Bad news, drivers! Bremen has become the first state in Germany to introduce a speed limit on its highways, and drivers must now slow down to a snail’s pace of 120 kilometers per hour (75 mph).

If you do the math, it may not be so bad. Bremen is an itty-bitty city state, so the new rules will annoy you for maybe half an hour. The question is, how will they even communicate with motorists who whiz along the country’s roads at a perfectly legal 130 miles an hour or more? That’s too fast to read WELCOME TO BREMEN, much less see a speed sign.

“Honey, did you see that thing? What did it say?”

‘I think it said we’re on Route 120, dear, maybe you should go a little faster.”

“Okay, but this other sign just said something about SPEED BUMPS ahea………”

related post: Flying cars not a total success…

Cars drive along a city highway in Berlin in a 2007 file photo. REUTERS/ Fabrizio Bensch

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It turns out a “take-your-guns-to-work” law was just passed by the Florida senate, letting workers keep guns in their cars for self-protection, so road rage doesn’t need to be just an empty outburst, and then lock those guns in their cars while they go into work.

It does exempt some workplaces, like nuclear power plants, prisons and schools, so obviously it’s been carefully thought through. But what about those Cape Canaveral astronauts? Can they take guns up to the shuttle? And you have to think about the heat, which can top a sizzling 100 degrees there. When your coworkers leave guns and ammo on the dashboard in the sun, will there be surprises?

One of the law’s backers says this was dear in the hearts of the founding fathers. Well, sure. Anybody who is watching that John Adams series on HBO will remember the debate between Adams and Jefferson, about having flintlocks in their Pontiacs…

More posts about guns

Guns on display at a National Rifle Association Meeting in in Orlando, Florida in a 2003 file photo. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

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We have video showing new technology being used to make art more fun, as kids can now talk with people in classics such as the Mona Lisa, and get replies.

Are you kidding? They are wasting this magic on education? Does nobody have a sense of humor? Why not install these gizmos instead of the real art? Imagine sweaty tourists shuffling by, when suddenly Mona Lisa starts talking to them…

“What am I smiling at? Oh please! Have you LOOKED at your outfit? You think we WANT to see you in that Metallica t-shirt, with your gross sausage thighs squeezed into short shorts? This is the frickin’ Louvre, pal!”

But okay, If they must use this technology for education, then use it with that iconic classic, “Dogs Playing Poker.” I seriously need to find out how that Saint Bernard fooled everybody with a lousy pair of deuces! Everybody wants to know that!”

Related post: Sorry Mona, you’re not smiling enough…

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You may have read about this cult in Russia, where members are gradually leaving their leaky, collapsing underground bunker even before Doomsday, which they reckon will come this month or next.

If you’re thinking of joining up, here is a statistic: nobody in the history of doomsday cults has ever died being right, and chances are far greater you’ll end up dying of embarrassment. Even if one of these cults DOES prove correct, they won’t be able to gloat about it. Where’s the fun in that?

These folks do have some legitimate concerns. They oppose processed foods, and think credit cards and bar codes are Satan’s work. So if you go looking for them, don’t bother with the Velveeta aisle at Piggly Wiggly. “Dear doomsday cult member, congrats! You’ve been pre-approved for a platinum Visa…”

Related post: Comrade, come visit a U.S. supermarket…

More Apocalypse news. Doomsday: The Slideshow:

A woman with a child walks in front of a fellow member of a doomsday cult as they leave their bunker, followed by their leader Pyotr Kuznetsov (rear) and a previously departed believer, in Russia, April 2, 2008. REUTERS/ Denis Sinyakov

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“Put down your lance, Vance!”

This just looks too good to be true. Photos of presidential security giving the full metal detector treatment to knights wearing enough scrap iron to build a Hummer? Is there a fear of yet another deadly broadsword attack, like we’ve seen so many times recently?

“Okay, put your farthings, talismans and grails in the bin…”
“Sir, please lay your battle ax flat on the conveyor belt…”
“Ma’am, use the Damsel line. It’s faster, unless you have a chastity belt.”

Sadly, nothing is what it seems these days. This was costume armor and wooden swords. Only the security was real. “Sir, I need a photo ID where your visor is OPEN”

A security official searches performers dressed as knights before the arrival of U.S. President George W. Bush and Ukraine’s President Viktor Yushchenko in Kiev, April 1, 2008. REUTERS/Grigory Dukor

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Maybe he’s not quite the unluckiest guy alive, but he’ll do until Mr. Unlucky comes along. A shepherd in Russia is suing his country’s space agency after a 10-foot-long chunk of metal from a rocket fell into his yard, just missing his outdoor toilet.

He wasn’t in it at the time, but it’s still way too close for me. Would you want your obit to say you died when space rubble pulverized your outhouse? “Hold your horses, honey, I’m almost done! Can you toss in another roll of Charmin, so I can…”

That’s the kind of thing where the family makes up another story, like you went away to shoot an upcoming American Idol series or whatever. I’m pretty sure of one thing: every new outhouse they build there in the future will have a skylight…

Related post: No food? What kind of toilet IS this?

Royal flush? Britain’s Prince Charles walks out of a bush toilet during a visit to Australia in a 2005 file photo. REUTERS/David Gray

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About 400 people were trapped for more than an hour yesterday by a “mechanical fault” on that huge Ferris wheel, The London Eye. Our story says staffers were in touch with the victims, who were stuck as high as 450 feet in the air, via intercoms.

The stalled passengers were offered water, blankets and glucose tablets.

That’s good to know. Given my attitude toward heights, if that ever happens to me they can cover me with the blanket and pound me with water bottles until I stop screaming. Some fully charged tasers, a portable toilet and a parachute might also come in handy.

Here’s the thing. When these poor people finally got back to Earth they were given refunds. Refunds! No thanks, pal, you just hang on to that refund and add it to my generous settlement, okay?

Related post: Your whole stomach came out your mouth?

Woman’s hair is blown back by winds as she passes the London Eye in a 2007 file photo. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor

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Blog Guy, I was so very interested in your recent Clone on the Throne? debate over whether the first  Queen Elizabeth may have a clone who is alive today. 

I have written a similar book, about the cloning of author Mark Twain. It will be published this spring under the title “Making Your Mark,” and I expect it to ignite heated controversy. 

Good to know. The Elizabeth post really did attract interest and comments, so if this is something my readers are interested in, I’m there. 

Please, everyone, be on the lookout for signs that folks from the history books may have clones walking around today. In addition to Elizabeth I, Mark Twain and Mamie Eisenhower I now have a reported sighting of Genghis Khan showing up as a weekend TV weatherman in Indianapolis.  Keep ‘em coming!

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Cast member Donald Sutherland poses at the premiere of “Fool’s Gold” at the Grauman’s Chinese theatre in Hollywood, California January 30, 2008. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni  

A Reuters story says they’ve unveiled this robot that will pump your gas while you stay in your car.

Call me cynical, but I have misgivings about combining a multi-jointed mechanical limb, a high-end luxury car and an ultra-volatile substance used in making Molotov cocktails.

HELLO SIR CAN I FILL ‘ER UP FOR YOU?

Uh, sure, robot.

OKAY I’M PUMPING NOW SIR… HOW ‘BOUT THEM GIANTS SIR?

Excuse me, robot, but that’s not my gas tank, it’s my window!

See, this dramatic story was not real, it was just imagined, to show why you may want to keep pumping gas yourself until this gizmo is perfected. OH DO NOT WORRY SIR THE GAS IS GOOD FOR YOUR LEATHER UPHOLSTERY…

Helen Long reports:

Robot pumping in Emmeloord, central Netherlands, February 4, 2008. REUTERS/Michael Kooren

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Sometimes we write stories about the “world’s oldest living person.” It’s not a title to covet, since it doesn’t last long for obvious reasons.  

Which brings me to this thing in the photos, which we’re told is the “world’s oldest plane.” Would you want to go up in that? Doesn’t this mean that every single plane made before this one either crashed, fell apart or  disappeared over some ocean? So, you do the math. 

“Passengers, welcome aboard World’s Oldest Airlines!  We’ll be serving the world’s oldest pretzels, and showing the world’s oldest movie. That hole in the fuselage is the world’s oldest airplane toilet.  Don’t tamper with the world’s oldest smoke alarm…”

You may be better off in a gyrocopter or a homemade submarine

The world’s oldest plane, the 100 year old Bleriot XI, during the Al Ain International Aerobatics Championship in United Arab Emirates, January 24, 2008. REUTERS/Handout

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