For you literary-junkies, it turns out that Jane Austen's letters contain many references to shopping:
From the letters it is apparent that the Austens bought some of their groceries on credit. On their journeys through London and Kent they frequently stopped at Guildford where they visited Mr Herington’s shop. There are several references in the letters to trying to pay his bills. On 20 May 1813 her party stopped at Guildford and she paid an earlier bill at Mr Herington’s and bought more goods from him on credit. Four days later she enclosed Mr Herington’s new bill in a letter to Cassandra. In March 1814 she intended to pay a bill of Mr Herington’s on her way through Guildford but she stayed at Cobham instead. One hopes she was trying to pay a later bill, not the one incurred 10 months earlier.’
Harry's other books on travel and adventure wouldn't make it to Neatorama. But his book, titled "Moles and Their Meaning", sure is a shoe-in:
.. every mole upon the face of man or woman has upon some other portion of the body a corresponding birthmark, the position of which can generally be located with startling accuracy.
Honey-coloured: "A man of singular good wit, happy in getting goods. It promiseth inheritance, the favour of superiors and the like." Black: Peril of a fatal but lingering malady connected with the stomach and liver, which will only be averted by great care in diet.
Read more about this fascinating subject on Oddbooks, a website dedicated to (what else) strange books: Link
This project, called TAKELUMA, is a phonetic writing system for representing the sounds of English. In this system, when phonemes are spoke, htye leave their mark on a continuous line of sound. TAKELUMA is an attempt to give shape to the sounds of speech and the hidden meanings they convey.
Violinist Jon Rose is a unique musician: he builds and plays weird string instruments. And oh, he plays music on fences.
Yes, fences: this one above is a barbed wire fence, made and played on as part of the New Music Festival in Viitasaari, Finland in 1995:
It was modeled on the border that separates Russia and Finland. Then came the idea to make an experimental radio work... an endless fence that circumnavigates the entire world, incorporating many of the conflict zones that seem unresolvable or remain as scars on the psychology of the people who must live on each side of these artificially created borders.
Did you know that the fortune cookie found at Chinese restaurants is actually invented by a Japanese?
hi! monkey on the true origin of fortune cookies:
you know that everyone enjoys a nice crispy fortune cookie at the end of a chinese meal, but, did you know that fortune cookies are actually japanese in origin?like myself, mr. hagiwara knew the importance of having a nice tasty cookie (or two) with a hot cup of tea.he thought that "tsujiura sembei" (a rice cookie that has long been enjoyed in japan and is often associated with new years festivities and pilgrimages to local shinto shrines) would be just such a treat. he took the basic recipe, made it a little sweeter and had this new little confection made in the kitchens of the gardens.
Think you got it bad? The male blanket octopus is 100 times smaller than his mate. As if that's not bad enough, he dies right after having sex with her.
... the male blanket octopus is, technically speaking, "the most extreme example of sexual size-dimorphism in a non-microscopic animal ... such dimorphism is not seen in any other animal remotely as large".
Dr Norman said: "There's no other critters on that scale that have such a significant difference between the male and female."
The two-metre female weighs at least 10,000 times as much as the male, sometimes up to 40,000 times as much.
Rick Preble built a global business empire making fence postcaps from scrap lumber. Now, he sells $15 million worth of postcaps from a shack with no indoor plumbing!
CORPORATE EXECUTIVE Rick Preble operates out of a Bainbridge Island shack built on a pier over Rich Passage. There is no indoor plumbing. The two "outhouses" sit on a deck just around the corner from the building's main entrance. Inside, a warren of small rooms is stuffed with computers and desks, calculators and extension cords, coffee makers, space heaters, exposed insulation, ramshackle shelves and innumerable samples of the products he sells.
It's hard to imagine a less prepossessing headquarters for a company that had $15 million in sales all over the country last year, with operations in Maine and China as well as here. "Dana and I used to joke about it," Preble says with a laugh. (Dana is Dana Smith, until recently his partner.) "Like when we got it to be a $10 million company. He was working in his chicken barn in Maine, and I was working on a dock with an outhouse. And we'd talk every morning — we'd joke about it." He looks around the office, and laughs again. "I mean, I've never had a customer out here!"
It's like Stomp, but with housewares! A short clip directed by Ola Simonsson and Johannes Stjärne Nilsson:
A gang in a Volvo have staked out a flat; when its occupants leave to walk their dog, the six break into the place. One keeps his eyes on a stopwatch: they have only ten minutes before the couple returns. Instead of stealing things, the gang goes from room to room making fascinating percussive music with found objects: first in the kitchen, then the bedroom, the bathroom, and the salon. Cabinet doors, pot lids, light switches, a pill dispenser, a lamp, books, and a vacuum cleaner hose all add to the suite in four movements. The drummers keep the first three rooms tidy, but what will the flat's occupants make of the hurricane that hits the living room? (IMDB)
