Ingenial

Blowing your nose in public and pointing with your forefinger are ones any non-Japanese would surely end up doing. One that should be adopted by other cultures is the Japanese custom of always having a friend pour you a beer and never allowing someone to pour their own.

Read the article at AskMen.com for the full list.

As of Friday, March 12.

At Friday’s close, these were the five highest market cap U.S. companies:

• Exxon (XOM), $315.38 billion.
• Microsoft (MSFT): $256.71 billion.
• Apple (AAPL): $205.48 billion.
• Wal-Mart (WMT): $205.09 billion.
• Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA): $202.20 billion.

The biggest oil company. The largest retailer. The leading software company. A conglomerate run by the world’s most respected investor.

And Apple.

I believe Apple will pass up Microsoft within two years.

From Tech Trader Daily.

This is just strange. To monitor the health of whales bodily fluid samples must be taken. Since taking blood, urine, or stool samples is hard (considering IT’S A WHALE) scientists might opt to position remote controlled helicopters over whale blow spouts to collect snot samples. Dr. Karina Acevedo-Whitehouse of the Zoological Society of London claims the hacky fix could be a breakthrough.

Via Boing Boing and Make

The best-selling car in America is the Cozy Coupe,  457,000 of which were sold in 2008. It beat out the Toyota Camry by 20,000 units and bringing up its total sales for the last 30 years to 10 million.

What’s the story behind this automotive juggernaut? Read more on the history of the Cozy Coupe at Mental Floss.

The urban utopias envisioned by the world’s citizens in the throes of modernist idealism are dead. Even the most optimistic commentators agree Detroit stands as a constant, vivid reminder of the human condition in 2010. Despairing photographers, journalists, historians, tourists and scholars flood to Michigan gawking at the glorious decay. They snap pictures, take “samples”, shove microphones in resident’s faces and in some cases contribute to the city’s destruction. Bottom line: they don’t help.

Detroit has real needs. Perhaps the city needs a hero to step outside the law to protect innocent citizens from the scrappers, looters, drug dealers, gang members and addicts.

Enter James “Jack Rabbit” Jackson: defender of the weak and powerless. The Metro Times reports he’s waging a war to protect his neighborhood. His weapons include a shotgun, video cameras, verbal intimidation and a neighborhood crime watch. His enemies methods are subtle and slow, designed to force people from their homes. They poison dogs, train middle school kids for a life of crime, sell fire hydrants for scrap, loiter in public places and sell drugs.

A burglar wanders into this suburban neighborhood and police don’t respond, Jack the Rabbit does. Other neighborhoods aren’t so lucky.

Read the full story at the Metro Times

Seriously. Switzerland has arguably the most stringent animal rights laws in the world but if a referendum on this Sunday’s ballot passes it will remove any doubt. If passed the referendum would grant all animals (including fish) the right to representation by a lawyer in court. If the animal does not already have representation a lawyer will be provided at the expense of the court.

In another life I spent two summers fishing commercially in Alaska. The above photo shows me holding a 70 pound King Salmon in the summer of 2008. Would this photo be enough to convict me of animal abuse in Switzerland? Let’s examine the evidence. Salmon meat is best prepared for market and preserved by a process called “bleeding” the fish. The fish must stay alive while bleeding out to ensure the best possible meat quality. If a lawyer could prove I did not stun Mr. Salmon in a humane way before bleeding him I could probably face charges. For making a living.

As excited as I am to read John Grisham animal court thrillers from Switzerland… please. If there’s anyone from Switzerland reading this and you have any sanity left vote no on goldfish lawyers.

Read the full story at the WSJ

UPDATE:
Swiss voters emphatically rejected the referendum with over 70% voting against the proposal.

Snow and ice routinely down power lines and trees and we’ve grown accustomed to hearing about deaths caused by inclement weather. We rarely hear of a weather phenomenon disrupting an entire religious way of life.

Orthodox Jews rely on markers called Eruvin to enable them to travel with a burden on the sabbath. In modern Judaism these markers are generally wires outlining a symbolic “fence” around a community of Jews. When even one of these wires is down the Jew practicing the Sabbath must not cross any property line carrying anything (ie: keys, strollers, wallets, children, groceries, or the scriptures.) Until the lines are fixed there will be a lot of Orthodox Jews stranded in their homes on Saturdays.

Read the full story

Killed, aborted or neglected, at least 100m girls have disappeared—and the number is rising.

It is no exaggeration to call this gendercide. Women are missing in their millions—aborted, killed, neglected to death. In 1990 an Indian economist, Amartya Sen, put the number at 100m; the toll is higher now.

The crumb of comfort is that countries can mitigate the hurt, and that one, South Korea, has shown the worst can be avoided. Others need to learn from it if they are to stop the carnage.

Read the full article at The Economist.

You’re a prisoner on death row in Texas. Your life will end in 70 days no matter what you do. How do you react? Kevin Varga faces such a predicament and gives us a glimpse of his daily life at the blog Minutes Before Six. Kevin’s facing charges of first degree murder with the punishment of death by lethal injection. How does he find out the date he will die? From a guard. Check out this incredible story day by day as it’s revealed on one of the best prison blogs around:

Minutes Before Six

London’s parking enforcement system seems broken. Critics of the system point to incidents in which the department actually tickets government vehicles and then fights the tickets later in the courts as examples of senseless waste. Read the story here:
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