Again the number 13 pops up!

The date: August 13th 2010
The time: 13:13
The players: One boy, 13 years old.

At this date, at this time the boy got struck by lightning.  Thankfully he is safe now.
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World Record for speeding fines!!

I have always had a bone to pick with the Swiss authorities about their speeding checks and fines.  I have to watch the speedometer more often than the road to see where I am going.  And they are not forgiving of even the slightest infraction - ever!  Even a few kilometres over the limit and you can be sure to either get flagged down and taken to the nearest police station, or receive a love note in the mail.  Most surely the former if you are in a car from outside the country.

And then there was this Swede, 29 years old, who decided to stick his nose up at the Swiss road police.  He was caught speeding at 290 kph (180 mph) by some new fangled camera (trust the Swiss to have the latest equipment to catch the speed nuts).  And so he was fined - and what a fine!!  A world record of Euro 928.770,45. At today's exchange rate that would a cool US$ 1.2 million.  Niiiiceee!

So if you like to drive, enjoy the rush of speed and do not have a few million to toss in the wind, when in Switzerland use public transportation.  Or keep an eye on every damn speed limit sign!!  Bon Voyage!!

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Taking animal smuggling to a different level!

The Norwegian customs caught this guy who had 14 snakes in stockings taped to his torso, geckos in cans taped to his leg and a tarantula in his bag. Apparently while they were searching his bag they realised that his body seemed to be in constant motion!!! OMG! Right now my imagination is in overdrive trying to imagine the sensation of squirmy creatures undulating against your body constantly ... UGH!!!

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A man was caught by Norwegian customs carrying a tarantula in his bag, and a further 14 royal pythons and 10 albino leopard geckos taped to his body, media reported Monday. The 22-year-old Norwegian was stopped in a routine check by Kristiansand customs after arriving on a ferry from Denmark, newspaper Faedrelandsvennen reported.

Customs found the tarantula, before deciding to give him a full body search that revealed 14 stockings -- one for each snake -- taped around his torso, top selling tabloid VG said.

Reptile smuggling is not uncommon in Norway, which prohibits people holding many reptile species as pets, but office manager Helge Breilid at Kristiansand customs was quoted by VG as saying customs officers had been "horrified" by Sunday's catch.

"Customs officers quickly realized the man was smuggling animals, because his whole body was in constant motion," Breilid told VG. When the man dropped his pants, the officers found 10 cans taped to his legs, each containing a lizard, he said.

The man was still being held by police Monday, Kristiansand police attorney Johann Martin Kile told VG, adding he would be released upon agreeing to pay a 12,500 Norwegian crowns ($2,256) fine. The reptiles were handed over to a security firm until Norwegian authorities decide what to do with them, Breilid said.
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Indian version of the Frog Prince fairy tale

Here we have the Indian version of the Frog Prince fairy tale. Fortunately for my breakfast, the heroines in this tale did not have to kiss their froggys. They all went back to their original lives and lived happily ever after! or at least ... so I hope.

(LOL Cats)

In a bizarre ritual, two minor girls, both seven, from the remote Pallipudupet village in Tamil Nadu's Villupuram district were married off to frogs on Friday night. The ceremony, an annual feature during the Pongal (harvest) festival, is conducted "to prevent the outbreak of mysterious diseases in the village''.

The girls, Vigneswari and Masiakanni, dressed up in traditional bridal finery - gilded sarees and gold jewellery - married the frog 'princes' in separate, elaborate ceremonies at two different temples in the presence of hundreds of villagers.

Amidst chanting of vedic hymns, the temple priests garlanded the brides and tied the magalsutras on behalf of the frogs pronouncing the two as wives of the amphibians before the sacred fire at the auspicious hour. The villagers threw themselves into the ceremonies with gusto. While residents living in the western part of the village acted as relatives of the brides and those from the eastern part play-acted as relatives of the grooms The ceremonies had all the usual elements of a traditional marriage including a sumptuous feast.

However, unlike the fairy tale `Frog Prince', where the ugly toad turns into a handsome prince when the princess kisses it, the Villupuram village belles bid their amphibian grooms goodbye and lead a normal life thereafter. As for the terrified frogs, they are thrown back into the temple ponds after the ceremony.
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Goldfish survives at least 13 hours out of water

So this lady wakes at 7 am to find her goldfish missing from its bowl. She found it at 8 pm after she returned from work. So the fish was out of its bowl for 13 hours - maybe more depending on when in the night it jumped out of the water!

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Barbara Woodford woke to discover Ginger missing from its bowl. Unable to find the fish before leaving for work, she feared the worst. But when she returned home in the evening she spotted her pet on the floor behind a cupboard, alive and well.

"I picked him up with a spatula and his mouth started moving. I put him back into the water and off he went. He was swimming fabulously. I couldn't believe it - it was a real Christmas miracle," said Mrs Woodward, 61, of Gloucester.

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Jack Frost shows his face!!

Parts of the US is now in the grip of an unusually harsh winter and Jack Frost or Old Man Winter has shown his face there - literally!

Photo: KomoNews.com

Locals in chilly Washington state in the northwestern United States suspect the icy figure of folklore has put in a personal appearance in the town of Lake Stevens. The icicle was found hanging from the home of local man Jeremy Olden and the photograph posted on a community website.

The uncanny ice structure, in which a head complete with hair, a forehead, nose, mouth and beard appears to jut from a thick icicle, has bemused locals in the town of 40,000 residents which is experiencing typically freezing winter weather.

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Another Virgin Mary gives birth to Jesus

Talk about coincidences! A carpenter and his wife (who just happened to be called Virgin Mary) were going to call their child after a prominent football star. But when he was born on the 25th of December, decided to call him Jesus.

A Peruvian woman named Virgin Mary has called her son Jesus after giving birth on Christmas Day. Virgin Maria Huarcaya, 20, delivered the 7.7 pound (3.5 kg) boy in the early hours of Christmas Day at the central maternity hospital in the capital Lima, according to Peru's state news agency. She then named him Jesus Emanuel. But in a further twist, the baby's father, Adolfo Jorge Huamani, 24, is a carpenter.
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Meat smell cologne is a hit

Burger King's new meat-inspired cologne is sold out, and it's commanding fat prices on ebay. The limited edition product costs just under four dollars. That's one-tenth the price of a bottle of Aramis.
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Holy Crap! .... Really!

Souvenir from the Holy Land: Donkey poop sealed in a prism!!

If you’re like me, nothing makes you think of the Holy Land like donkey poop. I mean, the donkeys are right there in the Nativity story, and where there are donkeys, there is, you know, leftover evidence of donkeys. So, for a special souvenir of a visit to this special place, why not buy Holy Land donkey dung sealed in plastic, as seen in these actual photos taken near Nazareth?

Of course, being a skeptic by profession, I have to wonder what sort of regulatory system applies to the region’s tourism business.

* Is this all GENUINE Holy Land donkey poop?

* Could some of it be imported from Chinese donkeys?

* Could this just be worthless imitation donkey poop?

* Could it be from other beasts or…well, don’t go there.

Anyway, I’ll probably order some for gifts, but I’m going to want to see some kind of government certification.

(Oddly Enough)

Hair length: 2.1 meters (6.9 feet)

Feng Wei combs her long hair at the restaurant she runs in Kunming, capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province, Dec. 15, 2008. Feng, 40-year-old, treasures her long hair of 2.1 meters, which hasn't been cut since she was ten

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Japanese descendants of Jesus?

The story of Jesus Christ gets another twist. Meet Junichiro Sawaguchi who claims he has descended from Jesus. He lives in Shingo, Japan where the locals believe that a mound of earth with a cross on it is the last resting place of the Messiah.



Seven hours north of Tokyo by train and bus, Shingo only had garlic farming to to put it on the map until a scroll was found in 1935 by a Shinto priest in nearby Ibaraki Prefecture that was identified as Christ's will and, bizarrely, identified Shingo as his last resting place.

The scroll is on display in the "Village of Christ Legend Museum," which closes in the tourist off-season between October and April, and is the basis of a very different take on the incredible tale. According to the document, Jesus arrived in Aomori at the age of 21, where he took the name Daitenku Taro Jurai, studied the Japanese language and developed a deep affinity for the country and people. Eleven years later – conveniently the same period in the Bible that his whereabouts cannot be accounted for – he returned to Judea but fell foul of the Romans.

Instead of being crucified, however, the Romans got the wrong man and nailed his brother, Isukiri, to the cross. Carrying his brother's ear and a lock of hair from the Virgin Mary, Jesus fled across Siberia to Shingo, where he grew rice, married a local woman called Miyuko and had three daughters, it claims. At the ripe old age of 106, Jesus died peacefully and was interred in the mound that sits on Mr Sawaguchi's land.

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Hedge becomes giant Christmas pudding

An English couple turn their hedge into a giant Christmas pudding to help celebrate the festive period. The festive topiary is the creation of the appropriately named Mr and Mrs. Holley from Somerset, UK. They got the idea from their granddaughter who remarked that the hedge looked like a giant pudding.

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Getting into the Christmas spirit ...

... a bit late but then I had to finish with the exams, and then sleep for 2 days to recover lost time in la la land and now am shopping (which I have not completely done with - yikes!) and wrapping (which I have just started - double yikes!!).

Anyhoo ... the heart gladdens with news of the Christmas Spirit from all over the world. For example, the homeless in Milan will be getting a rare treat this festive season - beluga caviare!! Always knew the Italians did things in style ;-) though I do wonder if those consuming this precious commodity will be able to appreciate its value/taste. I hope that they also get a hearty meal(s?) to go with the little black balls. My suggestion would have been to sell the little cans and then give the cash to charity. But maybe Italian red tape does not allow that sort of thing.



Down-and-outs and hard up pensioners in Milan will enjoy a rare Christmas treat this year: choice beluga caviar confiscated from traffickers. Italian police seized over 40 kg (88 lb) of the delicacy, worth some 400,000 euros ($558,300), from two men who last month smuggled it into the country from Poland for sale in the shops of Milan and the rest of the wealthy Lombardy region.

The head of the local forest police who carried out the raid kept the bounty in barrack fridges for several weeks, but realized it would soon go bad. "Tests showed us the food was still perfectly OK to eat but it couldn't be stored much longer, so we decided to give it to the poor," Juri Mantegazza told Milan daily Corriere della Sera.

A small amount of the sturgeons' eggs have been kept for further analysis while the rest has been sent to voluntary associations, charity kitchens and old people's homes. "Everything that comes our way is very welcome, even though most of our guests don't even know what those little black balls are," said Virginio Colmega, a priest who helps run the House of Charity in Milan.
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$1.5 million Christmas Tree

And we are back in Japan! To check out the world's most expensive Christmas Tree!!

Despite the recession, the makers have created the dazzling 24k gold tree to create a "gorgeous atmosphere". The tree is decorated with more than 240 jewels including diamond baubles and strings of pearls, weighs more than 21 kilograms - and is worth (£1million) 150million yen. The tree went on display this week at the Ginza Tanaka jewellery shop in Shinsaibashi, Osaka.
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Japanese can now drink Space Beer

Space Beer, the result of a five-month mission to boldly grow, where almost no one has grown barley before, has landed in Japan. The adult beverage, brewed from barleycorn cultivated in the International Space Station in 2006, has splashed down courtesy of the Russian Academy of Science, a Japanese university and beer giant Sapporo.

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Cashless Living

I wonder ... is there somewhere we can follow this guys efforts throughout the year? I am very keen on seeing how he is going to manage without cash. A very interesting experiment indeed! I am all for freebies :-D When in Italy I sometimes went to farms after harvest to collect whatever fruits or veggies I could find. It is an accepted practice and a fun way to pass the day too. Unfortunately, here in the big city, I have yet to come across any sort of freebie ... and I cannot imagine what would happen if we all started foraging for them! lol!!

A British economics graduate is challenging himself to live for an entire year without any money. The native of Bristol plans to barter his skills, forage for food and live in an environmentally-friendly house trailer without credit cards or cash. The 29-year-old hopes his example will help others realize they consume far more than they need. He says recent history shows capitalism is clearly flawed and the future is foraging and freebies.

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Failed Parenting

Parents ... stay aware of flying feet!
Watch this video!!

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China police stop a driver - discover he has no arms!

Police were amazed at their discovery during a routine check of vehicles on the road. Zing Shen, 42, was steering the vehicle with his feet and said he had been doing so for years. It was reported that he was stunned when police officers issued him with a public safety summons. The man told traffic police that ever since he lost his arms in an industrial accident several years ago, he had used his feet to steer his vehicle without difficulty. He has no arms from the elbows down. His car was an automatic so he did not have to concern himself with changing gear.
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An interesting subject at school: Witchcraft

It is a sad thing that not only do people still believe in witches but that this belief often leads to the killing of innocents. It is like we never left the Middle Ages! So now schools in India will include witchcraft in the syllabus as part of the Governments efforts to stamp out the superstitions and put a stop to the horrendous witch hunts. I wish them well.

Many tribal communities in the country believe in witches and their ability to cause harm to people, animals and the harvest. About 750 people, mostly old women, are estimated to have been killed in witch-hunts in rural India since 2003. In one of the worst cases, a family of four stoned and buried alive for allegedly cursing a relative of the village chief, the Times reports. Advocates for a change to the syllabus say beliefs must be altered early if India’s witch-hunts are to be stamped out.
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A Santa training school in South Korea!

Want to learn how to say 'Ho Ho Ho' just right? Or maybe do the Santa dance moves (what are those?!) ... Off you go to South Korea to learn how to be a Santa. And then maybe to Germany for a month long working holiday? You have got to get used to globe trotting anyway - it's part of the job description.

A South Korean amusement park is teaching students what it takes to be a good Santa Claus during the festive season. Dozens of Santa school students gathered on Wednesday (November 26) at Everland Park, which is about an hour's drive south of Seoul, to master the Santa technique. Instead of riding a sleigh, the 30 male and female Santa students rode on the roller coaster, they were also trained to perfect their chuckle, dance-moves and carolling.

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