I’ve had a fascination with the Mad Monk for many years now, probably entirely due to (the interestingly appropriately named for the current context) Boney M‘s hit song (minor hit most place; huge radio hit in Moscow, ID, where I lived at the time). Best when it’s back-to-back with "Night Flight to Venus" (but I’m a big fan of the back-to-back song tradition).

The chief of the prostate research center of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences wants Russia to be a civilized country with a view on the future and with correct views on erotica.
Naturally, then, he opens a museum whose marquee exhibit is Rasputin’s penis. "Having this exhibit, we can stop envying America, where Napoleon Bonaparte’s penis is now kept. … it cannot stand comparison to our organ of 30 centimeters." Yes, that’s right: the whole cold war was about penis envy.
Update: others have previously claimed to possess the organ in question (or at least bits thereof), so one might need substantial provenance before taking the exhibit at face value.

Nurses found guilty of infecting almost 400 children with HIV in buh-wacky court case that has movie of the week written all over it (Lifetime if it weren’t in Libya).

Tiny walking robot made from DNA. We are so living in the future.

Hollywood stuntman Dan Rudert has been hired to catch, mid-air, a sample container dropped from space. The article makes it sound as though we haven’t been doing that sort of thing for around 50 years (though it is, apparently, the first time it’s been done with a helicopter).

I love vending machines and wish there were more cool vending options in this country. If I were Lost in Translation, I would take a stroll with a pocketful of money and see what I could buy from machines and still have enough money to take a taxi back to the hotel.

T9 is interesting, but more so when you get a glimpse of its guts when it guesses something unexpected.

And on an oddly similar note, crappy scrabble draws.

The Treasures of Ancient Egypt, Eternal Egypt, and Eternal Egypt’s only NW stop in Victoria.
The bird guides agree, that was a merganser.

Y’know, aside from the part about shooting lasers into my eye, this thing sounds really cool.

Dear Sir,
I am struck by the similarity of the book jackets of Holy Fire and Solitaire. Are they, in fact, the same book? I think the public should be told.

Unfortunately, all my observations were voiced by someone else first.