Yummy Wakame Weblog

Moscow zoo rents out animals for guest appearances
Cash-strapped bosses at Moscow Zoo are renting out animals for the day in a bid to boost funds.

It hopes by allowing animals to make guest appearances more people will be encouraged to visit. For a fee of 1,000 roubles (about £20), the zoo will organise a house visit complete with keeper to make sure there are no accidents. The management at the state-owned facility said it hoped the “mobile zoo” project would increase interest in animals and the zoo among young Russians.

UK Couple find abusive note from postman
An elderly couple were left shocked and disgusted after opening a thank you note to find an abusive note inside it from their postman.

The note read: “Dear Customer, we had to open this letter to check for money or credit cards, there were none so you can have the f***** back!

“Next time, make sure there is some money. Love, Royal Mail.”

William Kill, 72, said: “We were disgusted. It is like having someone burgle the house.”

Venus ‘could support life’
US scientists say there could be life on Venus.

According to a report in the journal Astrobiology, the existence of life on the planet’s oven-hot surface is unimaginable. But microbes could survive and reproduce, experts say, floating in the thick, cloudy atmosphere, protected by a sunscreen of sulphur compounds, reports BBC News Online.

This Wonderful Life
Click to watch video

“This short film was presented at the Electronic Theater at Siggraph this year in San Diego. A troubled young woman finds an unexpected surprise in this highly emotional and beautiful tale. This short film features some of the most advanced and complex facial expressions I have ever seen Truly impressive both technically and artistically. Armed with nothing but his trusty Athlon 1.4 Ghz, 3ds max and a lot of patience, created this true little masterpiece. Bravo!” ~ Liam Kemp

(seen on Chapel Perilous)

Bsti links to Bluebaby

Tutu won’t react to Mugabe
Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu will not be reacting to Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s charge that he is “evil”, Tutu’s office said on Monday.

Tutu, a past winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, has criticised Mugabe’s government for human rights and democratic abuses, and has decribed him as a “caricature of an African dictator”.

Mugabe’s claim that Tutu is “an angry, evil and embittered little bishop” is due to be broadcast in a SkyTV interview with the Zimbabwean ruler on Monday.

Global Fund may withdraw Aids funds
The Global Fund to Fight Aids, TB and Malaria threatens to withhold nearly a billion rand from South Africa. The funds had been available since 2002, but were being held up in Pretoria.

Invisible “Air Guitar” On Sale on e-Bay – 7 Bids
Owner pictured holding the Air Guitar.

“YOU ARE BIDDING ON AN ORIGINAL AIR GUITAR FROM THE 80′S…”

“AS YOU CAN SEE THIS ONE IS IN VERY GOOD CONDITION AND SHOULD GIVE THE OWNER MANY MORE YEARS OF PLAYING AT DRUNKEN ORGIES, FRAT PARTIES, AND ANY FAT GIRLS BIRTHDAY PARTY…”

(seen on Weird Links)

Just for the Ladyboys of Bangkok fans…

Peter Funch is a photographer with a gorgeous website. He includes a gallery of the Ladyboys. Just select “02 HESHE” from the menu.

The incredible true story of the young Masai woman who was the first girl from her rural community to seek a university degree in the US, and her mothers journey to witness her graduation.

Anna Ntaiya, a dryly pragmatic woman, said she was going to the United States for three reasons: to see the daughter she had borne at 17, to witness an educational triumph that far eclipsed anything ever achieved by a woman from Enoosaen – her daughter’s graduation, and to personally thank the many Americans who had made it possible.

For Ntaiya, 43, the trip to her daughter Kakenya’s graduation from Randolph-Macon Woman’s College in Lynchburg, Va., required months of deliberation and weeks of preparation and prayer. She had to leave her struggling farm and her six children still at home for more than two weeks. And she endured 60 hours of nearly nonstop travel from Enoosaen into what would seem like a different century altogether — from a culture where no one owns a refrigerator or a television to one where everyone seemed to have a cellphone and a car.

This was the path her eldest child had traveled more than four years earlier in pursuit of a degree from an American university. Now it was Ntaiya’s duty to travel the path as well.