Here's something morbid for you: Texas death row inmates' last meal requests. Hamburgers and enchiladas are popular. One guy wanted "Twenty-four soft shell tacos, six enchiladas, six tostados, two whole onions, five jalapenos, two cheeseburgers, one chocolate shake, one quart of milk and one package of Marlboro cigarettes". All requests for cigarettes and alcohol are denied, as decreed by law. What is a "bowl of cheese"? One guy requested that his meal be given to a homeless person. Too little too late?

Today is all about search engines. Google Zeitgeist lists recent search trends: this week's top 10 gaining queries include "paula poundstone", "delta airlines", and "vicky botwright". Perhaps you're like me and are wondering, who the heck is Vicky Botwright? So of course I go look her up in Google...wait! That'll make the stats higher! Oh dear, it's a never-ending cycle. (She's an English squash player, turns out. Who knew English squash was so darn popular?)

Google also lists the top 5 misspelled queries: "amtrack", "volkswagon", "jenifer lopez", "william sonoma", and "shakespear". I'm thinking companies like Amtrak should get these stats and change their names accordingly. Jennifer Lopez loves to change her name anyway, right?

You can do your own research via Google as well. Go to the Google AdWords page, click on the 'continue' button at the bottom, and then enter your keyword(s). Click on Update Keyword Estimates, and voila. Google provides rough estimates of how often those keywords are searched for on a daily basis. For example, my favorite dinosaur, triceratops, gets a score of 300/day. Velociraptor, while admired by some, gets a measly 100.

Lycos has their version: the top 50 searches of the week. Number one is Dragonball, which, as far as I can tell is an on-line game. Tattoos is next. Wimbledon is number 9 here; it's #1 on Google. I wonder how the demographics differ for the different search engines. (Links mostly from metafilter)

What? McDonald's in Egypt has McFalafel? Bring it! (Link from robot wisdom)

Tokyo has tested its first women-only train car, in response to women complaing about being groped and harassed on the regular trains.

"Nearly every young Japanese woman, it seems, has a tale of being molested on a train. A quick survey of passengers on the inaugural ride of the women-only car revealed a host of experiences: One woman's neck had been licked repeatedly by a fellow passenger; another once found a man aiming a video camera up her skirt. Breasts have been touched, thighs stroked."

(Link from metafilter)

A pretty cool idea: FilmWise takes screen shots from films and removes hands and faces from the people, so you have to guess the movie from just the clothes and scenery. I can't say I'm very good at it, but I'm sure some of you movie buffs will do well. (Link from fresh hell)

Where does the Smoking Gun get all this stuff? Here's a collection of letters written to the Wisconsin Department of Transportation to complain about "offensive" license plates, such as "IH8GOP". I can't believe people take valuable time out of their day to complain about these things. (Link from metafilter)