See collection by designer. More Photo Galleries: Source: http://fashion.about.com
From Cynthia Nellis
Thursday, September 6, 2007
Price Guide for Barbie Dolls 1973-2007
This dolls price guide presents modern Barbie dolls produced from 1973 through today. For each doll, photographs, dates of production, market prices and other information will be provided. All prices and values given are based on a combination of dealer and Internet pricing, and are based on dolls NRFB (never removed from box). Prices for dolls removed from box are approximately 40% lower. You may browse the price guide using photographs or the text index. For earlier dolls, please see the Vintage Barbie Dolls Price Guide.
Source:http://collectdolls.about.com
From Denise Van Patten
 Barbie Goddess of the Moon by Bob Mackie |  Barbie Goddess of the Moon by Bob Mackie, Close Up |
Source:http://collectdolls.about.com
From Denise Van Patten
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Farmer Feeds Viagra to Oysters to Create the Ultimate Aphrodisiac
A farmer from Australia believes he has developed a technique able to produce the ultimate aphrodisiac - he feeds his shellfish Viagra.George May, who is an oyster farmer, stated that the natural qualities of the oyster combined with Viagra, which is one of the best modern pharmaceutical drug to raise sexual desire, can in fact turn into a multi-million dollar market. The 59 years old farmer mentioned that feeding an oyster with Viagra firstly can create a powerful aphrodisiac and secondly it's a funny thing to do.
George May is a former marketing executive. After he was diagnosed with prostate cancer he lost his job (in which he was quite successful). It is worth mentioning that selling oysters in Australia requires strict regulations.
Pfizer, a pharmaceutical giant that produces Viagra, ordered the farmer to stop using the name of the most famous anti-impotence drug in his marketing campaign. However, May outlined that not one obstacle would stop spreading his idea around the world. He plans to sell his exclusive Sydney Rock Oysters around the world.
According to May he receives calls from Macau, Hong Kong and Moscow. He mentioned that the idea of feeding oysters with the drug came to him when he started "hanging around with the boys" after his retirement and prostate surgery.
When his doctor had prescribed a rather small dose of Viagra, in order to help May recover from the surgery, the farmer thought of feeding the drug to oysters. The idea meant to help the local farmers, the majority of whom had fought a disease that swept through their crops. May told that the farmers were going to feed oysters with Viagra and zinc, along with every other aphrodisiac he was able to find.
After a while feeding the oysters with Viagra along with magnesium, zinc and sea grass became a patented idea. The shellfish was fed only after it passed through a process of purification.
Today May has about 10 million oysters in cultivation. In addition he says he eats a dozen or two each day and he has had no ill effects of consuming a foodstuff that includes some medication.
Pfizer's spokesperson said that the company producing Viagra was concerned only about the use of its brand name, and thus it is an ordinary drug issue.
"No-one can stop me feeding Viagra to my oysters. The reason that Pfizer are jumping up and down is that I used the name Viagra," May said.
Russian Mine Blast at Novokuznetsk (coverage)
Early morning, on May 24th, 217 people, workers at the "Yubileynaya" mine in Novokuznetsk in the Kemerovo Oblast (Russia), got into the elevator to go deep down the mine and collect more coal for their country. However, the scenario was rewritten at approximately 7:30 AM Moscow Time (4:30 AM GMT).At approximately 520 meters (about 1700 ft) deep down the mine a highly dangerous gas - methane - exploded.
By the end of that day 38 people were reported dead and the rest 179 miners were evacuated - 7 of them with serious injuries; one of them was in a critical condition with a serious head injury and burns. These reports were given at 16 PM Moscow Time the same day.
About the same time the rain stopped. It started right after the explosion was heard.
Russian authorities have initiated an investigation of the case, lead by Rostehnadzor, an institution for security and safety issues at hazardous places of work. The results of the investigation is expected to be ready not earlier than two weeks.
The Governor of Kemerovo Oblast, Aman Tuleev, suggested that the blast could be caused by a breach in the coal-bed. According to him, 23 technicians, controlling the level of methane in the air, were also in the mine. He stressed that the explosion came absolutely unexpected, as the concentration of methane in the air in the mine had a normal level.
This tragedy happened just two months after an explosion at the "Ulianovskaya" mine, where 110 miners found their death.
Both the "Yubileynaya" and the "Ulianovskaya" mines are part of the "YuzhKuzbassUgol" union. A half of this union belongs to the metallurgic group "Evraz". After the Ulianovskaya blast, the upper mentioned Rostehnadzor threatened withdrawing the license for mining, because of discovering serious violations safety rules.
The investigation at the "Ulianovskaya" mine showed that the automatic system for methane level control was set up for a higher than normal level of methane concentration. According to one of the versions, the system was too sensitive to increases of methane concentration, therefore it automatically shut down the main power supply and hence overall productivity losses.
After that investigation several people have lost their jobs and have been punished, yet here is another tragedy that Russian miners have to face.
Rostehnadzor intended to close the "Yubileynaya" mine twice this year, but the court, which was appealed to in this issue, declined the request and let the mine proceed its extractions. However, the security institution managed to halt extractions in certain sections of the mine, among others sections 16-15, where the actual explosion happened.
Not so long before the incident, regional authorities, along with Rostehnadzor, were fighting to withdraw the license for 'industrial safety' from "YuzhKuzbassUgol". The company's administration replied that the mine is equipped with modern mine security systems, which were fully functional at the moment of explosion.
The mines of "YuzhKuzbassUgol" extract about 18 million tons of soldering coal, 900 thousands of which are extracted by "Yubileynaya" and the accident of this mine increases its chances to be closed. However, experts say that if a decision will be reached and the mine will have to be closed, this won't happen, at least not for a long time. The "YuzhKuzbassUgol" extracts a fourth part of the coal in Kuzbas, and a fifth part in the whole country, which makes the mines of the company of extreme national importance.
The accident has also aroused a wave of concern among the leaders of the country. The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, demanded that the heads of coal extracting companies respected and followed all the rules of industrial security.
The company's administration still claims that the mine, except for the exploded section, is fully functional.
The "YuzhKuzbassUgol" promised to pay the families of the dead miners one million rubles (about $40,000) each. In addition, the Government promised to provide material support too, thus every family will be paid about 2 million rubles. Local authorities also plan to organize a center for solving various social and household problems of the dead miners' closest relatives.
Today, Saturday, May 26th, the miners have been honored with funeral processions. The material part of the funerals was taken by "YuzhKuzbassUgol".
The 38 dead miners were aged between 18 and 55 years. The youngest of them, Daniil Ilyin, the mine's mechanic, celebrated his 18th birthday in February; Boris Titov had his 55th year of live celebrated two weeks before the tragedy. Aman Tuleev, Governor of Kuzbas, was also present at the funerals.
Local administration has assigned a social worker and a psychologist to every family for moral support.
Due to the funeral processions the local television changed its schedule: all entertaining shows have been withdrawn.
Chinese Deliver Live Rats to Restaurants
Central China, plagued with about two billion rats forced out by a flooded lake, trucks the live rodents to the south to be used in restaurant dishes. Some Guangdong Internet users have already offered rat recipes as a way to deal with the rat invasion problem. The idea to cook rat meat in restaurants was partially suggested by the lack of snakes, a popular dish in the south of China, and owls, traditionally used in Chinese medicine. Some vendors asked the residents of a village in Hunan province, located near Dongting Lake, to sell them live rats, according to the Beijing News. Vendors offer 6 yuan for a kilo of live rats, but they keep silence as for where they are going to sell the rats. Villagers claim they could catch 150 kilos of live rats a night. As one of vendors from the capital of Guangdong province said, people are rich in the southern part of the country and enjoy eating exotic things, so his business develops really well.
There are restaurants in Guangdong promoting 'rat banquets'. The price for one kilo of rat meat is 136 yuan (that is $A20,7). Hunan local governments have been trying to stop the rats invasion. The rodents have already demolished about 1.6 million hectares of crops. They can also spread dangerous diseases, as reported by Chinese media centers. Some scientists have blamed Chinese Three Gorges Dam project and climatic changes for rodents invading dry land in Hunan.
British Invents Anti-Paedophilies Software
A computer program that is aimed at haunting internet sex offenders, who are chatting under kids mask was released by a British inventor. The innovative software is able to analyze the user's language patterns in relation to his age. This program is based on the knowledge that adults use more complicated phrases and punctuations when writing in the chartrooms. Even those who try to pretend they are kids cannot dodge the program, which can spot that a person uses simple words but speak in written form more often than a child would.
In addition to this, software takes into account such factors as sexual content in the course of all the chat relationships. If something looks dangerous, the text will be send to parents When the software find something suspicious it alerts the parents by sending them an e-mail or text excerpt.
Adam Hildreth, 22 year old inventor, named Young Entrepreneur of the Year, who created the Anti-Grooming Engine in cooperation with Cambridge University claims that it's 99 percent accurate. No matter how smart a sex offender is, this software tool is able to detect his tricks and protect kids.
The idea was already supported by National Council of Parent Teacher Associations and The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Center - the Government's anti-child abuse agency. They consider any protective measures against child abuse online a "golden opportunity".
Most children now surf the web without parental supervision and as many as one in seven kids is approached by web sex offender.
Mr.Hildreth now offers the program for free to the first 10,000 people registering on his site. Later he is aimed to charge £2 a month.
Storm virus attacks blogs
Storm virus is back again to infect blogs, webmails and bulletin boards. British and Korean computer security scientists claim it's a new variant of malware that is extremely difficult to detect. The Storm worm looks like a message that features news about Europe's storms. In fact, this virus can evaluate network traffic on the computer and later insert a link to malicious website into user's post, webmail or bulletin board. The text that will appear on user's blog will have a link to the website that holds the threat together with a note to attract readers' attention to visit a website with fun videos or e-card.
British computer security experts say Storm worm makes up more than 50 percent of all malicious computer software that infects another computer and can use personal data of the user sending it to third parties.
Storm virus presents a real danger as it interferes in social networks. A lot of people who visit blog journals are not aware of the threat that may come from the common discussion on related topics with the author they trust. A link that will appear in blog's author site will lure them to check out an interesting video.
One of Symantec engineers, Eric Chien, said that some bulletin boards were already spammed. The threat of the Storm worm is that it can mask spam under a real user's post.
Anti-virus programs are not always effective at detecting the dangerous malware as this virus is dynamically repackaged and is able to change its appearance and mislead anti-virus solutions.
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