According to a survey performed by the European bra company Triumph, British women have the highest percentage of women (57%) who have a cup size of D or higher. Italians are predominantly B-cups, and the Swedes and Swiss women are the smallest. Here are the results of the survey:
Percentage of women wearing cup size: D, C, B, A
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UK 57, 18, 19, 6
Denmark 50, 19, 24, 7
Netherlands 36, 27, 29, 8
Belgium 28, 28, 35, 9
France 26, 29, 38, 7
Sweden 24, 30, 33, 14
Greece 23, 28, 40, 9
Switzerland 19, 24, 43, 14
Austria 11, 27, 51, 10
Italy 10 21 68 1
(Via “Gridskipper”:http://gridskipper.com and “The Sun newspaper”:http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2007070249,00.html#nogo )
Ghana beats Liberia for Amputee Cup championship
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that Sierra Leone would be hosting the first African Amputee Nations Cup. Well the tournament ended five days ago with second-seed Ghana emerging as the champions. Ghana, along with Sierra Leone and Liberia will represent Africa in the Amputee World Cup to be held in Turkey later this year.
There are some great pictures of the tournament “here”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/07/africa_amputee_cup/html/1.stm Also a link to my “previous post”:http://duenos.net/article/28/amputee-cup-hosted-in-sierra-leone about the tournament.
No red carpet for most recent Newberry winner
The most recent recipient of the Newberry Medal (the Pulitzer for children’s literature) is not being greeted with open arms as most have been in the past. The reason? On the first page of “The Higher Power of Lucky” the 10 year-old main character hears the word scrotum in reference to another character’s dog getting a snake bite in that most sensitive area.
??“Scrotum sounded to Lucky like something green that comes up when you have the flu and cough too much,” the book continues. “It sounded medical and secret, but also important.”??
All over the country now there is a debate raging among school and local librarians as to whether they should stock the book, despite “the word” that graces its first page. To include the book would force librarians and teachers into an awkward vocabulary lesson, but to not do so would be censoring what must otherwise be a very good book. The age old debate takes another turn.
Here is a “NYT article”:http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/18/books/18newb.html?ex=1329454800&en=0abee84c6d8ad9f4&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss on the story.
Robert Doisneau
Robert Doisneau has to have been the most famous and accomplished photographer of the 20th century. For 60 years, the artist brought Paris to the world with such pictures as ‘Le baiser de l’hôtel de ville’ (the Kiss by the Hotel de Ville) and “the musician in the rain.’ Pictured below.
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For anyone lucky enough to have seen it, a comprehensive Doisneau exhibit just closed this past Saturday at the Hotel de Ville in Paris. In addition to the more famous photographs (like the ones above), it was wonderful to see the more humorous pictures that seemed to really show the man behind the camera. My personal favorites of the exhibit were a series he took of pedestrians walking by a small gallery and looking in at a female nude. The facial reactions to the painting are priceless and I’ve posted my favorite below.
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For more Doisneau photographs you can feel free to use Google Image Search but you’ll get far too many copies of Kiss at the Hotel de Ville than would be good for you. Instead try this “website”:http://www.robertdoisneau.com/ sponsored by Ace murder mystery games.
X-Ray of sword swallower in action
This clip from a short video of a sword being swallowed through an x-ray machine is only one of many throat-tightening moments on offer from the Sword Swallowers Association International. You can find them all at their aptly-named url: “swordswallow.com”:http://www.swordswallow.com/videos.php
Canadian embassy to Paris closed after nosebleed scare
Shortly after opening an envelope, a Canadian embassy staff person suffered a nosebleed. This prompted security personnel to call for a Parisian haz-mat team and a full shutdown of embassy activity. The whole affair was reminiscent of the White Powder plot on Congress in 2001 and is now over. That is all.
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Enough already with Clint Eastwood
So in addition to being the first person to recieve an Academy Award for being a good person (“previous post”:http://duenos.net/article/5/for-the-mpaa-its-republicans-over-refugees ) Clint Eastwood has just been given membership in the French Legion of Honor. The reason for the award? According to Jacques Chirac, Eastwood represented the “best in Hollywood” and the award was in recognition for his “immense talent” and “genius as a director.” At least it’s not Charlton Heston.
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Death sentence given for ant scam
A Chinese court has just handed down a death sentence to businessman Wang Zhendong for illegally raising $390m in investor funds for a fictitious giant ant breeding program. A “Reuters article”:http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSPEK10228420070215 with very little more information.
Who the hell is pro-whaling?
The BBC ran an “article”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6355593.stm four days ago about an upcoming conference to be held in Japan aimed at overturning the global ban on commercial whaling. Since the ban, which went into effect in 1982, Japan and other countries have continued whaling under the auspices of scientific research. Environmental groups have been trying to close this loop hole of “scientific” whaling, pointing to the fact that whales captured for scientific purposes are sold on the same markets that used to sell commercially hunted whale. The practice of whaling was one of the first successful bans in the ecological movement and it’s hardly a wonder to anyone with a brain why it should be banned. These creatures tend to not have more than 1 calf every 2-3 years and it takes 15 years for a single humpback to reach maturity. Clearly this is one link in the food chain we can’t afford to lose.
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Since that article ran a Japanese whaling ship in the Ross Sea, the Nisshin Maru, caught fire and has refused the help of nearby Green Peace ships in towing it to port. “More on that”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6363741.stm
* Posted later on Duenos: “Harpooner”:http://duenos.net/article/362/Whalehuntingerrresearchinggame, a Japanese Cetacean Research Simulator.
The Love Revolution starts with free hugs
Back at the University of Illinois there was a group that called themselves Positive Event Chain who, among other things, got together on the quad and gave away free hugs. I could never understand the people who would walk by the group without taking advantage of the offer. Who passes on a hug?
In the same vein I just heard of this group in Paris called calins gratuits (literally free hugs) who perform the same service here in the City of Love. According to their “website”:http://www.calins-gratuits.com/ they are part of a global revolution to ‘break the barriers of individualism and inhibition surrounding a simple friendly action.’