WhiteBoard News for Friday, July 18, 2003

Paris, France (Ananova):

A drink sold at the Ritz Hotel in Paris has been recognised as the most expensive commercially available cocktail in the world.

Guinness World Records says The Sidecar costs $440.88 a glass.

It contains Champagne Cognac that survived the 1870 siege of Paris and two World Wars.

The Sidecar was believed to have been invented by the hotel's head barman - Frank Meier - in the 1920s when it sold for the equivalent of $1.73. 

Head barman Colin Field said: "The Ritz Sidecar contains Ritz Fine Champagne 1865 pre-phylloxera Cognac.

"This Cognac is guaranteed, and has been inside the hotel for over a hundred years, although German soldiers nearly seized it during their occupation of Paris."

The recipe for the record-breaking cocktail is: 5/10 Ritz Fine Champagne 1865 Cognac, 3/10 Cointreau and 2/10 lemon juice.
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New York, New York (Reuters):

A Syrian-Jewish bride from Brooklyn will this summer wear what could be America's most expensive wedding gown, a white dress adorned with 1,100 glittering diamonds and worth $300,000, an assistant to the designer says. 

The gown has diamonds totalling 300 carats individually hand stitched onto the silk material made for the 23-year-old woman, who immigrated to New York three years ago. 

The mystery bride did not want her name or the wedding date publicised, said designer Anthony La Bate's assistant, John D'Agostino of Francesca Custom Apparel shop in Brooklyn.

The woman's father paid for the dress. 

D'Agostino said La Bate's wedding gowns usually run between $1,000 and $10,000. "This is well above and beyond the usual," he said. 

Mindy Woon, buyer and assistant manager of the bridal salon at the upscale department store Bergdorf Goodman, said the most expensive gown it sells is for about $40,000. 

"I've never heard of a gown that high," Woon said. "That's probably three times what most people spend on their entire wedding." 

The dress is in two pieces. The bottom part, a ballgown, can be removed for a more form-fitting, sleek look. 

La Bate designs between 300 and 400 wedding gowns a year, D'Agostino said. He has also designed ornate Rabbinical robes and dresses for Miss America (news - web sites) contestants. 
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Reykjavik, Iceland (Ananova):

A mystery British tycoon is reportedly lining up a bid for a penis museum in Iceland.

The Icelandic Phallological Museum is up for sale and it's understood there's an interested British buyer.

The museum hosts a collection of penis specimens from all native Icelandic animals.

Museum director Sigurdur Hjartarson has historically received an annual grant from the City of Reykjavík to maintain the museum.

But this year, Mr Hjartarson did not receive any funding, which he said was "strange", so has put the museum up for sale on his website.

He says it will be a "shame to sell the museum abroad" and see it leave Iceland, as it's the most talked-about museum in the country and the only one of its kind in the world.
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Leiqing, China (East Day):

A Chinese couple believe they have found the recipe to married bliss - by not talking to each other five years.

The middle-aged husband and wife from Leiqing, Zhejiang province, last exchanged words in 1998, even though they live under the same roof and sleep in the same bed.

The couple, who used to argue ferociously every day, say they have saved their marriage by refusing even to acknowledge each other's existence.

"We haven't had an argument in five years," the husband told the East Day newspaper.
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Dillon, Colorado (AP):

This time, it's staying on her finger. 

Derrick Monning and his fiancee, Debra Sweeney, dropped a $6,500 engagement ring in the snow Feb. 1, when he proposed at 12,200 feet on top of the Keystone ski area. 

Despite frantic digging, help from ski patrollers using metal detectors and an avalanche dog, the ring couldn't be found. 

Over the weekend, the couple, a few friends and resort employee Sy Meheen returned to look again and Monning spotted the diamond. 

"There it was, sitting perfectly in a crevice between two rocks, with the diamond pointing straight up," he said. 

He proposed to Sweeney again and made sure the ring ended up on her finger. 
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Chow
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