Over 650 unicyclists from 23 countries, and even more spectators gathered in Wellington, New Zealand, for the 15th 15th International Unicycle World Championships and Convention (UNICON XV).

UNICON is held every two years and welcomes anyone who can ride a one wheeled-bicycle. This year, the 10 day event took place between December 27, 2009 and January 7 2010 and hosted  all sorts of fun competition, performed on unicycles, of course. There were 30 different events, of which the most interesting were MUni (mountain-uni-cycling), Road Racing, Track and Field, Unicycle Hockey and Unicycle Basketball.

Yup, basketball and hockey played while riding a unicycle. Maybe you’ve seen this kind of display before, but it’s definitely new to me. I found some photos from UNICON 2010 and added a couple of videos, so you can better understand the game.

I guess these fall in the same weird category as underwater rugby.

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Robert Burck, known by most as The Naked Cowboy has announced his decision to run for mayor of New York City.

Claiming he “can do more with less”, The Naked Cowboy promised $10,000 loans for small companies, at no interest, call buttons for taxis at street corners and a wedding chapel in Times Square.

The Naked Cowboy has been hanging around Times Square, since 1998, dressed in nothing but a pair of white underwear, boots and a cowboy hat. Over time he became quite the celebrity, making appearances on hit TV shows like TRL and getting photographed with other celebrities.

He reportedly makes as much as $1,000 every day, collecting tips from passers-by in Times Square, working from 11 am to 2 pm.

Photos by Getty

via Telegraph.co.uk

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CompuLab has just introduced its new PC. It’s fast, quiet and most importantly, it’s tiny.

Designed around the Intel Atom Z530 1.6 Ghz processor, the smallish Fit-pc2 is a real power-saver too. It manages to run Microsoft Windows or Ubuntu Linux, using just 6W and can render full HD 1080p videos with just 7W.

The Fit-pc2 is fan and blower free, managing to stay cool thanks to its smart aluminum casing that dissipates heat. It may be just 4”x4.5”x1.05” (smaller that a CD), but it’s a pretty mean machine for its size. Here’s what u can find inside:
* 1.6GHz x86 CPU
* 1GB RAM
* SATA hard disk
* DVI with graphics acceleration
* High definition audio
* LAN and WLAN
* 6 USB ports

via fit-pc2.com

Believe it or not the same Russian Greenpeace activist got busted by the police again, just days after the first incident.

If there’s one think I admire about the poor environmental activist who faced the Russian police a few days back, it’s his persistence. The man actually got released by the police andreturned in front of Moscow’s City Hall, tocontinue his protest to Russia building incineration plants.

Sadly for the Greenpeace guy he wasn’t more successful than the first time. The police came and picked him up again, this time in a smaller car, so they made him take out his trash-can costume to fit. Third time’s a charm maybe?

This is apparently how they used to test new inventions in the Soviet Union during the 50s and 60s (at least that’s when these photos are taken). In this experiment they got that little pig drunk by forcing it to drink wine (Kagor, maybe you heard of it) and launching it into the air using some kind of giant mortar cannon. Some of you might find it funny, but I just think it’s cruel.

I guess animal cruelty and animal testing are old issues that aren’t going away anytime soon…

A Pakistani father fearing for his daughter’s safety allegedly made her wear a surveillance camera on her head so he could keep an eye on her.

There is nothing a good parent won’t do to ensure their child’s safety! For example, one Pakistani man recently went viral on X (Twitter) for installing a surveillance camera on his young daughter’s head so he could monitor her activities throughout that day and make sure she was alright. In a viral video titled ‘Next Level Security’, the Pakistani woman is shown being interviewed while wearing a CCTV camera on her burka-covered head. Asked about the bizarre accessory, she said that it was his father’s idea, adding that she had nothing against it because she knew her parents were concerned about her safety.

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The Arc’tryx MO/GO Hiking Pants come with a built-in exoskeleton powered by powerful motors that can increase the wearer’s leg strength by 40 percent and make them feel 30 pounds lighter.

Motor-powered exoskeletons have been a reality for years, especially in the medical field, but not so much in the leisure department. That is about to change, as outdoor brand Arc’teryx and Google spinoff Skip recently teamed up to create the “world’s first powered pants”. Called MO/GO (short for ‘mountain goat’), the innovative garment is more than a piece of clothing; it comes with bespoke carbon fiber support structures that feed power from integrated AI-controlled motors at the knees to the wearer’s leg muscles during ascents and decreasing pressure on their knees during descents. Marketed as a mobility device, MO/GO pants are designed to make hiking more accessible to people who may not have the endurance for it.

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English tattoo artist Daniel Gulliver has become known for his signature debossed tattoos, which look like they have been carved into the wearer’s skin.

Daniel Gulliver, also known as Gully, hails from London in the UK. He specializes in a variety of tattoo styles, from miniature ultra-realistic portraits to impressive optical illusions, like floating objects and characters with shadows placed perfectly to emphasize the floating illusion. However, Gulliver is best known for his debossed tattoos, which appear carved into the skin. They can be unnerving to look at, but there is no denying the talent and painstaking work that went into making them.

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A Mexican family has been outed as scammers after being caught on video placing cockroaches on their plates at a restaurant just so they can then complain and leave without paying the bill.

The Puerto Chale restaurant in Guadalajara, Mexico, recently took to social media to shame a family of scammers who had threatened to make a scene because of a cockroach they had allegedly found in the dishes they ordered unless the restaurant agreed to not charge them for their meal. Although confused by the incident, as the restaurant reportedly has a very strict hygiene policy, management decided to give in to the patrons’ demands just to avoid an unnecessary scandal. However, as soon as the family left, they checked the surveillance cameras and found proof that the whole thing had been premeditated.

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Goon Ten, or Dancing Shrimp, is a popular Thai street food made with live freshwater shrimp that jumps off the plate when marinated alive.

A bunch of small, translucent shrimp trying to wiggle their way out of being eaten alive doesn’t sound like the most appetizing meal, but in Northern Thailand, it’s actually all the rage. Usually sold from double-basket carts, goon ten consists of live freshwater shrimp wriggling in a spicy marinade of ground chili, lime juice, fish sauce, mint, sliced shallots, and lemongrass. It is most often served with a variety of sticky rice. Often described as one of the freshest foods money can buy, dancing shrimp salad will literally jump off the plate, as the live critters try to escape the spicy marinade. It sounds barbaric to eat such a dish in this day and age, but most of those who have tried it were blown away by its texture and complex flavor combination.

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Founded in the year 578, Japan’s Kongo Gumi construction company is recognized as the oldest continuously operating company in the world.

Thousands of companies are founded and liquidated daily around the globe, many of which only operate for a few years, maybe even months. The world’s most valuable companies have only been around for a few decades and with technology changing the business landscape at breakneck speeds, who knows how long they’ll be around. Today, there are only a few thousand companies older than 200 years, and even those seem relatively new compared to the world’s oldest continually operating company, Kongo Gumi. Founded in the 6th century by a Korean carpenter specializing in Buddhist temple construction, the Japanese construction company has been operating for a whopping 1446 years.

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The town of Kudrovo, in Russia’s Leningrad Region, is home to the country’s largest residential building, a giant oval-shaped monstrosity featuring 3708 apartments and 35 different entrances.

Completed in 2015 as part of the massive ‘Novyy Okkervil’ residential complex on the outskirts of Kudrovo, Russia’s largest residential building got its first international coverage in 2021 when aerial photos of it made it to the first page of Reddit, getting over 50,000 upvotes and thousands of comments. People were equally fascinated and freaked out by the enormous building, and many compared it to a human anthill. The comparison is not as farfetched as it might seem, because the concrete oval of Kudrovo is home to between 11,000 and 18,000 people (reports from Russian media vary) all technically living under the same roof.

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Animal lovers and animal rights activists the world over are asking for a boycott of the Bully Cat, a hairless breed becoming increasingly popular among people fascinated by extreme body shapes.

The bully cat is a relatively new feline breed that takes the characteristics of the hairless sphynx to a whole new level while adding other problematic features. This particular hairless breed has stubby short legs and heavily wrinkled skin that animal experts claim is prone to horrifying health problems. Believed to have originated in the United States only a few years ago, the bully cat quickly became popular overseas as well, particularly in the UK where animal welfare organizations recently began sounding the alarm about what they are calling a designer fad with painful consequences for the animals being exploited by unscrupulous breeders.

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Crocs teams up with DC Comics to create a surprisingly cool-looking version of its ubiquitous Classic Clogs inspired by arguably the best Batmobile ever designed.

The Croc brand has always been associated with comfort, but rarely with style. Nevertheless, the company has always come up with ways of surprising its faithful fans, teaming up with various other brands for intriguing collaborations. Its latest such venture resulted in the recently-released Batman x Crocs Classic Clog “Batmobile”, a limited-edition version of its Classic Clogs inspired by the design of the Batmobile featured in the 1989 Batman movie and its sequel, Batman Returns.

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A Russian chess player is facing a lifetime ban from official competitions after allegedly trying to poison an opponent by spreading mercury compounds on her chess board.

Amina Abakarova, a 40-year-old chess player from the Russian Republic of Dagestan, stands accused of trying to poison another female player during a chess tournament in Makhachkala. Surveillance footage from the Dagestan Classical Chess Championship shows the 40-year-old woman spreading a substance later identified as mercury on the chess board and pieces that would later be used by another player, Umayganat Osmanova. CCTV footage clearly shows Abakarova walking to the table where Osmanova was about to play and tampering with the chess board and pieces before casually walking away so as not to draw attention. Her actions would have probably gone unnoticed had Umayganat Osmanova not begun to experience symptoms like nausea and dizziness just 30 minutes later.

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