Oddity Central

Oddity Central

Woman Sick of Mowing the Lawn Turns Her Yard into a Giant Sandbox

Posted: 02 Jun 2014 03:54 AM PDT

66-year-old Georgianna Reid, a resident of Kansas City, got so fed up of mowing her lawn that she converted it into a giant sandbox. She actually replaced her green lawn with 80 tons of sand, after contractors tore up her yard. The conversion cost her $4,000, including a low fence all around the perimeter of the sand-covered lawn.

"Now, being over 60, I've decided that I've owned the house for 33 years and that I wasn't going to mow anymore or water," she said. Georgianna's corner house at East Meyer Boulevard and Walnut Street is so conspicuous now, passersby just cannot miss it. Unfortunately, not all the reactions are positive. A lot of her neighbors don’t think the house ‘fits in’ to the Brookside area.

Some of them have actually filed complaints with the city officials. A few went as far as stealing her volleyball net, lawn ornaments and a life-sized chest. "I think the house looks revolting with all that is out there," said neighbor Edwin Bisby. "I'm sure it's going to hurt the property values in this neighborhood."

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New Pay-by-Picture Restaurant Lets Patrons Pay for their Food with Photos

Posted: 02 Jun 2014 02:26 AM PDT

I always thought people taking pictures of their food was kind of silly, but at this new pop-up restaurant in the UK, I'd probably do it too. 'The Picture House' is the world's first pay-by-photo restaurant – you order, click a photo of the food, share on Instagram and eat for free!

The restaurant belongs to frozen food giant Birds Eye, who came up with the idea to cash in on people's obsession with photographing food and sharing the pics online. They conducted a survey and found out that more than half of the Brit population regularly took pictures of their meals, nine percent of them on a daily basis. So they realized, what better way to advertize their new dining range than with hashtags?

The pop-up eatery was open in Soho, London for three days in May, and is now moving to other major UK cities. They serve two-course meals that customers don't have to pay for, if they snap and Instagram it. "We wanted to tap into this social media trend and create a new reason for people to talk about and sample our inspirations range," said marketing director Margaret Jobling.

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French Students Invent Car That Runs for 2,000 Miles on a Single Liter of Fuel

Posted: 02 Jun 2014 01:14 AM PDT

The Microjoule is an extremely fuel efficient car that can travel over 2,000 miles on just a single liter of fuel. That sounds ridiculously unbelievable, but it's true. The carbon fiber vehicle is built to accommodate just one person at a time, lying down, which is a weird way to travel, but who cares, when it covers a 200-mile journey for just 20 cents?

The Microjoule is the brainchild of a group of French students at the La Joliverie College in Nantes, western France. They built the superlight vehicle (35 kg) as a part of the 2003 Shell European Eco-Marathon Contest to find the world's most fuel efficient vehicle. Needless to say, they won, beating 200 other teams competing in the event.

The judges at the contest tested the car on a track in Rotterdam, the Netherlands – they calculated that the car could do 2,072 miles (that's 3,300 kilometers) per liter of fuel or 9,400 miles per gallon. Which means that driving the Microjoule once around the world would only cost about $26.

Microjoule

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