Quazen

In fact this was the extraordinary price – worth 2,500 florins (about $1,000) at the time – that one man paid for a single tulip bulb in Holland in the 1630’s. Even higher sums than that changed hands at the height of what has come to be known as “Tulipomania” – a range for trading in tulip bulbs that swept the nation between 1634 and 1637…How did such an extraordinary state of affairs come to be?

Taking Venice as his theme, Kessler flooded the courtyard of the hotel with water dyed blue to resemble the sea. Magnificent painted backdrops provided the setting, and the entire scene was illuminated by 400 Venetian lamps. His two dozen guests sat inside a huge silk lined gondola bobbing on the “canal,” surrounded by 12,000 carnations and an enormous number of roses. They are food prepared by 15 master chefs and served by waiters dressed as gondoliers.

A born actor, Arnaud had little difficulty in convincing the villagers that he was Martin. How did he fool Bertrande? How could a wife not know that the man she was living with was an impostor? Or did she know?

I think most of us have indulged in the odd Big Mac and large fries, followed by a McFlurry, all washed down with a large strawberry milkshake and ultimately regretted it about an hour later, but the UK has taken this gluttony to a new level!

I know we’re all being encouraged to have our “Five a Day” fruit and veggies – but the lengths to which some folks will to make these more appealing to the palate are a little odd to say the least.

The dream was so vivid that, on walking, the rector felt compelled to build a real-life version of the maze he had seen. The newly constructed maze was modeled on a set of religious carvings in the village church and the design was symbolic. The winding pathways represented the journey of life. The wrong turnings and culs-de-sac symbolized the sins that people commit before death, obstacles on the way to paradise and heaven.

Although George Washington himself congratulated Hanson, stating that he held the “most important seat in the United States,” Hanson’s role, and that of the seven men who followed him, was to preside over Congress. He lacked the executive powers of the Constitution would invest in Washington and his successors, and he was powerless to enforce the measures of Congress, which were often ignored by the individual states…By 1786 the political weaknesses of the Articles were identified, and in 1789 the new Continental Congress had ruled the newly united states, and John Hanson, largely forgotten today, had the honor of being its first president.

Or maybe you’ll want to die after trying them.

What if cars can be collected like mere postage stamps? Would you pick every available classic model on planet earth and make it your own? I bet you would.

The Japanese have a wonderful relationship with their manhole covers: they treat them as art. Here is a selection of the ornate, the artistic and the ever so slightly bizarre.