It seems like we're in a season of celebrations, with even more down the road. Two big ones, of course, are Mardi Gras and Chinese New Year. This week we've found a whole slew of other things to be happy about.
Fifty years ago last week something important happened. So important, some may even say that without it, we would not be here to offer you these picks: Gregory Hines was born. We really do have a good argument for this and we'll get to it.
As an aside, you may as well know that also fifty years ago last week a bunch of folks at the University of Pennsylvania fired up ENIAC, the first general purpose electronic computer. The machine was bigger and slower than what you're using to read this, but even so, the world continues to celebrate the event. We understand the importance of counting to 5000 in one second, but we're still counting on Gregory Hines. Details are forthcoming. As a further aside, we'd like to point out that the computer has come a long way since then (baby). So far, in fact, that last week World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov took on a formidable machine called Deep Blue in the exciting ACM Chess Challenge. You may be surprised by the results.
Science and technology make quite a showing in this week's selection. The Space Telescope Science Institute has provided a collection of the latest pictures from the Hubble Telescope; choose to view thumbnail or full sized images. San Francisco's Exploratorium is also worth a visit. Their website showcases some of the many amazing interactive lessons available at this fun science museum, for kids and students of all ages.
So: back to Hines. If you're thinking ketchup you're wrong. But the connection is almost food related; so before we go there, try this: The Official French Fry Page, created with the kind of love and devotion you only see once or twice in a lifetime. No small potatoes either, Broccoli Central tells you everything you wanted to know about the green stuff, except how to cook and eat it. If you consider this page as an Internet style guide of sorts, you will also want to peruse , which frankly tells it as it is.
Okay, here goes... The Hines connection: food and computers? You decide. Gregory Hines has a Bacon value of two. What we really mean is: Brett Tjaden and Glenn Wasson at the University of Virginia have written a program that singlehandedly ends hours of parlor-game fun. Have you ever played the Kevin Bacon game? Name an actor or actress, and, like six degrees of separation, jump from movie to movie, leading through their casts, inevitably back to Kevin... For example, Hines was in The Cotton Club with Laurence Fishburne, who was in Quicksilver with Bacon. If this makes no sense now, it will when you try the The Oracle of Bacon at Virginia. (Just remember to capitalize first letters of names!) It'll be enough to make every day a holiday.
How does Yahoo! define small places? How about: countries, dependencies, principalities, what-have-you, with a total land mass of 259 square kilometers or less. (That's 100 square miles for the metrically-challenged.)
At 93 square miles, the fifteen self-governing Cook Islands fall under the administration of New Zealand. In this Polynesian paradise tipping is not customary and there are no high-rise hotels.
Also in the Pacific, the Republic of the Marshall Islands is trying to shed a history of nuclear testing and promote tourism. The islands occupy 70 square miles and offer great diving and surfing (of both varieties).
Surrounded by land instead of water, the 61 square mile principality of Liechtenstein borders Austria and Switzerland. This postage stamp-sized country, boasting a literacy rate of 100%, is famous for (you guessed it) postage stamps.
As people of the United States ready themselves for April 15th, Anguilla may come to seem more and more like paradise. This 35 square mile Caribbean island has no taxes, but plenty of sweet potatoes. You'll have to visit to find out how the government makes its money.
Another small dependency of the United Kingdom is Gibraltar, a 2.25 square mile island off the coast of Spain. Known for being invaded numerous times throughout its history, today it is home to the only wild primates found in Europe: the Barbary Apes.
Pitcairn Island in the South Pacific is even smaller. This 1.75 square mile piece of land is home to the descendants of six of the mutineers of the HMS Bounty. Write to any of the fifty residents (you'll find a list of their names, ages, and relationships), but don't expect a speedy reply: E-mail and the Internet haven't found their way to the island yet, and "snail mail" only comes about four times a year.
Finally, that extremely small, well-known land situated on the Riviera between France and Italy: Monaco. This principality packs more than just Casinos into 0.73 square miles of space. See what else it has to offer.