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Sept 1 WORLD LOBSTER EATING CHAMPIONSHIP: Kennebunkport, ME. This is an International Federation of Competitive Eating sanctioned event. Need more? click here

Sept 2 WORLD AIR GUITAR CHAMPIONSHIPS: Oulu, Finland. Contestants from around the world compete for the championship title.

Sept 3rd Do it yourself Country Song Generator

Sept 5th MOBILE PHONE THROWING WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP: Savonlinna, Finland.

Sept 6th TEDDIES 2004: London, England.Teddy bear collectors from around the world attend this Expo which includes modern and antique bears.

Sept 7th PERSON OF THE YEAR AWARD: Los Angeles, CA. The Latin Recording Academy honors Carlos Santana with its Person of the Year Awards.

Sept 8th WORLD BOG SNORKELING CHAMPIONSHIP: Llanwrtyd Wells, Wales. Competitors have to snorkel 60 yards in a peat bog.

Sept 9th Retailers Eye Your Cell Phone-Imagine this: You walk into an electrontic store, and your cell phone starts buzzing. A quick look, and you see a special discount on toner for your HP ink jet, but only if you buy right now. You need toner, but the price is still a bit high. You SMS back that you'll buy four if the price drops another 10 percent. Sold. You pick up your toner, flash the register as you walk by — which automatically processes your credit card, and out you go. This little scenario is a lot closer than you might think! Our retail technology editor has uncovered a fascinating new system that's just about ready to be installed.

Sept 10th Europe Travel Tips
A journey of a thousand miles begins these days not so much with a single step as with an idle thought along the lines of, “I wonder what Estonia is like, anyway?” This tidy site provides overviews of 49 European countries, including photos, tips on when to visit

Sept 13th Superfund Information Systems
Good news: The Hot Site editor's home office has not been declared a Superfund site. (Possibly that's an oversight, but roll with us here.) But you'd be astonished by how many thousands of hazardous-waste sites there are around the country, including right in your own neighborhood.

Sept 14th The Shoe Project
Some women love shoes, and we’d suggest that shoes love certain women too – specifically, the women who always seem to be able to find the most flattering, gorgeous pairs around.

Sept 15th Narrative Film Styles
Plenty of people like to talk about how well movie actors do their jobs (often with absolutely no idea of what they’re talking about, or confusing Actor X’s talent with the little crush they’ve got on him/her).

Sept 16th typoGenerator
Yesterday’s Comic Sans haters can soothe their fevered brows with this addictive little Flash site, which will convert any text you give it into a typographically gorgeous but practically unreadable image.

Sept 17th Hepster’s Dictionary
Cab Calloway: Cooler than you. Dead since 1994. Still cooler than you. This dichty site republishes his 1944 guide to the language of jive. No clambake here, and not corny even at 60 (translation: it, too, is cooler than you)

Sept 20th CyberHymnal
A resource of astonishing depth, this site collects over 4,800 Christian hymns and gospel songs, representing many denominations and traditions. You’ll get goodies such as words and music here (and the music in both scored and MIDI forms – listenable MIDI, even!)

Sept 21st Stadiums of the NFL
No one’s claiming that football stadiums are as revered as baseball stadiums – the football community not being generally prone to that kind of nostalgia – but this charming site makes a fine case for looking both back and forward at gridiron environs.

Sept 22nd MLB.com

Sept 23rd Kong is King
Lord of the Rings fans will understand why today is a very good day to tell you all about Peter Jackson’s next movie, King Kong, even though his remake of the fabled flick isn’t due in theaters until next year.

Sept 24th PCWorld: Keep It Simple
No matter how new and relatively pristine your PC is, we're willing to bet you could nudge it into even better fighting trim. This excellent set of articles from October's issue of PC World has tons of tips that'll knock the clutter your machine from startup to shutdown.

Sept 27th Now in its eleventh year, k9design.com invites you to its canine-captivating, people-pleasing custom product line. Your search will take you from personalized dog bandanas (BowWows) to our plush dog line (Stuffed Dogs)and to our personalized apparel and gifts for dogs and the people they love.

Sept 28th SPACESHIP ONE X-PRIZE ATTEMPT: Mojave Desert, CA. Scaled Composites' spacecraft "SpaceShipOne" is scheduled to make its attempt at the X-prize. Spacecraft successfully launched in June, now it will attempt to win the X-prize by performing two successful missions within two weeks to win the $10 million dollar prize. <http://www.scaled.com/projects/tierone/> and <http://www.xprize.org/home.php>

Sept 30th Hurricane Names
As you probably know, really big hurricanes have their names retired, on the theory that no one really wants to know if, say, an Andrew is even nastier when he’s Andy Jr. But how do they get their monikers in the first place? This FEMA sites for kids lists names slated for possible use in both the Atlantic and Pacific regions, and gives a full list (not counting the Class of 2004, yet) of those storms that have had their figurative jerseys retired.

OCT 1 woot!
It’s an online shop, but it only sells one product each day: Woot may be the oddest site we bookmark this week. The item – always electronic or gadgety in nature – changes every 24 hours and often is associated with some sort of discount.

Oct 4th Earthquakes: U.S. Geological Service
As most of you know, the Pacific Northwest’s Mount St. Helens is currently suffering a serious case of urp.