http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/Curiosities and other things I come across in my reading but can't spend much time on. Sometimes scientific, sometimes not, with sources wherever possible. hourly12000-01-01T12:00+00:00http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/634641One Malaysian state representative has an ambitious plan to help the country’s poorest single Muslim mothers. She hopes to marry them off – to state legislators. Compliant legislators could be rewarded with prizes for boosting their “quota”, the state's family and health committee chairwoman, Wan...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/633915Customs officers in Norway were amazed to find 14 royal pythons and 10 albino leopard geckos taped to a man's body. The 22-year-old Norwegian was stopped in a routine check by Kristiansand customs after arriving on a ferry from Denmark, the Faedrelandsvennen newspaper reported. After finding a...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/633612A German man who mooned at a train got his trousers caught in a carriage door and ended up being dragged half naked out of the station. The 22-year-old journalism student shoved his backside against the window of a low-slung double-decker train after staff forced him off in Lauenbrueck for...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/633471Some opponents call it idiotic, but supporters say paying these teens pays off for the rest of us. Tiwan Goodner and these other girls are not just learning self-defense but self-discipline and they’re taking these moves to the bank. “We are paying them to avoid pregnancy, to graduate from high...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/633219Police in Papua New Guinea are hunting the leader of a cult who promised villagers a bumper banana harvest if they had sex in public. The man and his followers fled naked into the wilderness when police tried to arrest them at the weekend, the Post Courier newspaper reported. It said the...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/632953A priest in Sokolka, Poland, dropped part of the Holy host during mass, then picked it up and placed it into a special vessel with water. One week later there was a stain on the consecrated item that appeared to be human heart tissue. Independent experts from a Polish university confirmed the...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/632762Newsmakers spoke in haste last week when it suggested Paris Hilton was unlikely to acquire a British-bred micro-pig because the extremely intelligent animals aren’t available in the US. Hilton has now ordered a bred-in-the-US Royal Dandie Extreme miniature pot-bellied pig from an Oregon breeder....http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/632349One Lexus has cameras that check the orientation of the driver’s face, and a Toyota sold in Japan tracks the eyelids. If the driver nods off, brakes are applied and seatbelts tightened. (Discover, Nov 2009) The latest model being offered in Japan is the Lexus ‘Virginity’. If its sensors detect a...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/632098Last Saturday’s Globe and Mail featured a positive review of Toronto ’s Ruby Chinese Restaurant. Here’s one snippet:” Almost every item [at Ruby] has snap, crackle and pop to spare.” The article neglected to mention one rather important bit of news about the restaurant: Ruby was shut down last...http://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Nautikos367/631868Some patrons at the Louvre museum in Paris know where they won’t grab lunch. Art lovers are unhappy with the announcement that McDonald’s will open at Le Carrousel du Louvre, an upscale shopping centre beneath the museum. As one art website editor explained: “I’m not against eating in a museum,...