Shopaholics looking for love can head to the heart of the French capital (Paris) to a newly opened store in one of the city's main shopping districts, which promises a high-end shopping experience.

Ladies looking for love can take a peek at eligible bachelors standing behind glass panels on display at the pop-up retail unit opened by French dating site adopte-un-mec (adopt-a-guy).

Alternatively they can search through hundreds of Polaroid photos pinned up on a notice board to see if anyone catches their eye.

One of the men, Arnaud Dimard, 24, told Le Point: 'It’s nothing like the girls in Amsterdam - there’s no prostitution and we’re there to serve these young ladies.'

Created in 2008 the popular site, which invites men to sign up and post profiles online, recently decided to expand its operations with a travelling road show.

It will showcase the men for ten days in Paris before going to a host of other cities including Brussels, Lausanne, Toulouse and Lyon.

Communication director Thomas Pawlowski said: 'Girls can come and do their shopping among friends; we’re just showing our fun side... it’s ironic, our marketing is all pretty wacky, there’s no smutty connotation to it.'

via metro.co.uk

Seizing on the entrepreneurial spirit that inspired quickie weddings in Las Vegas chapels, Dutch businessman Jim Halfens is trying to pioneer a business that lets couples undo their marriages just as easily. With a "wild, you've-got-to-be-joking plan to profit from the sorry state of so many American unions," Halfens wants to establish a "Divorce Hotel" that will facilitate splits for the 50 percent of American couples who call it quits, says Janet Morrissey at The New York Times. And Halfens — who is not married — argues that the out-of-the-box scheme, replete with plans for an accompanying reality television show, will be a hit. Here, a guide to the Divorce Hotel:

How does the Divorce Hotel work?
It's pretty simple. "On a Friday, a couple — which already have plans to split — check into a designated luxury hotel," says Julia Bricklin at Forbes. "On Monday, after meeting with lawyers, mediators, notaries, and psychologists all weekend, the pair walks away amicably, with divorce papers signed, for one flat fee."

How much does it cost?
A weekend will set couples back between $2,500 and $10,000. While $10,000 might seem like a lot for a weekend getaway in which fun isn't exactly on the agenda, it might be a deal considering the legal costs for messy divorces — anywhere from $5,000 to $20,000, or more if children are involved — that can take months or years to complete.

Are there any Divorce Hotels up and running?
Yes. Halfens says his Divorce Hotel operations in Holland have been used by 17 couples, all but one of whom successfully ended their marriage over the weekend. Halfens is looking at several potential U.S. sites for a Divorce Hotel, including New York City and Los Angeles.

Is it really called the Divorce Hotel?
No. The divorce is a luxury service offered through existing boutique hotels, largely because hotels "are reluctant to be seen as the Divorce Hotel," says Morrissey. The service offers couples separate accommodations, and hotel employees are instructed to treat them with special consideration. "You don't want the hotel crew wishing you a very nice weekend and hoping you have lots of fun here," Halfens tells The Times.

Will it work?
It "takes more than the length of a weekend jaunt to sort through the details of a complicated divorce, especially when such a divorce involves significant property or business holdings, stock options, real estate, or offshore accounts," says Doug Barry at Jezebel. Things get even more complicated when custody battles are at play. However, Halfens claims that his experiment has led to amicable divorces and heartfelt partings. "We once had a guy that said, 'I want a bottle of champagne,' and did a toast to his wife," he tells ABC News.

And there's going to be a reality TV show?
Possibly. A couple of production companies have reportedly expressed interest in the concept, and Halfens has invited Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore to launch the show. Halfens claims that they're a perfect fit because "they've indicated they want to end their six-year marriage on friendly terms," says Morrissey. "He hasn't heard back."

via theweek.com

Mao Sugiyama, a young Japanese illustrator from Tokyo, recently made headlines after he decided to have his genitalia removed. To top it off, he offered to sell his organs as a cooked meal, for ¥100,000 ($1.250). Six people pre-ordered…

“Please retweet. I am offering my male genitals (full penis, testes, scrotum) as a meal for 100,000 yen…. I will prepare and cook as the buyer requests, at his chosen location.” This was the tweet that started it all. Sugiyama, who calls himself an ‘asexual’, is a 22-year-old illustrator who aspires to be so devoid of sexual features that he will be able to publicly wear transparent clothing. To achieve his goal, the young man decided to remove all his genitalia. For the sake of argument, let’s just say you could somehow understand his wish, but what comes next is even more shocking. At first, he considered consuming his own genitals, but later decided to offer them up on Twitter, for ¥100,000 to the first person or group interested. He got six orders…

After his tweet went viral, Mao announced he was organizing a public banquet, in which he would cook and serve his own organs as per the request of his clients. Called “Ham Cybele – Century Banquet”, the event took place at the Asagaya Loft A event space, in the Suginami Ward of Tokyo. If you’re pondering the name of the event, Cybele is the name of an Anatolian goddess whose priests were all eunuchs, while “century” is a homophone for the Japanese word “genitals”. The day before the event, the artist tweeted “I’m starting to thaw them out” along with a very graphic photo. On April 13, a crowd of about 70 people showed up at the banquet location. One of the six buyers was a no-show, but the rest were ready to get what they had paid for.

Dressed as a cook, Mao Sugiyama sliced and cooked his own genitalia and served it to his curious customers. Calorie Lab, the website that broke the news in the US, thoroughly describes the look and taste of the ‘dishes’ and even has some photos of them. I’m not going to go into details here, but I can say the guest found them almost inedible. In order to be completely devoid of any sexual features, Sugiyama also removed his nipples and was planning on serving them as well, but after burning them with sodium hydroxide, there was apparently not much left to cook.

Before going through with the banquet, the Japanese illustrator had himself tested for sexual diseases. The five people crazy enough to eat his genitalia also had to sign a waver releasing Sugiyama and the organizers of the event from any liability arising from the consumption of human genitals. Since the whole event, Sugiyama has been constantly defending his actions and answering questions on Twitter. He’s talking about his operation, his decision and the corset he’s currently wearing to help maintain an androgynous shape as his female hormone therapy progresses.

After news of this bizarre event became popular in Japan, the Tokyo police was apparently notified by concerned citizens, but hey were unable to pursue the matter because there is no law against cannibalism in Japan. I think that’s probably weirder than Mao’s story… However, a police spokesman said, “We’re going to talk to the people at Asagaya Loft A and ask them what is going on and why they hosted such an event.” Good luck with that!

via odditycentral.com

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip -- There is an afterlife for animals at the Khan Younis zoo in the impoverished Gaza Strip.

Animals who die in the dilapidated park return to be displayed as stuffed creatures, giving visitors the unusual zoo experience of petting a lion, tiger or crocodile. But because taxidermy in the largely isolated Palestinian territory is not advanced and expertise and materials are in short supply, the experience can be grim.



Flies swarm around some of the 10 animals that have been embalmed so far. The makeshift cages housing the exhibits - fashioned from fencing salvaged from Jewish settlements that Israel dismantled in 2005 - are littered with empty soda cans and other trash.

An emaciated-looking stuffed lion, its coat patchy and mangy, lies on an exhibit cobbled together from crates and shipping pallets. A monkey had missing limbs. A porcupine had a hole in its head.



The zoo's 65 live animals, which include ostriches, monkeys, turtles, deer, a llama, a lion and a tiger, don't fare much better. During a recent visit, children poked chocolate, potato chips and bread through the wire. There's no zookeeper on the premises. Gaza has no government body that oversees zoos, and medical treatment is done by consulting over the phone with zoo veterinarians in Egypt.

Still, the zoo is one of the few places of entertainment here in Khan Younis, a city of 200,000 people at the southern end of the Gaza Strip. It's one of five zoos in the Gaza Strip, a densely populated coastal enclave of 1.7 million people ruled by Islamic Hamas militants.

Owner Mohammed Awaida said he opened the "South Forest Park" in 2007, only to lose a number of animals during Israel's military offensive against Hamas that began in December 2008. During the three-week offensive, launched in response to rocket attacks on Israel, Awaida said he could not reach the zoo, and many animals died of neglect and starvation.

Read more at heraldonline.com

Vaginas are not meant to be storage units. They are not meant to be purses. They are not meant to be secret hiding places. You are not supposed to put unsterilized foreign objects in them. Most of us understand these rules. But you'd be surprised. Some women cannot be stopped from violating the terms and conditions of their vaginas.

Vodka Bottle Filled With Urine
What do you do when you are on probation and need to pass a urine test, but aren't clean? You hide a small vodka bottle with someone else's urine in your vagina! At least, this was Mischelle Lindy Salzgeber's solution to her problem. The jig was up when the bottle was discovered during a routine body scan. Oh, and too bad the urine she borrowed to pass as her own tested positive for drugs anyway.

Heroin … And So Much More
Pennsylvania woman Karin Mackaliunas wins the award for most stuff stored in a vagina EVER. During a routine strip search, authorities discovered 54 bags of heroin, 31 empty heroin bags, eight prescription pills, and $51.22 in cash and change in her vagina.

Prosthetic Eye
Dr. Melissa Barton sees a lot of odd stuff as an ER doctor. But the oddest she ever saw (pun intended) was a woman who had placed a prosthetic eyeball in her vagina for "safe keeping." Why, you ask? Oh, she was preparing to have a fight with her neighbors and she told Dr. Barton that glass eyes "are pretty expensive and hard to replace."

Donny Osmond Poster
Of all the inconceivable phallic objects a desperately horny person could shove up in their vagina, a rolled-up Donny Osmond poster is not the first thing that comes to mind. A U.K. woman featured on the BBC3 show called “Bizarre ER” did just that. Doctors discovered a rolled-up poster of Donny Osmond shoved inside her vagina.

Knife
Two Florida women got in a drug-fueled fight over some prescription pills. Once arrested, police found one had a knife and a bottle of prescription pills hidden in her belly fat rolls. Wait … there's more. A thorough cavity search revealed a second knife ... hidden in her vagina.

Cell Phone
The only thing about stealing a cell phone and hiding it in your vadge is that when it rings, other people are going to hear it. That's what happened to Ruxandra Gardian, the Romanian woman whose vagina rang. Once authorities discerned where the ringing was coming from, the owner declined to take it back.

Credit Card
Another Florida woman, another strange object hidden in a vagina. Ann Marie Hernandez made a sizable Home Depot haul with a fraudulent credit card. When she was done with her shopping spree, she loaded the goods into her car and the credit card into her vagina.

Crack Pipe
Arlina Romero also had a stolen credit card on her person when cops caught her leaving a flop house. Instead of hiding the credit card in her vagina like Ann Hernandez, she put it in her pocket. There was something else hidden in her vagina. A crack pipe.

An interactive poster created by researcher Keidai Ogawa at Japan's Keio University does more than stare back at you — the woman onscreen romantically leans in for a kiss when you approach.

Ogawa's technology uses ultrasound sensors to detect the distance between a subject and the digital projection onscreen. As you move in for a smooch, the woman closes her eyes and gets ready for some action; when you back away after an innocent peck, she giggles and blushes.

Ogawa came up with the idea after he grew tired of the lifeless posters of pop idols lining his bedroom walls. But a kiss isn't enough for him. Ogawa says he wants to make it a more sensory experience, by adding such things as the smell of a woman's shampoo, or the sound of someone whispering, "I love you." The affection-seeking researcher is also working on an iPad app.

(Watch a demo below.)

Huug Bosse is a Dutch man who had hip surgery two years ago and he hasn’t stopped laughing since.

Huug Bosse’s wife finds it annoying, his brother and daughter have become exasperated, but all he can do in response is slap his knee and laugh uncontrollably.

The cause for Huug Bosse’s condition isn’t exactly clear, but it’s probably due to the anesthesia he was placed under, during the operation. In spite of all the mirth, there still is one thing that can move Huug Bosse to tears. He calls it the most beautiful song – the Dutch national anthem. Perhaps they should have it playing in the background whenever they want to get a serious word out of the man.

Huug Bosse’s wife says he was a normal man before he had his hip-replacement surgery, in 2010. Apparently the anesthesia he was under during the operation is to blame for his uncontrollable laughter. Although his daughter and brother don’t even visit him anymore because of his constant chuckling, Huug Bosse himself doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with him. He considers it normal for a person to have a change of personality, and says his clients think he’s the sweetest person in the world.

Huug Bosse’s wife says he’s always had a sense of humor, but over the last two years he has been laughing all day long.

bellenews.com

In what should probably be taken as another example of the weirdly sexual build up to next year's Russian elections, a man has touched 1,000 women's breasts for Vladimir Putin.

Why? We don't really understand. After touching all the breasts, he then meets Prime Minister Putin and shakes his hand, somehow passing the breast touching experience onto him (or something like that).

Sam Nickel, the man touching the breasts, has explained it wasn't all so easy in an interview:

The touching itself - it is certainly nice, but you imagine that 1,000 girls - it's only about 15-20% of the girls we interviewed. The remaining 5000-7000 girls did not agree. And each asks several questions. Each must be explained. In general, we spent a lot of time and nerves. This was terribly tiring. We burned on the summer sun; we were on feet 8 hours a day. It was the tedious work with breasts, their owners and friends of the owner of the breasts. I saw the breasts in my dreams at night and the dreams came true at daylight. But certainly I didn’t become a gay. I still love breasts.

By 2014, construction is set to begin on Napoleonland, a new theme park designed to pay homage to the French leader some believe to be a hero and others think of as one of history's most loathsome dictators. Park-goers can expect a water show recreating the Battle of Trafalgar, tributes to Napoleon's crushing defeat of the Russo-Austrian Army at the Battle of Austerlitz, a ski run littered with the frozen bodies of soldiers and horses and a re-creation of Louis XVI on the guillotine — all of it on the site of one of Napoleon's greatest victories, the Battle of Montereau. Even the Battle of Waterloo, which ended Napoleonic rule, will be featured. "It's going to be fun for the family," Yves Jego, the brainchild behind the park, told The London Telegraph. Indeed. After all, wouldn't Disneyland be better if its grounds were scattered with war casualties and 18th century beheadings?

Grutas Park

Grutas Park, a site about 75 miles outside Vilnius, doesn't have a roller coaster or a Ferris wheel — but it does have dozens of Soviet-era sculptures that escaped destruction when Lithuania gained its independence. The park's founder, Viliumas Malinauskas, used his family's mushroom-and-berry fortune to establish a place for those monuments to socialism to live on as a permanent reminder of past oppressions. But Malinauskas didn't stop there. Grutas Park, which opened in 2001, is also home to a Soviet-era playground, a restaurant serving Soviet-era dishes and, oddly, a zoo, complete with non-Soviet-era ostriches. If you're planning a trip, aim for April 1 and catch an annual comedy festival featuring impersonations of Communist Party bigwigs and bureaucrats.

Holy Land Experience

Holy Land Experience in Orlando, Florida, sits in the shadows of some of the world's most famous theme parks, but visitors expecting hair-raising rollercoasters may be disappointed. Holy Land is more of an outdoor museum than an amusement park, featuring exhibits such as the Jerusalem Street Market, which recreates what the holy city was like 2,000 years ago. For the less faint of heart, you can even watch a bloody recreation of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

BonBon Land

Some fifty miles southwest of Copenhagen sits BonBon Land, the whimsical, wacky and vaguely disturbing theme park home to attractions like the "Farting Dog" and "Skid Mark" rollercoasters. Though now owned by Spanish entertainment company Parques Reunidos, BonBon Land is the brainchild of Danish confectioner, Michael Spangsberg, who opened the park in 1992 to promote his developing candy business, BonBon. In addition to log flumes and rollercoasters, BonBon Land features a puzzling variety of cartoon animal statues, along with murals depicting seagulls defecating into alligators' mouths and dogs gleefully passing gas.

Hacienda Napoles

Visitors make their way into Hacienda Napoles, a museum and exotic animal park located in Colombia, by passing through an archway decorated with an old airplane. But that's not just any old airplane — it's the same plane that transported the notorious Columbian drug lord Pablo Escobar's first load of cocaine to the U.S. The park is located on the grounds of the former drug lord's ranch. Before police shot and killed Escobar in 1993, Hacienda Napoles served as his home and a playground full of life-sized dinosaur sculptures, vintage cars and more than a dozen hippos. Today, the park features guided tours, horseback riding, a swimming pool and a zoo and attracts upwards of 50,000 visitors per year.

The Children's Republic

The child-sized Argentine theme park was a product of the Eva Perón Foundation, run by the wife of populist authoritarian President Juan Domingo Perón. Created to teach Argentinean youth about the virtues of democracy, young visitors to the park can elect their own congress and haggle with banks over imaginary loans. With its tall spires and bright colors, the park almost looks like the original Disneyland.

Dickens World

Located in County Kent, England, was a $124 million idea that Sam Anderson wrote in the New York Times magazine "promised to be an 'authentic' re-creation of the London of Charles Dickens's novels, complete with soot, pickpockets, cobblestones, gas lamps, animatronic Dickens characters and strategically placed chemical 'smell pots' that would, when heated, emit odors of offal and rotting cabbage." But Anderson, who attended the delayed opening of the park in 2007, returned in 2012 to find a park wracked by the recession, surviving off of rent from the chain restaurants that abut the village.

Love Land

Located on the South Korean island of Jeju — known in decades past as the traditional honeymoon island for arranged-marriage newlyweds — Love Land is one of the world's most salacious sculpture gardens. The park greets visitors with sprawling limbs and remarkably acrobatic (and unmentionable) depictions of love-making, created by art students from Korea's Hongik University. Besides phallic artwork, the park also includes sex-ed information at its visitor center and a gift shop for those who leave the park feeling, ahem, inspired.

Dollywood

Dolly Parton is a modern day jane-of-all-trades, but who knew the Queen of Country was also a theme park connoisseur? Dollywood, the entertainer's thrill park is a full-fledged amusement extravaganza with rides like Dolly's Demolition Derby bumper cars and the Dollywood Express steam engine.

Shijingshan Amusement Park

When ABC News visited Shijingshan in 2007, they reported that much of the place looked eerily similar to parts of Disney theme parks and that the characters bore striking resemblances to Donald Duck, Mickey Mouse and Snow White. Even the park's slogan, "Disney is too far, please come to Beijing Shijingshan Amusement Park," hints as the park's motives.

We all know about the secret world of fetishes, and for the most part, although they may not be for everyone, they are harmless.

Police found a horde that was not to be believed: 1,000 pairs in the man’s vehicle and more than 10,000 pairs in his home.

The 48–year-old man was arrested with an accomplice after he broke into a building located in Bangkok’s Chinatown.

The suspect admitted to police that he had been stealing and collecting panties since he was 18. But perhaps that’s not the worst of it.



“He smelled them all the time, even while driving,” said police Major General Saroj Promcharoen.

They could arrest him only for breaking and entering, but not for stealing property because no one has reported the underwear stolen, legally translating to the lack of a plaintiff.

It would seem that this tale of pilfered panties comes straight from the annals of the Guinness World Records, or better still, Ripley’s Believe It or Not.

A better trick might be stealing the panties from the women while they are still wearing them. Perhaps our man was brushing up for that finale.

The world may never know.

Go figure (and hang onto your panties).

And if you din’t think this news was funny, check out the video below, this guy’s version hilarious.

Jack in the Box is now serving a Bacon Milkshake. Yes, it's real, and yes, they are hoping it will cause some sort of bacon-fueled mass hysteria, so it's "as limited as limited can be." Denny's produced a Maple Bacon Sundae for their Baconalia promotion, so it's not unheard of for a chain to add bacon to dessert, although word on the street is the Jack in the Box shake uses bacon-flavored syrup and not actual porky goodness.

The shake is part of a new campaign that asks the question: If you like bacon so much, why don't you marry it? They mean literally: the ad below features a bacon wedding that ends with the oh-so-romantic words "You may eat the bride."

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) keeps track of the things that they confiscate, though, and among the nail files, water bottles, and cosmetics there are a few contraband items that really stand out.

Birds. According to the TSA, agents in Los Angeles discovered two birds wrapped in socks and taped to the leg and chest of a woman who was en route to China. The birds were found during "a pat-down that was being administered due to bulky clothing," the TSA reported on its blog.

A science project. A college student's metal-and-wire science project prompted agents to shut down an checkpoint in Omaha after they saw it on the X-ray monitor.

Knives and swords. Not just a plastic picnic knife or a Swiss Army knife, mind you, but tree saws, a 14-inch sword hidden in a cane, a brass-knuckle knife, and even a "non-metallic martial arts weapon" called a Tactile Spike, which agents found stashed in a passenger's sock -- while he was wearing it. One passenger was carrying two sharp throwing knives in a hollowed-out book. The title? "Ninja: The Shadow Warrior." Of course.



Snakes and turtles. In August, TSA agents in Miami caught a man with seven -- that's right, seven -- snakes hidden in his pants. He was not happy to see them. The reptiles were coiled up and stashed inside pantyhose that the man had tucked into his trousers along with three small turtles; agents found them using "imaging technology" (yup, one of those full-body scanner things).

Grenades and land mines. Both inert, the TSA reports, but still... if a bottle of shampoo isn't OK, why would anyone assume that a grenade would be?

Guns and ammunition. Passengers are actually allowed to carry firearms as long as they're in their checked luggage and have been declared to the airline. But here's a list of the things that TSA agents found in a single carry-on bag in Wichita, Kansas, recently: "A tree saw with a 13-inch blade, a pocketknife with a 3-inch blade, two throwing knives with 8-inch blades, eleven individual 30-06 rifle rounds, one 12-gauge shotgun slug, five count of buckshot, and five boxes, each containing 25 rounds of 12-gauge shotgun shells and a partridge in a pear tree." All in all, TSA agents confiscated 1,200 guns in airports throughout the US in 2011.


A stun-gun disguised as a bright pink smart phone. "Law enforcement authorities responded to the incident and allowed the passenger to continue on her flight, after surrendering the item to TSA," according to the TSA's blog.

C4 explosives. A soldier flying out of Arizona thought it would be cool to bring a few small chunks of C4 explosives home to show his family. We would suggest an alternative souvenir next time.

240 (or so) live fish. According to the TSA, "The passenger didn't have a little baggie with a goldfish in it, they had 4 large hard-sided suitcases each filled with only fish and water."

Oddly not on the list: The red-velvet cupcake that TSA agents in Las Vegas confiscated just before Christmas, when a woman tried to bring the snack on the plane. The cupcake had been baked inside a glass jar and, according to Rebecca Haines, the TSA agent who stopped her said that the treat's vanilla-bourbon frosting was "a gel-like substance" and, therefore, forbidden.

"We also had a small pile of hummus sandwiches with creamy fillings, which made it through, but the cupcake with its frosting was apparently a terrorist threat," she told ABC News. When she left Boston, TSA agents at Logan Airport let her go through security with two of the treats, saying that they "looked delicious and told us to have a great trip," she said. "But in Las Vegas, they were dangerous. They shouldn't be delicious in one part of the country and a security threat in the other."

A stroke turned a butch British rugby player gay, the Daily Mail claims.

Chris Birch, 26, a Welsh bank clerk, broke his neck while attempting a back flip and then suffered a stroke, the Daily Mail reported Tuesday.

When he woke up, he told his family he had changed.

"It sounds strange, but when I came round, I immediately felt different," Birch told the paper. "I wasn't interested in women any more. I was definitely gay. I had never been attracted to a man before - I'd never even had any gay friends."

He quit his job, dropped his old friends, and began studying hairdressing, the Daily Mail reported.

Birch lost 110 pounds, cut his hair and started dating men.

The London Mirror, which first carried the story in September, said Birch’s accident took place in 2005 after Birch broke up with his fiance.

Birch spent months in recovery.

“I had to learn to walk, eat, even speak again and all my family were supporting me, hoping they would see the old Chris come back soon enough,” he told the Mirror.

“My old friends would come round and visit me but the conversation would dry up straightaway. I wasn’t interested in the rugby scores, going down the pub to watch football or anything else I used to do.

“Suddenly, I hated everything about my old life. I didn't get on with my friends, I hated sport and found my job boring.

“Everyone said I was more sarcastic, behaved differently and that even my mannerisms had changed, but to me the way I felt was natural. So I started avoiding seeing my old friends who wanted me to be someone I wasn’t,” he said.

Instead he began going to local dance clubs and made new friends, including one special man.

“I continued seeing this man and then one night we slept together. I knew then that I wasn’t interested in women any more. I was definitely gay,” he told the Mirror.

For the last 18 months he has been living with a 19-year-old lover above the hair salon he works in, the Mirror and Daily Mail said.

Neither paper interviewed any of Birch’s family members or friends, or any of his doctors or neurologists.

This bride went a tiny bit over the top with her wedding dress with a train that takes some stopping.

They say it’s a day you should never forget – and that’s certainly the case for Italian bride Elena De Angelis and the village of Casal di Princice.


She has broken the world record for the longest wedding dress by arriving to the church with a mammoth, 3km (1.86 mile) long veil.

Hundreds of schoolgirls and their mothers turned out to help the bride-to-be along the streets of her village.


The Gianni Molaro designed cream dress, which is made from 6,000 metres of silk chord, is expected to be confirmed as the world’s longest by the Guinness book of Records.

It’s apparently 28 times the length of Manchester United's Old Trafford pitch and would take Usain Bolt running at blistering world recording pace almost five minutes to run its full length.

Driven to the church in a vintage car Elena was applauded by the entire village.


The veil literally stretched for miles and had to be carefully collected by designers after Elena arrived in the church.

Principles of Organic and Biochemistry? Yawn! English Literature 101? An outdated snooze-fest! Differential Equations? That one is just begging to be skipped! Now that college students have the option to take classes on everything from zombies to garbage, gone are the days of choosing between Art History 1 and Art History 2 to round out a schedule.

Underwater Basket Weaving
Once the fictional name given to college classes that required minimal participation in exchange for credits, Underwater Basket Weaving is now an actual class offered at University of California, San Diego, as well as at Rutgers. It stands to reason that this recreational class, in which students submerge grasses or wicker in water and then braid it together into baskets, is meant to get students to relax after they’ve spent a long week actually going to college.

Philosophy and Star Trek
“Star Trek is very philosophical.” This is the matter-of-fact statement that leads the course description of PHIL-180, Philosophy and Star Trek, at Georgetown University. The undergraduate course is advertised as an introduction to basic philosophical tenets surrounding metaphysics and epistemology, and Star Trek is the context for grappling with the existential imponderables that arise. In other words, without Star Trek, you’re never going to get a bunch of hungover freshmen to show up and care about Kierkegaard.

The Joy of Garbage
It might serve our society well if this course, offered at Santa Clara University, was required around the country rather than simply being a whimsically named elective at one California school. Instructor Virginia Matzek does not let her students shy away from what she calls “the yuck factor,” taking them to sewage treatment centers and landfills and any other place that deals with the business end of what we throw away. In this age of countless environmental controversies and problems, the more people who know about the way our waste is processed, the better off we all might be.

Daytime Serials: Family & Social Roles
This course is offered in the Women’s Studies program at the University of Wisconsin. It compares daytime programming with prime-time dramas in order to examine the way themes of gender are portrayed and how those portrayals affect women and men in our culture. It’s fair to suspect that despite the subject, this class has more than Soap Opera Digest on the syllabus. If you think soap operas are just about amnesia, twisted love affairs between long-lost fraternal twins, and made-up medical procedures that frequently resurrect “dead” characters, think again. Daytime television actually serves as insight into gender roles.

Zombies in Popular Media
Zombies are the new vampires, you know. Columbia College in Chicago is capitalizing on the zombie’s rising star power with this course that examines the undead’s history and importance in fantasy and horror texts. But don’t think you’re getting off easy with this one. The course description advertises an “intense schedule” of critical theory and source media. For the record, “source media” includes movies and comic books.

Myth & Science Fiction: Star Wars, The Matrix, and Lord of the Rings
Almost everyone knows that these wildly popular epic trilogies are all based on mythologies that have been around since the dawn of time. At Centre College in Danville, Kentucky, instructor Lee Patterson leads a workshop that explores classic epic storytelling using these contemporary examples instead of restricting himself to Virgil or Homer like some professors might. This is all a long way of saying, “Dorks of the world, come on out of your mom’s basement—it’s the college class you’ve been waiting for!”

Maple Syrup: The Real Thing
This educational gem is offered as part of the honors program at Alfred University in New York, the same institution that brought you such courses as Purity and Porn in America, Hannibal Lecter’s Book Club, and Tightwaddery: Living the Good Life on a Dollar a Day, among other highly entertaining class options. The course description is pithily introduced as a job listing: “Wanted: Someone with a background in meteorology, chemistry, botany, forestry, art, and cookery who is also a nature lover with lots of patience. Must enjoy long hours of hard work in the snow, cold, and mud.” It then goes on to invite students to experience the joys of learning the process of syrup-making and its storied history. Interesting? Perhaps. Honors program worthy? That’s debatable.

Being able to gorge on whatever you please without piling on the pounds might sound like a dream come true.

But for Carole French, who can tuck into takeaways, feast on fry -ups and still tip the scales at a tiny six stone, it's a living nightmare.


The mother-of-two is one of only two people in the world that have been diagnosed with muscular fibrositis disproportion - a disorder that means her body can't store fat.

And while initially the condition might seem attractive, Mrs French says the reality is miserable.

The slight 50-year-old is so thin she is forced to wear children's clothes as a size zero hangs from her tiny frame.

Carole, from Oldham, Manchester, says she is bombarded with taunts and stares every time she leaves the house from strangers.

She says some even try to take her picture and shout cruel jibes about her petite body, which many believe is down to anorexia.

Mrs French said: 'So many people tell me I'm lucky to be so thin, but I just wish I could put on weight.

'Since I was a teenager, people have always assumed that I was anorexic - but nothing could be further from the truth.

'I eat like a horse - I never skip meals and I treat myself to a Chinese take-away once a week.

'People can be really cruel - I know I look different, but I don't choose to look the way I do.

'People stop and stare at me and take pictures of me like I'm in some kind of freak show. It's really upsetting.'

At 5ft 4in, Mrs French struggles to find clothes to fit her, and is forced to buy aged 10 children's clothes.

This is despite her determined efforts to consume at least the recommended number of 2,000 calories for a woman every day.

Her regular diet involves cooked breakfasts, cheese salads for lunch, and chinese take-aways for dinner - washed down with a pint of calorific stout.

Born a normal-sized baby, Mrs French's parents soon noticed their was something different about their daughter when she took much longer to sit, crawl, and walk than other children her age.



By the time she started school, it was glaringly obvious to her class mates that she was not the same as them - she was tiny, and her arms and legs were stick thin.

Aged 13 she weighed just a tiny four stone - and her terrified parents were convinced the teenager was suffering from an eating disorder.

Mrs French said she longed to be like her peers and develop a curvier figure.

'When I was a teenager, I was always picked on by the other kids - they used to call me 'stick insect' and say I was anorexic.' she said.

'Even my parents thought I was doing something to myself to avoid putting on weight.

'But I was desperate to look like my friends, who were all developing curves and beautiful figures. I stuffed myself with carbs and mum's huge roast dinners, but nothing seemed to work.

'Even when my mum took me to the doctors, they referred me to hospital to make sure I wasn't bulimic or anorexic.

'It took doctors a year to diagnose me with muscular fibrositis disproportion - there was only one other person with it in the world.

'It means I don't have as many muscles as a normal person, and virtually no body fat.'

The condition is likely to lead to other health problems.

She said: 'My condition leaves me constantly exhausted, and I'm likely to develop osteoporosis and arthritis.

'There's no cure for it - I've just had to learn to live with it.

'My husband, Steve, and two sons, Neil and Mark, say I'm perfect just the way I am.

'Loads of my friends say they'd love to swap their body problems for mine - but I remind them of all the stares and comments I have to put up with.

'Anorexia is a terrible thing - but there's nothing I can do to change my body.'

Thirteen-year-old Scottish teen Megan Stewart can't brush her hair while sitting up.

It's not that she wouldn't want to -- rather, if she does, she runs the risk of her brain shutting down because of the static electricity.

Stewart has a rare condition called "hair brushing syndrome," which is triggered from static electricity, the Scottish Daily Record reported. The condition is so rare that Stewart's doctors had only ever heard of one other case of the condition.

As a result, Stewart can't touch balloons, nor can she wear shiny clothing, because of the danger of static shock, the Mirror reported.

And now, Stewart brushes her hair upside down, with her hair hanging over the side of her bed, to avoid the risk of static electricity, the Daily Mail reported. She also has to keep it damp while brushing it.

It all started three years ago, when Stewart's mom was brushing her hair on her first day of the sixth grade. As her hair was being brushed, Stewart "flopped over and her lips turned blue," her mother, Sharon, told the Daily Record.

Stewart's condition might be a result of birth complications, according to the Daily Mail. Stewart was born weighing 2 pounds and 5 ounces, and also was born with a hole in her diaphragm, causing her stomach to fall through and only one lung to grow because of the lack of room in her body.

It's possible that Stewart's condition might be a form of a reflex anoxic seizure, where people faint or show symptoms of epilepsy, in response to triggers like fear, loud noises or pain, the Daily Record reported.

Full story here

Except Stanley Thornton is 30-years-old - and his 'mother' is really his room-mate.

Mr Thornton seeks comfort in being treated like a baby, a condition known as paraphilic infantilism.

The 'adult baby' lives out his fantasies at his California apartment, where he has built himself a giant crib, play pen and even a man-sized high chair.

He spends his days playing with Lego as he sucks on his pacifier, and being spoon or bottle-fed by his room-mate Sandra Diaz, who willingly acts as his mother.

Tonight viewers will see inside his bizarre alternate world as he features in a National Geographic programme, 'Taboo: Fantasy Lives'.

He said: 'For some people being an adult baby is a sexual fetish for them, but for most of us it's just, you know, you're doing it to relax, you come home from work, you change into baby mode, you put away your adult stuff and everything goes on hold.'

He first began his return to childhood when he was 14, as a way of coping when he started wetting the bed after being abused as a boy.

He started wearing diapers when he was 13, and then gradually realised he still wanted the comforts of babyhood - toys,a crib and even a pacifier. At 20, he began 'day wetting' and now wears a diaper every day.

He said: 'The first thought is you start thinking you're crazy, because this isn't normal, or at least that's what you think, you think you're the only one doing it.

'Then you go down the road and go on the computer and you find all these other people that are doing it, and you find the name for it.'

In 2000, he started website for other 'adult babies', where members can find 'mothers or 'babies', and tips on where to buy diapers.

According to his website, he used to work as a security guard, but had an accident and now claims disability benefit for a heart condition.

Each morning Miss Diaz, a former nurse, wakes him up in his 'nursery', where he sleeps in a crib dressed in a playsuit, underneath colourful mobiles hanging from the ceiling.

He said: 'I like it, it's very comfortable, it's easy to get into the baby feel while you're in it. There's nothing else like it, waking up in a crib as opposed to a bed.

'Sleeping in a crib, you wake up as a child and you go on from there, and it's easy to stay in the same mindset.'

Then Miss Diaz feeds him, either with a bottle or from a spoon.

He has just finished building a giant high-chair, and he reinforced a children's play area to take his weight so he can play with Lego and stuffed animals.

Miss Diaz said: 'I love him like he is my favourite nephew, he is like my family member who lost his mother, and I'm like the aunt stepping in and saying I'm still here for you.'

Mr Thornton changes into adult clothes when he goes outside, but as soon as he gets home he goes back into 'baby mode.'

Some infantilists, known as 'diaper lovers', see the condition as a sexual fetish.

But Mr Thornton is keen to stress he and other 'adult babies' find comfort, not sexual satisfaction, by being treated as a child. Infantilists have no sexual desire towards children.


He said: 'Being an adult baby I've had a couple of different reactions, some good, some not so good.

'I've had some people that are perfectly fine with it and others that are just angry, maybe think you're automatically a paedophile because you're too into it.

'I like to be treated as a baby, just to get the love and affection, safeness, just to go back to a time when you're caring for a one or two year old.'

More images & video at Dailymail

The Green Man Pub in Wellington offers the 30ml shots for a princely sum of £12 - and apparently it's going down a treat with regulars.

The gastro-pub serves the drink chilled fresh from a Christchurch stallion farm and each shot contains about 300 million individual horse sperm cells.

Green Man pub co-owner Steven Drummond is to blame for the grimace-inducing drink, which he explained is knocked back by both male and female customers.

He advises his customers to shoot the sticky horse semen back in one gulp rather than attempt to sip the bizarre concoction.

He came up with the idea when trying to invent a new drink to spice-up a local food challenge.

Ever wondered what it feels like to be pregnant? Now even men can find out thanks to a new dress created by Takuya Iwamoto from the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology and his team that simulates the weight, temperature, movement and heartbeat of a fetus (see video below).

The device can replicate the 9-month long process in two minutes or it can be worn for a longer period to experience what it feels like day-to-day. To mimic the fetus, it contains a 4-litre bag filled with warm water. Kicking movement is recreated with a lining of 45 balloons that expand and contract. But wiggling is more complex to reproduce and requires a grid of air actuators that exploit a tactile illusion. When two vibrating sources placed a distance apart move at the same time, it triggers a sensation in between the two points. So by varying vibrating pairs over time, the simulated fetus seems to squirm.

The system also contains an accelerometer and touch sensors to allow for interaction. When the suit is connected to a computer, software displays a 3D model of the fetus that changes to mimic different stages of pregnancy. The fetus on the screen appears to be in a good mood when a wearer strokes their abdomen and makes steady movements. But if the person moves around vigorously, it will trigger more intense motion.

The team hopes the system will help men better to understand what a woman goes through during pregnancy. It offers a more realistic simulation than existing systems by reproducing the temperature and movement of the fetus.

The work will be presented in August at Siggraph 2011 in Vancouver, Canada.