BLT Sandwich Guinness

World Longest BLT Sandwich Guinness World Record

WINDSOR – The town that brought us the world’s largest pumpkin pie and the biggest apple pie in America was shooting for the longest BLT sandwich on Sunday.

At the Windsor Farmers Market, students from the Windsor High School Culinary Arts program slathered chewy French bread with mayonnaise and layered the tasty bed with juicy heirloom tomatoes and mixed lettuce greens.
And on top, 120 pounds of sliced, hand-cured, pork belly bacon.

“To me, it’s all about the sweet taste of the tomato and the salty, smoky flavors of the bacon,” said Jeff Mall, chef and owner of Zin restaurant in Healdsburg, who cures his own bacon and donated it to Sunday’s cause. “And good bread and good mayonnaise just make it.”

Marie Ganister, director of the culinary program, said the students will apply to Guinness World Records for the largest BLT ever. Sunday’s was 146 feet.

A check of the record-keepers’ Web site had no listings Sunday for a bacon-based sandwich. A “largest sandwich” entry details a 5,440-pounder made at Wild Woody’s Chill and Grill in Roseville, Mich., in 2005. It gives no indication of what was inside the behemoth.

With a line of hungry Sunday brunchers lined up, Ganister readied her students for the final step, putting both sides of the sandwich together.

“OK everybody,” she said, a length of BLT for as long as she could see to either side. “Close your sandwich!” At $5 a slice, the potential history-maker served as a fund-raiser for the 160-student culinary program.

“How sweet it is,” said Windsor Town Councilman Sam Salmon, tucking into the BLT’s
ceremonial first slice. “I like good bread. I like tomatoes. I like lettuce. Mmm, mmm, mmm.”
Windsor’s BLT record attempt follows on the heels of 2006’s 500-pound apple pie and what was billed as the world’s largest-diameter pumpkin pie in 2003.

The sandwich fest was part of the summertime Windsor Farmers Market, which celebrated the seventh Annual Tomato and Pepper Festival Sunday.

Market attendees also were able to escape the heat — at least in fantasy — with Beach-Boys-style tunes from the California Beach Party band.

Worlds Oldest Dog Dies at 29

Bella - Worlds Oldest Dog Dies at 29

Bella, a Labrador cross, was bought by David Richardson from the RSPCA, 26 years ago when she was three years old.

She had lived with Mr Richardson, 76, and his partner Daisy, 81, since 1982 in Clay Cross, Derbyshire.

But she was put down on Saturday following a heart attack while on holiday with the couple.
Until Bella the record for the oldest dog was held by Butch, a 28-year-old from America who died in 2003, according to the Guinness World Records. Officially, the oldest ever dog was Bluey, a sheepdog from Australia, who lived to 29.

Although Mr Richardson, from Clay Cross, has no official documentation to prove Bella's age, he insists she was 29.

"We had just come up to Mablethorpe – we always go to the same place on holiday because we can take the dogs," said Mr Richardson.

"We had barely been here for an hour when Bella started panting and yelping and collapsed in front of the sofa.

"We took Bella to the vet but she was so ill she had to be put to sleep. It was very upsetting. We will miss her a lot.

"Lots of people came to see us and to wish Bella goodbye. Our friends and neighbours were very fond of her,

The RSPCA does not hold records stretching back to when Mr Richardson bought Bella and the Guinness World Records says Bella could not have been included because their was no documentation.

Longest Cucumber

Worlds Longest Cucumber Guinness World Record

The 36.1in cucumber was grown by Alf Cobb who beat his own record of 35.1in at the National Amateur Gardening Show at the Bath and West Showground in south-west England.

Farmer Ken Dade's marrow tipped the scales at 143lb (65kg) – more than 30 times heavier than the 4.4lb variety found in supermarkets and almost 7lb heavier than the previous world record, set by a fellow British grower, Mark Baggs, at the same event in 2005.

The marrow needed two men to carry it on to the display table. Both vegetables will now be added to the Guinness World Records.

Ray Davey, the giant vegetable co-ordinator and steward of the Flower, Fruit and Vegetable Marquee, said: "I know the crowd will enjoy the display. They just gasp when they come in here. It's always full of people."

Growers from around the world visit the annual event, which includes the giant fruit and vegetable competition as its highlight.

Last month organisers were optimistic that the event would set records because this summer's mix of moderate sunshine punctuated by rain showers has provided the perfect conditions for growing marrows, runner beans and cucumbers.

David Thomas's pumpkin weighed 464lb – more than 440lb heavier than those that are commonly grown. Mr Thomas won first place in the show, but failed to snatch a record.

His vegetable was only a quarter of the size of the world record holder and half the size of last year's winner. He said: "It hasn't been the best year for the pumpkin, too much rain and not enough sun.

"I had the seed from last year's winning pumpkin but you can't do anything about the weather."
The giant vegetables will remain on display at the event, in Shepton Mallet, Somerset.

Large Hadron Collider

Guinness World Records 2008 | Limca Book of Records India | Amazing Feats

One of the Leading Blog of Guinness World Records 2008 & Limca Book of Records - Amazing Feats, World Guiness Records News, Video, Photos & Limca Book of Records Feats Online.

Roger Highfield draws together a range of interesting facts about the Large Hadron Collider atom smasher at CERN

* The £4.5 billion machine has a circumference of 27 km (17 miles) and lies an average of 100 metres (330 feet) under the ground, straddling French and Swiss territory. advertisement

* At full power, trillions of protons - subatomic particles - will race around the LHC accelerator ring 11,245 times a second. It is capable of achieving 600 million collisions every second.

* The machine counts as the world's largest fridge. All the magnets will be pre-cooled to -193.2°C (80 K) using 10,080 tons of liquid nitrogen, before they are filled with nearly 60 tons of liquid helium to bring them down to -271.3°C (1.9 K).

* The LHC is the emptiest place in the Solar System too. To avoid colliding with gas molecules inside the accelerator, the beams of particles travel in an ultra-high vacuum - the internal pressure of the LHC is 10-13 atmospheres, ten times less than the pressure on the Moon.

* When two beams of protons collide, they will generate temperatures more than 100,000 times hotter than the heart of the sun, concentrated within a miniscule space.

* When the experiments get running at the LHC, the four great "eyes" of the machine start observing collisions, they will generate 15 million gigabytes of data every year, that is equivalent to one thousand times the information printed in the form of books annually.

Lightning gives Tesla a run for its money

Today, the Lightning car company of the UK introduced a new electric supercar, in many ways similiar to the Tesla Roadster. There are two great things about the new entrant.

First, it has absolutely stunning styling - it looks like those absolutely stunning long-hooded Jaguar XK coupes you still see floating around and falling apart.

Second, you can charge it in an instant - under 10 minutes - which is a huge advantage compared to the multi-hour charge regime required by the Tesla.

But there are two little problems.

First, the price of 120,000 pounds seems in line with the Tesla's 110,000 US dollars ... until you realize a UK pound is worth about $2. So the LIghtning costs a whopping $240,000. Ouch.

Second, the ten minute charge is only if you have 480 volt three phase power, which you have in your home only if it's one of those giant compounds on ten acres in the Malibu hills. Alas, if you have a more normal 110 or 220 volt service, a charge will take about as long as a Tesla.

The company wants to offer public charging stations in Tesco stores, but given that their car is $240,000 it doesn't seem like the company wouod be interested. (Tesco is a large-scale grocery chain, a bit classier than Wal*Mart but the same basic idea.)

So this looks like a very interesting entrant into the elite electric car stakes. I wish both them and Tesla the best.

watching the 2008 Olympics

If you're like me, issues from Internet censorship to heavy air pollution make this year's Olympics look like an unfortunate mistake. The Chinese seem poor at living up to their word ... but they're still going to put on a spectacular show.

If you still want to watch, you want to have the right gadgets to do it, so instead of paying a Chinese airline for flights, you can pay American gadget makers, who then hire Chinese contract manufacturers to build their stuff. So I guess the Chinese still win, no?

Here's some great stuff for you to buy, or drool over, in anticipation of the Games. And if nothing else, they should make the upcoming Football season truly spectacular ...

Dangerous Airports&Solar Cell&Rotten Tomatoes visits Pixar

Yes, that's a 747 landing right on the beach.

Oddly enough, there has never been a major incident at the airport!

Check out the site for video and more dangerous airports.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A new company appears to have cracked one of the major obstacles towards full-scale adoption of solar power: Cost.

Its cells can generate power at a price approaching "grid parity" - that is, the same acquisition cost over their lifespan that it would cost to buy power from a normal electric company. It turns out that cost is about $1 per killowatt of capacity.

Previous solar cells cost about $2-4 per killowatt, so this is huge cost savings over the previous technology.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Old news to some of you, perhaps, but it's never too late to enjoy a peek into the Pixar universe, about when point Wall*e was released.

I particularly liked the sign on the server room, like a 24-hour diner.