Richard Branson, the eccentric billionaire owner of Virgin Atlantic Air, lost a bet to Tony Fernandes, the owner of Air Asia. Consequently, he must serve as a flight attendant on an Air Asia international flight:

Branson made the wager with Lotus racing team principal Tony Fernandes , who owns Air Asia, over which of their Formula One teams would go better this season.

The loser had to serve as a "stewardess" on the winner's airline.

Although neither of the men's teams scored a point in their debut season, Lotus slightly outperformed the Virgin.

Fernandes said today "it's time for Richard to start preparing himself for some hard work and the likely pain of a pair of high heels."

The date of the Kuala Lumpur-London flight has yet to be set, but seats will be auctioned off and money given to Branson's chosen charity.

Link | Photo: Reuters

This unknown cosplayer is dressed as a hat worn by Jayne Cobb, a character on the TV show Firefly.

Oh, He robbed from the rich
and he gave to the poor.
Stood up to the man
and he gave him what for.
Our love for him now
ain't hard to explain.
The hero of Canton
the man they call Jayne.

via Great White Snark | Image: Fox

Previously: If Firefly Had Been Made in the 80s

This excellent image captured by NASA shows astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson gazing out of a window on the International Space Station. It was taken last September. Dyson, a chemist, went into orbit on April 2, 2010 and remained on the station for 174 days.

Link via DVICE | Photo: NASA

Software engineer Skytee made a steampunk-style bandwidth meter. He (she?) calls it the TorrentMeter:

I got a 1908 voltmeter in a brass housing, about 20cm (8in) in diameter. It had a resistor made from a wire wick. The gauge's internal resistance without that is now about 67 ohms, eats up 150mA when the handle is at full scale, and wants about 10V. That's too much to be driven directly by a micro controller. A switching amplifier, made from a couple parts, shall help.

Link via Make

The finish is crude, but that just adds to the charm. Anyway, the concept is brilliant: an eternal fountain of warm gravy. Instructables user turkey tek rigged this arrangement based on a peristaltic pump powered by an electric drill.

Link via J-Walk Blog

Scientists in Taiwan discovered that placing gold nanoparticles in plants made them glow, which could turn them into an effective form of nighttime illumination:

By implanting the gold nanoparticles into the leaves of the Bacopa caroliniana plants, the scientists were able to induce the chlorophyll in the leaves to produce a red emission. Under a high wavelength of ultraviolet light, the gold nanoparticles were able to produce a blue-violet fluorescence to trigger a red emission in the surrounding chlorophyll.[...]

“In the future, bio-LED could be used to make roadside trees luminescent at night. This will save energy and absorb CO2 as the bio-LED luminescence will cause the chloroplast to conduct photosynthesis,” Dr. Yen-Hsun Su said in an interview with Chemistry World.

Link via Popular Science | Photo (unrelated) by Flickr user Irargerich used under Creative Commons license

Model maker Michal Miszta crafted an engagement ring box with a Toy Story theme:

I was helping the cupid recently, commissioned by romantic guy to craft the engagement ring box related to Disney/Pixar Toy Story movie. We came with this idea that all characters from the movie support him and help to convince the girl to be his wife. They even built the “Marry Him” sign with LEGO bricks :) I managed to sculpt and fit 8 characters in this 95mm x 65mm x 75mm box. We have Woody, Jessie, Buzz Lightyear, Rex, Sqeeze, Mr. and Mrs Potato Heads and in the center Lots-O’-Huggin’ Bear holding the ring. They are sculpted in green stuff specially to fit the scratchbuilt wooden box. all is painted with acrylic paints and vartnished to give the satin finish. Lego sign is laser engraved in plywood. I didnt make molds of the figurines so it will be only one model like this worldwide.

Link via Super Punch | Photo: Michal Miszta

In 1939, Robert Irwin bought the first comic book in which Batman appeared. It cost him 10 cents -- that's $1.57 adjusted for inflation. He's now put it up for auction, and current bidding has exceeded $400,000:

When asked why he kept this particular comic book, Irwin’s replied was simple:

“I don’t know,” he said. “I must have just liked the cover.”

That simple attraction the now iconic Bob Kane graphic means the 10 cents Irwin spent on it as a 13-year-old boy in will now come due as an investment that will realized a return than can be measured in hundreds of thousands of percentage points – certainly better than even the highest performing stocks.

“Imagine yourself as a kid, and you buy a comic book, read it and put it away,” said Jerry Stephan, Consignment Director for Comics at Heritage. “Now imagine you put it away for decades before realizing, more than 70 years later, that your foresight, that the one comic you kept from your childhood, that you tucked carefully away, has emerged as one of the great pop culture treasures of history.”

Link via Geekosystem | Photo: Comic Book Resources

Previously: World's Most Valuable Comic Books

(Video Link)

Brewing beer is, as you can see, an incredibly complex process. The brewery Trumer International put together this video showing how it's done.

Link via Make | Company Website

Kevin Breakstone makes cartoons of characters from Deadwood and Star Trek: The Next Generation without looking at what he's doing:

Blind contour drawings are made by not looking at the page while moving the pen. I draw these with a sharpie and then use watercolors to make them purty.

Link via Comics Alliance

A Russian architectural firm called Ab Ellis has unveiled its proposal to turn an old diamond mine in Siberia into a huge domed city that stretches 1,700 feet below ground. Eco-City 2020 could house 100,000 people and be powered by solar cells on the city roof. At the link, you can view several more architectural concept images, as well as photographs of this site, which is the second largest hole in the world.

Link via DVICE | Photo: Ab Ellis

Heather Carreiro of Matador Abroad suggests twenty English language words that she thinks should return to common usage. Here are two examples from her list:

9. Brabble

Verb – “To quarrel about trifles; esp. to quarrel noisily, brawl, squabble” – Brabble basically means to argue loudly about something that doesn’t really matter, as in “Why are we still brabbling about who left the dirty spoon on the kitchen table?” You can also use it as a noun: “Stop that ridiculous brabble and do something useful!”[...]

14. Hoddypeak

Noun – “A fool, simpleton, noodle, blockhead” – This one doesn’t need any explanation as to how you could use it; you may already have someone in mind who fits the description.

Link via Brian J. Noggle | Photo by Flickr user greeblie used under Creative Commons license

Last March, we blogged about a man who repossesses stolen jetliners. Max Hardberger does something similar, but with commercial ships. Here's how, years ago, he got a ship called the Naruda out of Haiti:

He played for time. He pumped the guards with booze and waited for dark before ordering his engineer to lock them into their cabin. It was a toss-up whether they would try to shoot their way out, but they were either too drunk or not being paid enough to bother. Hardberger started the engines, switched off all the lights and sneaked out of harbour. If they were spotted, the Naruda would be seized, and he'd be slung in jail. Only when he was in international waters could he relax. Hardberger called down to the guards. He offered to set them loose in a lifeboat or take them to Venezuela; the choice was theirs. They chose the lifeboat.[...]

Over the years, he's distracted crews with prostitutes and witch doctors, bribed officials to look the other way, conned Russian mobsters and hidden from naval radar by riding out thunderstorms at sea; he's even taken a 10,000-tonne freighter out of Haiti while the 2004 revolution was going on around him. "It's basically a matter of planning," he says. "To get a boat out of port, you need a chief engineer and a one or two crewmen in your team, so everyone has to know exactly what they are doing.

"I make sure we all arrive in port separately. The aim is to draw as little attention to ourselves as possible, so none of us fly in; rather we come in by ferry or cargo ship. I always stay in lowlife hotels in the seediest part of town, as it fits with my usual cover story of a sea captain looking for work. During the daytime I will scope out the port, working out the easiest way to get the boat out of port; it's always best to have a plan where you can board it brazenly, rather than creep on surreptitiously. In the evenings I act the stereotypical drunk captain, tipping my whiskey down the sink while no one is looking. And when it's time, we move in."

Link via Samizdata | Photo: Guardian

Bloggers from Speedhunters attended a custom van show at Fuji Speedway in Japan. Among the amazing vehicles on display was this Batman-themed van. You can view pictures of many more custom vans at the link.

Link via Jalopnik

Previously: Bosozuku-Style Car Mods

Goodyear has developed for NASA a new airless tire made of springs that can be used on future moon missions:

The tire, constructed out of 800 load bearing springs, is designed to carry much heavier vehicles (up to 10 times) over much greater distances (up to 100 times) than the wire mesh tire that Goodyear helped develop for the Apollo Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV). The Spring Tire has now been recognized with a so-called “Oscar of Innovation” at the 44th Annual R&D 100 Awards in Orlando, Florida.[...]

Another advantage of the Spring Tire is its ultra-redundancy. Asnani points out that the tire doesn’t have a “single point failure mode” like pneumatic tires. Where one hard impact can cause a puncture and deflate a pneumatic tire, such an impact would damage only one of the Spring Tire’s 800 load bearing springs. Additionally, the Spring Tire’s combination of overall stiffness and flexibility allows off-road vehicles to travel fast over rough terrain with relatively little motion being transferred to the vehicle, says Asnani.

Link via OhGizmo! | Photo: Gizmag

Previously: Airless Tires for Military Vehicles