Two signs that the End Times are surely nigh:
- The new Vdara hotel in Vegas has a problem with its pool. It's not the chlorine balance or a leak: it's an accidental death ray. The glass skyscraper is focusing sunlight to a degree that's burning people and has melted plastic. The "solar convergence phenomenon" was taken into account when the hotel was designed, and owner MGM Mirage hired a consultant -- who placed a filter over the window, reducing the effect by 70 percent, apparently not enough. (Imagine if this filter were to be removed, bwah-ha-ha.)
- The upcoming Commonwealth Games in Delhi also have a problem: monkeys. Rhesus macaques often cause property damage and occasionally attack people (they were indirectly responsible for the death of Delhi's Deputy Mayor S.S. Bajwa), but are protected by devout Hindus. Delhi has decided that the solution to monkey problems is more monkeys; in a scene that could be part of the next remake of Planet of the Apes, officials are deploying langurs, a larger species of monkey, to keep the macaques at bay.
(Yes, I know monkeys aren't apes.)