Someone at a company called Tableseed analysed all the Associated Press "strange news" stories that were released in the past year. The state with the greatest number of such stories was Florida, followed by New Hamshire (?) and Alaska.
The top ten cities yielding strange stories were...
1) New York City, NY
2) Lincoln, NE
3) Madison, WI
4) Philadelphia, PA
5) Chicago, IL
6) Cinncinnati, OH
7) Boston, MA
8) Detroit, MI
9) Dallas, TX
10) Pittsburgh, PA
The full dataset includes the ranking of 51 states (I'm very surprised that Kentucky came in 51st) and 75 cities. It's meaningless, of course - but you'll probably want to check where your state and city rank...
Via Within the Crainium.
25 November 2009
Impressive meteor captured on video
"A streaking fireball briefly illuminated parts of the Utah sky to daylight-level conditions early Wednesday. Surveillance video from an observatory shows a blinding flash of light at 12:07 a.m., followed by clear images of the object."
Via NAACAL.
Oxford names a common room "Gryffindore"
The student body voted on Sunday to pass a motion renaming the house after JK Rowling's equivalent at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry.It is the first time Magdalen College Junior Common Room has changed its name during its 550 year history.
Islands seen from space
Top to bottom - the Lesser Sunda Islands of Indonesia, The Maldives, The Galapagos (I wonder if there are seahorses in the waters there...), and Atafu Atoll in Tokelau.
From an assemblage of about a dozen at Wired, where there are further details re the islands.
Troops in Afghanistan fighting the Taliban
The Taliban is the bottom circle. Click to enlarge.
From an article at the Guardian, via The Daily Dish.
24 November 2009
Faces burned with acid
Most people are aware that in some cultural settings, women and girls are punished by having acid thrown in their face. Typically these stories circulate without photographs of the victims, perhaps in part because of the shame felt by the victim, but also because of hesitancy of the mainstream press to inflict such images on the public.
This week I found at the All Eyes blog at TampaBay.com an essay on the subject accompanied by a set of a dozen portraits, each accompanied by a brief biographical sketch. Here are some examples:
Irum was burned on her face, back and shoulders twelve years ago when a boy whom she rejected for marriage threw acid on her in the middle of the street. She has undergone plastic surgery 25 times...The Tampa Bay article links to a NYT column by multiple-Pulitzer prize-winning columnist Nicholas Kristof which further discusses these acid attacks.
Shameem was raped by three boys who then threw acid on her three years ago. Shameem has undergone plastic surgery 10 times...
At the age of five Najaf was burned by her father while she was sleeping, apparently because he didn't want to have another girl in the family. As a result of the burning Najaf became blind and after being abandoned by both her parents she now lives with relatives. She has undergone plastic surgery around 15 times...
Bushra was burned with acid thrown by her husband five years ago because she was trying to divorce him. She has undergone plastic surgery 25 times...
Menuna was burned by a group of boys who threw acid on her to settle a dispute between their family and Menuna's...
I found the Tampa Bay blog link in a Reddit thread, where this topic is discussed at length, and where there are links to several organizations which provide support to these women, and which accept donations: The Acid Survivors Trust International, The Cambodian Acid Survivors Charity, and the Acid Survivors Foundation, Pakistan.
I suppose there will be visitors to TYWKIWDBI who will be distressed to be confronted by these faces on arriving at the blog. I don't care. These women have been "below the fold" too long. It's hard for me to describe how high my respect is for the raw courage these women display, not only in pursuing their lives with such an enormous cosmetic defect, but in being willing to be photographed. I encourage you to view the other portraits and admire the quiet dignity of these women.
Photos by Emilio Morenatti, Associated Press.
Erté
Erté was the working name of Russian-born French artist Romain Tyrtov. His initials were R.T., so he used the pronunciation of the letters as his pseudonym.
Erté is perhaps most famous for his elegant fashion designs which capture the Art Deco period in which he worked. His delicate figures and sophisticated, glamorous designs are instantly recognizable, and his ideas and art still influence fashion into the 21st century. His costumes, program designs and sets were featured in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1923 [and] many productions of the Folies Bergère...The best online collection of his work that I've been able to find tonight is at Purple Dragon's Erte page.
Image above via Ordinary Finds. Click to enlarge.
"Peek-a-boo"
"President Barack Obama plays peek-a-boo with Maeve Beliveau, the daughter of Director of Advance Emmett Beliveau, in the Outer Oval Office, Oct. 30, 2009." Credit.
Taken out of context, a variety of other captions would be possible. The Reddit thread was entitled "Obama bows to everyone."
Blogged because some of you will be interested to learn that the White House has a Flickr photostream with about 800 photos in it. These photos are classified as "U.S. Government Work" and thus are copyright-free:
A work that is a United States Government work, prepared by an officer or employee of the United States Government as part of that person's official duties, is not subject to copyright in the United States and there are no U.S. copyright restrictions on reproduction, derivative works, distribution, performance, or display of the work...
"Those who do not learn from history...
... are doomed to repeat it" (George Santayana).
The BBC ran a piece last week recalling the end of the Soviet venture in Afghanistan, and comparing it to the current one...
The BBC ran a piece last week recalling the end of the Soviet venture in Afghanistan, and comparing it to the current one...
By the late 1980s, Moscow's exit strategy was basically the same as Nato's today - to build up an allied government in Kabul with sufficient trained army and police forces to defend itself, thereby allowing foreign troops to leave.
But even with the backing of a 100,000-strong Soviet army and billions of rubles in aid, the Afghan government struggled to establish its legitimacy and authority much beyond the capital - much like President Hamid Karzai's Western-backed administration today.
This bleak assessment of the situation in late 1986 by the Soviet armed forces commander, Marshal Sergei Akhromeev, sounds eerily familiar.
"Military actions in Afghanistan will soon be seven years old," Mr Akhromeev told Mr Gorbachev at a November 1986 Politburo session.
"There is no single piece of land in this country which has not been occupied by a Soviet soldier. Nonetheless, the majority of the territory remains in the hands of rebels.
"The whole problem is that military results are not followed up by political actions. At the centre there is authority; in the provinces there is not.
"We control Kabul and the provincial centres, but on occupied territory we cannot establish authority. We have lost the battle for the Afghan people".
More at the link, and if that is not sufficiently cautionary, one can think back to the British experience in Afghanistan in 1842.
The Dynosphere
This invention achieved speeds of 30 mph. The latticework in front of the driver was not a visual impediment while in motion.
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