind of pregnant belly since he’s a man:
But while operating on Bhagat, Mehta saw something he had never encountered. As he cut deeper into Bhagat’s stomach, gallons of fluid spilled out — and then something extraordinary happened.
"To my surprise and horror, I could shake hands with somebody inside," he said. "It was a bit shocking for me." …
"He just put his hand inside and he said there are a lot of bones inside," she said. "First, one limb came out, then another limb came out. Then some part of genitalia, then some part of hair, some limbs, jaws, limbs, hair." …
At first glance, it may look as if Bhagat had given birth. Actually, Mehta had removed the mutated body of Bhagat’s twin brother from his stomach. Bhagat, they discovered, had one of the world’s most bizarre medical conditions — fetus in fetu. It is an extremely rare abnormality that occurs when a fetus gets trapped inside its twin. The trapped fetus can survive as a parasite even past birth by forming an umbilical cordlike structure that leaches its twin’s blood supply until it grows so large that it starts to harm the host, at which point doctors usually intervene.
There are many "key ring" portable pen out there, but there aren’t many engineered as well as an Inka Pen (it’s no wonder given that Inka’s inventor, Greg Adelman, used to design optical instrumentations for the Scripps Institute of Oceanography and worked on engineering projects for the US military and NATO).
The tiny pen unscrews into a full-length pen and uses a pressurized ink cartridge that can write in virtually any conditions: in wet conditions, below-zero weather or in the hot desert sun. It even writes underwater!
Of all the key ring pens I have used, Inka certainly stands apart. All in all, a very cool pen: Link - Thanks Greg!
The furor over Pluto’s demotion continues. Alan Stern, the lead scientist of NASA’s New Horizons mission to Pluto chimed in:
Pluto was disqualified because its highly elliptical orbit overlaps with that of Neptune.
But Dr Stern pointed out that Earth, Mars, Jupiter and Neptune have also not fully cleared their orbital zones. Earth orbits with 10,000 near-Earth asteroids. Jupiter, meanwhile, is accompanied by 100,000 Trojan asteroids on its orbital path.
These rocks are all essentially chunks of rubble left over from the formation of the Solar System more than four billion years ago.
"If Neptune had cleared its zone, Pluto wouldn’t be there," he added.
Stern said like-minded astronomers had begun a petition to get Pluto reinstated. Car bumper stickers compelling motorists to "Honk if Pluto is still a planet" have gone on sale over the internet and e-mails circulating about the decision have been describing the IAU as the "Irrelevant Astronomical Union".
By the way, the image on the left is a photo of Clyde Tombaugh [wiki], the person who discovered Pluto.
Brazilian paleontologists have discovered a new species of dinosaur called the Maxakalisaurus topai:
The name of the species, Maxakalisaurus topai, derives from an Indian tribe, Maxakali, which lives in the area. Topa is a divinity that the tribe worships. It is a custom in Brazil to give native Indian names to paleontological finds.
David Alexander wore 121 t-shirts to break the world’s record of most t-shirts worn at one time!
Alexander, who weighs 210 pounds shirtless, tipped the scale at 285 pounds in full garb.
Sharp spent roughly two hours wrestling the tees - which ranged in size from small to 8XL - over his friend’s head and arms, calling out each number as they progressed, per Guinness rules. In 93 degree heat, Alexander sweat through the first 36 shirts. The duo had wondered why the previous record holder had stopped at 107. By 60, they understood: The necks grew tight, the shoulders constricting, and the sleeves so long that Alexander couldn’t bend his elbows.
It took 30 minutes and four guys with scissors to cut Alexander out of the cloth. All was documented on videotape, which the duo plans to send to Guinness to earn the official title.
Check out the stats and drool: 110" to 200" screen sizes, resolutions up to 19,200 x 2,400 pixels, ultra-widescreen format, bluetooth connectivity, optional touch-screen capability, and more!
Don’t know your techno from your breakbeat from your ghetto tech house? Ishkur’s Guide to Electronic Music v2.5 to the rescue: complete with sample music.
