I have come across many cool hedge shapes in the past such as the hedge whale, the hedge sea monster and the hedge elephants but this is the first time I have seen a hedge car. The 11ft car is made up of six plants and there are also some 6ft high mechanics which are made from two plants each. The plants have been carefully trained over a wire frame to create the shape and are then trimmed.

I tend to get a lot of migraines so was interested to read out this new treatment. Its a mouth spray that works in 30 minutes and has the advantage of lasting up to 2 days. The treatment which contains Levadex is currently undergoing clinical trials so is not yet available but is supposed to be more effective than current over the counter remedies and have less side effects.

This is interesting its a watch that contains a satellite positioning system which can locate the wearer to within ten feet. Aimed at parents who want to keep an eye on their children, the brightly coloured watch costs £149.99. Parents will be able to see their child’s location on Google maps by texting a special number. They will also be able to set up safe zones in which the children can play and receive an alert when the children go outside the area. The device is made by a company called Lok8u. I’m not sure how practical it is for children as they would soon learn to take it off but I would be interested in getting one of these for cats. Having emailed the company that makes these I have found out that a cat version is due to be released in the new year.

A chocolate maker from New Zealand has invented a rather usual meat flavoured chocolate. The chocolate truffles are made from a blend of dark chocolate and ground up meat. According to the inventor when eating them you first get a smoky taste, followed by a strong chocolate flavour and at the end you get a taste of salami. I’m not sure it appeals to me.

If you want to make a fashion statement then the thing to be wearing is these mantyhose apparently. It appears demand for the male tights is soaring with Selfridges now stocking a range designed exclusively for guys. They are made by lingerie brand Unconditional and cost £70 if you want some. I think they look a bit silly. Apparently the way to ear them is under suit to keep the legs warm and not with a skirt as shown in the picture.

This is interesting its a man who makes famous landmarks from toothpicks. He has spent six years building the structures and in that time has used over six million toothpicks and more than 170 million litres of glue. The picture to the left shows him working on a structure of the Cambodian temple of Angkor Wat  and the second picture shows his version of the Taj Mahal.

I was watching Watchdog last week and was interested to see a feature about a fault with the PS3. The problem starts when a yellow light appears on the console after which it no longer works. Dubbed the yellow light of death the issue appears to affect machines that are just part their warranty date. The Watchdog programme approached three commercial repair technicians who tried to fix a small number of consoles and managed to revive all but one of them, so if your PS3 has the issue there are people who can resolve it for you. What I find surprisingly though is that Sony refuse to acknowledge the problem denying that there is a manufacturing fault. So far my PS3 is still ok but I would be interested to hear from anyone who has experienced the problem and whether you managed to fix it.

If this article is to believed then jellyfish could soon be appearing on the menu at some restaurants. Carme Ruscalleda wants to add them to menu of her restaurant Sant Pol del Mar. Jellyfish are eaten in Japan and China but most Europeans seem reluctant to try it. It is, however, meant to have many health benefits such as improving the cardio vascular system and balancing blood pressure. Before she is allowed to serve the jellyfish she must first prove that the local variety is safe to eat. It seems she has eaten jellyfish many times with no ill effects and compares it to fresh squid. Would you fancy eating jellyfish?

This is Paul Karason a man that has managed to turn himself blue. The colour is caused by the effects of using a silver compound which he has been using for over ten years to treat a bad case of dermatitis on his face. I think I would rather have the dermatitis than the blue skin but he seems happy with the results and continues to take the compound. Apparently he will stay blue for life.

According to this article if you want bigger fruit from your tomato plants then you should try urinating on them. A study has found that urinating on your tomato plants can make the crop up to four times bigger than usual. The discovery was made by a team of Finnish researchers who found sprinkling the tomatoes with human urine mixed with wood ash made the ideal fertiliser. Its an interesting idea but I’m not sure I would fancy eating the fruit.

When you look at a furniture coaster it might not be immediately apparent that it could double as an artificial leg but they can if you are a tortoise apparently. Lucky the turtle lost his front legs when he was attacked by a racoon. He has since been fitted with some furniture coasters that allow him to move around as normal and continue to do all the things that tortoises usually do.

According to this article cask ale is enjoying something of a revival. It appears consumers are moving away from big corporate brands towards local fare. I always remember ale as being drunk by a few old regulars in the pub and often there were complaints that the beer was off. It appears that pub companies are now becoming more aware of how ale should be stored and served and it is now starting to attract younger drinkers. Personally I find larger a little boring whereas ale is a little more like sampling wine, each is different. All hail the ale. You can check out the CAMRA site here if you want to find out more about the campaign for real ale.

According to this article tall people lead happier lives than their shorter friends. A study published in the journal Economics and Human Biology has found that most miserable men are almost an inch shorter than average. The research found that shorter people are generally more dissatisfied with their lives. 450,000 adults were interviewed about how they viewed their life. Tall people were more likely to be positive and judge themselves as happy, they were also less likely to feel negative emotions such as sadness and physical pain. I’m not convinced myself, I’m fairly happy but am also tall but I also have plenty of friends who are short but also happy.

This is interesting its some pictures taken by a man in Surrey of bats flying over his garden pond. To get the pictures he rigged up this rather elaborate set up using a digital camera that listens for ultrasonic squeaks and an infrared beam to trigger flash  lamps when a bat flew near the water. The first picture shows how he set up his equipment and the second is one of the pictures that he took.

I have read a few articles about silent disco in the past but was surprised to learn that it appears to be becoming very popular. According to this article it is becoming popular at weddings and private parties. Silent discos work much the same as regular discos except people dance to music played through personal headphones rather than through speakers. There are several different channels to choose from so people at the same party can choose their own type of music. The article highlights one example where a couple had a silent disco at their wedding reception and chose to have Motown on one channel for older guests and current hits on another for the younger ones. It’s an interesting idea and has the advantage that you can party all night without upsetting the neighbours.

According to this article short haired bumblebees are going to be reintroduced in Britain. The species has been extinct in Britain for almost ten years but now a conservation programme will try to reintroduce the species from a colony of insects in New Zealand. Conservationists will fly to New Zealand’s South Island to collect some queen bees from a colony that was exported there over a century ago. These bees from the native colony will be bred in captivity. They then hope to use the bees offspring to start repopulating the English countryside reintroducing the first bees next June.

This giant woolly rat is a new species that has recently been discovered in Papua, New Guinea. The rat was discovered near an extinct volcano. It measures nearly 3ft long about the size of a cat and weighs more than 3lb and has no fear of humans. It has provisionally been named the Bosavi woolly rat and it it thought that it is only found in this crater.

I came across this story about a youth football team who have been playing for three years without winning a game. They have played 90 matches and endured defeats of 19-0, only ever picking up a point because the opposing team did not turn up. They finally celebrated their first ever victory last week when they managed a 3-2 win. I admire the teams persistence  in sticking with the game, hopefully this will be the first of many more wins for them.

According to this article a loggerhead turtle has found in a rockpool near Tintagel in Cornwall. The turtle which has been nicknamed Steve is the second loggerhead turtle to be found in the area within the month. Steve appeared to be unharmed and he has been taken to Newquay’s Blue Reef Aquarium where he is recovering with the other turtle, Squirt. Both turtles will be released in the Canary Islands once they are fully recovered.

These cute little guys are part of a programme to release sand lizards in sites across the UK. The endangered lizards have almost disappeared from Britain due to loss of habitat caused by agriculture and building developments. Hundreds of sand lizards are to be released at five sites in Surrey, Dorset and mid Wales in an effort to reverse the decline of the creatures. The lizards have been raised in special hatcheries with minimal contact from the breeders so they do not become too tame. Their new homes are on nature reserves which have been assessed to make sure they provide the right habitat for the lizards to survive.

These interesting looking sandwiches were created by Mark Northeast in an attempt to get his son Oscar to eat his vegetables. Fed up of his son not eating his meals Mark started to make them a little more interesting. His creation include a caterpillar and a crocodile (pictured) as well as Spongebob Squarepants and a piano. They are certainly more exciting than most sandwiches I have seen.

If you are scared of spiders you might have an excuse if you are a girl. According to this article girls could have a natural fear of spiders. Researchers came to the conclusion after conducting an experiment on a group of children. They showed pictures of spiders to 20 children, 10 girls and 10 boys who were 11 months old. The boys didn’t seem bothered by the pictures but the girls already associated spiders with being afraid. Based on the findings it is thought that girls are genetically more susceptible to fearing potentially dangerous animals.

Staff at a computer company in South Africa are using pigeons to transfer data between offices because it it quicker than broadband. They say that it takes six hours to transfer four gigabytes of encrypted data from Durban to their call centre 50 miles away. In contrast it takes a pigeon with a memory card attached to its leg, just an hour to make the journey. The pigeons do face some problems, however, such as getting eaten by predators on route.

It seems everything is out to get us, just last week we discovered the pint glass is dangerous, now it appears biscuits are too. According to this article more than half of all Britons have been injured by biscuits. The injuries range from being scalded by hot tea or coffee whilst dunking to breaking a tooth during a morning tea break. An estimated 25 million adults have been injured whilst enjoying a biscuit, with around 500 ending up in hospital.

The custard cream appears to be the most dangerous biscuit, it gets a risk rating of 5.63 being responsible for the most accidents. The safest biscuit is the jaffa cake with a rating of just 1.16. The hidden dangers of eating biscuits include flying fragments, injuries caused by dunking into hot drinks, being poked in the eye with a biscuit, choking on crumbs, breaking a tooth and falling off a chair whilst reaching for the tin. One man also managed to get stuck in wet concrete after wading in to retrieve an escaped biscuit. In the interests of biscuit safety below is the a list of biscuits by risk factor as taken from the article on the The Telegraph. Be afraid.

Custard Cream 5.64
Cookie 4.34
Choc Biscuit Bar (eg: Rocky) 4.12
Wafer 3.74
Rich Tea 3.45
Bourbon 3.44
Oat Biscuit 3.31
Digestive 3.14
Ginger Nut 2.99
Shortbread 2.90
Caramel Shortcake 2.76
Nice Biscuit 2.27
Iced Biscuits/Party Rings 2.16
Chocolate Finger 1.38
Jaffa Cakes 1.16

If this article is to believed the latest must have accessory to be wearing is a pair of bunny ears. According to the article the bizarre new trend appears to have been started by designer  Luella who shaped her models’ hair into ear shapes for a catwalk show. Since then various celebrities such as Madonna (left) and Lady GaGa have been spotted wearing the rather odd looking ears. I’m not sure this is a trend I will be following, I think they look a bit silly.

This is interesting its a device that allows you grow plants without using soil. The seeds are put on a sponge rather than being grown in the soil and a mains generated system sprays them with oxygenated water to keep the plants hydrated. It is available from Firebox at a cost of £34.95 and according to the comments at the bottom of the article it is also possible to buy larger devices that are suitable for growing other things such as tomatoes, beans and peas. I have grand plans to start a vegetable patch in the garden next season but this looks quite useful for a mini window sill herb garden. I think I will put on of these on my Christmas list.

This is unusual, its 3D sculptures carved out of old phone books. They are made by Alex Queral an artist from Philadelphia. He produces two new pieces a month and has been working in this way for 14  years. He starts off by sketching a picture and then places it over the phonebook to use as template before using a scalpel to cut away at the pages to create the finished sculpture. You can see a work in progress above and a finished image of Obama to the right.

This giant Lego house is being built in Dorking in Surrey. So far it contains over two million Lego bricks. It comes complete with a Lego toilet, bath and bed. Once it is finished Top Gear presenter James May intends to stay in it for several days or until it falls down.

I am frequently annoyed by people who can’t get through a train journey or a shopping trip without calling all their friends on their phone. I don’t mean the people that pick up a call when they are out, after all that’s the point of having a mobile phone, what annoys me is those people who can’t simply sit in silence and feel the need to call everyone in their phonebook. It seems I am not alone in finding this annoying, pub landlord Harry Walker has decided to ban the use of mobile phone in his pub. Instead customers who wish to use them will need to take their call outside. He has come to the decision because he says that it is anti-social and his customers prefer not to be disturbed with the constant ringing and people talking loudly on their phones when others are trying to enjoy a meal or a quiet drink. I can see his point.

If this article can be believed the government is looking for an alternative to the pint glass because the traditional one is too dangerous. According to the article the Home Office has called in a team of designers who will look at creating a safer alternative to the pint glass. The move comes because there are around 87,000 violent incidents involving glass every year which cost an estimated £100 million in NHS and police costs. It will be interesting to see what they come up with but personally I quite like my pint in its proper glass.

This is unusual its a newt that is able to push its ribs through its skin to use them as weapons. The Spanish ribbed newt is able to force its bones through its skin when it is threatened. Surprisingly this does not appear to cause the newt any harm but it is quite an extreme method of protection.

A man has spent 15 years creating the first coloured bubbles. Tim Kehoe has spent around $3m creating the worlds first ever coloured blowing bubbles. Called Zubbles they contain a special dye which gives them bright colours but which also disappear within 15 minutes of the bubble popping. They are available in various bright colours including purple, red and green. The Zubbles have gone on sale at $15 for two bottles on the Zubbles website and are likely to go on sale in the UK later this year.

According to this article giant pandas could be extinct within two to three generations. The warning comes from the WWF who say the destruction of the pandas natural habitat is the main threat facing the species. The problem is that the remaining living areas are becoming increasingly fragmented leaving most of the remaining pandas in areas of bamboo less that a mile wide. These areas are often separated by highways which make migration and mating difficult for the pandas. It is thought there are around 1,600 pandas left in six mountain ranges in southwestern China, with only 43% of panda habitats being protected areas.