I half expected this to bite my leg as I stepped over it...
Meet the real star of Cannes: Midge the one-eyed cat from Yorkshire with a passion for sprinting
Amidst all the daily news of fraudulent and corrupt politicians, recession and redundancies, the collapse of the global economy and a swine flu pandemic, it's so warming to come across a story like that above. A Yorkshire parish councillor named Martin Humphreys who races his one-eyed rescue cat Midge back from the shop each day, has made a short children's film featuring himself and Midge competing in one of their races. Made on a budget of just £1,000, The Great Race will be debuting before judges in the Short Film Corner at the Cannes Film Festival.
Mr Humphreys is reported to be hoping The Great Race will be taken up by a movie company: "I truly believe this could be one of the greatest children's films of all time," he says.
Well, as one ex-runner to another, I for one have no intention of even trying to resist Midge's charm! Go cat!
There's another video here too from the BBC
Thanks to Paleo-Future I know now that back in the 1950's Collier's were predicting that 'mankind' (the United States) would eventually have complete control over weather. The 50s of course were the dawn of the space age, and many such optimistic predictions for scientific and technological advancement were being bandied about. Collier's ran a series of articles about space flight, Man Will Conquer Space Soon!, written by experts in the field and illustrated with stunning works by such artists as Chesley Bonestell and Fred Freeman. Some of these space-age fantasies did change to reality, driven into being by the Space Race and the Cold War.
Sadly, despite the fact Paleo-Future can provide plenty of evidence to demonstrate it was something of a hot topic back in the day, complete control over the weather wasn't one of these developments that became reality. I wish it had. Instead we've simply fucked the weather up with global warming and exacerbated its effects by building on flood plains.
My dear dad, Luddite to the end, always used to gloomily pronounce that we'd ruined the weather by sending up rockets. Maybe he had a point after all.
Sadly, despite the fact Paleo-Future can provide plenty of evidence to demonstrate it was something of a hot topic back in the day, complete control over the weather wasn't one of these developments that became reality. I wish it had. Instead we've simply fucked the weather up with global warming and exacerbated its effects by building on flood plains.
My dear dad, Luddite to the end, always used to gloomily pronounce that we'd ruined the weather by sending up rockets. Maybe he had a point after all.
This place is just so jaw-droppingly FANTASTIC I get all orgasmic at the thought of being 'accidentally' locked in here for a weekend. It's a library, but not as you or I know it, Jim. It belongs to an internet entrepreneur named Jay Walker, who I had not heard of before but now desperately want be adopted by. Like some kind of magpie-on-acid, he's amassed an amazing and eclectic collection of books and what can only be described as cult objects, and what I love best about the whole thing is - he seems to have done it simply for his own private and personal enjoyment of them, collecting simply whatever interested him without any snobbish pretensions or eye to making money out of his collection. Amazing.
Look at this - it's the actual Enigma machine!
Browse the Artifacts of Geek History in Jay Walker's Library
There was no denying the footprints in the snow on the morning of February 9, 1895. The odd tracks appeared in several towns in South Devon, England. Residents of Lympstone, Exmouth, Topsham, Dawlish, and Teignmouth all reported the same thing. During the night some weird and uncanny creature had raced in a straight line through these towns, covering a hundred miles and more and leaving behind the tracks nobody could identify.
Each track, about 4 inches in length and 2-3/4 in width, was exactly 8 inches apart. They were roughly shaped like a hoofprint and were promptly christened "The Devil's Footprints" by all who saw them. Even the conservative London Times printed a report of the footprints in the snow...
Going straight across country, the tracks never swerved. They were found upon the top of 14-foot walls and they crossed the roofs of barns and houses, went up and over snow-covered piles of hay and even appeared on the tops of wagons which had been left out all night. It was as if the creature had leaped up or down, for the tracks showed no apparent change of pace or speed. In many places it was reported that the snow had been "branded" away or melted from the ground where the "feet" had touched....
Over the hundred-mile course, the distance between the tracks never varied from the regular 8 inches, yet how could anyone or anything travel that far in a single night without varying its stride? Too many people saw the tracks for it to have been a joke or a local phenomenon. In some instances the prints vanished at the edge of unfrozen ponds or rivers, and appeared again exactly in line on the opposite side, to race away in that straight and mysterious flight across the sleeping countryside. And in all that distance, no one saw it, no one heard it. Only the tracks remained as evidence of the creatures passing.
Rest of this article here: 'The Devil's footprints': solving a classic mystery
Other sources on the Devil's Footprints:
Charles Fort, The Book of the Damned, chapter 28 1919
Mysterious Britain: The Devil's Footprints
Each track, about 4 inches in length and 2-3/4 in width, was exactly 8 inches apart. They were roughly shaped like a hoofprint and were promptly christened "The Devil's Footprints" by all who saw them. Even the conservative London Times printed a report of the footprints in the snow...
Going straight across country, the tracks never swerved. They were found upon the top of 14-foot walls and they crossed the roofs of barns and houses, went up and over snow-covered piles of hay and even appeared on the tops of wagons which had been left out all night. It was as if the creature had leaped up or down, for the tracks showed no apparent change of pace or speed. In many places it was reported that the snow had been "branded" away or melted from the ground where the "feet" had touched....
Over the hundred-mile course, the distance between the tracks never varied from the regular 8 inches, yet how could anyone or anything travel that far in a single night without varying its stride? Too many people saw the tracks for it to have been a joke or a local phenomenon. In some instances the prints vanished at the edge of unfrozen ponds or rivers, and appeared again exactly in line on the opposite side, to race away in that straight and mysterious flight across the sleeping countryside. And in all that distance, no one saw it, no one heard it. Only the tracks remained as evidence of the creatures passing.
Rest of this article here: 'The Devil's footprints': solving a classic mystery
Other sources on the Devil's Footprints:
Charles Fort, The Book of the Damned, chapter 28 1919
Mysterious Britain: The Devil's Footprints
Which Historical Lunatic Are You?
From the fecund loins of Rum and Monkey.
You are William John Cavendish-Bentinck-Scott, the Fifth Duke of Portland!
Sometime Marquis of Tichfield, Earl of Portland, Viscount Woodstock, Baron of Cirencester, co-heir to the Barony of Ogle and renowned as the finest judge of horseflesh in England, you took the tradition of aristocratic eccentricity to unprecedented heights. Having inherited the stately home of Welbeck Abbey, you proceeded to construct miles of underground tunnels and a ballroom, in pink, beneath it. The ballroom was complete except for one small detail. It had no floor. Despite this vast home, you lived exclusively in a suite of five rooms, each one also pink.
Having been turned down by your opera singer objet d'amour, Adelaide Kemble, in your youth, you suffered a broken heart and never married. This did not stop you from caring deeply about the wellbeing of your servants. Occasionally you would even help them muck out the stables. However, you did not neglect discipline, forcing disobedient underlings to skate themselves to exhaustion on your subterranean skating rink. Servants were given strict instructions regarding conduct: if they met you in a corridor, they were to ignore your existence while you froze to the spot until they were out of sight; and a chicken was to be kept roasting at all times in case you felt like sneaking into the kitchen for a snack.
You became ever more eccentric with age. You built another tunnel, this time to the railway station, through which you would ride your carriage. When you reached the station your carriage, with you inside, would be hoisted up onto the train in its entirety.
Upon your death, your multitude of titles passed to your cousin, who was obliged to delve into your curious domain to find your body once the servants had reported your absence. Entering your private rooms, he found that, aside from a commode in the centre of your bedroom, the only objects in the whole suite were hundreds of hatboxes, each containing a single brown wig.
Comment: Interesting result for a hoarder with antisocial habits such as myself! I went to Welbeck Abbey once. Or at least, I had a cup of tea in the garden centre adjoining it. I don't know if it still is, but at the time I was last that way, the Abbey itself was closed to the public (which I'm sure His Grace would have approved of) - it was a military academy or something like that (which I sure he wouldn't) - gack! I would like to see the underground ballroom and those tunnels if they still exist.
What other time of the year do you sit in front of a dead tree and eat candy out of your socks?
