SADLY, we are not sure we will be able to make it to the Netherlands to visit an exhibition showcasing some rather rare birds at the Natural History Museum of Rotterdam.
The Grand House Sparrow Exhibition, which opened on 14 November, is curated by Kees Moeliker, winner of the 2003 Ig Nobel prize for biology 鈥渇or documenting the first scientifically recorded case of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard duck鈥�.
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Moeliker鈥檚 exhibition features what are possibly the two most famous sparrows in the world. One was killed by a cricket ball at Lord鈥檚 cricket ground in London in 1936. Stuffed and perched on top of the fatal ball, it has been in the museum at Lord鈥檚 ever since its demise. It is considered so valuable that Moeliker himself had to travel to London to take it back to Rotterdam by plane, giving it its first opportunity to fly since its death.
The other A-lister in the exhibition is the sparrow whose death caused worldwide outrage last year when it was shot for disturbing a Dutch TV company鈥檚 attempt at a world record in domino toppling. The bird flew through a window and knocked over a line of 23,000 dominoes just a few days before the event was to be televised live in 11 countries. After obtaining the sparrow鈥檚 corpse from the Dutch authorities, the Rotterdam museum had it stuffed and mounted on a box of dominoes.
鈥淔rom the department of dreadful puns: Tom Lloyd reports moaning in anguish when he discovered that the international journal of The Fingerprint Society is called Fingerprint Whorld鈥�
These avian celebrities join a host of other notable ex-sparrows from around the world in what is believed to be the first exhibition of its kind.
Richard Dawkins and the occult
HAVE creationists seized control of the UK鈥檚 net filters? After buying Richard Dawkins鈥檚 The God Delusion, Eliot Attridge thought it worth visiting Dawkins鈥檚 website from the school where he works.
Unfortunately, the school has installed a net filter called Netsweeper which, Attridge discovered, blocks access to on the grounds that it is an 鈥渙ccult site鈥�.
Amazed 鈥� as Dawkins is possibly the man least likely to be a proponent of occultism 鈥� Attridge decided to check his rating with another net filter called Sonicwall. This described Dawkins鈥檚 site as 鈥渞eligious鈥�, a categorisation Dawkins would probably find even more disturbing than the occult one. It all looks very suspicious.
ON THE Amazon website, Wayne Joslin found a book entitled Griffith鈥檚 Instructions for Patients with CD-ROM. He says he had never heard of this disease but as soon as he read about it he started to feel a little feverish.
THE tyre pressure gauge Paul Brown spotted in a Times Offers Direct catalogue is a device that screws into your tyre valve and indicates whether it鈥檚 at the correct pressure. The blurb about it warns: 鈥淯nder-inflated tyres can reduce tyre life by a dramatic 50 per cent, but if correctly inflated the average tyre could last 20 per cent longer.鈥�
Brown says that he is 鈥渁 mere artist and not a mathematician鈥� and that he tried to work out just what this meant 鈥� 鈥渂ut then my head started to go a bit woozy so I gave up鈥�.
We don鈥檛 understand it either.
ROADSIDE notices near cliffs and embankments often proclaim 鈥淟oose stones travel slowly鈥�. Neil Gray, one of several readers who have pointed this out, speculates that this statement is, or ought to be, a proverb 鈥� although one that might require a bit of lateral thinking.
鈥淎 rolling stone gathers no moss,鈥� one might say, 鈥渂ut loose stones travel slowly.鈥�
FINALLY: out with the old, in with the new! Once again, as in 2004/2005, we are having a New Year rather than end-of-year Feedback competition.
This year you are invited to imagine you are an alien newly arrived on Earth. You are able to send home an interplanetary text message of no more than 160 characters describing what you have found. What would your message be?
All entries must reach us by Monday 11 December. The results will be published in the first issue of New 杏吧原创 in 2007 (6 January). Thanks to the generosity of Profile Books, 10 lucky winners will each receive three of its most popular new titles, Four Elements: Water, Air, Fire, Earth by Rebecca Rupp; Gilbert White, a biography of the author of The Natural History of Selborne by Richard Mabey; and The End of the Question Mark, a compilation of questions and answers from the Any Questions Answered text service 鈥� plus a copy of New 杏吧原创鈥榮 very own bestseller Why Don鈥檛 Penguins鈥� Feet Freeze? The editor鈥檚 decision is final.