Best websites:
Best websites: Fun
From time-wasting tips to laugh-out-loud funnies through puzzles, the best websites to make you smile and train your brain.
The memory of Michael Jackson is safe forever thanks to the thousands of people who’ve contributed to the hypnotic eternalmoonwalk.com Photo: REUTERS
1. If you’ve ever lived with a food hoarder or neat freak you’ll appreciate the strained tones of the messages on Passive-Aggressive Notes (passiveaggressivenotes.com).
2. Smartkit (smart-kit.com) is home to all sorts of puzzles (jigsaw puzzles, sudoku, cryptograms) to help you train your brain.
3. Letters of Note (lettersofnote.com) is a stylish site with scans of letters, telegrams, faxes and memos: Einstein encouraging Roosevelt to pursue atomic research, the Museum of Modern Art turning down a gift from Andy Warhol in 1956.
4. OMGPOP (omgpop.com) is full of time-wasting games like Tetris-a-like Blockles, and Pictionary clone Draw My Thing. Requires Adobe Flash Player 10.
5. IAmA (reddit.com/r/IAmA) is a place where people invite others to ask them questions based on something they reveal about themselves, be it ‘I am an expert cabinetmaker’ or ‘I attended a taping of The Price is Right’.
6. Low Culture (lowculture.co.uk) is the premier site for dissections of the latest episode of The Graham Norton Show or passionate defences of the eighth season of Spooks.
7. Ffffound (ffffound.com) is one of those nebulous sites – a design/photography ‘image bookmarker’ – that shows you pretty pictures of lovely things.
8. The memory of Michael Jackson is safe forever thanks to the thousands of people who’ve contributed to the hypnotic Eternal Moonwalk (eternalmoonwalk.com).
9. The now legendary FAIL Blog (failblog.org) lowlights humanity in all its dumb idiocy, from placard typos to wedding day slapstick.
10. spEak You’re bRanes (ifyoulikeitsomuchwhydontyougolivethere.com) brings together the best – or rather, worst – user comments from news websites.
11. The Daily Mash (thedailymash.co.uk) is a brilliantly satirical news site. Typical headline: ‘BNP Question Time to replace Christmas for Guardian readers.’
12. You Can’t Please Everyone, part of the Cynical-C blog (cynical-c.com), is a collection of one-star Amazon reviews of classic films, books and albums.
Snake pictured slithering across car windscreen
Snake pictured slithering across car windscreen
This is the moment two engineers were left seriously rattled when a giant snake slithered across their car windscreen.
The 4ft albino snake slithering across car windscreen Photo: SWNS
James Denton and Morne Aspeling were driving back to their office when the 4ft giant albino snake emerged from the under the bonnet.
James and Morne, both telecom engineers, pulled over and jumped out of the van and called for help. The snake was safely removed from the van and taken to an animal shelter to be cared for in a special reptile-friendly tank.
Mr Denton believes the snake is an escaped pet which crawled under their bonnet to find warmth – but moved when they started the engine.
He said: "As I looked back across the dashboard I saw the head of a snake poking up from the bonnet.
"Needless to say, it was quite a shock and it took me a moment to realise it was real. "When its tongue flicked out and it moved again, we both made a pretty sharp exit from the van."
The workers, both based in Jersey, were rescued by officials at the Jersey Animal Shelter.
Ambulance driver Jonathan Hudson said the animal is either a non venomous corn or milk snake.
He said: "It’s not everyday that we get a call to come and collect a live snake from a telecommunications van, so I was curious to see what had been found.
"When I got there the snake was much bigger than I expected at a little under four feet long. I knew right away that it wasn’t an indigenous snake so had to be an escapee pet.
"From its markings we think that it is a corn snake or milk snake, both of which are non-venomous, and one of the albino varieties.
"Snakes don’t do well in the cold, so my guess is that it was attracted by the warmth of the engine and crawled in there for shelter.
"This is a mature snake that has been a pet for some time and has only recently escaped. We are very keen to see it re-united with its owner."
Bald baby hedgehog abandoned by mother
Bald baby hedgehog abandoned by mother
A bald baby hedgehog is being nursed back to full prickliness after being abandoned by its mother when it was born with almost no spikes.
Baldrick the hedgehog Photo: IMAGES INTERNATIONAL
The four-month-old creature, named Baldrick, was bald apart from a few prickles when he was found in a garden in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk.
He is now being looked after by John and Tonia Garner at Foxy Lodge Wildlife Rescue.
Mr Garner, 50, who is a signaller for Network Rail, said Baldrick, who was named after Blackadder’s unlucky sidekick, is very unusual.
"He’s a bit of a rarity," he said. "We’ve had 45 hedgehogs altogether, but he’s the first one without any spikes."
Hedgehogs’ wrinkly bodies normally have around 500 spikes, which protect them from predators and the elements and keep them warm. Until he grows spikes, Mr Garner said releasing Baldrick would be "pointless".
Mr Garner added: "There’s no way he would survive if he was released now. It would be like releasing a polar bear which has just been shorn like a sheep into the North Pole."
Each day, the Garners clean Baldrick using antiseptic scrub and massage baby oil into his body to soften up his skin. They hope making his skin softer will allow spikes to come through.
Mr Garner said Baldrick, one of 22 hedgehogs currently being looked after by him and his wife, was a bit of a character.
"Baldrick loves mealworms," he said. "As a treat, he gets more than his fair share and would jump through a hoop for one. You go into his room and he will go up to the edge of the cage and put his paw up. He’s not satisfied until he gets a few mealworms. He’s quite a character."
He believes Baldrick was abandoned by his mother when he was just weeks old.
He said: "I think the mother suspected he would not survive and they’re quite ruthless in the wild. If one of the babies is not keeping up it will be abandoned.
"Luckily, Baldrick was found, otherwise he would have been dead a long time ago."
When the hedgehog was brought to Foxy Lodge at the age of about six weeks he weighed 240g, but is now up to about 800g.
The animal sanctuary was only started up by Mr and Mrs Garner in May and has had just under 180 animals through its doors, including a lamb, bats, seagulls, barn owls and a kestrel.
Great white shark grins for camera close-up
Great white shark grins for camera close-up
A diver has captured a photograph of a great white shark approaching his camera with a toothy grin like that of Bruce, the terror of the 2003 film Finding Nemo.
Amos Nachoum’s image that captures the smile of a 14ft great white shark Photo: BARCROFT
The great white image was captured by Amos Nachoum, an underwater expert who guides courageous scuba divers to encounters with the large creatures.
Mr Nachoum photographed this 14ft-long predator from just a few feet away in the waters off the coastal Mexican resort of Guadalupe.
The image strongly resembles the toothsome snarl of Bruce, played by Barry Humphries, as he faced Nemo, played by Alexander Gould.
Despite the proximity of a mouthful of razor-sharp teeth, Mr Nachoum insisted he was not in danger.
He said: "I have a 100 per cent safety record. These sharks aren’t the ferocious creatures we see in Jaws. The danger is in your mind."
Finding Nemo was a film about a young clownfish called Nemo, who is stolen from his coral reef home, forcing his timid father to travel to Australia and search Sydney Harbour to find his son.
Weird moth looks like a Gremlin
Weird moth looks like a Gremlin
A Merseyside photographer found the strange creature perched on a log in his garden.
By Harriet Alexander www.telegraph.co.uk
The Pale Tussock moth is actually quite common in England and Wales. The animal, which has a wing span of 40-60mm, is known for being hairy. Photo: SOLENT
Austin Thomas, 42, was taken aback to find the bizarre creature sitting by his garden pond.
Mr Thomas, from St Helens, said: "I often wander into my back garden with a cup of tea before breakfast to see if my pond has attracted any wildlife overnight.
"I spotted a moth sitting on a log and thought it would make a nice picture if I got my macro lens and zoomed right in on it."
Mr Thomas said that the animal looked like one of the mischievous creatures from the 1984 comedy Gremlins.
In the cult-classic comedy, which was executive produced by Steven Spielberg, the little creatures wreak havoc in a small American town.
"The moth started to wake up as I moved the log from a wind-sheltered spot into better light," Mr Thomas explained.
"It was then I noticed its unusual antennae, hairy body and the remarkable likeness to something out of the film Gremlins. I was amazed."
The Pale Tussock moth is actually quite common in England and Wales. The animal, which has a wing span of 40-60mm, is known for being hairy. The caterpillars feed on shrubs and trees before growing into moths.
Nod for non-Latin web addresses
Nod for non-Latin web addresses
The approval of website addresses using non-Latin characters has been described as the “biggest technical change to the internet” since its creation 40 years ago.
Internet addresses using scripts such as Hebrew, Hindi and Korean will be available by mid-2010 after their use was approved by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) board at a meeting in Seoul, South Korea.
Nations and territories will be able to apply for internet address endings reflecting their name and using their national language from November 16, when ICANN’s Internationalised Domain Name (IDN) fast track process begins.
If the applications meet certain criteria, including government and community support and a stability evaluation, the applicants will be approved to start accepting registrations for domain names.
More than half the world’s internet users do not use English or a Latin-based language as their first language and this move will see around 100,000 new characters available for use in IDNs.
Peter Dengate Thrush, chairman of ICANN, a not-for-profit corporation which oversees internet addresses, said: “The coming introduction of non-Latin characters represents the biggest technical change to the internet since it was created four decades ago.
“Right now, internet address endings are limited to Latin characters – A to Z. But the fast track process is the first step in bringing the 100,000 characters of the languages of the world online for domain names.”
Rod Beckstrom, ICANN’s president and chief executive, added: “This is only the first step but it is an incredibly big one and a historic move toward the internationalisation of the internet.
“The first countries that participate will not only be providing valuable information of the operation of IDNs in the domain name system, they are also going to help to bring the first of billions more people online – people who never use Roman characters in their daily lives.”
Mr Beckstrom said engineers around the world had been working on the technical issues surrounding the introduction of IDNs for more than nine years and the systems had been tested over the past 18 months.
Unflappable Newsreader Ignores Giant Seagull
Unflappable Newsreader Ignores Giant Seagull
© Sky News 2009
Australian newsreader Peter Hitchiner has been upstaged by a special guest during a bulletin – a giant seagull.
The bird stole the show as it walked past the studio’s camera filming the Melbourne skyline.
The Channel 9 newsreader was reading a story about a 27-year-old being murdered at the time.
Peter Hitchiner told a Melbourne radio station: "I was reading away…and I suddenly thought ‘Oh gosh that seagull’s back again’, because we had a bit of a problem last night.
"About 50 seconds to six o’clock this seagull arrived and started pecking at the camera and it had the beadiest huge eyes you’ve ever seen in your life."
Luckily Hitchiner is an experienced campaigner and the bird failed to ruffle his feathers.
Mouse grounds plane at New York’s JFK
Mouse grounds plane at New York’s JFK
An aeroplane bound for Heathrow had to be grounded at JFK airport, New York, on Sunday after a mouse was spotted in the cabin before take-off.
By Nick Collins www.telegraph.co.uk
The possibility that the rodent could have gnawed through wires was enough for the pilot to call in a replacement aircraft Photo: GETTY
More than 300 passengers were delayed after the pilot refused to fly in a situation reminiscent of the film Snakes on a Plane.
In the film, a cargo of poisonous snakes breaks loose mid-flight and causes havoc by attacking passengers and crew as well as ripping out electrical cables, causing short circuits on the aircraft.
Mice may not pose the same threat as mambas, but the possibility the rodent could have gnawed through wires was enough for the pilot to call in a replacement aircraft.
Andy Picken, 47, who had been to the US with his wife Jenny to celebrate her 40th birthday, told the Sun he had to wait three hours for a substitute plane to arrive at midnight.
"We thought it was a joke, but the captain said we all had to get off.
"It is amazing that something as small as a mouse disrupted a transatlantic jet."
Delta Airways reportedly described the stoppage as "standard procedure".
Paintings by dog sell for more than £1,000
Paintings by dog sell for more than £1,000
Paintings done by a dog called Sam are selling for up to £1,045 in Maryland, USA.
Selling for up to $1700 (£1,045) for an individual work, Sam has put his brush to 22 different canvases Photo: BARCROFT MEDIA
Using the lush surroundings of his home town of Eastern Shore, Maryland as his muse, Sam’s paintings are attracting a loyal art world following.
Some of his 22 paintings – done using a tailor-made paintbrush held in his mouth – have sold for up to $1700 (£1,045).
"Sam is a regular renaissance dog and his abstract paintings are all the rage with the hip New York galleries," says Mary Stadelbacher, Sam’s owner.
"He loves his painting and would happily carry on for hours if I left him to it.
"He loves to work in a variety of colours and layers his paintings with darker shades first and then moves on to lighter ones later."
Mary, who runs Shore Service Dogs, in the United States took in six-year-old Sam four years ago as a rescue dog.
"He had been bounced around a couple of dog pounds, so I couldn’t have that," says Mary about Sam, who is a bloodhound, sheep-dog cross.
"I took him in and intended to train him up as a fully fledged service dog."
However, soon after Mary took Sam in she was struck down by a botched operation that robbed her of the use of her right hand for a time.
"I never completed Sam’s training because of my rehab," says Mary.
"So in the end I decided to keep him on to help me around the house."
Painting al-fresco in the summer and by the heat of a bright fire in the winter, Sam the painting dog is a pooch for all seasons.
"Using his specialised training as a house-help dog, combined with my amateur art background, Sam is a fully trained artist," explains Mary.
"He takes the paint-brush mouth piece and will approach the canvas and begin painting on the simple command of ‘paint’.
Inspired to teach Sam to paint after seeing a spate of painting animals, Mary and Sam help to keep Shore Service Dogs centre open with the money made from the art sales.
"I saw dolphins painting and elephants painting, so I thought why not a dog?" explains Mary.
"He has been exhibited in swanky New York galleries such as Denise Dibro’s studio and art collectors have bought his work from as far a field as Chicago.
"We even had one woman buy her dog one of Sam’s paintings as a birthday present.
"He is quite a unique abstract artist."
Britain’s loudest snorer
Britain’s loudest snorer
Jenny Chapman has been diagnosed with one of Britain’s loudest snores after being found to make more noise than a jet aircraft during her sleep.
Published: 8:00AM BST 16 Oct 2009 www.telegraph.co.uk
Grandmother Jenny Chapman has a snore measured at 111.6db, louder than a low flying jet Photo: MASONS
Mrs Chapman, 60, snores every night at 111.6 decibels – eight decibels louder than the roar of a low-flying jet – much to the dismay of long suffering husband Colin, 62.
The retired bank worker could drown out the sounds of a spinning washing machine, diesel truck, farm tractor or speeding express train.
She regularly wakes herself up and her husband Colin has had to retreat to the spare room at least five nights a week for the 18 years they have been married.
She has snored throughout her entire life and one of her earliest memories is waking up to her sister pinching the bridge of her nose when she was five.
Over the years Mrs Chapman has tried nose bands, pills, visited the doctor ”countless” times and even considered invasive surgery in a bid to cure her snoring.
Last weekend she took part in a two-day snoring ‘boot camp’ at the Hilton Warwick Hotel – where the extent of her problem emerged.
She was the loudest of the six chronic snorers, four men and two women, who took part in the clinic designed to promote natural remedies to their problem.
She said advice from experts at the camp had already helped but her snoring would probably never go away.
Mrs Chapman, from Deeping St James, near Peterborough, Cambs., said: ”I was shocked to hear how loud my snoring was at its peak. I knew I was noisy but not that noisy.
”It was a bit embarrassing to be told in front of everyone but it was all good fun by then.
”The experts said it was the loudest they had ever experienced. I can sympathise with my husband now who is always complaining.
”They recommended tips for healthy living but I won’t be giving up alcohol totally just yet – that’s too much to ask.”
Around 75 per cent of the UK population are believed to be snorers with the condition most prevalent in middle-aged men.
The exact cause is known but too much food or alcohol, and problems with the nasal passage and soft palate at the back of the throat are thought to have an effect.
Will & Testament- Bishop calls for free speech on ordination of womenAn Irish Catholic bishop wants to have the freedom to explore the case for the ordination of women in public. There is a Vatican-enforced ban on even discussing the issue of female ordination, but Bishop Willie Walsh used an interview with RTE News to call for a public debate. In 1994, Pope John Paul II published an apostolic letter, On Reserving Priestly Or […]
- Augustine of HippoSaint Augustine of Hippo, one of the greatest minds in the history of the Christian Church, was born on this day in the year 354. He was African; yet that basic fact about him is too often forgotten in the white-washed history of the church. A great theologian, he was also the author of the first autobiography in the history of Western literature -- The Conf […]
- Bishop calls for free speech on ordination of women
- Alphainventions
