Given the recent tragedies and near tragedies involving taxis carrying children in the Western Cape, installing newfangled 3-D holograms of children at crowded intersections, instead of speed bumps, for e.g, might prove not to be that efficient, here on the wild frontier.

Drivers have to care about children’s lives, to slow down for children.

Watch out. It's Pavement Pattie!

But would this ingenious / slightly batty new scheme work in more obedient countries?

What about Australia or Canada for e.g?

This, from Discovery Magazine: “In what sounds like a terrifying experience, the 3-D Holgram of a girl’s elongated form appears to rise from the ground as cars approach, reaching 3D realism at around 100 feet, and then returning to 2D distortion once cars pass that ideal viewing distance. Its designers created the image to give drivers who travel at the street’s recommended 18 miles per hour (30 km per hour) enough time to stop before hitting Pavement Patty–acknowledging the spectacle before they continue to safely roll over her.”

They’re testing the pedestrian security system out in Western Vancouver at the moment, near a girl’s elementary school.

Is it a cue for the parents of the girls of Ecole Pauline Johnson Elementary School to lock up their daughters?

The following concerns have already been raised:

” I don’t like it, what happens when these drivers get conditioned to looking at these images and then plow right over a REAL child..
Its gonna happen…” From Mike G on the Discover Website.

“Nothing promotes vehicular safety like desensitizing the act of running over children with your car.  I’m sure this will end well.” From The High Definite.

“Great. And when the driver swerves to miss the “fake” child, he hits a real one? Clever” From Sepp on the Discover website.

“Great…then when someone actually runs a child over this will be a great get out clause!” from Izzy on The Daily Mail.

Sometimes, a chick needs a break from all the madness...

..the Kardashians...

...cupcakes...

and the rest.

At times like this, I love to page through books filled with things that cannot be bought and look at creatures that aren't begging for attention.

I have posted images from his book creatures. before. These perfect images, captured at 1/8000th of a second shutter speed are from ...

...2009's Bird. (this guy is ours, an African Fish Eagle)

A most magical book.

Via Andrew Zuckerman

Cameron Diaz made an appearance at the Royal Box at Center Court at the US Open. But something was disturbing the refined atmosphere.

It was not the kind of thing that she had expected to have to put up with in the Royal Box.

Gwen Stefani shared her friend's disapproval and demonstrated how to smile without one's eyes. A classic Alpha female method for displaying displeasure.

Clue: Pete Wentz's worried little embarrassed face.

Oh dear. Mrs Wentz let the free booze go to her head.

...and mistook the Royal Box for the mosh pit at a Burning Man festival.

Love all?

Via DListed.

Evidence of genius.

Cheeseburger and chips …cupcakes.

By BakerGal from About Happiness

The "burger" assembly involves a slice of chocolate cupcake inserted between the halves of a vanilla cupcake. I prepared cheese-colored fondant and decorated the cupcakes with it

"To make the "fries," I removed the crusts from pound cake, sliced it into french fry proportions, and browned them under the broiler for a few seconds. I then tossed them onto a frosted vanilla cake."

Swiped from Jezebel

No, this is not KK's sex doll. The one of the right is the wax model for Mme Tussauds, no the one on the left is, no the one on ...oh, does it really matter? The yucky sex doll is after the jump. If you want to see it. Warning cannot be unseen etc.

Kim Kardashian? Over-exposed?

And it used to be that having a Barbie or action figure in your image meant that you had “arrived.”

While it is news to me, apparently there is a flourishing market for celebrity sex dolls.

Lindsay Lohan, Sarah Jessica Parker, Britney (In her “Oops I did it again” school girl incarnation) are only some of the celebs who had the dubious honour of being immortalised as a sex doll.

Vomit.

Don’t say you weren’t warned.

Manufacturer Pipedream Products says: “Kinky Kim The Filthy Love Doll is going to be the must have blowup babe of late summer!"

Good grief.

Sob.

“She loves Big?”

“Sex in the Shitty?”

Here’s my plan:

The moment my 10 year-old daughter says she wants to be a pop star is the very moment she gets sent to a convent.

For the next 100 years.

Even though we are Jewish.

Via Trendhunter

Hm.

There was a time when Everyone’s Dad bought Playboy for “the stories.”

It was common knowledge that that statement was a lie, back then.

Back then, Everyone’s Dad bought Playboy to see glossy versions of American Corn-Fed Girl’s-Next-Door with their clothes off.

Of course.

What has changed most dramatically is the notion of anyone actually buying a copy of Playboy magazine, at all.

Edged out of the top of their market by glossy mainstream magazine’s penchent for shooting every passing female star with her kit off and bum in the air and out of the sleazier side by the internet, Playboy Enterprises are in big trouble.

It’s “Playmates” are too tame, not famous enough, not exiting enough. It’s budgets too small, it’s credibility too rickety to fight for a place amongst it’s mainstream competitors, who have sucked up what once was it’s USP with ease.

The update of that old Playboy lie is, “I buy Rolling stone for the music reviews,” or “I buy Vanity Fair for it’s in-depth reporting.”

It’s not “I buy Playboy to see Kim Kardashian not really nude.”

The public buy magazines for escapism. And when it comes to celebrities, we buy magazines that shock, titillate and distract us from our own mundane, possibly unsatisfactory lives.

If Playboy was to have a hope of survival in 2010 and beyond, they will have to find something more distracting and titillating, than these old-fashioned kitschy Kim K shots.

Who would buy Playboy for this?

Is there anything here the a potential Playboy reader (and the rest of the world) hasn’t seen before?

Remember, at all times, that she got her break through the release of a sex tape.

Since then, she has made her living relentlessly exposing every inch of her life and her body.

As a result these images appear somewhat…quaint.

Heigh ho. She is the Paris Hilton of 2010. The embodiment of the power of ambition and energy over any discernible talent.

We have handed her and are living through, the cliche of her 15 minutes of fame. It would be unsporting of us to resent her milking it.

But talentless individuals, finding themselves in this position, run the very real danger of ending up somewhat over-exposed.

So, perhaps it’s not such a bad strategy to go into Playboy, where, for once, she is expected to expose not very much at all.

Via Radar Online.

In his series, The Everyday Occurrences of an Ageing Superhero...

...photographer, Paul Armstrong documents the banalities of a semi-retired, bored and depressed ...

...out-of-shape ...

...Captain America.

It's The Invincibles, if it were a reality show.

The Invisibles?

From Flavourwire, "“If I have any personal ‘style’ to my photography, it is in finding humor and drama in people and life,” he says on his website. “I’m still exploring this life and this new medium. I find that things aren’t always as serious as we conjure, and that laughter bonds us more than politics or beliefs.”

Aaaah, shame.

A superhero needs his dignity.

Via Wiseacre Photographs and Flavourwire.

Jeannie, not in 3-D.

It’s COSMO’s first ever 3-D cover!

An obvious (almost overdue) move for one of our covers, (ahem) I’m sure you will agree.

You can’t see how …um, very 3-D it is on this “normal” version. To get the full effect – you’ll have to see the actual image through our nifty 3-D rose and blue-coloured spectacles, courtesy of Levi’s Curve ID, which are bagged with the October issue.

(I always like readers to see COSMO through rose coloured spectacles, myself.)

On shelf 15th of this month.

It's nice to see a chick of my very own vintage still getting the work.

And this is shot by Rankin. Hurray. (But ...what is going on with the styling and the VERY scary expression in the bottom left hand picture?)

Shame, a model never grows out of sitting like a pre-schooler. (What is going on with the lighting?)

No, c'mon. Dead animal horns as a headdress? Let's bring back the veil and 80s hat. this pic is cruelty to animals. Both of them.

Pictures speak louder than words.

Via FGR

And here are the finalists in the “Most Delicious” category of the American Society of Editors Cover Awards.

See if you can spot a trend.

Enjoy your burger!

The best ...burgers!

Savour your burger. Pray to God for a burger.

Break out. Go mad. Have a pizza.

...or a hot dog. Go on. Have an adventure.

...or, if you really insist, have a muffin. Go on. You first.

Yes. These judges do like their white bread.

Via Nascapas