Category Archives: amusements

amusements, current affairs

Oddity of the Week

Pope Francis is currently visiting Cuba and the USA. The followning was reported at the end of August by the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post and summarised by the Weird Universe blog:

Muslim clerics complain of the commercialization of the holy city of Mecca during the annual Hajj pilgrimages, but for Pope Francis’s visits to New York, Washington, DC, and Philadelphia in mid-September, shameless street vendors and entrepreneurs already appear to be eclipsing Mecca’s experience. Merchants said they’d be selling, among other tacky items, mozzarella cheese statuettes of the Pope ($20), a Pope Toaster to burnish Francis’s image on bread, a Philly-themed bobblehead associating the Pope with the boxer “Rocky”, local beers Papal Pleasure and YOPO (You Only Pope Once), and T-shirts (“Yo Pontiff!” and “The Pope Is My Homeboy”). The Wall Street Journal quoted a Philadelphia archdiocese spokesman admitting that “you kind of have to take it in stride”.

amusements, food+drink

Oddity of the Week: Seaside Rock

It has just been brought to my attention that Blackpool (and one suspects other places) are now offering seaside rock in a variety of flavours other than the hitherto ubiquitous peppermint and occasional fruit flavours.


According to the Blackpool Gazette local vendors are now offering flavours such as cappuccino, peanut butter, gin & tonic, chicken tikka, cheese & tomato pizza and, rather oddly, fish & chips.
Cappuccino and gin & tonic might just work. I’m not convinced about the others.

amusements, people

Ten Things #21

For this month’s Ten Things I thought we might have a bit more fun.
Over the years I’ve come across many strange, but perfectly genuine, names given to people. They range from the apparently ordinary (I once worked with a guy called Carl Marx) to the totally outrageous. Here are a few of the more outrageous.
Ten Remarkable Names of Real People

  1. About thirty years ago we had a vacation student working in our office who went by the name of Fanny Hyman …
  2. … which I think is one step worse than the friend of a former colleague called Simone Kuhnt.
  3. Of course these aren’t all people I’ve encountered. Some, like the charity worker spotted in 2003, come from media reports. This lady was called Patricia Titti; I just hope she isn’t known as “Pat”.
  4. Continuing in this somewhat dubious vein, I once played cricket against a guy called Jimmy Riddle.
  5. Or again, back in 2000, there was a Urologist at the Devon & Exeter Hospital by the name of Brenda Wee. Which I think beats the urologist by the name of Jack Cox who once treated me.
  6. Going to the more mundane, we shouldn’t forget the former English rugby player, Austin Healey.
  7. But why is it that the medical profession seems to have more than its fair share of odd names, like the Canadian medic, spotted in 2001, by the name of Prof. Lester Grimspoon.
  8. Although to be fair the Victorians had their moments too. Doing family history searches recently I spotted Leonardi Da Vinci Williams (died 1846 in Lambeth).
  9. Oh but there are modern ones too, like Summer Helps whose birth was announced in the Times in 1997.
  10. Nevertheless I’m almost totally convinced that first prize must go to Patriarch Moran Mor Ignatius Zakka I Iwas, Supreme Head of the Universal Syriac Orthodox Church who died in 2014.

And there are hundreds more where they came from!

amusements, arts

Oddity of the Week: Pearls

Japanese artist and jeweller Shinji Nakaba specialises in making tiny wearable sculptures. The pieces come in all shapes and sizes, but his most prolific series involves human and animal skulls carved from oyster pearls and attached to rings, necklaces and brooches.

pearl skulls

You can buy his pieces through his online shop, although at several hundred dollars a time, they aren’t cheap. But a great present for your inner goth!
From: www.thisiscolossal.com/2015/08/skull-pearls/.

amusements, pleasures

Oddity of the Week: Playboy

According to the Weird Universe website, quoting the Houston Chronicle of 12 August 2010 …

Playboy magazine has long published an audio edition, and the Library of Congress produces a text edition in Braille. However, as a Houston Chronicle reporter learned in August [2010], a Texas organization (Taping for the Blind) goes one step further, with volunteer reader Suzi Hanks actually describing the photographs — even the Playmates and other nudes. “I’d say if she has large breasts or small breasts, piercings or tattoos,” said Hanks. “I’ll describe her genitalia. I take my time describing the girls.” “Hey, blind guys like pretty, naked girls, too!”