Last Christmas, I received one of those Page-A-Day calendars to keep on your office desk. Normally, when I have one of those, I pull off about two months' worth at the same time because I completely forget about it. And I still do that for the newest one I own, but this one is a little different. This calendar is full of odd and wacky websites, which of course, is great research for my columns. I'll highlight some of my favorites here, and try to give a little bit of info when necessary.

I mean, I don't want to completely rip off the company who produces the calendars. But I suppose this is no different than a friend sending me a link of Coke blowing up because of Mentos dropped inside of it. I'm guessing you'd probably be angry with me if I didn't share with you the following items:

• The Wooden Periodic Table Table
• Hacking Billy Mouth Bass in Linux
• Pictures of celebrities ... eating
• Kitten War!

And these four are just from the first few days of January ... stay tuned for more!

So the news out recently is that PayPal is going to block "unsafe browsers." I'm not talking about people here, but actually web browsers. How will PayPal know if something is unsafe? Good question, but one way they will tell, according to this article, is by determining the version of the actual browser.

PayPal mentioned that some users still hit its site with Internet Explorer 3, which was released more than 10 years ago? Sure, there probably are some people out there who are using antiquated browsers. And maybe there are a few others who are testing in multiple versions (just recently, I downloaded IE 3 to see how ridiculous things look in it). But seriously, shouldn't PayPal be looking at stopping the actual attacks and not just old browsers?

Oh well, this is pretty funny. Mental note: Don't attempt to login to PayPal with a WebTV emulator!

I'm not absolutely certain about this, but I think I have a similar basic understanding of Leonardo Da Vinci as your typical educated U.S. citizen. I know he was a brilliant artist during the Renaissance and dabbled a bit in science and engineering endeavors. While " The Science of Leonardo: Inside the Mind of the Great Genius of the Renaissance ," reaffirmed these beliefs, it provided much, much more information that it nearly hard to believe about the great Da Vinci.

The most important thing, in my opinion, is that the man essentially invented the scientific method. This, as you may already know, is the process by which all scientists conduct research in our world. It seems bizarre to even consider that a method could be invented. However, before Da Vinci's time, no one was attempting to study nature and the elements in this manner.

Through the scientific method, Da Vinci made many amazing discoveries ... in fact, way too many for this short article. With the power of artistry, he was able to create detailed anatomical drawings of the human body, sketches of types of water flows and pictures of many trees and plants. His work led to advances in cognitive science, hydraulics and botany many years later.

And this doesn't include his research within the engineering and math (specifically geometry) fields, as well as general urban planning. The man somehow made advances in all of these fields, and of course, had time to whip up the "Mona Lisa."

The sad part in Da Vinci's work is that most of it lie hidden for centuries before being published. Most of what we know today about Da Vinci's studies remained a mystery until the 1700s. It's reasonable to think that if civilization would have known more about his discoveries during his time, or even immediately after his death, we would already be a more advanced civilization than we are today.

This book would appeal to a large group of people, especially history buffs and anyone with affection for science, math and engineering. Basically, people interested in knowledge should be intrigued by the life of Leonardo Da Vinci, history's greatest life-learner.

Ben is an author and web developer who lives in Baltimore. Send comments and suggestions to info@benwoods.com .