(Posted by Benedetta Torrini) - Deep in the Brazilian rainforest there is a town built around a church where worshippers drink hallucinogenic tea. Alex Bellos took a trip up the Amazon to sample the high life in Céu do Mapiá...

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(Posted by Cassiopea) - There is only one way to get a really good view of Cap Rocat. And that's by hovering over it in a helicopter, preferably on the way to landing at this hotel's heliport. From there, it is but a short ride in a chauffeured golf cart to the private beach or back to one of the pleasingly secluded suites. Built into the cliffs of Cap Enderrocat and overlooking the Bay of Palma, this fortress-turned- luxury-hotel has, since its opening in 2010, become a firm favourite with the type of traveller who favours discreet luxury above all things. Virtually invisible from sea level - a useful quality, presumably, when it was a military outpost - the place is like a fantasy dwelling, complete with drawbridge: part Spanish finca, part Moroccan riad.

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(Posted by Richard Galliano) - The current Google Doodle, a fully functioning web-based synthesizer in tribute to the late Robert Moog, prominently features a record button. Hundreds of cover songs are being recorded by users around the world using the Moog doodle. Here’s a sampling of some of the best — and geekiest — cover tunes recorded with the Moog Google Doodle, as seen Wednesday on YouTube.

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(Posted by Benedetta Torrini) - I recently read a story about how we get pulled into yesterday each time we follow the sage advice of our parents, aunts, uncles and grandparents. Do you ever find yourself — at 30, 40, or 50 years of age — still carrying through on that advice? For the longest time into my adulthood I didn’t go outside for fear that I’d “catch my death of cold.” Same with going outside barefoot in the winter.

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(Posted by Richard Galliano) - The California teacher fired last month after her former career as a porn actress was discovered by pupils and school administrators once spoke openly about her work as an educator in behind-the-scenes footage included in one of her X-rated films. Stacie Halas, 31, worked as a science teacher at a public school in Oxnard, where the local school board voted unanimously to can her after learning that she had starred in an array of hardcore porn films (some of which were discovered online by her students at Richard B. Haydock Intermediate School, where Halas began working in 2009).

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