The iBag2 is a digitally programmable handbag designed to flash and vibrate when “danger spending zones” are hit and even self-lock if these discreet warnings are ignored by shopaholics.

Launched by personal finance website Finder.com, the iBag2 is the result of a joint effort from a female-led team of engineers from robotics firm Colmac Robotics Ltd in Ireland and renowned New York-based fashion designer Geova Rodriguez. The first were in charge of the robotics of the accessory while the latter came up with the couture design. Finder claims it has created the unique products to help monitor and curb impulsive spending and avoid buyer’s remorse.

The iBag2 comes with a series of built-in features that remind shoppers of their spending goals whenever they reach for their wallet and even self-locks when it believes that they are most vulnerable. For example, the GPS tracking feature lets the iBag2 know when you are approaching one of your pre-programmed vulnerable spending zones, so it can warn you via flashing amber lights. An RFID system connected to LED lights and vibration motors also sends discreet warnings whenever you reach for your wallet, to remind you of your spending goals. But perhaps the most notable feature of this smart handbag is the self-locking mechanism. A magnetic field is used to snap two steel plates together to lock the bag whenever the built-in timer signals your most vulnerable spending moments during the course of a day or when you enter one of the vulnerable spending zones mentioned above.

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The Norwegian Environment Agency has recently released a series of haunting images of at least 323 dead reindeer – 70 of them calves – killed in what has been described as one of the deadliest lightning strikes ever.

It is unclear exactly when the natural disaster occurred, but the hundreds of dead bodies were discovered on Friday by a group of hunters in a remote area of the barren Hardanangervidda plateau, in central Norway. Spanning some 8,000 square kilometers, Hardangervidda is the largest high mountain plateau in northern Europe and the largest national park in Norway, with a population of 10,000 to 11,000 wild reindeer.

While the specifics of the mass death will probably never be known, experts say that animals tend to huddle together in extreme weather, which makes it easier for lightning to pass through their bodies. Norwegian officials say that multiple animal deaths caused by lightning strike is not very uncommon, but the scale of this event is definitely unheard of. “We are not familiar with any previous happening on such a scale,” Kjartan Knutsen of the Norwegian Environment Agency said. “Individual animals do from time to time get killed by lightning, and there are incidents where sheep have been killed in groups of 10 or even 20, but we have never seen anything like this.”

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Mbah Gotho, an Indonesian man from the island of Java, has official documentation that attests that he was born on December 31st, 1870. If confirmed, this would make him 23 years older than the than the official world record holder for world’s oldest human, French woman JeanneCalment who died at 122.

Authorities in Gotho’s hometown of Sragen told local media that they have verified their records and an ID card with his date of birth posted online, and that his claim appears legit. However, until his documents are independently verified, he cannot officially be named the oldest human being in history. Not that the title matters to much to Gotho, who in a recent interview told reporters that he has only one wish left – to die. While it may sound eerie, it’s an understandable desire, considering his current situation.

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Aware that once something is on the internet, it says on the internet, a man from Weifang, China’s Shandong province, actually destroyed the physical internet infrastructure in his neighborhood to prevent some embarrassing photos of himself from appearing online.

The man, only identified as Liu, had only recently arrived in Weifang in search of a job, when he attended neighborhood square dance. The popular activity is usually associated with middle-aged women, but that didn’t bother him. At least, not until he noticed bystanders laughing and taking photos of him showing his dancing skills. He quickly left the event after that, but couldn’t shake the feeling that the people who had photographed him would share the embarrassing photos online.

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Barbara Murphy, of Roy, Utah, is giving the phrase “walking dead” a whole new meaning. The 64-year-old woman is alive and in pretty good health, but, for some reason, the Social Security Administration believes she died on in July 2014 and is attempting to take back two years’ worth of Social Security payments and recuperate Medicare or Medicaid treatment costs.

Barbara first experienced the woes of being dead on paper despite otherwise perfectly alive two weeks ago, while out to dinner with her granddaughter. When it was time to pay the bill, the waitress returned with her credit card and told her it had been rejected. Her husband was able to pay for the bill, but when her granddaughter, who works at a bank, called the office to ask about the status of Barbara’s account, she learned that it had been frozen after the Social Security Administration issued notice of her death.

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48-year-old Emyr Mathias, a builder from Ceredigion, Wales, is preparing to embark on an epic 200-mile journey carrying a 25-kg wooden cross from St. Davids in Pembrokeshire to the top of Mount Snowdon, after getting a series of visions from the Lord.

A devout Christian for the past 31 years, Emyr says he is taking on the monumental challenge in response to a calling he received from God. It all started a couple of years ago, when he started getting these strange visions. In the first one he was carrying a St David’s flag from St David’s to Snowdon, but he dismissed it as silly, telling himself “I’m not carrying a flag on the road – that’s silly!” Then, he claims he had a second vision in which God told him “I want you to carry a cross from St David’s to Snowdon,” but again Emyr thought “I’m not doing that”.

Not long after having these visions, Mathias met Angie Taylor who, after the loss of her son, carried a cross from Land’s End to John O’Groats with amazing testimonies of what the Lord did along the way. After telling her about God’s message to him, she said “You daft bat! Get the cross made!” So he did.

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A Japanese tombstone company is using the augmented reality technology made popular by Pokemon Go to allow mourners to “catch” pre-recorded video messages from their deceased loved ones in cemeteries.

Named “Spot Message”, the new Pokemon Go-inspired app is the brainchild of Yoshiyuki Katori, president of Ryoshin Sekizai, a tombstone company based in Katori, Japan’s Chiba prefecture. He claims that the new technology realizes his longtime dream of preserving realistic memories of the dearly departed for the living. “My uncle, who ran a paint store, died eight years ago after he fell from a tall structure at work,” 33-year-old Katori said. “His death was so sudden, and it shattered the lives of his family. I also respected him a lot, so I would often visit his grave, consulting with him in my mind whenever I had issues concerning my business. I wondered how comforting it would be if he could talk to me at his grave, with messages like ‘How are you doing?’ and ‘Hang in there.’ ”

His desire to hear his uncle’s words at his grave inspired the Japanese entrepreneur to use augmented reality to plant pre-recorded messages from the dead at their graves and other places dear to them, for their living friends and family to discover using their smartphones.

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A young Vietnamese woman recently shocked police after admitting that she had paid someone to cut off her left hand and foot, so she could claim a health insurance payoff of roughly $180,000.

The extreme insurance scam reportedly began in May, when a 30-year-old woman named only as Ly Thi N convinced an acquaintance to cut of her left arm and foot in exchange for 50 million dong ($2,200). The plan was to make it look like she had been hit by a train, so the cold-blooded accomplice, named as Doan Van D, acted like a bystander who just happened to find her injured near a railroad in Hanoi. He was the one who called an ambulance and notified the police about the “accident”.

Ly Thi N was found lying in the ground with a severed hand and leg, and the woman told police that she had wandering near the railway track when a train passed by and dragged her under it. Doan Van D, who she described as a total stranger, just happened to pass by and ended up saving her life. At first, everyone thought that the victim was lucky to be alive, but policemen investigating the accident became suspicious after learning that the woman and the 21-year-old who allegedly found her by accident actually knew each other quite well. Read More »

In a bid to give their children a head start in life, wealthy Chinese parents are enrolling them in all kinds of early education programs, including CEO training courses.

Chinese state media reports that an early education institute in Guangzhou, China’s Guangdong province, is offering a ‘CEO training course’ for kids aged between 3 and 12, at a price of 50,000 yuan ($7,500) per year. Kids attend two classes per week, during which they engage in activities such as filing in missing words in sentences and stacking up toy bricks. That doesn’t sound like anything special, but according to a promotional brochure released by the institute, the course “enables young children to become a powerful, competitive leader”.

There’s no denying that China probably has the most competitive educational environment in the world, which means parents would do almost anything to make sure their children don’t get left behind, but experts believe such extravagant courses ultimately benefit the parents rather than the children. They regard their kids’ attendance to such classes as evidence of the family’s social status, completely disregarding the fact that the syllabus they offer is of no real value.

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Watermelon plants usually yield only 1 to 4 fruit per harvest, but a new variety created by an agricultural technology company in China has recently set a new Guinness Record after yielding no less than 131 massive fruit.

The Chinese seem to be really good at creating super plants. Just weeks after we posted about their impressive “octopus tomato trees” that can yield over 30,000 fruits at a time, we bring you the “watermelon king”, a new breed of watermelon that can set over 100 viable fruits per plant. Created by the Zhengzhou Research Seedling Technology Co., Ltd., the plant has been acknowledged as the most productive watermelon plant in the world after yielding 131 fruit in just 90 days.

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Unable to cope with the death of her husband, a Russian woman reportedly spent at least four months trying to bring him back t life with the help of holy water and prayer.

The unnamed 76-year-old retired therapist from the central district of Volgograd stunned police investigators when she said she didn’t report the death of her 87-year-old husband because she believed she could revive him by sprinkling holy water on his body and reading prayers.

The woman’s bizarre secret was revealed on August 12, when she accidentally flooded the apartment below, and a neighbor forced his way into her home to turn off the water. He found the almost completely mummified of her husband laying on the living-room couch and immediately notified the police. Forensic pathologists determined that the man had been dead for four to six months, but found no traces of violence on his body and concluded he had died of natural causes.

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Two notorious Indian criminals recently detained for forging documents and scamming people have managed to secure bail by doing what they do best – faking documents signed by nonexistent cops and guarantors.

Mohammed Lukman Shaikh, 48, and Bashir Mulla, 62, both with long criminal records under their belts, were put behind bars a little over a month ago for forging passports and other Government-issued documents. The two were so well-known for their document-faking talents that during their trial hearings, the Thane court warned police to recheck documents submitted during the proceedings, as both had a history of fabricating papers and cheating the authorities. Even so, Shaikh and Mulla managed to use their skills to secure bail and now they are nowhere to be found.

The two con artists were in judicial custody when they managed to secure bail and walk free. This happened a month ago, but the police just learned about it three days ago, after Vijay Sanap, a constable attached to Srinagar police station in Thane, discovered something suspicious in the paperwork of their case.

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Inspired by the 2004 Tom Hanks film The Terminal, a homeless army veteran looking for a place to sleep recently decided to move into Heathrow Airport. He originally planned on staying for a couple of nights, but he’s been living there for almost a month.

A former member of the Parachute Regiment who served in Northern Ireland before working in private security, Simon Jones – fake name to protect his identity – fell on hard times after his business collapsed and his romantic relationship ended. Penniless and with no place to sleep, he remembered watching The Terminal, in which the main character is forced to live in an airport after war breaks out in his country leaving him stateless, and decided to crash at Heathrow Airport – the busiest in Europe – for a couple of nights.

“I suddenly lost everything when my business, which provided high-risk assignments and the training of personnel, collapsed. The business put an enormous strain on my relationship and we separated. I was suddenly homeless and, because all the bank accounts were in joint names, penniless,” Jones told English newspaper The Sunday Express. “I was mulling over what to do. I don’t want to be a burden on anybody, so felt I couldn’t stay on friends’ floors for more than a night or two, especially since I can’t pay my way. Then I remembered the Tom Hanks film about the bloke living at an airport. I realized there would be washing facilities and even free wi-fi.”

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Fashion Model Summer Rayne Oakes has been living in a 1,200-square-foot converted industrial space in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, for 11 years, and during in that time she has managed to turn it into a stunning oasis filled with 500 plants, including a living wall, an irrigated vertical garden, a closet garden, edibles and exotic species.

“I think that the only way I’ve really been able to survive in New York is by surrounding myself with plants,” Oakes told Modern Farmer Magazine, which makes sense considering she grew up in a country house on five acres of land in rural northeastern Pennsylvania, surrounded by domestic animals and lots of plants. It was fashion modelling that first brought her to the Big Apple, but that, and everything else she has been involved in since relocating to the big city, has been about raising awareness to the environment.

“It was the modeling at start because at that point in time I wanted to look at how I could bring environmental awareness out to a wider audience,” Summer said in an interview with 6sqft. “I got kind of stuck on the idea that I could do it through fashion. Not that I had ever really been involved or interested in it, and I didn’t even know how to get there other than by meeting people. Putting myself back into my 18-year-old self, it was the idea of wow, I think fashion could be a really cool way to disseminate environmental awareness.”

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42-year-old Jarnail Singh was recently admitted to The Corporate Hospital in Gurdaspur, India, after complaining of severe stomach pains and general weakness. What he failed to mention was that he had voluntarily swallowed 40 sharp metal knives over the past couple of months.

After asking Singh a few questions and performing the routine checkup, doctors were puzzled about the cause of the pain, so they did an ultrasound. That revealed a large solid mass in the man’s stomach, which led medical staff to believe he was suffering from cancer. To confirm the diagnostic, they performed a gastroscopy – inserting an endoscopic camera in his stomach. The mass appeared metallic and doctors could identify shard of blades and wood, which was very unusual.

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