STUFF: News, Technology, the cool and the plain weird

[MIKA27]

Grabbing Drones Out Of Mid-Air Is A Very Stupid Thing To Do

Don’t grab drones out of mid-air. It’s a stupid, dangerous idea. Don’t believe me? Well, you can check out the photos of Enrique Iglesias following his Tijuana concert last night for confirmation.

Iglesias has taken to using drones to get crowd shots during his concerts, and he’s apparently formed the unfortunate habit of grabbing said drones out of mid-air to get POV shots, as well. According to The Associated Press, “something went wrong” (gee, I wonder what?!) when he attempted the stunt last night, and the singer sliced a bunch of fingers open, causing blood to splatter everywhere.

Before

After

To Iglesias’s credit, he decided to continue performing for 30 blood-soaked minutes after the incident, before being rushed to an airport and put on a plane to LA to see a specialist. His next show is in July in Mexico City, and hopefully, he’ll have learned his lesson.

Let’s all just go back to smashing guitars, mkay?

[MIKA27]

Chinese ship capsizes with at least 450 on board

A cruise ship carrying more than 450 people has capsized after being caught in a storm on the Yangtze River in southern China, says state media.

The Xinhua news agency said rescuers had spotted the upturned boat and could hear people calling for help.

It said eight people had been rescued so far and rescue teams have been heading out in boats to save the passengers, most of them tourists.

Premier Li Keqiang is travelling to the scene in Hubei province.

The four-tier Dongfangzhixing - or Eastern Star - had been carrying 405 Chinese passengers, five travel agency employees and 47 crew, Xinhua said.

Rescue workers have been heading out on boats to search for survivors

It was travelling from the eastern city of Nanjing to Chongqing in the south-west - a journey about some 1,500km (930 miles) - when it sank in the Damazhou section of the Yangtze in Jianli county.

The water there is about 15m (50ft) deep.

The captain and the chief engineer, who are among those rescued, were quoted as saying that the ship had been caught in a cyclone and sank quickly.

Rescue work was being hampered by strong winds and heavy rain, the report said.

Mr Li has ordered a team from the state council to lead the search and rescue operation, Xinhua added.

More than 10 boats have been deployed for search and rescue

Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said the vessel was owned by the Chongqing Eastern Shipping Corporation which runs tours to the scenic Three Gorges river canyon area along the Yangtze river.

The BBC's Jo Floto in Beijing said that stretch of the Yangtze is known for its beauty and attracts many Chinese retiree holidaymakers.

Those on board had mostly been tourists aged around 50 to 80 on a tour organised by a Shanghai company, the People's Daily reported.

Twenty-two people died on the river in January, when a tugboat undergoing tests capsized near Zhangjiagang, in Jiangsu province.

[MIKA27]

LOMOGRAPHY PETZVAL 58 BOKEH CONTROL ART LENS

Lomography went old-school a couple of years ago, reviving the classic Petzval lens for Canon and Nikon DSLRs, and now they’re going to the 19th century well once again. Check out the Lomography Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Art lens.

Billed as “the world’s first Petzval bokeh control lens,” this 58mm f/1.9 lens features a “Bokeh Control Ring” that lets you adjust the strength of the swirly bokeh effect in your photos. There’s plenty of color saturation, artful vignetting, and yes, swirly bokeh. For the unfamiliar, bokeh is the aesthetic quality of the blur produced in the out-of-focus parts of an image produced by a lens. Made by hand using “premium Russian glass optics,” the lens has been specially developed to work with modern analogue and digital cameras and is available in Canon EF and Nikon F mounts. [Purchase]

[MIKA27]

COFFEE CUPS MADE FROM RECYCLED COFFEE GROUNDS

Outside of fertilizer and compost, most of us have no use for coffee grounds once they’ve done their daily pick me up duties. That wasn’t good enough for Julian Lechner. After five years of experimenting, Lechner created Kaffeeform, an innovative recycled material made with used coffee grounds and renewable raw materials. The first release for the new material is a set of coffee cups. In addition to the whole meta aspect of drinking coffee out of coffee, each lightweight cup smells of joe and has a unique marblewood appearance. The initial production run of 250 Kaffeeform Cups will be offered exclusively at the Amsterdam Coffee Festival. [Purchase]

[MIKA27]

Roger Moore Explains The Key To James Bond: He Doesn't Enjoy Killing

James Bond is known for racking up a pretty high body count, and for having a great quip every time he puts someone in the ground. But Roger Moore, who played the role for a dozen years, says he thinks the key to Bond’s character is that he dislikes killing.

We’re stoked to feature an excerpt from the new book How to Be a Superhero, in which journalist Mark Edlitz has interviewed tons of actors who have played iconic superheroic characters, from James Bond to Superman to Spock. The book, featuring a foreword by David Mamet, comes out on June 15, and here’s an excerpt from the Roger Moore interview.

What was the key to understanding Bond’s character? Can you give a practical example of how as an actor you applied that insight to a specific scene, moment or line?

When I first took on the part, I read Fleming’s books. There was little offered in them about the character. However, I remember reading one line that said Bond had just completed a mission - meaning a kill. He didn’t particularly enjoy killing but took pride in doing his job well. That was the key to the role as far as I was concerned.

[Author’s Note: Moore is referring to the passage in the novel Goldfinger, in which Ian Fleming writes: “It was part of his profession to kill people. He had never liked doing it and when he had to kill he did it as well as he knew how and forgot about it. As a secret agent who held the rare double-O prefix – the license to kill in the Secret Service – it was his duty to be as cool about death as a surgeon. If it happened, it happened. Regret was unprofessional — worse, it was a death-watch beetle in the soul.”]

While there is deservedly much discussion about how suave and funny you were as Bond, you were also very good at making him cold-blooded and lethal. How did you approach those scenes?

Well if you read the Internet blogs, they agree I was funny, but they’re not so sure I was suave and certainly they don’t regard me as having been cold-blooded. There was one scene in For Your Eyes Only where I had to be rather cold-blooded in killing a villain. They say that scene changed the series tone for my films, but I wasn’t comfortable with it, if truth be known. I was rather cold-blooded and mercenary on Fridays though. That’s the day I received my paychecks.

What was your approach to saying “My name is Bond, James Bond,” 007’s signature line? Audiences eagerly anticipate the line. Seems like an actor can go a bit mad thinking about it.

Oh goodness, I spent many, many hours committing that line to memory! Guy Hamilton, the director on my first Bond, said, “Don’t say the line with a Scottish accent and we’ll be fine.” Words I heeded.

From the movies, we learn so little about Bond personally. What do you imagine his private life is like?

It’s probably one bar to another bed. I’d imagine his private life to be rather limited as he’s seemingly always on the job.

When people meet you on some level (perhaps an unconscious one) they believe that they’re actually meeting James Bond. Are you aware of that? What’s that like for you? Do you feel any pressure to meet those expectations?

Oh, I don’t think they think I’m Bond. Well, ok, maybe. I sometimes get comments like “Hello, Mr. Bond” and such like. I smile and keep walking, but if someone comes up to me and says “Hey, you’re James Bond!” I’ll say, “No, I am Roger Moore, I used to play James Bond.” I don’t pretend I am the character. Therefore, I have no expectations to meet other than those of meeting Roger Moore. I am, of course, charming, polite, and courteous.

Where do your and Bond’s personalities converge and diverge?

Well, when I played the part he looked and sounded like me. That’s where the similarities and differences begin and end!

Men the world over have dreamed of being as suave, capable, masculine, and as appealing to women as Bond. Most of us come up a bit short. When you were in character did you ever allow yourself to actually feel like Bond? How did that feel?

How does Bond feel? I don’t know. I never really absorbed myself in a role like some actors do. Many take the roles home with them and live the part. I’m quite happy to leave mine at the studio and return home as I left, simple old Roger Moore. I guess it would be easy to think I’m invincible and live as charmed a life as 007, but that would be foolish, wouldn’t it?

You’ve played a wide variety of characters in scores of movies. You’ve also starred in memorable television shows including The Saint and The Persuaders, but the character you’re most associated with is James Bond.

Without doubt you are recognized for the last role you played. When I was Bond, I was recognized as Bond. Before that I was recognized as Lord Brett Sinclair, The Saint, Beau Maverick, Silky Harris and Ivanhoe. Bond was later than those other parts, and perhaps bigger, too.

What are the positive and negative aspects of the association?

The positive aspects of Bond? A bigger paycheck. The negative aspects? A coward having to pretend he is brave, and trying not to blink when explosions go off.

Can you please give us some advice on how to be as cool as Bond in our daily lives?

Stay in bed . . . with a pretty lady.

How has playing James Bond affected you personally, not professionally, not publicly, but personally?

Personally, it has given me financial security. It has also provided me with a certain celebrity, if that is the right word, which has enabled me to work as a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF.

Speaking of UNICEF, how has playing Bond been an asset to meeting children in your travels for UNICEF?

It is a great asset. After all, who would want to meet a jobbing actor? But meeting an actor o once played James Bond, that opens doors. I find I’m able to meet with presidents, prime ministers and people who make decisions. Bond has afforded me a great personal passport, which I use for UNICEF.

What question should I ask my next interview subject?

My question for your next interview: How do you keep your head when all about you are losing yours?

Why do you think the films have remained so popular for fifty years and counting?

The films are hugely popular because they are entertaining. The producers never cheat audiences; the money goes on the screen.

How to Be a Superhero: The untold stories behind the great movie & television superheroes from the people who played them is on sale in two weeks.

[MIKA27]

Hit With a Painful Ear Infection, He Takes a Closeup Peek With His Cellphone Video. What Happens Next Might Gross You Out.

Bruce Branit said that after a lake swim a week ago, he got a “super painful ear infection” and a “totally blocked ear canal.”

In an effort to get a closer look at what might be going on, Branit said he turned on his cellphone video and pointed it toward his ear canal —

and then, horror:

What appears to be a spider seemingly crawled partially out of Branit’s ear canal and then headed back inside. Branit himself sounded pretty agitated by the whole thing.

Reactions to his 14-second YouTube clip, “I think I have something in my EAR!!!” have been swift — it’s closing in on 400,000 views as of Sunday afternoon after he posted it Friday.

[MIKA27]

Why you should want a Nintendo Android console

Could Nintendo really switch to Android?

Japan’s most respected business newspaper, the Nikkei Shimbun, today raised the possibility that Nintendo’s mysterious upcoming system — codenamed NX — may be based on Google’s Android operating system. The report is curiously sourced to a single anonymous insider, and takes the form of a column, not a typical news story; moreover, the Nikkei has a spotty record with Nintendo in particular.

But that doesn’t make the proposition any less fascinating, and it’s one I’ve been considering myself for some time. Although it would be an unusual move for the Japanese giant, which is famously hesitant to cede control over any aspect of its products, there are a lot of reasons why it might make sense — and why it wouldn’t contradict Nintendo’s own philosophy.

The most obvious reason for Nintendo to use Android as a starting point is that it would give the company a considerable leg up toward having its own credible, modern operating system. Anyone who’s used a Wii U will know how far behind Nintendo is in this area; the software is inexplicably slow, even after multiple updates and workarounds, and despite its tablet-focused approach, it doesn’t offer anywhere near the functionality of the most basic Android mobile devices.

Nintendo is arguably the best developer in the world when it comes to making video games, but like many of its Japanese contemporaries, has failed to adapt to a world where software platforms are now paramount. Android is the most-used operating system in the world today, and the parts of it most important and useful to Nintendo would be available for free.

Whatever your thoughts on the Android operating system itself, they wouldn’t be likely to have much bearing on any Nintendo implementation. The company's philosophy is to create unique console hardware as a canvas for its talent, and a move to Android at the system level wouldn’t lead to, say, Nintendo releasing its top-tier titles straight to the Google Play store for anyone to download, or relying on Google for media services. President and CEO Satoru Iwata has made it clear that the recent alliance with mobile gaming company DeNA is designed to drive interest in Nintendo’s dedicated systems, and announced NX the same day as the DeNA deal to push home the point.

So I would expect a Nintendo Android console to run a much more dramatic fork of the OS than something like Nvidia’s gaming-focused Shield devices, which have access to the Play store and other Google-powered functionality. Nintendo could build its own user-facing layer, along the lines of Xiaomi and Amazon’s Android-based operating systems, while remaining in complete control over what software sees release. There’s no reason why Nintendo couldn’t include quirky, original features like Miiverse or StreetPass on this hypothetical system.

But Nintendo ultimately wants more software on its platforms, having struggled to attract third-party content ever since the N64 in the ‘90s, and an Android-based NX could prove more appealing to developers than the often-awkward proprietary hardware. Although Amazon’s devices run Android at their core and should be easily compatible with most Android apps, some developers have decided against the seemingly simple task; the lack of built-in Google services means many apps have to implement Amazon’s own replacement APIs, which can be non-trivial. Many games and media services, however, only really need to run their own content, meaning that in theory there’d be fewer obstacles to getting them up and running on the NX. Nintendo would have to do some legwork, for sure, but a gaming-focused Android OS could afford to be less complex than a phone.

And Android compatibility could benefit developers inside Nintendo as well. Iwata has long spoken of the need for Nintendo to better integrate its home consoles and handheld devices, and said early last year that the two teams were merged because technology had advanced to the point where both form factors could use the same architecture. The shared technology would let users run the same games at home and on the go, and allow for multiple form factors.

Iwata implied that the next system could retain some similarity to the Wii U in order to speed up its development; Nintendo’s latest home console runs on PowerPC architecture not known for its mobile friendliness, but Iwata allowed that a successor would simply need to "absorb the Wii U architecture adequately." However, given that system’s eventual resounding failure and Nintendo’s spectacular about-face on the issue of mobile, it’s just as easy to see the company deciding to work with a hardware partner on an ARM or x86 processor and using the widespread Android codebase as a different yet equally simple path. By the time NX is available, which I would expect to be well over 18 months away, ARM processors will routinely match and outstrip the power of the Wii U, making them more than suitable for the type of games Nintendo makes. Intel has made gains with x86 on Android, too, and would be worth considering.

I can’t say whether there’s any truth to this report or not, but I do think Nintendo could make it work. Imagine a suite of devices from set-top box to tablet to gaming handheld, all with input options designed by Nintendo. Each would run Nintendo’s own speedy operating system, yet would have access to countless compatible Android games and media apps. And each would play premium Nintendo games created specifically for the hardware and released nowhere else. (Heck, each could even play premium third-party games, too, in the implausible event that publishers would like to return to Nintendo platforms.)

In this scenario, Nintendo could preside over an ecosystem it controls while providing an easy path for others to join — all without compromising on what people have come to expect from modern hardware. Who wouldn’t want to buy into that? The days of Nintendo’s proprietary advantages are long gone, but in helping to democratize the design of computing devices, Android might just offer the unlikely assistance Nintendo needs to return to the summit of relevance.

[MIKA27]

Big Trouble in Little China with The Rock will be the greatest cinematic experience of all time

Here's an empirical truth: everybody loves The Rock. If you're not a fan of wrestling, there's the Fast and Furious movies. If you hate cars; there's San Andreas. If you hate disaster movies, there's his upcoming HBO series Ballers. And if you hate yourself, there's even The Scorpion King. The point is that Dwayne Johnson has managed to turn himself into a likable, nice-guy leading man that can deliver on the action front while also transitioning credibly into comedy without skipping a beat. Which is why I'm very excited about him potentially starring in a remake of John Carpenter's Big Trouble in Little China.

The Wrap first broke the news that Johnson is in negotiations to star in a remake of the film, which back in 1986 featured Kurt Russell as a smirking, would-be action hero fighting supernatural forces in San Francisco's Chinatown. The movie was considered a box-office failure at the time, but went on to become a beloved cult classic, and its oddball mixture of martial arts, comedy, and tongue-in-cheek bravado could be a perfect fit for an actor who earlier this year flexed his way out of an arm cast. The new Big Trouble in Little China is being written by the team of Ashley Miller and Zack Stentz, who previously worked on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, X-Men: First Class, and the forthcoming Power Rangers movie.

Of course, the downside is that the remake could end up being a disappointing and cynical misfire like so many recent 1980s remakes (RoboCop and Poltergeist, right this way; your table is ready). But with Big Trouble in Little China, you're starting with a property that already has the goofiness and camp turned to 11 — just check out the trailer below — so the two likeliest outcomes are awesome, and more awesome.

MIKA: See for me the original was brilliant, the feel of movies in that era can not be replicated IMO.

[MIKA27]

Now This Is How You Make An Entrance At The Beach

This image shows the U.S. Navy’s Landing Craft Air Cushion 60 vehicle — a special class of hovercraft — arriving at Virginia Beach on May 29th for the 2015 Patriotic Festival. Coolest way to turn up to the beach?

[MIKA27]

AUTODROMO BRIAN REDMAN PROTOTIPO CHRONOGRAPH

The Brian Redman Prototipo Chronograph is a new, limited edition series from Officine Autodromo. 500 units will be produced, with the first 100 being 18k gold plated, and the remaining 500 being raw stainless steel.

Brian Redman is a racing driver who needs no introduction to any fan of classic motor racing, he completed in many of the most iconic cars of the ’60s and ’70s, including the Ford GT40, the Porsche 908 and 917, the Ferrari 312 PB, the Alfa Tipo 33 and the BMW CSL.

Autodromo decided to build this watch to commemorate Redman’s stunning performance at the 1969 Nurburgring 1000kms, along with co-driver Siffert Redman would race the back-up Porsche 908 to a popular victory over the Ferraris. The dial has the same red and white paint scheme as the famous 908, and each comes with a booklet signed by Brian Redman himself.

[purchase Gold] [Purchase Stainless]

[MIKA27]

Indonesian Supervolcano Showing Signs of Possible Eruption

Residents of the village of Sitoluama in the North Sumatra district of Indonesia are in a state of panic as the ground beneath their homes is becoming hot and emitting steamthat smells like sulfur and gas. When you live near Lake Toba, that’s a cause for alarm since the lake fills the caldera of the Toba supervolcano which erupted around 70,000 years ago, causing the largest known eruption on Earth in the last 2.5 million years. Is Toba getting ready to blow and change the global climate again?

Inspectors checking for unusual heat and sulfurous steam

The heat and gaseous steam started on May 27, 2015, according to resident Purasa Silalahi, who felt the ceramic tiles on his floor getting hot .

Steam and smelling like gas coming out of the pores of the soil was feared to threaten the safety of people around, so we report them to the government.

Some experts believe the last Toba eruption caused a “volcanic winter” which lowered the average global temperature by 3-5 degrees C and triggered the last glacial period. It may have caused a tremendous drop in human population at the time to barely a few thousand people. The supervolcano disgorged 700 cubic miles (2,800 cubic kilometers) of magma. To put this in perspective, the Krakatoa eruption in 1883, one of the largest on record, released only 3 cubic miles of magma. Tobaalso sent a huge amount of volcanic ash over the Indian Ocean, Indian Peninsula and South China Sea, traveling as much as 4,350 miles (7,000 km).

Should we be getting ready for another volcanic winter? No one knows, or is admitting to know. The environmental agency of Toba Samosir is investigating, as is the Department of Mines and Energy of North Sumatra, but there has never been gas seepage in the area and there are no known gas or oil deposits to cause the leak.

Indonesia is dense with volcanoes, many of them active. Volcanic and earthquake activity appears to be on the rise worldwide. Some have linked this activity to the pole shift. Fracking isn’t helping. Neither is climate change. Toba is the biggest, meanest and scariest volcano of the bunch and it may be awakening.

Should we be worried?

[MIKA27]

The Enduring Mystery of Marilyn Monroe

One of the most fascinating – and deeply controversial – pieces of documentation that has surfaced concerning the still-controversial death of Marilyn Monroe came from an individual that the FBI identified, in its now-declassified dossier on the Hollywood legend, as a “former Special Agent, who is currently Field Representative, Appointment Section, Governor’s Office, State of California.”

Written and sent to the FBI in 1963, its contents are eye-opening in the extreme, since they suggest that the attorney general, himself, Bobby Kennedy, was involved in a plot to “induce” Monroe’s suicide. The lengthy document sent to the FBI begins as follows:

“Robert Kennedy had been having a romance and sex affair over a period of time with Marilyn Monroe. He had met her, the first date being arranged by his sister and brother-in-law, Mr. And Mrs. Peter Lawford. Robert Kennedy had been spending much time in Hollywood during the last part of 1961 and early 1962, in connection with his trying to have a film made of his book dealing with the crime investigations. He used to meet with producer Jerry Wald. He was reported to be intensely jealous of the fact that they had been making a film of John F. Kennedy’s book of the PT boat story.”

Robert Francis Kennedy

The unidentified writer continued that RFK was deeply involved with Marilyn Monroe, and had repeatedly promised to divorce his wife to marry Marilyn. Eventually, however, she realized that Bobby had no intention of marrying her, at all – and almost certainly never had any such plans.

Adding to that woe, was the fact that, as the Bureau was also informed, “…about this time, 20th Century Fox studio had decided to cancel [Monroe’s] contract. She had become very unreliable, being late for set, etc. In addition, the studio was in financial difficulty due to the large expenditures caused in the filming of ‘Cleopatra.’ The studio notified Marilyn that they were canceling her contract. This was right in the middle of a picture she was making. They decided to replace her with actress Lee Remick.”

The spiraling bad luck, in both her private life and her acting career, prompted Monroe to turn to Bobby Kennedy yet again, even though it was clear to her that the relationship was doomed to go nowhere. It was a decision that may well have cost Marilyn her life, as the words of the FBI’s confidante demonstrate:

“Marilyn telephoned Robert Kennedy from her home at Brentwood, California, person-to-person, at the Department of Justice, Washington, D.C. to tell him the bad news. Robert Kennedy told her not to worry about the contract – he would take care of everything. When nothing was done, she again called him from her home to the Department of Justice, person-to-person, and on this occasion they had unpleasant words.

“She was reported to have threatened to make public their affair. On the day that Marilyn died, Robert Kennedy was in town, and registered at the Beverly Hills Hotel. By coincidence, this is across the street from the house in which a number of years earlier his father, Joseph Kennedy, had lived for a time, common-law, with Gloria Swanson.”

It was at this point in the informant’s story that things turned decidedly dark. Hardly surprising, since he outlined something controversial in the extreme: a plot to manipulate Marilyn Monroe into taking her own life. It began like this, FBI documents state:

Peter Lawford

“Peter Lawford knew from Marilyn’s friends that she often made suicide threats and that she was inclined to fake a suicide attempt in order to arouse sympathy. Lawford is reported as having made a ‘special arrangement’ with Marilyn’s psychiatrist, Dr. Ralph Greenson, of Beverly Hills. The psychiatrist was treating Marilyn for emotional problems and getting her off the use of barbiturates. On her last visit to him, he prescribed [illegible] tablets, and gave her a prescription for 60 of them, which was unusual in quantity, especially since she saw him frequently.”

That “special arrangement” had one goal: the death of the Hollywood goddess. The statement to the FBI continues:

“[Monroe’s] housekeeper put the bottle of pills on the night table. It is reported the housekeeper and Marilyn’s personal secretary and press agent, Pat Newcombe, were cooperating in the plan to induce suicide. Pat Newcombe was rewarded for her cooperation by being put on the head of the Federal payroll as top assistant to George Stevens, Jr., head of the Motion Pictures Activities Division of the U.S. Information Service. His father, George Stevens, Sr., is a left-wing Hollywood director, who is well known for specializing in the making of slanted and left-wing pictures. One of these was the ‘Diary of Anne Frank.’”

On the day of Marilyn’s death, said the FBI’s source, Robert Kennedy checked out of the Beverly Hills Hotel and flew from Los Angeles International Airport via Western Airlines to San Francisco, where he checked into the St. Francis Hotel; the owner of the hotel being a Mr. London, a friend of Robert Kennedy. From there, Kennedy phoned Peter Lawford “to find out if Marilyn was dead yet.”

FBI records reveal what reportedly happened next: “Peter Lawford had called Marilyn’s number and spoke with her, and then checked again later to make sure she did not answer. Marilyn expected to have her stomach pumped out and to get sympathy through her suicide attempt. The psychiatrist left word for Marilyn to take a drive in the fresh air, but did not come to see her until after she was known to be dead.

Joe DiMaggio, Sr. with Marilyn Monroe.

“Marilyn received a call from Joe DiMaggio, Jr., who was in the U.S. Marines, stationed at Camp Pendleton, California. They were very friendly. Marilyn told him she was getting very sleepy. The last call she attempted to make was to Peter Lawford to return a call her had made to her. Joe DiMaggio, Sr., knows the whole story and is reported to have stated when Robert Kennedy gets out of office, he intends to kill him. [Deleted] knew of the affair between Robert Kennedy and Marilyn.”

The story was not over, however; in fact, far from it. The FBI’s source had far more to add: “While Robert Kennedy was carrying on his sex affair with Marilyn Monroe, on a few occasions, John F. Kennedy came out and had sex parties with [Deleted], an actress.

Chief of Police Parker, of the Los Angeles Police Department, has the toll call tickets obtained from the telephone company on the calls made from Marilyn’s residence telephone. They are in his safe at Los Angeles Headquarters.”

From there, things got even more intriguing:

“Florabel Muir, the columnist, has considerable information and knowledge of the Robert F. Kennedy and Marilyn Monroe affair.

She personally saw the telephone call records. Marilyn Monroe’s psychiatrist, although he knew she had taken the pills, did not come to her home until after she was dead. He made contact with the coroner and an arrangement was made for a psychiatric board of inquiry to be appointed by the coroner, an unheard of procedure in the area. This was so the findings could be recorded that she was emotionally unbalanced. It was reported this arrangement was to discredit any statements she may have made before she died.

“During the period of time that Robert F. Kennedy was having his sex affair with Marilyn Monroe, on one occasion a sex party was conducted at which several other persons were present. Tap recording was secretly made and is in the possession of a Los Angeles private detective agency. The detective wants $5,000 for a certified copy of the recording, in which all the voices are identifiable.”

We may never know for sure to what extent the data provided to the FBI was acted upon – even if at all. We can say one thing for certain, however: just as with the deaths of JFK, Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King, nagging suspicions remain that the official explanation may not be the correct explanation.

[MIKA27]

Qatar and Putin’s FIFA Friend Is Dead

There isn’t a bribe big enough for either of them to keep the World Cup after Sepp Blatter resigns.

LONDON — Soccer’s World Cup plans were cast into chaos Tuesday as Sepp Blatter announced that he would stand down as president of FIFA. At a shock press conference just four days after he was re-elected as the most powerful man in world sports, Blatter asked the organization to select a new leader.

Blatter’s stunning departure from soccer will reopen the battle to host the next two World Cups after the selection process was mired by allegations of bribery. The United States finished second in the voting for the 2022 tournament that went to Qatar, but widespread reports of illegal payments have raised questions over the legitimacy of the Gulf emirate’s hosting—to say nothing of its use of what’s been called slave labor.

Vladimir Putin, who took a close personal interest in Russia’s successful 2018 bid, will also be nervous Tuesday night as his friend Blatter announced that he will stand down from FIFA as soon as a successor is elected. The process is expected to be complete by March 2016.

The new president will be forced to hold a thorough internal investigation into the organization and, if FBI claims are to be believed, it seems likely that the World Cup bidding process for 2018 and 2022 would be heavily criticized. That would make it extremely difficult not to re-evaluate who should host the tournaments.

Dawn raids on a luxury hotel in Switzerland last week plunged soccer’s governing body into the most serious crisis in its 111-year history. An indictment unsealed in Brooklyn outlined charges against 14 men accused of operating a scheme of money laundering, fraud, and cover-ups for 24 years. Among those arrested were FIFA’s vice president and a former vice president.

Blatter ignored the clamor from prime ministers, presidents, and European football leaders to stand down last week or at least postpone the presidential election. “Why would I step down?” he told Swiss TV. “That would mean I recognize that I did wrong.”

Just four days later, he returned to the stage at FIFA’s headquarters in Zurich to announce that he would be stepping down after all. The New York Times reported that the FBI is continuing to build a case on his personal role in the alleged corruption, but Blatter claimed it was the reaction of the football world that forced him to retire early.

“I have decided to lay down my mandate,” he said. “While I have a mandate from the membership of FIFA, I do not feel that I have a mandate from the entire world of football—the fans, the players, the clubs, the people who live, breathe and love football as much as we all do at FIFA.”

“What matters to me more than anything is that when all of this is over, football is the winner,” Blatter said.

Greg Dyke, head of the English Football Association and one of Blatter’s most outspoken critics, said he was delighted by the change of heart.

“At long last we can sort out FIFA. We can go back to looking at those two World Cups. If I were Qatar right now I wouldn’t be feeling very comfortable.”

Michel Platini, the former star player for France and current boss of European football, is the favorite to replace Blatter. Last week, Platini told Blatter to his face that he must stand down for the good of football.

“It was a difficult decision, a brave decision, and the right decision,” he said today.

Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan, who ran against Blatter for president last week, confirmed that he would run again, as did David Ginola, who dropped out of the last race a few weeks into his candidacy.

Blatter’s sudden resignation announcement came after a disastrous day of PR management that was unraveling fast in the face of further allegations and freshly leaked evidence.

The most damning of the FBI’s world soccer allegations concerns a $10 million payment made direct from FIFA’s headquarters to the private bank account of a man who has been described as one of the most corrupt in sporting history.

American investigators say this payment may have provided the most direct evidence of collusion at the very top of FIFA. Shaken soccer officials responded earlier in the day by trying to pin it on a dead man.

An internal document contradicting claims that FIFA’s former finance chief had been the man to authorize the payment gave the impression that FIFA was continuing to cover up allegations of corruption.

U.S. authorities claimed the $10 million in cash was a bribe intended to secure support for South Africa hosting the 2010 World Cup. South Africa was unable to find the vast sum of money, so it asked FIFA to send the funds on their behalf.

At the end of last week, FIFA spokepeople said they were not at liberty to discuss an ongoing investigation and were thus unable to explain why they had done so. That was before the allegations had reached yet higher into the organization, however.

Reports in the U.K. over the weekend claimed that the payment must have been approved by Jérôme Valcke, FIFA’s general secretary and Blatter’s No. 2. On Tuesday, The New York Times cited anonymous American officials who said Valcke was indeed the “high-ranking FIFA official” fingered in the indictment that was accused of making the payment in 2008.

After the latest claims, FIFA decided that it could now address the reports. In a statement released Tuesday morning, a spokesman said it was not Valcke who authorized the payment that went directly into the private account of Trinidadian official Jack Warner, who was the head of soccer in North and Central America and the Caribbean at the time. The FIFA statement said the transfer of funds was authorized by the chairman of FIFA’s finance committee, Julio Grondona.

So, FIFA was claiming to offer transparency at last. What did this man have to say about his extraordinary decision to approve the unusual payment?

Nothing. Grondona had suffered an aortic aneurysm and died suddenly last summer.

The FIFA statement also claimed these funds were not a bribe; this was an altruistic act of charity by the South African Football Association, which had asked FIFA to help it set up “The Diaspora Legacy Programme.” This project was intended “to support the African diaspora in Caribbean countries” so that South Africa could share the spoils of their World Cup legacy.

The money was transferred to Warner but the project was never announced in either the South African or the Caribbean press. In fact, Google and media database searches show no public mention of the program anywhere in the world before this week.

A letter dated March 2008 that emerged todayfrom the South African FA to FIFA about the $10 million payment was addressed to Valcke and detailed the money “promised” to the personal account of Warner.

“The Diaspora Legacy Programme shall be administered and implemented directly by the president of CONCACAF who shall act as a fiduciary of the Diaspora Legacy Programme Fund of $10 million,” wrote Molefi Oliphant, president of the South African Football Association.

The FBI says $750,000 was shared with Chuck Blazer, the U.S. soccer official who has co-operated with American investigators. It’s unclear what happened to the rest of the cash, but the diaspora is still waiting.

[MIKA27]

Tokyo Granny Found Stuffed in Suitcase

There are laws in Japan against disposing of bodies improperly, but funerals are expensive, and people are creative.

TOKYO — Coin lockers in Japan aren’t just for dead babies anymore.

Tokyo Station, one of Japan’s largest terminals, and “terminal” may be the best word, was plunged into chaos and confusion on Sunday when news leaked that a corpse had been left behind in a coin locker. The firm managing the lockers at the station notified the Tokyo Metropolitan Police about finding the body at roughly 9:00 that morning, according to police sources.

Tokyo Station, like many train stations in Japan, has a large number of coin lockers for travelers to store small, medium-size and large objects, including suitcases.

Police immediately cordoned off the area where the lockers were located, near Tokyo Station’s South Exit, sparking rumors and speculation that a dismembered corpse had been stuffed into them.

In Japan, and especially in Tokyo, where the population is dense and solitude is scarce, chopping up bodies to make them easier to hide, and even mailing them (on one occasion, as sex dolls) to get rid of the evidence, isn’t completely surprising.

The Internet was rife with rumors that a severed head had been placed in one of the smaller-sized coin lockers. By 2:30 pm, in Yahoo Japan’s real time keyword ranking Namakubi, which literally translates as “raw head,” climbed the ranks to number five.

By the evening, the police made an official announcement to explain the situation and stop the rumors: An employee of the station’s coin locker management firm found a yellow suitcase on the morning of April 26. It had been placed in a locker under stairs about 40 meters from a ticket turnstile. The employee took the suitcase into “protective custody” where it was kept on the office premises for more than 30 days. Since no one had claimed the suitcase, staff opened it on the morning of May 31 to check the contents and perhaps find something to identify the owner.

As soon they unlatched it, the employees noticed hair and a rank smell from the suitcase. They called the local Marunouchi police department.

There was some speculation about why the body hadn’t been found sooner or the smell from the suitcase hadn’t tipped off the management firm, but a 30-day waiting period to inspect left-behind sealed luggage is standard and police sources noted the climate control in the station was good, the summer has been mild so far, and that a well-sealed suitcase can trap many odors.

The body is that of a 70- to 90-year-old woman, 4 feet seven inches tall. She was wearing clothes and had been stuffed into the suitcase. There was no sign of injury and no immediate cause of death could be determined. The police are currently investigating it as a case of improper disposal of a corpse, a crime forbidden under Japanese law.

There have been a number of such cases recently. On May 22, the Tokyo Police charged a 68-year-old man with improper disposal of the corpse of his 64 year-old wife, even though she had been cremated. On April 23 the man had dumped her ashes and leftover bone fragments into a supermarket toilet in Tokyo’s Nerima ward. When questioned by the police, the man reportedly confessed to the crime telling them, “She caused me a lot of trouble when she was alive. I hated her.”

As grisly as it sounds, the ubiquitous coin-lockers in Japan’s many train stations have long been dumping grounds for the dead. A rash of dumping unwanted babies in coin lockers inspired Japanese author Ryu Murakami’s best-selling dystopian fiction classic Coin Locker Babies in 1980.

In order to discourage the practice of abandoning unwanted children in such random places, Jikei Hospital in Kumamoto Prefecture introduced a a “baby hatch” to accept infants anonymously from parents who felt they could not raise the children. This “drop-off box” service reportedly resulted in over 90 babies being saved between 2007 and 2012.

While the number of children born declines, and as Japan’s population rapidly ages and many find it difficult to pay for lavish funerals, it’s quite possible that this dumping of a rather old body in a train station locker reflects the demographic change in the land. Funerals are expensive and there are families that can’t afford them.

Two brothers were arrested in Hyogo Prefecture on April 1 for improper disposal of a corpse. The arrest was not an April Fool’s joke. The brothers told the police that they lacked the money to pay for their mother’s funeral services. The prosecutors eventually dropped the case.

Actually, in Japan, even graves are essentially long-term coin lockers. At some Buddhist temples, if the relatives of the deceased cease to pay for the upkeep of the gravesite, after a few decades the “resident” is evicted and new graves go on the market. Even the dead have to pay the rent. That’s life (and death) in Japan.

[MIKA27]

BANZAI: THE 9 BEST JAPANESE WHISKIES TO DRINK

Traditionally, the realm of fine whiskey was divided into four nations with well-defined roles. Scotland was the king. It was the home of the best whiskies, and that fact was almost never disputed. And Ireland was the queen, largely seen as an excellent alternative to Scottish whiskies, but no real threat to upset the natural order of things. Of course, there was also America, the knavish knight who sought to usurp the king (and had many supporters), but just never seemed to be mature enough to do the job. And, finally, there was Canada, the court jester, who just seemed to be following its own strange path with fewer true followers than dabblers.

And then the unthinkable happened, and the whiskey world was turned upside-down. The Whiskey Bible gave out its top awards for 2014 and the winner was from Japan (actually, Scotland was shut out of the Top 3, with America getting second and third. Lots of self-proclaimed whiskey experts are only vaguely unaware that Japan even makes whiskey, let alone some that are among the very best in the world. So here’s our quick guide to the best Japanese whiskies you’ll want on your shelf and in your glass.

YOICHI 10 YEAR OLD

Just as it might come as a surprise to many that Japanese whiskies are among the best in the world, it might also shock some to know that older is not always better and that blends can compare quite favorably to single malts in many cases. This 10-year-old can stand up to any other whiskey in the world. It has a head nose of fresh fruit and peat, but what makes it great is a creaminess that belies its age. The finish is clean and smoky, certainly befitting the experience that came before it. Made on the northern island of Hokkaido in the old Scottish tradition of direct-fire stills and aged in premium wood barrels, this simple and elegant young whiskey is a peaty masterpiece.

***** COFFEY MALT

Distilled in the super old-school Coffey still, the ***** Coffey Malt puts most of the old Kentucky bourbons that inspired it to shame. Rich and flavorful, it tastes very much like it would be at home in Kentucky or Tennessee, but a quick splash of barley adds a mature fullness the old Colonel never considered. The result is an impeccable whiskey, one with hints of the old South, but with a flavor all its own. Consider this the perfect lubricant for after-dinner relaxation and conversation in place of bourbon.

HIBIKI 12 YEAR OLD

If you’re looking for a more complex whiskey, here’s the one for you. Aged in plum liqueur barrels, this multiple award-winning Hibiki can overwhelm some drinkers with the several distinct fruit combinations in its nose. But stay with it. From there, it’s a rich combination of fruits, cloves and a bit of sherry. And it comes to a close with an equally distinct finish that will make you want another sip. Be careful, though, you won’t get this one cheaply anywhere, but it’s worth the price, especially if you’re not exactly excited about the thought of your next glass of Macallan.

HAKUSHU 12 YEAR OLD

I remember that Car and Driver once called a certain Infiniti sedan “the Jaguar that Jaguar should have made.” You’ll get the same sense with Hakushu — it’s the Scotch the Scots should have made. It’s made in a forested nature preserve in idyllic northern Japan, which guarantees an unending source of pristine water, then distilled and aged using the most traditional method. It’s a no-nonsense whisky with no fruit or sherry overtones and a minimum of smoke, so it’s not meant to be sampled and discussed at length. But as a pure sipping whiskey, it’s hard to beat by anyone.

WHITE OAK AKASHI BLENDED WHISKY

Don’t buy this in or from Japan where they add molasses spirit to sweeten it to suit the local palate; instead, get the export version, which is all whiskey. It’s a blend, and proudly so. Distilled in bourbon and then sherry casks for only two months a year, quantities are low since the company relies heavily on its primary products — sake and brandy — for its revenue. It makes whiskey for the love of it, and it shows. This blend combines the smoothness and drinkability of a fine bourbon, like Buffalo Trace, with the complexity and subtlety of a top-shelf Scotch, like Talisker. Not for everyone — especially dedicated whiskey nerds — but a great summer sipper. Try it before you try White Oak’s sublime single malt; they’re both great, and the blend is a bargain.

***** TAKETSURU 17 YEAR OLD

While you might sip the White Oak blend with close friends, there are times you have to impress those who believe they know better. That’s pretty easy with this 17 year old. From nose to finish, there are so many distinct flavors — even the least refined palate will find many, identifying oak and honey right from the start — that it will almost certainly create a long discussion in which tasters try to outdo one another. And, while they’re talking, you can enjoy the whiskey. But do not enter into a relationship with ***** Taketsuru 17 Year Old lightly. It is a colossal whiskey, one meant for sipping and savoring — and one that just might ruin you for others.

***** PURE MALT BLACK

This is another blend you’d be wrong to pass over. Bursting with a variety of flavors — varying from dark chocolate to coffee then to peat — it ignores the biases people have against blended whiskeys and transcends the price it can be had for. It’s definitely not a whiskey for noobs, though. The flavors that come through at the highest volume are all the heavy ones, peat, dark chocolate and smoke. It’s a perfect way to end a hearty meat-focused meal, but it’s not great for casual drinking.

For the record, this whiskey isn’t really distilled in Japan — it’s a blend of malt spirits from Scotland and grain spirits from Canada — but it is masterfully blended and aged there, making it officially a Japanese whiskey. Aged in plum brandy casks in an old railway tunnel into a mountain (beats a warehouse, no?), it tastes like no other whiskey from anywhere. Without trying to sound too pretentious, it’s a youthful whiskey with plenty of alcohol nose and tang, but little finish, making it perfect for casual drinks or even before dinner. Try it with a bit of soda on a hot day.

YAMAZAKI 12 YEAR OLD

One of the reasons to love Japanese whiskeys is while they adhere to time-honored traditions, they also like to add a twist or two. And so it is with the popular (even beloved) Yamazaki 12 Year Old. It’s malted in the traditional Scottish way, but then aged first in American bourbon barrels, then Spanish sherry barrels and finally Japanese oak barrels. The result is a delightfully robust whiskey, brimming with powerful fruit flavors. And, more than any other whiskey on this list, it looks and feels good. Thick and almost viscous, it has a beautiful orange-brown hue that almost screams “I am a great whiskey.”

[MIKA27]

HERE ACTIVE LISTENING SYSTEM

Be it a busy street, a crowded commuter train, or just everyday noise, there are plenty of times we'd like to have an EQ for the sounds around us. And that's just what the Here Active Listening System provides. This pair of wireless in-ear buds works in conjunction with a built-in DSP and a companion app to give you control over real world sounds. Active noise cancellation can drown out unwanted sounds, the equalizer can transform live music, sound effects and filters let you experiment, and preset modes make it easy to manage common situations. The buds offer a battery life of six hours, and include a case that doubles as a charger.

[MIKA27]

The Fallout 4 Official Trailer Is Here

Fallout is back, and, as expected, it’s headed to post-apocalyptic Boston. You can watch the first (great) trailer right here.

As we already know thanks to an accidental early website leak, Fallout 4 is official, and it’s coming to PS4, Xbox One, and PC.

It’s been seven years since Fallout 3, the first and only Fallout game developed by Bethesda Game Studios so far. Fallout: New Vegas, released in 2010, was created by the independent studio Obsidian Games. Over the past few years, people have been going nuts in anticipation for Bethesda’s next game, which we all assumed would be Fallout 4. Now, it’s official. After shipping The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim in 2011, Bethesda Game Studios moved on to the next Fallout.

Bethesda is promising that we’ll see more during their E3 press conference, and I imagine we’ll see a lengthy gameplay demo as well as an official release window. (A fall 2015 release would be wonderful.)

[MIKA27]

Apple Recalls Beats' Pill XL Speaker Because It's A Fire Hazard

Beats’ Pill XL speakers are HOT HOT HOT! As in, they will literally catch on fire, and you should remove them from your home or office environment immediately. Apple is recalling Beats’ largest Pill speaker model because overheating batteries may cause the oblong, overpriced speakers to be set ablaze.

“Apple has determined that, in rare cases, the battery in the Beats Pill XL Speaker may overheat and pose a fire safety risk,” Apple’s recall website reads. “If you have a Beats Pill XL Speaker, please stop using it.”

If you have a Pill XL and aren’t stranded in a damp wooded area with only your Pill XL by your side, desperately trying to start a fire to stay warm (in which case this will be welcome news) you can submit a request to return it via Apple’s website. Apple will contact you to arrange the return of your Beats Pill XL speaker, and you’ll get $399.95 in Apple Store credit or an electronic payment 3-4 weeks later.

[MIKA27]

The FBI's First Aircraft Were Spy Planes From The Vietnam War

When the FBI first bought its own planes in the 1970s it was a minor scandal. But what’s so shocking about the feds having aircraft? The scandal was that they were originally experimental spy planes used in the Vietnam War.

The FBI has finally admitted to using fake aircraft companies to fly surveillance missions over US soil. This isn’t terribly surprising news, since the FBI has been doing this sort of thing for years. But the FBI didn’t always have its own air force.

The FBI acquired its first two planes from the US Army sometime in mid or late 1974 and stationed them in Los Angeles. Both planes were Lockheed YO-3As, designed with a decidedly retro body (think more glider than supersonic jet) that allowed them to quietly patrol the skies over Vietnam. The YO-3A was notable in that it never took a single bullet from enemy fire, due in large part to the fact that it wasvirtually silent.

As one syndicated article about the FBI’s air force from March 1975 explained: “In Vietnam the Army wanted a plane so quiet that it could not be detected by Vietcong troops on the ground even when it flew at an altitude as low as 100 feet.”

But it wasn’t just their stealthiness that made the planes interesting to the FBI. They also had night-vision capabilities, a new technology that had been developed by DARPA during the Vietnam War. The YO-3A was also notable for being the first plane to feature the lasers that would later be used for guided missile systems.

Naturally, news of the FBI buying up surplus spy planes from the Army didn’t sit too well with many Americans. Even if one gave the FBI the benefit of the doubt, the general impression from a public relations perspective was bad. Planes coming home from an unpopular war overseas to be used to track Americans? Even if they were being used exclusively for hunting down criminals, it wasn’t a good look.

The fact that the FBI was acquiring its own planes at all worried some in Congress, no matter the source. Until the mid-1970s the FBI always borrowed the helicopters and aeroplanes of other agencies whenever it really needed them.

In 1975 Representative Les Aspin, a Democrat from Wisconsin, raised concerns that these planes were going from the battlefield to America’s skies: “The FBI has provided absolutely no justification for establishing its own air force,” Aspin said in 1975. “The bureau ought to get out of the air power business as soon as possible.”

So why did the FBI want its own planes? The stated goal was to use these aircraft for trailing kidnappers and other aerial reconnaissance in Southern California.

“It’s strictly an experimental thing,” FBI special agent in charge at the Los Angeles field office said to reporters in 1975. “But we think the plane could be very effective in trailing cars involved in extortion or kidnapping plots, for example, or in rescuing kidnapping victims.”

The same FBI agent assured reporters in 1975 that these planes wouldn’t be used for transporting government employees or anything shady like that. They were simply for “investigative purposes.” These days government employees getting free rides in expensive planes would no doubt be a lesser scandal than surveillance planes stalking American skies.

[MIKA27]

Being Inside An Ice Cave Inside A Glacier Looks Absolutely Stunning

National Geographic shares this really cool photograph taken by Robbie Shone showing the inside of a glacier. Being inside the ice cave is like being in a sparkly gem stone or something. NatGeo says the explorers in the photo were installing a rope traverse below the surface of Europe’s second largest glacial system, the Gorner glacier.

You can see more of Shone’s stunning photography from this exploration here.

[MIKA27]

BATTERISER

Like nearly everyone else reading this, we’ve got countless disposable alkaline batteries powering our devices in both our office and household. It also seems that we are constantly moving from one device to the next, replacing batteries every few weeks. For just a few bucks, Batteriser looks to increase that short lifespan by up to 800 percent.

Most batteries only use about 20% of their full capacity, because although the average AA battery is rated for 1.5 volts, after a few uses it drops below 1.35 volts, and the cell is now rendered useless for most electronic devices. Batteriser is an ultra slim voltage booster designed by electrical engineer Bob Roohparvar. It works on disposable batteries, AAA through D, and thanks to its slim design, the metal sleeve can fit right inside the gadget you’re powering. The Batteriser will cost just $2.50 per sleeve when it releases, and is also reusable, with a virtually unlimited shelf life. [Purchase]

[MIKA27]

Nubia Launches Visually Borderless Z9 Smartphone

Sick of your phone screen actually having edges? The latest high end Android phone out of China looks amazing.

The flagship devicewas unveiled yesterday at a fashion show in New York. The screen still technically has a very thin edge, so how good the nubia Z9 really is in person remains to be seen. But you know what, I want one. A lot.

The nubia Z9 uses a 5.2 inch 10920 x 1080 screen that runs right to the edges of the phone. It also uses the Snapdragon 810 chipset, has a 16MP camera with OIS, a 2900 mAh battery and runs Android 5.0 Lollipop.

It can also use the edge of the phone and screen to control a range of different things, such as snapping a picture, swiping through images or playing a game.

The phone comes in three versions — Classic, with 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage, for $735 (US $564). The Elite has 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage and costs $840 (US$645). The Exclusive has the same specs but adds a fingerprint reader and costs $945 (US $725).

It won’t be available till later in the year (and no Australian release date is given). Until then, check it out in action below.

[MIKA27]

How To Climb Big Cliffs Without Ropes And Not Die

Rock climbing can be divided into a crazy mess of sub-genres: top-roping, sport, trad and about a thousand too bizarre to name. But they almost all rely on ropes to catch you if you fall. There is, however, another way: severing the nylon umbilical, and climbing rope-free above water instead.

In climbing terms, ‘soloing’ (often referred to as free soloing) means climbing tall stuff without ropes. Because a fall basically means instant death, it’s not exactly the most popular branch of climbing. But it has a less deadly cousin — deep-water soloing, a.k.a. climbing tall stuff above deep water, so a fall just gets your hair wet. DWS has all the athleticism, freedom and adrenaline rush of normal rock climbing, but without having to mess with 10km of rope every session. Basically, it’s a ton of fun.

It’s also limited to a few select locations. DWS normally happens on hot islands with jacuzzi-temperature oceans. In New York State, are the Adirondacks. More importantly, there’s a little island in the middle of Lower Saranac Lake with a 21m cliff overhanging deep water — ideal DWS terrain! (Well, ideal apart from the water temperature, which in early May hovers a couple degrees above freezing.)

Beggars (and Canadian DWS enthusiasts) can’t be choosers, though, so on the first weekend of May, I packed a couple cars full of friends, and aimed for the border. Saranac Lake is in upstate NY, about five hours from Manhattan, or a comfortable three-hour cruise from Montreal. We left early Saturday morning, with a plan for the ultimate chill outdoor weekend: drive to the lake, pick up canoes (and beer!) from an outfitter, cruise a few kilometres along the lake to a campsite on an island, right next to our climbing location.

Even if you don’t like paddling, canoe-camping is still the best way to spend a zero-effort weekend in the backcountry. Normally, you’ve got to pick between the convenience (and alcohol-carrying capability) of car-camping, and the civilisation-free awesomeness of backpacking. But with a canoe, you can load up a 120-litre drybag with liquor and steak (I’m speaking from experience here), and cruise to your campsite without breaking a sweat.

From our put-in onto Lower Saranac Lake, it was a 3km paddle to our campsite — a tiny island right next door to Bluff Island, home to the cliff. In early May, the campsites aren’t officially open, so we had the lake to ourselves. Even better, you’ve got your pick of 60-odd official campsites, without the need to pay.

We made it to the island a little after noon, recovered from the long paddle with one of Vermont’s incredible home-brew ciders, and unpacked the bags. Although we’d come mostly with the intention of deep-water soloing, which requires no gear save climbing shoes and chalk, I’d brought a full climbing rack, in case the water turned out to be too cold. But once we’d walked around our new home a little, we thought of a much better use for my 90m of rope: making a zipline over to the neighbouring Bluff Island.

Making a zipline with climbing rope really isn’t all that easy: climbing rope is dynamic, meaning it stretches to absorb the impact of a fall. It actually stretches a hell of a lot: 30% in a typical lead fall. Thanks to the laws of physics, that means it sucks for building a zipline: the weight of the person on the rope will cause a huge amount of sag, even if you use pulleys to put 500kg of tension in the rope before sliding down it.

Even knowing this beforehand, thanks to a misspent youth messing with climbing gear, I felt I still had to try and get across the channel between the islands in the air. So, we rigged the zipline 12m up a tree — necessary so that, even with sag, I’d be above the water — and I pulled myself over, albeit with my arse kissing the surface in the middle. Since I was the lightest guy in the group (and no-one wanted to get stuck on a rope in the middle of a freezing lake), we cut the line down, and headed over to the cliff.

The local climbing guidebook describes the deep-water soloing on Bluff Island as “one-star climbing in a five-star location”. The cliff is 21m high, and probably the same distance wide, with a few easy lines going up the obvious cracks, and much trickier face climbs going up blank sections. Compared to most climbing locations, it’s nothing too technical, high, or exciting; but with the setting, in the middle of an achingly beautiful lake, it takes on a new lease of life.

I’m not a particularly talented rock climber (and the water was ball-freezingly cold), so my first route went up the easiest-looking crack. Technical climbing grades go from about 5.4 (a slightly steep staircase) all the way to 5.15, which would be a steeply-overhanging wall with basically no holds.

My first climb was probably a 5.7, easily within my normal gym-climbing ability; but even with the knowledge in the back of my head that it was deep water below, climbing at 21m was enough to freak me out. I don’t normally have any problem with heights, but sitting on the equivalent of a four-story building with no rope made my palms pretty damn sweaty.

I’d never even jumped off a cliff that high before, so, before going back around to try another line, I decided (with some not-so-subtle peer pressure) that jumping back down would be the best way to restore my confidence. Practising falling is a common exercise for nervous sport climbers, so there was some kind of sense behind the idea.

21m is a long way down, though. I’ve done some big ropeswings before; this was another level. You’ve actually got a lot of time to think on the way down: there’s time for your brain to ask questions like “why the **** am I doing this”, “how bad would a belly-flop hurt”, and “I wonder if that stuff about jumping into freezing water causing heart attacks is actually true”, before you’re suddenly 5m underwater.

And man, is that water cold. ‘Take your breath away’ isn’t just a flippant phrase with 38-degree water: I could only breathe shallowly, gasping for breaths as I swam towards the canoe at the bottom. (Pro tip for would-be DWSers: have a safety boat of some kind upwind of wherever your climber is going to land, but far enough away that deep-water soloing doesn’t turn into deep-canoe soloing.)

But after ten seconds out of the lake, the cold wore off, and the adrenaline kicked in. On the next climb up, feeling far more secure, I had more time to think about the actual climbing, and started to really appreciate this version. In every roped version of the sport, most of your mind is focused on getting to the next bolt, or putting the next piece of protection in the rock. Soloing, you don’t have those milestones every 3m to aim for, so it becomes much more about the rock, about the movement — about total freedom of hanging out halfway up a cliff at sunset with nothing but a chalk bag.

Anyway, after my sunset climbing epiphany, I downclimbed back to the canoe (there’s no way I was jumping into that lake after the sun had gone down), and we paddled back over to the island. This is where the real fun of canoe camping kicks in: we were isolated in the middle of a lake, with a 12-pack of freshly chilled beer, a couple fire-grilled steaks, and a full moon.

The only thing intruding on the isolation was the sound of a banjo — some guys had paddled onto the island a couple hundred yards over, and installed themselves around a fire for a night of music. Obviously, we had to go for a moonlight paddle to get our bluegrass fix, and the guy even invited us up for a few beers. Totally surreal perfection.

We woke up late the next morning, and squeezed in a few more hours of climbing — enough to finish off all the good routes on Bluff Island. With the sun getting low and canoes to return, we packed up, made waves back to the put-in, and were back in Montreal in time for playoff hockey.

Want to deep-water solo yourself?

With most kinds of climbing, the hardest part is normally buying (and learning) all the very necessary safety gear. With deep-water soloing, that’s not a problem — you don’t need to know what a figure-eight is, or how to tie a harness. What you do need, though, is a good location — a cliff, overhanging deep water. That means more than just a cliff-jumping location — when you’re jumping in control off a cliff, you can land a good 3m away from the edge, meaning some small rocks at the bottom aren’t dangerous.

But when you fall off deep-water soloing, it’s unexpected, and far less controlled. In an ideal world, you want to be climbing an overhanging cliff, so there’s zero danger of hitting anything. At a minimum (and especially if the cliff is vertical, rather than overhanging), there needs to be completely clean entry into the water.

You’ll also want a safety boat in the water. A fall from any real height into water can go wrong, breaking limbs or causing unconsciousness. An ideal safety boat is something like a RIB or a larger rowboat; canoes work, just, but it’s very difficult to drag an unconscious person into the canoe without capsizing yourself.

Regardless of what kind of boat you have, position yourself upwind, and close to the climber, but not so close that they fall into the boat. Most importantly, make sure whoever’s driving knows what they’re doing: messing around with a powerboat close to shore, with people in the water, is a great way to get hurt.

In terms of gear, you need very little: ideally, a couple pairs of climbing shoes, so that when they get wet, you have a dry pair ready to go, and you don’t have to wait for your one pair to dry out between climbs. Falling into the water obviously destroys a chalk bag: a better alternative is liquid chalk, which you can apply in the boat, and should last for the entire climb.

You’ll be reading more about the sport of climbing in the near future. We plan to explain its various forms, breakdown the jargon and hopefully make it easy for you to get into.

[MIKA27]

Super Up-Close View Of An F-18 Taking Off From An Aircraft Carrier

You’re only centimetres away from F-18 Hornets launching from an aircraft carrier. You hear the power of the fighter jets, feel the closeness of these flying killing machines and see the impossibility of their take off. The fighter jet starts moving and is in the air in such a short distance, it’s always unbelievable.

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The Secret 1949 Radiation Experiment That Contaminated Washington

The physicists who invented the nuclear bomb worked out of Los Alamos in New Mexico, but the people who did the dirty work of making the bombs were in Hanford, Washington. Throughout the Cold War, Hanford churned out plutonium for our nuclear arsenal. It was also, conveniently, a place to experiment with radiation.

Today, Hanford is the most contaminated radioactive site in America — the site of a massive (and troubled) cleanup effort. Radioactive material is still accidentally leaking into the ground. Though Hanford’s plants routinely released small doses of radioactive material into the air, most of this damage came from an event in 1949 called Green Run.

Workers at Hanford

Green Run was a secret Air Force experiment that released Hanford’s largest single dose of radioactive iodine-131. On the night of December 2, 1949, at the behest of the military, scientists at Hanford let 7000 to 12,000 curies of iodine-131 into the air, where it rode the wind as far as 322km. For a sense of scale, the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant accident released an estimated 15 to 24 curies of iodine-131 and the Chernobyl accident 35 million to 49 million curies.

The Green Run stayed secret until the 1980s, when it was revealed by Freedom of Information Act requests from local newspapers. The military details are still classified. More than half a century later, suspicion and controversy continue to lurk around Green Run, especially among the residents who lived downwind of Hanford.

There’s still much that we don’t know about the Green Run, but here is what we do.

Hanford, Factory and Farm

The B reactor at Hanford under construction.

When Hanford broke ground in 1943, residents nearby in eastern Washington knew it was a war construction project but not much else. Under the then-secret Manhattan Project, Hanford’s reactors produced the plutonium for the first nuclear bomb, detonated at the Trinity site in 1945, and Fat Man, dropped on Nagasaki. Only after the war was Hanford’s true purpose widely known.

As the US entered the Cold War, Hanford grew. Its nine reactors together processed enough plutonium for 60,000 bombs. Rural eastern Washington became the Atomic Frontier.

Hanford was always more than a production facility; it was also a research complex. Up to 1000 animals were housed on a farm near reactor F for experiments on the effects of radiation. The animals included fish, dogs, pigs, sheep, and even alligators. Sheep, especially, were given feed with iodine-131, the same radioactive material that the reactors were discharging into the air.

Hanford workers feeding radioactive food to sheep.

Testing a sheep’s thyroid for radiation.

Spying on the Soviets

The “Green Run” sounds benign, even pleasant, but its name has more dangerous origins. Normally, irradiated uranium fuel is cooled for up to 101 days before it is processed, so that short-lived radioactive elements like iodine can decay. In the Green Run, the fuel was cooled just 16 days; it was still “green”.

Carl Gamertsfleder, then Hanford’s Health Instruments Deputy Chief, later told the Spokane Chronicle, that the “green” order came from the military, who assumed the Soviets were rushing to produce nuclear bombs. If the Soviets were short-cooling their fuels, the radioactive results might be spotted some distance away. So Air Force wanted to fly planes behind a radioactive test plume, to test out their own instruments.

The first page of Hanford scientists’ once classified report on the Green Run, titled “Dissolving of Twenty Day Metal at Hanford.”

That’s why, on the night of December 2, 1949, Hanford employees processed one ton of 16-day-old fuel without filtering the exhaust, releasing 7000 to 12,000 curies of iodine-131 in the air. It was two to three times as much as they intended. The experiment also went forward despite, Gamertsfleder claimed, reservations about weather. “We knew what the weather was and we didn’t want the release to be done then,” he told the Chronicle, “On the Columbia River it probably got as many people as it could.”

The radioactive iodine-131 spread over a 322km x 64km plume, which was actually too small. That meant much of the iodine-131 made it onto the ground, in higher than desired concentrations. The vegetation in nearby communities had readings of 0.1 to 4.3 microcuries/kg, ten to hundreds of times higher than the “permissible permanent concentration.”

Downwinders

In the decades since, committees and researchers have revisited the question of whether the Green Run’s iodine-131 endangered the health of people living downwind. The answer, according to official sources, is no.

Iodine travels through tainted food and milk, and the Green Run happened in winter, when few people were harvesting vegetables from the ground and few cows were grazing. A Congressionally mandated study could not find a link between thyroid disease caused by iodine-131 and releases of the material by Hanford, during the Green Run or otherwise.

But, as secret government experiments do, the Green Run bred suspicion and mistrust. In 2005, a lawsuit filed on behalf of 2300 downwinders finally had its had in court. Of the first six plaintiffs, two who had thyroid cancer were awarded $US500,000 in damages — too little for the rest of the cases to continue.

That’s pretty much where the story ends with the Green Run, a largely-forgotten episode of history in a largely-forgotten place. But Hanford still bears the scars of the Cold War, and the Green Run is an unsettling example of what the government has done in the name of keeping its citizens safe.