These museums are far from average.

The Museum of Bad Art: "[O]ur mission: to bring the worst of art to the widest of audiences."

• The caption for the picture above is: "The flesh tones bring to mind the top shelf liqueurs of a border bistro. With an astonishing emphasis on facial bone structure, the artist flirts with caricature and captures features of Mamma's face which remind us of a Presidential candidate. The upright marionettish pose of the babe hints that the early bond between mother and child is as formal as it is familiar. Good old fashioned parental respect is at the center of this celebration of color and contour."

The Cockroach Hall of Fame Museum in Texas: "A museum of cockroaches that everyone can love."

• The museum has life Madagascar hissing cockroaches and "cockroaches that have been dressed in costumes to portray various themes." Below is Liberoachi.

You may not want to read on if you are squeamish.


The Mutter Museum by the College of Physicians of Philadelphia: "Disturbingly Informative"

• Grover Cleavland's secret tumor
• John Wilkes Booth's thorax
• The "Soap Lady" who died of Yellow fever in the 19th century and whose body has turned into soap.
• The nine-foot colon of a man who only had a bowel movement once a month. A picture can be seen here.
  
• A collection of 2,000 objects that were swallowed and removed without surgery by Dr, Jackson.

The Icelandic Phallological Museum

• "[P]robably the only museum in the world to contain a collection of phallic specimens belonging to all the various types of mammal found in a single country."

The Vrolik Museum in Amsterdam: "over two thousand specimens of humans, mammals, and other vertebrates"

• "Since 1994, 150 specimens of congenital malformations have also been on display."
• congenital malformation: "physical defect present in a baby at birth[.]"
• From what I understand, the babies are in formaldehyde jars.

China

For some context:

• In July 2007, China's population was 1,321,851,888. With a world population of approximately 6.6 billion, one out of every five people on earth lives in China. In 1950, China's population was 563 million, but had grown to one billion in the early 1980s. For a stable population, the national fertility rate must be 2.1; China's is 1.7. China's population is expected to peak in 2030. India has a much faster rate of growth and is expected to surpass China's population in 2040. Source.
• For a live counter of Chinese population, go here.
  

All of these statistics come from the May 2008 edition of the National Geographic magazine. Because it is hard to paraphrase statistics, they are all selected quotes.

• 119 baby boys are born for every 100 girls.
  
• The number of unmarried young Men-called bare branches-is predicted to be 30 million by 2020.
• China's one-child policy created a generation of only children numbering 90 million.
• Beijing enforces a one-dog policy that prohibits pets more than 14 inches high.
• China is expected to overtake the U.S. as the world's largest economy in ten years.
• Urban Chinese earn more than three times as much as those in rural areas[.]
• Authorities have added 171 new pop culture references to China's national language registry.
• Percent of the world's umbrellas made in China: 70
• Percent of the world's buttons made in China: 60
• Percent of U.S. shoes made in China: 72
• Percent of U.S. kitchen appliances made in China: 50
• Percent of U.S. artificial Christmas lights made in China: 85
  
• Percent of US toys made in China: 50
• Percent of Chinese goods sent to the U.S. that end up on Wal-Mart's shelves: 9
• Percent of the U.S. toys recalled in the U.S. in 2007[:] 100
• Number of months a Chinese factory worker would need to work to earn the money to earn the cost of a Thomas the Tank Engine train set: 6

More facts gleaned from the articles and paraphrased.

• "Wang" is the family name of 93 million Chinese.
  

• Sheng Qi, a Chinese artist, cut off his own finger in protest of the 1989 events of Tiananmen Square. (Picture above.) Visit his website.
  

Oops. I also forgot to add Minimal Ramblings of an Incoherent Mind :"A little home on the Internet where the quiet voices inside of my head can escape to be shared with the world. The loud voices, on the other hand, are silenced and stuffed into the basement to be punished for all eternity."

"Should I start trying to match my titles to my posts?" or "It is hard to be creative all the time." or "I pressed enter and posted this too early."

In Detroit, plans are made by architect Steven Flum to convert shipping containers into a $1.8 million, 17 unit condominiums. The units will be between 90 to 180 square meters (approximately 262 to 590 square feet) and will range from $100,000 to $190,000. The containers will be stacked four high and will have balconies, patios, windows, doors, plumbing, heating and stairways. Source.

However, using shipping containers for housing is nothing new. This is an Atelier Workshop’s Port-a-Bach. This house can be rolled into place and folded out to accommodate two adults and two children. Source.

Here is Leger Wanaselja Architecture's two bedroom house overlooking San Francisco. The house uses three containers and a glass atrium. Source.

Adam Kalkin, maker of the quick house, designed this nifty shipping container cafe. Source.

"Global Peace Containers" is a non-profit organization interested in using shipping containers to build housing and facilities in poorer countries or for emergency relief. Here is a school they built in Jamaica and a house they built in Atlanta, Georgia. Source. Source.


And be sure to check out the new blogs I linked to. I realized I was neglecting that part of my blog.
Less Than Half a Nickel - Sergent P's 2 cents. A blog that deserves more readers.
Smiling Through it all - "My random blog about life & death, love & heartache, and the struggle to get my life together."
The Thoughts and Sayings Of Baba Doodlius - Learn why sheep are planting hobbit bones in the jungle.

Careful when flying.

Gokhan Mutlu of New York is suing Jet Blue for more than two million dollars. Mutlu was traveling on a standby voucher. When a flight attendant complained of her jump seat being uncomfortable, the pilot gave Mutlu's seat to her. Mutlu was allowed to sit in her jump seat, but was eventually made by the pilot to sit in the restroom. The pilot insisted that he was in charge of the plane and Mutlu should be "grateful for being on board." Mutlu sat on the restroom toilet for more than three hours. After a bout of turbulence, Mutlu was allowed to return to his original seat. "A JetBlue spokesman declined comment on the lawsuit Monday." Source.

Unrelated, but I was looking at my blog statistics to see what people searched to find me. Someone had found my blog after Google-ing "NIIOMTPLABOPARMBETZHELBETRABSBOMONIMONKONOTDTEKHSTROMONT"
This is the post that explains it. I also am near the top with an un-filtered Google-ing of "nude penguin." I don't want to know, but I bet they were disappointed.

History

To be a Pontifical Swiss Guard, one must be a Roman Catholic single Swiss man aged 19-30 who is beardless, attended Swiss military school and is at least 5 foot 8.
The Swiss guard was established on January 22, 1506 when 150 Swiss mercenaries pledged their loyalty to Pope Julius II. Now, they guard the Vatican, including the entrance to the Pope's private apartments. Source

Not many people know that the 300 Spartans did not make their last stand at the Battle of Thermopylae alone. Seven hundred to one thousand Thespians stood with them. Source. Other source.

On September 15, 1896, two locomotives were crashed head-on in a publicity stunt in Texas. The event became known as "The Crash at Crush." A similar stunt was successfully performed a few months previously.
For "The Crash at Crush," a special four-mile track was laid and two telegraph offices were built. For the crowd, two water wells were drilled, five tanks of water and several tons of ice were brought in and several hundred faucets were built. Three hundred policemen watched the 30,000 to 40,000 person crowd that sat 200 yards away in a grandstand.
The trains barreled closer and collided. "There was just a swift instance of silence, and then as if controlled by a single impulse both boilers exploded simultaneously and the air was filled with flying missiles of iron and steel varying in size from a postage stamp to half of a driving wheel."
Three were killed and six were seriously injured. Souvenir hunters cleared debris, the railroad made quick compensation and a ragtime song was composed to memorialize the event.
Source.

ouch

At Old Man Rock Cafe in Queenstown, New Zealand, Sarah Ferguson was served dishwashing detergent instead of mulled wine. When Ms. Ferguson's lips and mouth began to burn, she spit it out. A cafe worker, Bethany Sim, offered to taste the liquid with similar results, receiving burns and possible scarring. The dishwashing detergent had been delivered to the restaurant in a mulled wine container. The incident occurred last July, but the restaurant faces sentencing next month.
<"Under New Zealand's no-fault accident law, victims do not sue for damages. Instead, treatment costs and income loss are met by the country's Accident Compensation scheme."
Source

School is Over!!!

Nischal Narayanam completed his bachelors degree at 10 and his master degree at 12. In November 2007, he was "the youngest PhD student and . . . on his way to become the youngest doctorate."
When he was 11, Nischal broke the Guiness Book record and memorized 225 random objects in 12.07 minutes. Nischal was also able to relate each random object to its number.
He recalls practicing, “You need intense concentration for sitting at least three to four hours without looking at external things. But I enjoyed it every time I practised.”
Nischal's teacher, Jayasimha Ravirala, set the 2005 record by memorizing 200 random objects. He says, "There is nothing like good or bad memory, it is just a matter of training to tap its potential."
Nischal has written six math books.
Source.
Source
Source

Musician Giovanni Maria Pala believes there is a hidden musical score in Leonardo de Vinci's Last Supper and has written La Musica Celata (The Hidden Music) describing his find. Here, you can hear the music that emerged from the painting.
Because the apostles were in groups of three, the music is played in 3/4 time. Pala says, ""I marked the pieces of bread on the table and the Apostle's hands as music notes. Then I drew a pentagram over the scene between the tablecloth and Jesus' face. I couldn't believe my ears when I played the music. It sounded really solemn, almost like a requiem."
When Pala drew lines between the notes, the Hebrew sentence, "with Him consecration and glory" appeared.
Source: A video showing an interview and the pictures of the music, pentagram and Hebrew sentence.
Source