Webkinz

Today I was just thinking of things that I collected when I was younger and the first thing that came to my mind was my cabbage patch kid collection, just like my nana and gramma. It all started when I was about 9 years old. These days though there are new crazes like Bratz and now...

WEBKINZ!

For about the last six months I have noticed that Webkinz are taking over the world! Well maybe not exactly taking over the world but defintely taking over children. So after hearing all the hype from my cousins and them wanting me to help them I realized that even I was beginning to get sucked into the Webkinz world activities and I am not embarrassed to say it! So earlier this year my cousins bought me my own Webkinz, and they couldn't wait to tell me about the adoption process and all the games and educational activities, and really there is something for everyone to enjoy.

So now I have a cute way to stay in contact with my cousins and as an older person it makes me very glad to know that there is something worth while for children to have. They learn about budgeting money, taking care of a living thing, learning things about the past, math, the environment and so much more.

So being interested in the whole thing and realizing through my cousins how "cool" it is to have the most Webkinz pets I was curious to know what kid holds the record for having the most because they sure do have a lot and I came across this youtube link.

Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axa71dAi5m0

More Rubber Bands...

Hey everyone! So for this post I thought that I would talk about the world record for the largest rubber band ball in the world. The creator of this ball is a man by the name of John Bain who now resides in California. He spent seven years and hours creating this enormous rubber band ball which weighs 3,500 pounds. It says on his website that each rubber band was stretched around the ball each time to create a true rubber band ball.

This type of world record is very popular, usually within a few years someone new always beats the existing world record. John's rubber band ball however is in the Guinness Book of World Records for 2007. Here is something that I took from his website to decribe to you guys how he got started:

I started my ball while working in the mail room of one of the world's largest law firms, Skadden Arps. While working I was surrounded by office supplies. This is when I started becoming fascinated with making art out of any piece of office material that I could bend, twist or glue into something cool. I had to pick up the mail from the post office every day for the attorneys, while at the post office I would grab a handful of the free rubber bands. These handfuls eventually added up to a 30 lb. ball. At this point normal size bands began to break and it was time to find a better source of bigger bands. I then wrote a persuasive letter to numerous rubber band companies promising to break the world record and also agreeing to give there company some free publicity when the record was mine. I quickly received a response from Alliance rubber and they began sending me boxes of bands. The project took me approximately 2 years. I spent about two hours a day in my garage wrapping bands, dodging broken bands and dancing around my ball like a wild Indian at a ritual. This means I listened to countless hours of music and had lots of quality thinking time. The ball is solid to the core rubber bands! This means in the center there is one rubber band tied in a knot. If you were to cut the ball in half it would look like an everlasting gob stopper from all the different colored layers. My advice to anyone who wants to attempt to break my record...Good luck, making a ball of rubber bands this big and trying to keep it round is extremely hard.!

Interesting...

David Blaine's New Record

He does it again folks! Another world record for David Blaine.

Today on Oprah, Blaine made the new record for holding one's breath for the longest amount of time. He held it for 17 minutes and 4 seconds!

There is a link to the article at the bottom.

Enjoy!

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gxsfhFmW71JZPr4OA8yqHI_v2GQwD90C8S800

Doggie Death Row

This is so random and I never knew there was such a thing, but with a dog of my own that I have had for about four months now, I seem to always bump into doggie news. So this is my new discovery and its pretty straight to the point.

An Lhasa Apso dog from Seattle, Washington, was on doggie death row for 8 years and 190 days. After that extremely long amount of time of being on doggie death row for two biting incidents, the dog, whose name is Word, was transferred to Pigs Peace Sanctuary, Washington, USA.

It sounds like it was a huge waste of time. Plus I doubt that the dog spent those 8 years and 190 days miserable so what was his punishment? In the end he lived, he was just sent somewhere else, oddly placed on land with pigs.

Vanity

We all like to look good, right? Nice clothes, nice hair, neat appearance, an so on-in our own way. But I am sure that we all agree that there are extremes. Most of us dont have the money to get a rhinoplasty or any kind of implant or it could be because we are not that vain. Its okay to want to look good but when is it enough and how far would you go? Well for Angela Bismarchi, she is just getting started.

At her 42nd operation, and at only 36 years of age, Angela shows no signs of stopping. She is so close to beating the record of 52-year-old American Cindy Jackson who currently holds the record for having the most plastic surgery operations, 47 of them!

Let me tell you a little about Angela Bismarchi. She is a Brazilian model who had her first operation after giving birth to her first child at age 21. From there she says that she loved the results and became so fasinated with plastic surgery that her last two husbands were plastic surgeons who operated on her. Now, I am not one to judge because it is her body afterall, but I am sure that her lifestyle has to be effecting her daughter in some negative ways. She has a mother who is obsessed with the way she looks and quotes saying "I always was vain." Her daughter is just going to want to do the same things and might always feel as if she is not fine the way she looks. She might feel that she has to keep making 'improvements'.

Shoes

I'm sure most of you have heard this line:

You can never have too many shoes. Right!?

But this person took that line very literally. I'll admit, I'm a girl and I love shoes too and I am sure that if I did not have people around me, especially my mother, telling me that enough is enough this record would be mine. This lady, I have given her the title of shoe lady, but her real name is Darlene Flynn, and while she may not have only collected shoes that are able to be worn but she owns other types of shoe related items. Most of them are figurine shoes-shoes that can't be worn by her own two feet.

51 year old Flynn says "I don't know why it had to be shoes, I just love them and it kind of got out of control." Darlene Flynn now owns over 7,765 pieces of shoe memorabilia and she lines them up against the wall in her house in a cabinet type thing.

I thought that that was a pretty cool collection to have and share with the rest of you!

Going and going...

Most women want their dream wedding growing up. From the moment little girls watch Cinderella they want the princess wedding, their prince charming, and of course their one of a kind wedding gown. Well a woman by the name of Andreas Evstratiou from Paphos, Cyprus had just that on February 18, 2007, her wedding day!

Her wedding dress train measured 4468 feet and 5.94 inches. She now holds the record for the longest wedding dress train. That is as long as a house or a small brick building. Im guessing on this but she probably had to have lots of people helping her to not get her train stuck or torn somewhere. I am also guessing that she took the train off for her reception so she could have some real fun.

My opinion-dress trains should NOT be that long!

Run Run Run as Fast as You Can...

...You cant catch this guy, not a chance. His name is Erwin Valdenebito and he currently holds the record for the greatest distance run on a treadmill in 24 hours. That remarkable distance is 153.9 miles. He made the record in April of 2007 in Santiago, Chili.

I doubt that he keeps this record for too long though because this is just a common attempt that many people make. I actually found on a website a list of lots of people who have created records involving treadmill running.

Do you wanna go the distance?

Wo Baby

I find it to be slightly alarming and idiotic that senior citizen women want to give birth to babies. I feel that women who are 65, 66, and so forth should not even be thinking about having children, but every now and again I will hear a story about an older woman, going in for invitro fertilization and 9 months later giving birth to a baby.

Doesn't this seem like a death wish, I mean, how long will women who become mothers at such an old age be around for their children? Not long right? There are chances that these women won't see their children graduate from college, get married, have grandchildren. They'll miss all the 'moments'.

Also there are many health issues that older people face...I just can wrap my brain around the logic that these women have.

The woman who now holds the record for being the oldest woman to give birth is Adriana Iliescu. She is currently raising her daughter who she gave birth to at age 67. She is very happy though and was quoted saying:

I am happy! It's a very big feeling, which I didn't have many times in my life. I feel fulfilled, like I have achieved my greatest desire."

I wish her the best of luck!

Nails, Nails, Nails

I thought that this was so disgusting! In 1971 this woman, Lee Redmond, took the record for having the longest nails on a person. To date, her nails, in total, measure 24 feet and 7.8 inches. She looks like she came right out of a horror flick. My main thought when I saw her was how does she function day to day doing basic things that everyone does. Like brushing her teeth, taking showers, doing her hair, getting dressed, writing and typing.

It says online that she keeps up with her nails too, that is with manicures and such but still, what an odd record to have, and if I may say so again, disgusting!

Hula Hula Baby

When I was a kid I started out so bad at hula hooping, I mean really bad. Then at around 9 or 10 years old my grandmother bought me a big yellow hula hoop and I got better at it. One day I was in my back yard for about an hour hula hooping non stop and I can remember saying to myself that I was so good at it and that I could make a record. But I was defintely wrong, I was no where close to beating the hula hooping record. That record belongs to Kym Coberly who in 1984 hula hooped for three days. That is 72 hours of hula hooping! Now some of you might be wondering if you do this continuosly without taking any breaks but thats not the case. I found the rules to hula hooping-if you want to set a record yourself.

THE RULES!

1. The record is for continuous revolution of a hula hoop.
2. A standard size and weight hula hoop must be used.
3. The hoop must be revolved between the shoulders and hips.
4. If the hoop passes above the shoulders the attempt is ended.
5. If the hoop passes below the hips the competitor has 30 seconds in which to try to recover it without using his/her hands or arms. If the hoop is not revolving above the hips within 30 seconds the attempt is ended.
6. If the hoop passes below the knees and/or touches the ground, the attempt is ended.
7. Once the hoop has begun to spin the hands of the competitor must not touch the hoop. If the challenger touches the hoop with his/her hands, the attempt is ended.
8. Rest breaks of 5 minutes per hour are allowed. (Note: This rule has been changed; in previous years, this was a non-stop categories)
9. No person under the age of 14 may compete.
10. Persons aged between 14 and 18 must, before competition, be in possession of a document signed by their parent or legal guardian, giving them permission to compete. This document must be added to the log book and witnessed before the attempt has started.
11. A fully-qualified practising member of the medical profession must be present at all times watching the attempt.
12. The entire attempt must be filmed on audio video.

Now, I haven't really hula hooped for years because someone stole my yellow hula hoop right from the side of my old house and I have yet to find one like it but maybe I will pick up the hobby again some day.

Hubba Bubba

We all love to chew gum, and definitely bubblegum when we were young kids. We would go to the supermarket and beg mom, dad, or our older sister even for 50 cents so we could buy that pack of Bubble Yum gum. Then when you got it we would put 1 piece in our mouths or maybe 2 and begin chewing. At least I know that I did. Now, it was time to start blowing those bubbles. I can remember having contests with my brother to see who could blow the biggest bubble and now, I can't even remember who won most of the time.

Today though, people are very big on sugarless gum, even myself, and classic bubblegums like Bubble Yum and Bazooka are not as popular these days. I use to love the mini comic strips in Bazooka gum!

Anyways, I wanted to know who holds the record for blowing the biggest bubblegum bubble and found out that the record belongs to Susan Montgomery Williams. She made this record in 1994 and the bubble that she blew was 23 inches wide. Wow! I think I may start practicing again, thats one big bubble!

Tsar Bomba

Recently in my English class, I was assigned to read The Curve of Binding Energy by John McPhee. The novel was about the life and career of relatively unknown theorist physicist Theodore B. Taylor, as well as his warning to the world to avoid nuclear weapons and to keep them out of the wrong hands. He thought that they should be locked up somewhere safe. After reading it, it got my mind thinking of nuclear weapons that have been used in the past such as in Nagasaki and Hiroshima, and the destruction that they have caused. I also began to think of the most powerful bomb to ever detonate in the world out of curiosity. I did some quick research and discovered that the most powerful bomb to ever detonate was called the Tsar Bomba.

The Tsar Bomba is also known as The Big Ivan or the King of the Bombs. It was tested and detonated in 1961 by the Soviet Union. It looked like a huge rocket, weighed 27 tons and was eight meters long. It caused massive devastation; the complete destruction of Tsar Bomba extended to a radius of 40 miles surrounding the blast and severe damage went as far as 60 miles. I posted up a couple of pictures just so you all can actually see the bomb itself.

My opinion, I just think that it is so amazing (in a negative way) of how much time people spend developing nuclear weapons that ultimately will kill people. I do not understand why some researchers and scientists are so fascinated with such a morbid topic. We already have so much destruction in the world and don’t need people continuing, to this day, to make nuclear weapons that can take years to develop, and just hurt the rest of humankind in the end.

Twister

We all remember that game right? Having the parties with your friends and you whip out the Twister game and get all..well twisted and tangled. This game was so much fun when I was a kid. I mean it was always present at every birthday party and now I see the next generation playing it as well. My cousins love it too, its very popular and brings me back to the good old days.

So today I came across the largest Twister board-ever to have existed in the world! This Twister mat measures 88.9 feet by 27.6 feet and was created by the people of the Netherlands. In April of 2005 hundreds of people gathered to participate in a game of Twister, just look at the picture.

Looking at it makes me want to go somewhere and buy one!

Beefy!

WO!

Look at the size of this burger, I cant believe it! I was just watching the news and saw this burger that now holds the record for the biggest burger in the world and I was like wow, that can feed an army-literally! Its called The Absolutely Ridiculous Burger.

The burger weighs 134 pounds and was created by Steve Mallie, a Detroit restaurant owner. I mean flipping the thing to finish cooking took 3 people. The patty was made with beef, bacon and cheese and the bun alone weighs 50 pounds. So is this making you hungry? If so, the burger sells for 350 U.S. dollars, and orders must be made 24 hours in advance to give the cooks enough time to make it.

If big burgers are your taste...enjoy...I just dont' know how someone would go about eating it.

Pumpkins

Random!

Today...I had pumpkin on the brain, I know weird...but I know that people grow pumkins all over the world so I was interested in knowing who holds the record for growing the largest pumpkin in the whole world. Well, the world record belongs to Joe Jutras from North Scituate, Rhode Island. Back in 2007 he brought the 1,689 pound pumpkin to a fair in Massachusetts and beat the record from the previous year held by Ron Wallace who had a pumpkin that weighed in at 1,502 pounds. Both records are outstanding-just out there though.

I mean gosh, you must really like gardening if you are gonna grow something like a huge pumpkin, tomato, or even peach which kinda reminds me of James and The Giant Peach. You guys remember that movie? The whole thing I find funny-growing extra big fruit.

I wonder how long it took for him to grow it and what on earth did he plan on making with it?Possibly pumpkin soup, or maybe pumpkin pie?

Mani Mania...He Deserves A Blog All to Himself!!!

This is so off topic from what I usually write about...you know...I usually refer my 'For the Record' blog to people who have set official records but I swear sometimes that my dog is trying to set a record of his own. Don't get me wrong, for as long as we have had him which has been two months, I love him more and more each day -but he is a little terror and is probably trying to set a record for being the most annoying disobedient pup. But, thats only when he chews on the couch, jumps on the sofa, bites everything but his many chew toys, busts through my bedroom door, and completely ignores me when I call him etc.! Oh yes, I have discovered the selective hearing that he has, just like a human child!

Today-well I haven't a clue to what has gotton into him! Thats why I call it Mani Mania and I am seriously considering making a seperate blog just to talk about him! Can you believe that today he actually poked a whole in the sofa!? I was like, "oh no he didn't!"

Thats when I think of what Cesar Milan says "...stay calm and assertive" I mean after all he's only a puppy and I need to take it one day at a time. So, despite Mani's attempts to make the record for the most annoying puppy in the world, it was so worth getting him! Just look at that puggle face!

Uh oh gotta go he's chewin' on the sofa again!

Dog Ears!

So recently I got a dog, a puggle, and he is just the cutest thing ever. I mean, yes, he is messy and everything, and he does things like goes to the bathroom where he is not suppose to and he chews on things that are not for him but he is totally loveable! He loves to play fetch and tug of war like most dogs and he loves to walked. One of the cutest things about him are his ears because they are so long and floppy like a beagle's ears. So with dogs on my brain and how cute my dog's ears are I wanted to find out what dog has the longest ears in the world.

Then I came across a dog who holds the record, in the Guinness World Records, for the longest ears on a dog. His dog's name is Tigger and he lives in Illinois. His ears measure 13.75 inches and 13.5 inches! That is so long! Break that down and you get a foot, give or take an inch. That is amazing and funny. There are such wacky records in the world.

It could be my preference, or the fact that I have just gone dog crazy since I have gotten a dog, but I think that dogs that have the long floppy ears are better looking. Just look at the picture for yourself!

Odd collection?

Okay, sometimes I hear things that are really silly. Especially when it comes to collections, so today I was looking for people who have the most of something in the world and I came across this woman who loves penguins and has a collection full of penguin stuff. Her name is Birgit Berends and she has a grand total of 2,520 penguin things. From little figurines to cute plush dolls, to posters. This woman from Germany has been collecting all of her penguin nic nacs from 1990. After I found that out it made me think of my own collections and as silly as it may seem I collect anything Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh! Yeah, I am no longer a child but that is what I like to do. I have plush dolls of Eeyore from Florida, figurines from happy meals, pez heads, magnets, pens and the list goes on. I started my own collection when I was about 10 and each yesr it grows even more.

I am sure that most people have collections but just don't own up to it. Dont be embarrassed if your collection is something out of the ordinary like that of Birgit Berends. I have a collection of a classic cartoon character. You may have a collection of old records or a collection of baseball cards. Other people are more unconventional and have collections of bubble gum wrappers or the gag bags that are on airplanes. Weird but true!

Hey, how did he do that?

Criss Angel, the new icon in the illusion world. A man with many tricks up his sleeve, and the one question that he leaves among his many fans is...how did he do that? I mean just recently this guy was on the Oprah Winfrey show doing random things, one of which was beating Houdini's record of how fast he could escape from a straight jacket while suspended upside down in the air. Well, of course, Angel did end up beating Houdini's record as well as doing other things on Oprah's talk show.

One of his other stunts, or tricks, or illusions, or whatever you want to call them was when he took a knife and faced it upright on a table. He then asked an audience member to come up to the stage and place the knife under 1 of 4 styrofoam cups as he turned away. When she was done he turned around and began to smash his hands down on the styrofoam cups and remarkably he did not stab his own hand! Lucky or supernatural?

One of the last stunts he did while on the Oprah show was telling Oprah herself to write a number down on a piece of paper and to show the audience what the number was that she chose. He had no clue what it was but from from her 'body languauge' he was able to figure out what number she chose! If this doesn't spark any interest maybe catch an episode of his show and see him walk on water, make people disappear an reappear, or rip up newspaper, put it all together in his hands and somehow the newspaper is in one piece again.

These things can't be possible right, right?

Don't Hold Your Breath

Some of you may remember from a couple of years ago, in 2006, a stunt man by the name of David Blaine attempted to break the record for who can hold their breath under water for the longest amount of time while freeing himself from chains that held him under water at the same time. The stunt took place right in Manhattan, at the Lincoln Center and attracted a lot of attention. It was a week long endurance challenge that aired on the ABC network. Blaine stayed in a glass sphere full of water for one week! Sadly for him, he missed the record by about 2 minutes but was grateful for the support that he recieved from his fans.

My take on the wole thing is that I am always amazed at what people push their bodies to do, or even how people survive bizarre accidents. Its amazing to think that someone actually held their breath for 8 minutes and 58 seconds, or even Blaine's record of 7 seven minutes - give or take a few seconds. He didn't reach his goal but he can always try again and continue to train.

The other side of me says though, that that is a dangerous task to try to tackle. From science, we all know that experts always say that it is not a healthy idea to hold your breath because it cuts off the circulation to your brain and can cause brain damage as well as damage your lungs! If I were David Blaine I would try to do something else amazing with my body instead of putting the health of my insides in danger.

Stretchy!

Ah ha ha ha! That is the first thing that I think of when I look at this picture. Then I say, well maybe this guy was obese, lost a lot of weight and now has really lose skin. Perhaps he was thinking of getting it removed but then changed his mind because he discovered that he would make the record for the man with the most stretchiest skin. The truth behind this man though is that he has a medical condition called Elhers-Danlos Syndrome. His name is Garry Turner, from England, and as of 1999 he holds the record for Stretchiet Skin. But his skin is not the only thing that is extra stetchy,so is the inside of his body. Turner's organs and everything else internal is susceptable to collapse along with the fact that his blood vessels can rupture at any time.

Now, I suppose first impressions are not everything because what I thought to be light hearted is really a life threatening condition. I would really hate to have to worry about hypermobility of my joints everyday. Now, hypermobility is when your joints move more than the average person, you have extended motion. Stuff like this has many side affects and can cause early deaths. Its cool to look at but I dont want parts of my body to be moving around in awkward positions, do you? On the other hand, Garry Turner seems to enjoy every moment of his 'talent'.

Smallest Waist On A Living Person

Ok, every now and then on TV, I'll see a special on record breakers. You know, the people across the globe setting odd and wacky records. It has always intrigued me how people do the most out of the ordinary and random things and draw so much attention to themselves, while fasinating others everywhere. For that reason I have decided to create this blog for the sole purpose of introducing some of the most fasinated record breaker holders in the world. The person that I will start with is the woman with the smallest waist in the world. Her name is Cathy Jung and as of 1999 she was crowned Smallest Waist On A Living Person. Her waist is only fifteen inches. Thats as wide as well, a jar of mayo or even a honeydew melon!

Now my first question was, how did that happen? It couldn't have been a natural thing...well its not! Cathy Jung has been wearing a corset for 24 hours a day, for the past 12 years! She takes the time out to lace up every day and says that she enjoys her life just like anyone else-with a 'normal' waist size. Looking at her though leaves me to ponder because well...its looks quite uncomfortable to say the least!