Rumours of vampires on campus sent Boston Latin School into a fright this past week, reports the Boston Globe. What is stranger is that the school’s administration actually issued a notice assuring the staff, students and their parents that “rumours involving vampires” were nothing more than just that. Headmaster Lynne Mooney Teta declared that there were no vampires at the school, and adamantly offered assurances that no one at the school had been hurt, arrested—or bitten. The rumours of such bloodlust were reported to be causing anxiety and disruption among the students.
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Like an airbag for your social life
Whether you have been on the sending or receiving end of an ill-considered email or phone call—be it a drunk-dialing an ex or sending a venomous message to an in-law when all you really needed was a good night’s sleep—it is an oft proven fact that while technology provides convenience, it often destroys any chance for sober second thought.
Apple and Google recognize our human weakness, and have put time and money into helping users avoid alcohol- or rage-inspired mishaps. Google recently announced on their official Gmail blog that users will be able to install a “Panic Button” that will allow them to undo e-mails up to five seconds after they were sent out.
The DRIVEN calendar, “Ongoing”: And Then There Was Light
Until June 21st , Montreal—Montreal’s Notre-Dame Basilica is currently hosting And then there was light, a stunning “multimedia show on the cutting edge of Canadian sound and light technology.”
One part of the show, which highlights the Basilica’s history and some of its amazing works of art, sees the nave transformed into a giant ship, complete with sails that appear to swell.
The DRIVEN calendar, “Ongoing”: The Nature of Diamonds
Until March 22, Toronto—Diamonds may be forever, you only have a short time left to catch the Royal Ontario Museum’s The Nature Of Diamonds exhibit. The show has been on display since October, and these are the final weeks to explore the the historical, scientific and cultural meanings behind these hard carbon crystals.
The DRIVEN calendar, “Ongoing”: Rigoletto
March 7- 17, Vancouver—Featuring murder, betrayal, mockery and really bad mojo, Verdi’s captivating operatic tragedy, Rigoletto, is on until March 17th at the Vancouver Opera.
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Just desserts: the sweet side of political dissent
Nothing quite sends the message of contempt better than a dessert to the face. So learned UK Business Secretary Lord Mandelson as he was met with a showering of green custard as he arrived for the British government’s low carbon economy summit (the incident is reported here by Sky News).
To heal and incapacitate?
It’s always shocking when a new technology is found to have a secondary use to its original, intended purpose. Some cancer researchers will likely be particularly surprised that their work might be about to find its way into battlefield arsenals or police patrol cars.
Most cancer treatments are pretty simple in theory: they seek cancerous cells and kill them before they have time to spread. NewScientist.com reports that a technique thought to be a promising cancer treatment is now being investigated as the basis for a Taser-esque weapon that stuns for longer periods, using short, nanosecond-long pulses of extreme voltage.
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McNuggetgate 2009
We are living in a time of economic unrest and upheaval. People are losing their jobs, their homes and their sense of security. Difficult times like these force the average person to take a deep introspective look at what matters in life, and/or collosally overeact to minor irritations.
Consider the case of a Fort Pierce, Florida woman who called 911 three times after McDonald’s employee informed her they had run out of Chicken McNuggets. (Hat tip to TCPalm.com)
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The DRIVEN calendar, “Soon”: Fringe Rewind
March 12-14 & 19-21, Calgary—For two weekends, six of the most popular artists of Calgary Fringe Festivals past have been invited back to perform in special encore presentations of their shows, in Fringe Rewind.
The beauty of the Rewind is that it’s a kind of greatest hits package, pre-filtering the flops and failed experiments inevitable in any full fringe theatre line-up. You’ll find that record of success all the more reassuring as you wait for the curtain to rise on the well-enough-titled Jihad Me at Hello. More titles after the jump. Read More
The DRIVEN calendar, “Scene”: Van Dongen, Painting the Town Fauve
Until April 19th, Montreal—Art lovers can visit Van Dongen, Painting the Town Fauve, in the first major North American retrospective of the art of Dutch painter Kees Van Dongen.
Coproduced by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the Nouveau Musee National de Monaco, the collection ”brings together some 200 works, including over a hundred paintings, as well as forty rare drawings, prints and other archival documents and photographs, and, for the first time, a dozen Fauvist ceramics.”
