museum of the weird – Page 20 – Museum of the Weird

Posted on July 12, 2012 by Guest Blogger

MAN BUILDS HIS OWN VIRTUAL REALITY GIRLFRIEND

Using Augmented and Virtual Reality, one man has built his own girlfriend! *Photo courtesy of Alsionesvx

…and i don’t blame!

One, possibly lonely, hacker in Japan has decided that a cat or dog wasn’t quite the companion he was looking for after having so much trouble finding a girlfiend. So, what to do? Just build one of course! Why didn’t I think of that? Well, actually… I did, but didn’t have the know-how or quite the creepiness that this guy does.

Future Of Tech on MSNBC.com writes:

In a slightly creepy but undoubtedly impressive feat of DIY electronics, an evidently lonely Japanese hacker has put together a virtual girlfriend through a combination of motion-tracking hardware, video goggles, and some scavenged 3-D game assets.

A video on YouTube, originally posted at Hack a Day, shows the view through a pair of video goggles that have been augmented with an Asus Xtion motion-tracking tool, essentially an off-brand Microsoft Kinect. This helps track his motion and the environment, and is assisted by some augmented-reality software that places virtual items on the image.

The last ingredient is, of course, a popular Japanese virtual pop idol. Hatsune Miku has starred in many games and concerts, and clearly the builder, known at the moment only by his online handle “Alsionesvx,” is a fan. He collected some 3-D models and animations from a portable game that has some augmented reality functions and merged them with his hacked-together environment.

Now Hatsune Miku not only appears before him at the park and in his apartment, but follows him when beckoned, is blocked properly by things like trees, and even casts a shadow. He interacts with her, as well, flipping her tie and patting her head.

MUMMIES MADE OF DIFFERENT BODIES FOUND IN SCOTLAND

This female mummy was found comprised of at least 3 different people.

A little over 10 years ago, archaeologists in Scotland found a set of 4 skeletons that dated back to almost 3,500 years ago but, there was a problem.

Every other bone or so dated back to a different time, some of them 100 of years apart! How could this be?

LA Times writes:

An international team of archaeologists have discovered that two mummies found on an island off the coast of Scotland are, like Dr. Frankenstein’s monster, composed of body parts from several different humans. The mummified remains, as much as 3,500 years old, suggest that the first residents of the island of South Uist in the Hebrides had some previously unsuspected burial practices.

The West Coast of South Uist was densely populated from around 2000 BC until the end of the Viking period around AD 1300. Researchers led by archaeologist Michael Parker-Pearson of the University of Sheffield have been working at a site near the modern graveyard of Cladh Hallan, which gives the site its name. The team has so far excavated three roundhouses from a village that was apparently occupied from around 2200 BC to 800 BC. A little more than a decade ago, they found the two skeletons under one of the houses, as well as the remains of a teenage girl and a 3-year-old child.

The two primary skeletons were buried in a fetal position and showed evidence of having been preserved. Chemical evidence suggests they were mummified by being placed in nearby peat bogs for a year or longer. The high acidity and low oxygen content of the bog prevents bacteria from breaking down body tissues. After preservation, the skeletons were apparently removed from the bog and buried.

But the skeletons did not “look right” to the researchers. The female’s jaw didn’t fit into the rest of her skull, for example. Closer examination of the male, they reported in the Journal of Archaeological Science, showed that arthritis was present on the vertebrae of the neck, but not on the rest of the spine. The lower jaw had all of its teeth, while the upper jaw had none; but the condition of the lower jaw’s teeth showed that they had been paired with upper teeth. The team concluded that the skeleton has been assembled from parts of at least three bodies, some of which were separated by several hundred years of time.

EX-CIA AGENT FINALLY SPEAKS ABOUT ROSWELL CRASH

The CIA are said to have covered up the Roswell, New Mexico UFO crash of 1947.

The 65 year anniversary of the famous crash in Roswell, New Mexico was July 8th and one man decided it would be the perfect time to give his input on the matter. He might actually know what he’s talking about, after all, he was an agent of the CIA for 35 years and rather high-up as well.

Huffington Post writes:

Happy anniversary, Roswell, N.M. It was 65 years ago today that the Roswell Daily Record blasted an infamous headline claiming local military officials had captured a flying saucer on a nearby ranch. And now, a former CIA agent says it really happened.

“It was not a damn weather balloon — it was what it was billed when people first reported it,” said Chase Brandon, a 35-year CIA veteran. “It was a craft that clearly did not come from this planet, it crashed and I don’t doubt for a second that the use of the word ‘remains’ and ‘cadavers’ was exactly what people were talking about.”

Brandon served as an undercover, covert operations officer in the agency’s Clandestine Service for 25 years, where he was assigned missions in international terrorism, counterinsurgency, global narcotics trafficking and weapons smuggling. He spent his final 10 years of CIA service on the director’s staff as the agency’s first official liaison to the entertainment and publication industries. It was during this time, in the mid-1990s, that he walked into a special section of CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., called the Historical Intelligence Collection.

“It was a vaulted area and not everybody could get in it,” Brandon told The Huffington Post. “One day, I was looking around in there and reading some of the titles that were mostly hand-scribbled summations of what was in the boxes. And there was one box that really caught my eye. It had one word on it: Roswell.

BIGFOOT HAIR SAMPLES SOLD AT AUCTION TO MUSEUM OF THE WEIRD!

Certified Genuine BIGFOOT Hair? We sure hope so! Only time will tell but, the adventure begins now!

You’ve read that right, folks! We have gotten ourselves a hold of quite the crypto-important find here, a set certified genuine BIGFOOT hair samples all the way from Washington state!

We ran into a story posted over on one of of our favorite Bigfoot related websites, bigfootlunchclub.com, the other day that spoke of a man that had some hair samples in his possession. When we learned that they’d be up for auction this weekend, we knew immediately we had to have them!

Owner and operator of Museum of the Weird himself, Steve Busti, made sure that would most certainly be the case.

For when a possible answer to the mystery of Bigfoot comes calling, he has got to try and answer!

The folks over at GrindTV.com have written a few words about the auction:

The Nacogdoches Auction in Nacogdoches, Texas, sold a vintage bedroom set, antique dolls, a 1950s Schwinn bicycle, antique furniture and a lock of hair from … Bigfoot. Wait, what?! Hair from Bigfoot? Uh, yes, hair from Bigfoot, aka Sasquatch.

With a bid of $225, Steve Busti was the lucky winner for what actually appears to be hair from — something.

“I’m excited,” Busti said by phone soon after Saturday night’s auction. “I’m really looking forward to having the hair tested. If they come back with some unusual result, it could really change things. This could really be like the smoking gun, if you will, that will prove the existence of this animal.”

Busti owns the Museum of the Weird in Austin, Texas, and plans to add the hair to an existing Bigfoot exhibit that includes alleged Bigfoot tracks in plaster casts.

We appreciate the mention and you can read the rest of the story over at www.grindtv.com

Obviously, there’s always the chance of not actually being from a bigfoot but, that’s why we’ll be sending it in for DNA testing as soon as possible and you, our readers of the Weekly Weird News, will be the first to hear what the results are.

We couldn’t be more excited to be involved with the Bigfoot community and hope we can contribute our own research, findings, and now, quite possibly, actual evidence of the sasquatch himself, Bigfoot.

Posted on July 5, 2012 by Steve Busti

Introducing JOURNEY INTO TWILIGHT

We would like to announce the premiere of Journey Into Twilight, a brand new weekly podcast available here on museumoftheweird.com!

Join famed Texas mojo-man Doc Ravencraft and Museum of the Weird owner Steve Busti each week for discussions with psychics, UFO hunters, cryptozoologists, paranormal explorers, practitioners of magick, as well as artists from the horror and fantasy genre. And as always, we’ll be taking your phone calls. It’s a delightful departure into the space between the light and the shadows.

The first episode airs live at 8:30pm Central on Thursday, July 5th, 2012. And don’t worry if the premiere has already aired, you can always catch the episode on our Blog Talk Radio widget on the right side of the page.

Tune in for an all new experience, and join us as we Journey Into Twilight together.

Posted on July 5, 2012 by Guest Blogger

BLOOD-RED RAIN FALLS IN INDIA

Poor residents of Kannur, India… for Thursday must have been one creepy day.

This small Indian village took a page right out of the classic horror movies when the streets literally ran red, not with blood mind you, but with blood-red water from a crimson colored summer shower!

That’s right, it wasn’t some freak accident or farmer taking care of some animals that stained the ground such a sad shade, turns out that with the right combination of pollutants, rain water that collects as clouds in the sky may actually undergo a chemical process and change from the usual clear we are used to, to a deep, deep red.

The Time of India writes:

Though not for first time in the state, red rain in parts of Kannur on Thursday did create some panic and curiosity among the residents in the district. The strange phenomenon happened around 6:50am and lasted for 15 minutes. People in the 1km area in and around Edachery in Puzhati panchayat panicked as their courtyards turned blood red after rain.

Kannur block panchayat president Shaija M, who collected the sample of the rainwater, said the water was as dark as black coffee and had the smell of raw beetroot. “I thought someone killed some animal and its blood got mixed with water on the courtyard,” she said.

Read more at timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Posted on July 5, 2012 by Guest Blogger

‘SPACING OUT’ TALKS UFO’S AND SPACE EXPLORATION IN NEW WEB SERIES

'Spacing Out' explores UFOs, space, the search for extraterrestrial life, etc.

Thanks to a new web series from the great folks over at Openminds.tv, you now have an amazing, nightly news-esque way to get your fix of all things UFO and space exploration related!

Maureen Elsberry and Jason McClellan take a different approach to presenting the sci-fi happenings from around the world that usually get dismissed or pushed aside for more something more ‘entertaining’ . They’ve stayed in the format of your favorite local news station just giving you the facts they have, letting you take a look at the evidence and, allowing you to make up your own mind, just the way it should be.

The Huffington Post writes:

If you’re tired of the nightly local “eyewitness news” and would like to see more stories about UFOs and the search for aliens, try “Spacing Out.”

No, it’s not a state of mind. Rather, it’s a weekly webseries that presents the latest otherworldly news on UFOs and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence in a format similar to a traditional news broadcast. But instad of 30 minutes of news, sports highlights and the weather, “Spacing Out” is all about the general mysteries of the universe.

Produced by OpenMinds.tv, “Spacing Out” debuted on May 4 and is co-hosted by Jason McClellan and Maureen Elsberry, who offer a fresh take on how UFOs and related topics are presented to the public.

The hook of the show features interviews with top researchers, journalists, media personalities and scientists — whether it’s photographic and video analysts in the UFO field or people who are scientifically searching for ET.

“We structure it in an eyewitness news format to give more of an objective view of all the subjects,” Elsberry told The Huffington Post. “This keeps it more easily digestible for both the general public and not just hard-core enthusiasts. In a news format, you’re able to objectively present facts and then let viewers formulate their own opinions.”

Read more at huffingtonpost.com or watch episode of 9 of spacing out right here, featuring some awesome UFO footage:

Posted on July 4, 2012 by Guest Blogger

MAN HAS 5-INCH WORM REMOVED FROM HIS EYE!

PK Krishnamurthy, an Indian man from a small section of north-eastern Mumbai known as Mulund, had the unfortunate experience of becoming one of India’s rarest medical oddites.

Mr. Krishnamurthy, at 75, thought he had seen it all, but it turns out the one things he hadn’t seen yet was, quite literally, right in his own eye the whole time!

The vile assailant and wounded victim post-surgery, PK Krishnamurthy.

And, if that wasn’t all good and fun as it is, the worm that turned up in this man’s eyeball is actually a sign of a bigger problem, due to the little fact it had come all the way from his intestines!

Yup, it managed to wiggle from one end of this man to the other!

The Mumbai Mirror writes:

For two weeks, Mulund resident P K Krishnamurthy, 75, felt his right eye twitching and even hurting at times. On Wednesday, doctors pulled out a 13-cm live worm from his eye, in one of the city’s rarest medical instances. While we have all dealt with worms – both within our bodies and outside – Krishnamurthy’s case is a medical nightmare come true.

The parasite – which had taken residence under conjunctiva (the transparent layer that covers the front of the eye) – had travelled all the way from Krishnamurthy’s intestine, through the blood stream, to reach the eye. Its journey stunned doctors, who said that they had not heard of a precedent. “We haven’t come across such long worms travelling so far,” said eye surgeon Dr V Seetharaman, who operated upon Krishnamurthy at Fortis Hospital, Mulund.

Doctors at JJ Hospital, one of the city’s largest medical facilities, said that they had encountered only one such instance in the past 20 years, but the crawly culprit in the case was only 2 to 3 cm long. Krishnamurthy started feeling irritation in his left eye two weeks ago. He consulted an ophthalmologist, who prescribed him eye drops. The twitching and pain, however, didn’t subside. On Wednesday morning, the 75-year-old consulted Dr Seetharaman. “I was shocked when the doctor told me that there was a live worm in my left eye and that I needed to undergo a surgery,” Krishnamurthy told Mumbai Mirror just hours after the surgery.

Dr Seetharaman said that the worm was not only alive, but moving, and was visible by naked eye. “It was coiled up underneath the conjunctiva, below the superficial layer of the eye,” he said. “There have been cases, though very rare, of intestinal worms travelling to the eye. But never a worm as long as this one.”

CROCODILE CAUGHT IN THE PHILIPPINES WAS LONGEST IN THE WORLD

This crocodile, caught in the phillipines some months ago, weighed over a ton.

Using steel traps and lots of courage, hunters if the town of Bunawan of the Southern Philippines were able to capture the longest crocodile in the world, and quite possibly the largest with it weighing well over a ton, according to Guinness World Records.

Sky News writes:

A seven metre-long crocodile has been confirmed as the largest in captivity.

Lolong weighs more than a ton, and has taken the top spot from an Australian crocodile which measured more than five metres, a Guinness World Records spokesman said.

The giant reptile has been blamed for a number of deadly attacks in a remote area in the southern Philippines and was eventually caught in the remote town of Bunawan.

It has become the star attraction of a new ecotourism park and research centre on the outskirts of the town and has drawn thousands of tourists since news of its capture spread.

Bunawan has earned £45,000 from the modest entrance fees at the park, with most of the money being used to feed and care for the crocodile.

The town’s mayor Edwin Cox Elorde said news of the record sparked celebrations, but said there are also concerns that more giant crocodiles might be lurking in a nearby marshland and creek where villagers fish.

“We’re really proud because it proves the rich biodiversity of our place but at the same time, there are fears that Lolong may not be alone,” he said.

THE NEW KING OF ROCK, PAPER, SCISSORS …IS A ROBOT?

My secret of always going 'scissors first' is useless against this guy.

Now, you would hope that the world’s scientists are spending their time trying to solve problems that have plagued humanity forever. Again, you would hope. But, it seems the researchers over at the Ishikawa Oku Laboratory in Tokyo, Japan are spending their time wisely by making a robotic hand that never loses at Rock-Paper-Scissors.

Because, that needed to happen.

Just kidding, this thing is actually pretty awesome! Just watch it in action in the video below:

MSNBC writes:

When someone claims they’re good at rock-paper-scissors, they’re usually just trying to psyche you out so they can predict your next move. But this robot, created by the Ishikawa Oku Laboratory in Japan, doesn’t need to psyche you out, because it knows it will beat you every single time.

How can it do it? One thing it certainly doesn’t do is any kind of high-level analysis of the game. It doesn’t put your last sequence of moves through a complex semantic analysis and try to predict the move. It doesn’t use anti-random tactics like “five scissors in a row” to throw you off. All it needs is a high-speed camera and quick reflexes.

Yes, the robot cheats. By watching the image from a camera that can determine the position of your hand every millisecond, it is aware of your move the very moment you make it. And as soon as your hand starts to form that rock, the robot is giving you some paper to wrap it up. At the very end of the video, you can see the tiny delay between the human making a move and the robot reacting — but it happens so fast that you wouldn’t notice except when shown in slow-motion.