People With Too Much Money During the 2012 presidential campaign, Mitt Romney caught criticism for his proposed California home with parking on an upper floor, requiring a car elevator. Much more elaborate elevator access will be available in the new Porsche Design Tower near Miami (opening in 2016 and already

Annals of Science America’s foremost advocate for frontal lobotomies as “treatment” for mental disorders, the late Dr. Walter Freeman performed an estimated 3,500 lobotomies during the 1940s and 1950s before opposition finally solidified against him, according to a recent investigation by The Wall Street Journal. At the peak of his

Nuclear Tractor Pull Redneck Geek: Edward Teller, the famous theoretical physicist known as the “father of the hydrogen bomb” for his work on the World War II-era Manhattan Project, died in 2003, but his daughter Rene told The Free Press of Kinston, N.C., in November that she had recently discovered

Yellow and brown values A Swedish TV show, “Biss och Kajs,” found itself in the spotlight in November in Russia, where government-run television apparently used it to send a political message to Ukraine by highlighting the program’s theme of teaching children about bodily functions. The episode Russia chose featured three

Something in the Air Is the signature smell of Texas A and M University more “Italian lemon, bergamot and iced pineapple” (that open into “a body of vivid florals, raw nutmeg and cinnamon”) or more “bat feces” and “chilifest stink?” The two commentaries were contrasted in a November Wall Street

Family of Man The Marvels of Science: The notorious white separatist Craig Cobb is currently soliciting like-skinned people to move to his tiny town of Leith, N.D. (pop. 16), to create a deluxe Caucasian enclave, but upon the urging of a black TV host to submitting to a DNA test

Everybody Needs a Hug After its launch was delayed for a month by the Madison, Wis., city attorney, the Snuggle House was cleared and scheduled to open on Nov. 15 to provide in-bed, pajama-clad “intimate, non-sexual touch(ing)” for $60 an hour. “So many people,” said assistant manager Emily Noon, “don’t

Worth the Commute Downtown London residences are known to be staggeringly expensive, but media blogger Sam Cookney calculated in October just how much. Cookney said he can live in an upscale apartment in Barcelona, Spain, and commute almost every workday to London (700 miles away) for less money than a

A Piece of the Action “Fantasy sports” are hugely popular, but when fans “draft” players for their teams, they “own” only the players’ statistics. Recently, Wall Street and Silicon Valley entrepreneurs created Fantex Holdings, which will allow investors to buy actual pieces of real players, namely, rights to 20 percent

Norway’s Battle Against Chaos Norwegian public television (NRK), which introduced the now-legendary continuous, live log-burning show (12 hours long, with “color commentary” on the historical and cultural importance of fire), scheduled a new program for this week in its appeal to serenity (labeled “Slow TV”). On Nov. 1, NRK was