“10 Downing Street is one of the most heavily guarded buildings in Britain. Apart from the decorative policeman, the front door cannot be opened at all from the outside because it has no handle, and no one can enter the building without passing through an airport-style scanner and a set of security gates manned by armed guards. In the first five years after Tony Blair became Prime Minister, 37 computers, 4 mobile phones, two cameras, a mini-disc player, a video recorder, four printers, two projectors and a bicycle were stolen from inside the house.”
Ladies & Gentlemen: Amanda fucking Palmer
“Gustav III, King of Sweden (1771-92), believed coffee was poisonous. To prove his theory, he took two murderers, sentencing one to drink coffee every day and the other to drink tea. Two doctors were appointed to oversee the experiment and see who died first. The first to die were the doctors. In 1792, the King was assassinated at a masked ball in the Stockholm Opera House. The tea-drinker eventually died at the age of 83, and the coffee drinker survived them all.”
