The 73 x 143 in. (185.4 x 363.5 cm.) color print face-mounted to Plexiglas was acquired from Galerie Monika Sprüth, Cologne, by “a distinguished German collector” off the auction block on Nov. 9.

The new title-holder beat out “Untitled #96″ (1981) by Cindy Sherman, which sold just last May for $3,890,500.

In a statement posted on Christie’s website, the photograph was described as a “breathtaking masterpiece of scale and wonderment, as well as the icon of Andreas Gursky’s pioneering photographic oeuvre” that “enwraps the viewer in the sheer beauty of its scene.”

“Reaching out towards infinity, the work invokes a contemporary take on the ‘sublime’ with the astounding perfection of line and color achieved through the invocation of an apparently natural landscape,” the statement continued.

Christie’s described the work as thus: “For Gursky, as for many of his art historical predecessors, the Rhine is of almost totemic significance. One of the longest rivers in Europe, it carves an exceptionally straight course, passing through six different countries including the artist’s home town of Düsseldorf before reaching its confluence with the North Sea. Spanning the full width of the epic picture plane, the Rhine’s captivating, riverine landscape appears vibrant with bands of bright, emerald green grass and slivery water, the ripples across the surface of the river illuminated with brilliant, hyper-real detail. Above the straight course of the river lies an atmospheric, blue-grey sky, thick with dense clouds, which almost bisects the composition, presenting a distant, unobtainable horizon far beyond the lush riverbank.”

Christie’s cited quotations from Gursky explaining how he came up with his opus.

“I wasn’t interested in an unusual, possibly picturesque view of the Rhine, but in the most contemporary possible view of it,” Gursky was quoted in L. Cooke’s “Andreas Gursky: Visionary (Per)Versions.”

Christie’s also cited a quotation from the photographer as published in A. Ltgens’ “Shrines and Ornaments: A Look into the Display Cabinet.”

“There is a particular place with a view over the Rhine which has somehow always fascinated me, but it didn’t suffice for a picture as it basically constituted only part of a picture. I carried this idea for a picture around with me for a year and a half and thought about whether I ought perhaps to change my viewpoint,” Gursky had said. “In the end I decided to digitalize the pictures and leave out the elements that bothered me.”

The artwork is number one from an edition of six, the others being in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich, Tate Modern in London, and the Glenstone Collection in Potomac. —Marlon Anthony Tonson/KBK, GMA News

source: http://www.gmanews.tv/story/238418/world/worlds-most-expensive-photo-sells-for-43m

Bonneau Police Chief Franco Fuda ticketed Virginia Tice, 65, in early July at a local convenience store after spying the adornment dangling from her truck.

South Carolina law considers a bumper sticker, decal or device indecent when it describes, in an offensive way as determined by contemporary community standards, “sexual acts, excretory functions, or parts of the human body.”

The offense carries a maximum fine of $445 but no jail time, Fuda said.

“This is certainly not a staple of my ticket writing in Bonneau,” the police chief told Reuters on Wednesday.

The Charleston law firm Savage & Savage will represent Tice for free, attorney Scott Bischoff said. The trial had been scheduled for next week but was delayed because the defendant will be out of town.

“She’s such a sweet lady and she just says ‘I don’t want to pay the fine.’ We’ll let a jury decide whether this is really criminal behavior. I don’t want to take away from the importance of free speech, but it’s really comical,” he said.

Lawmakers in some states have sought to ban the colorful plastic or rubber devices that go by brand names such as Bulls Balls and Truck Nutz.

Fuda said if the fake testicles were a free speech issue, “I don’t know what they would be trying to express.”

“I went to (a) few websites that said, excuse the expression, ‘show your nuts,’” he said. “I didn’t see anywhere it said support your local proctologist or farmer.”

(Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Cynthia Johnston)

http://news.yahoo.com/woman-faces-trial-fake-testicles-163136934.html

The only difference was that the lovers were monkeys, taking part in India’s first simian wedding — with the whole unfolding drama a classic clash between age-old village belief and the demands of modern life sceptical of that way of thought.

Hindu belief includes worship of animals as avatars of the gods. Monkeys have an especially significant role in Hindu mythology where they are worshipped as avatars of Hanuman, the mighty ape that aided Rama in his fight against evil.

So when plans for the wedding of “Raju” and “Chinki” were laid in the small village of Talwas, deep in the forests of Rajasthan, villagers responded with excitement.

Raju, the “groom,” was famous in Banetha village, about 55 km from Talwas, attracting crowds whenever he went outside. He was known for eating, sleeping and smoking cigarettes with his owner, Ramesh Saini, who treated him like a son.

“I want to enjoy the feelings of a son’s marriage through Raju’s wedding,” said Rajesh, a 38-year-old married but childless auto rickshaw driver who nursed Raju back to health after finding him unconscious three years ago.

So he was overjoyed two months ago when he met Chinki’s caretaker, a priest in a nearby village, who proposed that the two monkeys be married.

“We will welcome the bride in our house in Banetha after the wedding with all rituals,” said an excited Ramesh while offering tea to Raju at a roadside tea shop.

Hundreds of invitation cards were sent out to nearby villages for the wedding, planned according to traditional Hindu customs that include seven rounds of the sacred fire as the wedding vows are recited by a priest. A huge pre-wedding feast was planned, along with a procession with Raju on a horse.

“It’s an open invitation to all the villagers. I am expecting more than 2000 people for the feast,” Ramesh said as he stood with Raju near a huge cooking pot to supervise.

But no good love story is complete without a little hiccup.

As news of the marriage spread, the state forest department officials stepped into action. Since monkeys are protected in India as government property, no one can pet them, train them or — as in this case — marry them, even to a fellow monkey.

“It’s illegal to marry a monkey. Anyone found doing that or attending the marriage ceremony will be arrested,” said forest range officer Bhavar Singh Kaviya.

Tensions rose in both villages after officials issued their final warning. The monkeys and their owners went into hiding.

On the day of the planned wedding, more than 200 guards poured into Talwas, where they confronted hundreds of people from nearby villages who had arrived to see the rare spectacle.

“I have come all the way just to watch God’s marriage and now the police are telling me to go back and stay away from the temple,” said Prem Jain, an angry 72-year-old villager, after arguing with a policeman.

“They told me the monkeys have been captured. They can’t capture God!”

But then came the news — the monkey couple had been secretly married off in a ceremony somewhere deep in the forest. The villagers erupted in joy and began celebrating.

Forestry officials immediately set out to look for the pair and finally found Chinki tied to a tree. She sported the vermillion mark worn by married Hindu women on their foreheads.

The officials couldn’t resist congratulating Chinki and posed for pictures with her.

“She is like my daughter and I am doing the duties of a good father,” said a smiling Kaviya, carrying the monkey to a jeep.

Both monkeys were captured and officials said they hoped to release them soon in nearby forests, but Ramesh was confident of their eventual return.

“I know my son Raju, with his wife Chinki, will come back home,” said an emotional Ramesh, mingling with the crowd to avoid being caught. “I will have a big reception for them.” – Reuters

http://www.gmanews.tv/story/225825/odds-and-ends/high-drama-as-monkeys-wed-in-india

Friends praise the panoramic views and spare nature of the vacation home of Boston architect Warren Schwartz and his wife, Sheila Fiekowsky. But “sometimes, there’s a feeling of, ‘What is holding this up?’,” said pianist Eve Wolf.

Boston architect Warren Schwartz designed and built a modern home of glass, steel and concrete in the Berkshires for himself and his wife Sheila, a longtime violinist for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The three-bedroom home climbs to more than 30 feet, with views across the wooded hills and a rooftop terrace, where the Schwartzes watch the night sky in the summer.

Ms. Wolf, who noted that she trusts Mr. Schwartz’s handiwork, isn’t the only visitor to have experienced a brief moment of uncertainty. A slim, 17-by-90-foot rectangular volume of glass and steel, the house slopes down a hill in the Berkshires before dramatically cantilevering for 45 feet. The great room floats 14 feet above the ground and has walls of glass on three sides with sweeping views of the surrounding, hilly countryside. The home’s poured concrete floor vibrates when the couple’s 65-pound Standard poodle, Oberon, bounds with enthusiasm after a ball. (Mr. Schwartz blames Oberon’s particular bounding style.)

“I thought it was going to be a ranch house,” said the 59-year-old Ms. Fiekowsky, a violinist who plays with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, admitting she, too, was nervous when her husband told her he wanted to have half the house float in the air. Mr. Schwartz, whose firm Schwartz/Silver Architects has completed projects for clients including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Princeton University, noted that the house’s cantilevered space is counterbalanced by a massive concrete basement hidden in the hillside. He said it’s “overdesigned” for stability and can hold 60 people safely, plus several thousand pounds on the home’s rooftop terrace.

A Cantilevered Glass House

Visitors walk through a long slice of hallway, past three terraced bedrooms, before arriving in the great room. Round, steel support beams painted white slice across the home’s glass walls at varying angles. Midway through the home, thin steel sheets that have been folded into steps connect the home’s rooftop terrace to the basement-and-patio level.

Walls of frosted glass separate the 12-by-11-foot bedrooms from the hallway and translucent, honeycombed plastic doors slide away to reveal en-suite bathrooms. “I wanted everything to be very light in color, light in structure, and feel as much as possible like floating,” said Mr. Schwartz, age 67.

The décor, a high-low mix, is modern and minimal; a glass Le Corbusier table in the great room sits near an IKEA kitchen. The couple gravitated toward a color palette of black, grey, white and silver so the landscape outside would remain the star. (Even the dog’s black cage, partially covered in gray fabric, hews to the color palette.)

cantilevered space is counterbalanced by a massive concrete basement hidden in the hillside. He said it’s “overdesigned” for stability and can hold 60 people safely, plus several thousand pounds on the home’s rooftop terrace.

A Cantilevered Glass House

Visitors walk through a long slice of hallway, past three terraced bedrooms, before arriving in the great room. Round, steel support beams painted white slice across the home’s glass walls at varying angles. Midway through the home, thin steel sheets that have been folded into steps connect the home’s rooftop terrace to the basement-and-patio level.

Walls of frosted glass separate the 12-by-11-foot bedrooms from the hallway and translucent, honeycombed plastic doors slide away to reveal en-suite bathrooms. “I wanted everything to be very light in color, light in structure, and feel as much as possible like floating,” said Mr. Schwartz, age 67.

The décor, a high-low mix, is modern and minimal; a glass Le Corbusier table in the great room sits near an IKEA kitchen. The couple gravitated toward a color palette of black, grey, white and silver so the landscape outside would remain the star. (Even the dog’s black cage, partially covered in gray fabric, hews to the color palette.)

Amid modern and minimalist decor, the landscape is the star of the great room. Eirik Johnson for The Wall Street Journal

This isn’t the first attention-grabbing home the couple has built. In the 1980s, they built second home No. 1 on their 18-acre Berkshire site: a striking octagonal, stucco-and-wood, castle-like structure featured in several architectural magazines. Their children grew up in it over the summers, when Ms. Fiekowsky plays at nearby Tanglewood, the orchestra’s summer home. But after more than 20 years, Mr. Schwartz said, the wood was weathering poorly and the house felt dated.

With their children grown, Ms. Fiekowsky felt the call to create an adult home minus the swing set and basketball court of the previous building. Mr. Schwartz liked the idea of designing anew. They razed the octagonal house in 2007.

Mr. Schwartz drew partial inspiration for the cantilevered space from a family trip to the Grand Canyon, where they had stood at the precipice of a cliff watching the sun rise, and doodled plans during his wife’s concerts. Being his own client gave Mr. Schwartz some freedom. The walls in the home, for example, are unpainted plaster, which he feels looks richer, and some doors were left unframed as part of the home’s minimalist look.

“Nothing was supposed to distract from the essence of the house and the power of the view,” he said.

The couple spent a little over $1 million to build and furnish the home, completed in 2009. Other owners in the Berkshires, a vacation spot that’s particularly popular in the summer, include the pianist Emanuel Ax, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick and other Boston Symphony Orchestra musicians. Up the road, an 1,800-square-foot home built in 2005 sold for $266,000 last summer.

The couple has hosted intimate wine receptions in the great room and catered cocktail parties on the rooftop terrace, complete with their neighbor’s black Angus cows wandering nearby. “I was there during the most magnificent thunderstorm,” recalled Truman Welch, an Episcopal priest who lives near the couple’s main home in Newton, Mass., “and it was like being in the middle of the storm.”

Last weekend, as gusts of wind lashed snow against the glass, Ms. Fiekowsky bribed Oberon with treats so he would show off his tricks. The only thing she’d change about the home? “More closet space,” she said.

http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/living-room-ready-for-liftoff.html

Fiery food mavens seeking to one-up each other now have to gear up for a whole new test of culinary bravado: the world’s hottest chili pepper.

Yes, the Naga Viper, the latest claimant to the world’s-hottest-pepper crown, outdistances its predecessor, the Bhut Jolokia, or  “ghost chili,” by more than 300,000 points on the famous Scoville scale of tongue-scorching chili hotness. Researchers at Warwick University testing the Naga Viper found that it measures 1,359,000 on the Scoville scale, which rates heat by tracking the presence of a chemical compound. In comparison, most varieties of jalapeño peppers measure in the 2,500 to 5,000 range — milder than the Naga Viper by a factor of 270.

You might think the Naga Viper would hail from some part of the world with a strong demand for spicy food, such as India or Mexico. But the new pepper is actually the handiwork of Gerald Fowler, a British chili farmer and pub owner, who crossed three of the hottest peppers known to man — including the Bhut Jolokia — to create his Frankenstein-monster chili.

“It’s painful to eat,” Fowler told the Daily Mail. “It’s hot enough to strip paint.” Indeed, the Daily Mail reports that defense researchers are already investigating the pepper’s potential uses as a weapon.

But Fowler — who makes customers sign a waiver declaring that they’re of sound mind and body before trying a Naga Viper-based curry — insists that consuming the fiery chili does the body good.

“It numbs your tongue, then burns all the way down,” he told the paper. “It can last an hour, and you just don’t want to talk to anyone or do anything. But it’s a marvelous endorphin rush. It makes you feel great.”

A member of the Clifton Chili Club — a group of Brits who travel around sampling chilis — decided to try one of Fowler’s Naga Vipers on camera. You can watch his less-than-pleasurable experience here.

(Photo of Bhut Jolokia, the previous holder of the hottest pepper in the world title: AP/New Mexico State University)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20101203/sc_yblog_thelookout/worlds-hottest-pepper-is-hot-enough-to-strip-paint

British constructor Perry Watkins sits in his ‘Wind Up’ mini car on a street in Essen, Germany, Monday, Nov. 8, 2010. The car is listed in the Guinness book of records as the world’s smallest car with a license to drive on public streets. Just 41 inches high, 51 inches long and only 26 inches wide the mini always finds a parking space. It can drive 60 kph and even has security belts. The car will be shown at the motor show starting Nov. 27 in Essen.

http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Worlds-Smallest-Car/ss/events/lf/112410smallestcar

BOGOTA, Colombia — Edward Nino Hernandez is in many ways a typical 24-year-old Colombian male. He loves to dance reggaeton, dreams of owning a car — preferably a Mercedes— and wants to see the world.

Top on his list of people he would like to meet are Jackie Chan, Sylvester Stallone and former Colombian President Alvaro Uribe.

What sets Nino (pronounced NEE-nyoh) apart is his size.

He is slightly taller than a piece of carry-on luggage and weighs just 22 pounds (10 kilograms).

Nino has just been officially certified as the world’s shortest living man by Guinness World Records, measuring 27 inches (70 centimeters).

“He hasn’t grown since he was 2 years old,” his mother, Noemi Hernandez, said of the oldest of her five living children.

The previous titleholder was He Pingping of China, who was 1.5 inches (4 centimeters) taller and died March 13. The Guinness people discovered Nino afterward.

They say Nino’s reign is not likely to last long, however.

Khagendra Thapa Magar of Nepal is expected to take over after he turns 18 on Oct. 14. He measures about 22 inches (56 centimeters) and is currently recognized by Guinness as the shortest living teen.

Doctors never could explain why Nino is so small, his parents say.

“They never gave us a diagnosis,” his mother, Noemi Hernandez, said during an interview in the family’s sparely furnished apartment in Bosa, a mostly poor district of southern Bogota.

Hernandez, 43, said Nino weighed just 3.3 pounds (1.5 kilograms) at birth and was 15 inches (38 centimeters) long.

She said doctors at the National University studied him until he was 3, then lost interest. She and her husband, a security guard, lost a daughter who was similarly small in 1992 when she was about to complete a year of life.

The couple’s youngest child, 11-year-old Miguel Angel, stands 37 inches (93 centimeters) tall and has facial features similar to Nino. The other three boys are of normal height and appearance.

“I feel happy because I’m unique,” Nino said in an interview Friday with The Associated Press.

He does, however, have his problems: cataracts in both of his eyes that blur his vision and, says his mother, require urgent surgery that the family can’t afford.

“He doesn’t see well. He isn’t able to read,” she said.

During an interview, Nino’s eyes water and he fidgets with the laces on his toddler-sized black dress shoes.

Other than his eyes, he has no medical complaints.

He’s mentally sharp and laughs easily though it’s sometimes hard to understand his high-pitched speech and his stubby fingers make writing difficult.

Nino had to repeat several years of school before dropping out in the eighth grade. But he’s very sociable, loves to travel — though he hasn’t been outside Colombia — and likes to play dominoes and checkers.

“He only gets depressed when he’s shut in at home,” his mother said.

Leafing through an advance copy of the Guinness World Records 2011 edition, which launches Sept. 15 in the United States and the next day internationally, Hernandez shows Nino a picture of the world’s smallest woman, who is from India.

He’s not interested in the least.

Nino says he already has a girlfriend. She’s 18, is named Fanny and measures just under 5 feet (1.5 meters), he says.

Nino has earned some cash dancing at department stores and is now acting in a film in which he plays — What else? This is Colombia — a pint-sized drug thug.

In his big scene, Nino gets into a shootout.

He acts out the scene, mimicking a pistol with the index fingers of his entwined hands, then slumps over onto the chair’s arm. His character doesn’t survive the gunbattle.

Nino smiles broadly at the idea of more acting jobs and more life in the spotlight.

And he says he’s gotten used to all the picture-taking.

But being the world’s smallest man does have its drawbacks.

“It bothers me that people are (always) touching me and picking me up,” he said. — AP

He Pingping of China smiles as Sultan Kosen of Turkey rests his hands on He’s shoulders during a promotional event in Istanbul January 14, 2010. The world’s shortest man, China’s He Pingping who was just over 74 cm tall (29 inches), has died at the age of 21 from apparent heart complications.

http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/slideshow/photo//100316/ids_photos_india_wl/ra825657445.jpg/

Radio dzBB reported on Monday that while the goat died shortly after it was born, people continue to flock to Mabuti village in Dingras town to see it.

Tourists who heard of the unique animal sought to get a glimpse of it.

The report said the goat had one of its three eyes and two of four ears located at the back of its head.

Despite the goat’s early death, local village officials plan to preserve the remains of the goat and turn it over to local authorities, the report said.

Dingras is a third-class town with a population of 35,793 people in 6,921 households.

http://www.gmanews.tv/story/181853/mutant-goat-attracts-tourists-in-ilocos-province

]]> http://kakaibangkwento.wordpress.com/2010/01/18/%e2%80%98mutant%e2%80%99-goat-attracts-tourists-in-ilocos-province/feed/ 0 yei http://kakaibangkwento.wordpress.com/2009/05/27/man-divorces-wife-by-text-message/ http://kakaibangkwento.wordpress.com/2009/05/27/man-divorces-wife-by-text-message/#comments Wed, 27 May 2009 06:00:50 +0000 atty. yei http://kakaibangkwento.wordpress.com/?p=185 ]]>

A Saudi man has divorced his wife by text message, a newspaper said on Thursday.

The man was in Iraq when he sent the SMS informing her she was no longer his spouse. He followed up with a telephone call to two of his relatives, the daily Arab News reported.

A court in the Red Sea city of Jeddah finalised the split — the first known divorce in Saudi Arabia by text message — after summoning the two relatives to check they had received word of the husband’s intention, the paper said.

Saudi Arabia practises a strict form of Islamic Sharia law, and clerics preside over Sharia courts as judges. Under the law a man can divorce his wife by saying “I divorce you” three times.