Rent a German

One of my best friends in the world just moved back to Aachen in Germany after two years in Boston. But according to Torillsin it doesn't matter. I can just rent-a-german.

Would you rather be shaggin'?

Zevatron sent me this link to a recent North Carolina senate bill that would authorise NC license plates to bear a slogan reading "I'd rather be shaggin'". This means dancing, in North Carolina. Right now the plates in that state read "First in Flight". Lucky people who know how to do that dance. Here is a flyer inviting "all shaggers and shag organizations" to a golf tournament and containing information about a "junior shag scholarship". What a find.

Ethiopians returning home

The Boston Globe is running a story about Ethiopians and other Africans who return home after living in the West for most of their lives. Apparently there is a growing trend towards this and African countries are trying somewhat successfully to lure back citizens. "Business leaders in Ghana and Ethiopia have launched their own ''back to Africa" campaigns to retrieve the more successful among their diaspora and attract black urban professionals from the United States and Europe.In some cases, they are lured to Africa with promises of easy citizenship, inexpensive real estate, and tax breaks, helping to reverse the westward migration of its best educated and most talented. Ghana, once a hub for the West African slave trade, is reaching back centuries to woo US blacks to the land of their forefathers." The article likens Ghana and Ethiopia to Israel.

English-speaking teenage mothers

In this week's issues of New Scientist there is a story about teenage pregnancies and the need for more or less sex education. An accompanying graph shows that the top six countries in the world for the rate of teenage pregnancy are all Enlgish-speaking. Why is that? It could be a statistical anomaly, but to have all six at the top, above all other languages, must have some cultural significance.

Christo's crackers

This edible copycat installation is photogenic.

Keimmutterschiff

More German. This one literally means "germ-filled mother ship". You use it for a person who is coughing and sneezing all over the place.

Will you pluck my twanger

This clip from the English 80s TV show Rainbow is unbelievable. George, Zippy, Bungle and Geoffrey talk about playing with themselves, their twangers and their balls. It doesn't look dubbed, plus the voices are all correct. Who thinks it is real? If it is real, did the scriptwriters have fun or what?