U2′s epic 360 tour is finally coming to an end tomorrow, June 30th, in Canada. Billboard.biz has already released their estimates for a final tally for gross and attendance. The final gross is estimated at just over $736,137,000. An extraordinary gross no matter how you look at it. The tour also broke attendance records with a total attendance estimated at 7.2 million people in 110 shows.

The U2 360 tour dates were expanded an additional 7 dates allowing them to cement the status of the tour as the highest earning ever. The expanded dates were possible due to the re-scheduling of last year’s tour dates because of Bono’s emergency back surgery.

The groundbreaking tour used a unique in-the-round stage set-up which allowed up to 25% more tickets to be sold at each venue thanks to increased capacity. The average ticket price is estimated at about or near $100.

The tour started in Spain in 2009, making it’s way around the world, including places that U2 had never played before, like Moscow, Russia.

The only major region not played by U2 was Asia, with no shows scheduled in Japan or any other Asian countries. No word on why U2 skipped Japan, but logistics must have certainly played a part.

U2 360 Tour Stage

The revolutionary 360 stage featured a 400,000+ pixel video screen which featured high definition images of the band, intermingled with graphics and other video. Video packages were used from political figures including Aung San Suu Kyi and Desmond Tutu were featured between songs. Later in the tour, Astronaut Mark Kelly made a video to be used at nearly all of the final leg’s shows, featuring him reciting lyrics from David Bowie’s Space Oddity and also lyrics from U2′s own Beautiful Day. Mark Kelly is the husband of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot in the head earlier in the year at an event for her constituents. Giffords has said that U2′s Beautiful Day is her favorite song.

The U2 360 stage itself was almost sparse, but featured a rotating drum kit, and moving walkways. The center stage was encircled by a circular walkway that allowed the band to get close to the audience. Several thousand general admission ticket holders were treated to an intimate experience at each show, with the band being close in front of them and at times behind them when using the circular walkway. The band also sold tickets to areas on the side of the stage and circular walkway, called RedZones, which went up for auction with the proceeds going to Product (Red) which donates their proceeds to the Global Fund. The Global Fund fights malaria, tuberculosis and other preventable diseases all over the world.

The U2 360 screen would expand at one point in the show, becoming almost a honeycomb that engulfed the band.

U2 360 Tour Opening Acts

Opening acts on the tour included Snow Patrol, Kaiser Chiefs, Glasvegas, Damien Dempsey, Republic Of Loose, Bell X1, The Script, The Hours, Elbow, Muse, Black Eyed Peas, Kasabian, Razorlight, One Republic, Aviv Geffen, Interpol, Jay-Z, Springbok Nude Girls, Amadou & Mariam, The Fray, Lenny Kravitz, Florence and the Machine, Carney and Arcade Fire.

U2 360 Tour Set List

With the tour nearly done, there are several sites to check out for U2 360 tour set lists. We recommend U2gigs.com and U2tours.com. These two sites also include fan submitted reviews. Setlist.fm is also a good resource for setlists.

U2 360 Tour Reviews

Reviews of the U2 360 tour have been nearly universally excellent, saying the band achieved the impossible by creating a sense of intimacy in massive stadiums. In addition, many described their experience to be nearly religious or communal. Of criticisms leveled at the tour, the most common seem to be related to a lack of intimacy and sub-par sound for those seated in the upper decks. Some also criticized the over-the-top nature of the show and lights.

Celebrities at U2 360 Tour

At nearly every show, celebrities and political figures from the local area and worldwide came to the show. In Miami, basketball star Lebron James and Gloria Estefan were present. In Nashville, many contemporary Christian music artists attended. In Las Vegas, President Bill Clinton and Paris Hilton attended. In Seattle, members of Pearl Jam were there. In Anaheim, Maria Shriver and celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay attended.

The Coast Guard is set to rescue about 15 people who had been marooned on a small island in the Pacific. The rescuers hope to travel back to the island to pick up the castaways at daylight on Saturday.

The castaways include 9 adults and 6 children from 4-59 years of age, apparently hailing from an island called Chuuk in Micronesia, they were on their way to Ruo Island on an outing.

The castaways were boating on Tuesday when their 28 foot vessel struck a reef, overturning it. A 3 day search was initiated over an area of nearly 20,000 square miles. The castaways were spotted on Friday near Murilo Atoll, holding hands to form a SOS on the beach.

The Murillo Atoll is located in the Hall Islands group, a tiny area of islands, atolls and sandbars that is located about 70 miles from Micronesia, where the boat set sail from.

The family apparently had set up shelters and were using a solar powered radio to get news of the Coast Guard search.

A beloved craft beer from New Zealand has inspired the latest American supercar. Called the Shelby Tuatara, the supercar, based on a totally new design, is designed by Shelby Supercars. The company is based in the USA.

The car is a sleek, slim, almost flat appearing supercar. The maker of the car says it will be the fastest car in the world. Rumors are that the car will be able to reach top speeds of 275 miles per hour. The current fastest car is the Bugatti Veyron Super Sport from Italy, apparently measured at a top speed of 268 miles per hour.

Previously, the Italian motorcycle maker Bimota had one of their fastest motorcycles named Tuatara, so Shelby is not the first automaker to use the name.

The beer Tuatara is famous for using high quality ingredients. The beer that the car is named after, and that is sought after by beer lovers the world over, is a Bohemian Pilsner made of yeast, hops, malt and pure water. The company says they make beer in the tradition of Bavarian beermakers since the 1500′s.

The company also makes a Belgian ale and will also be releasing a new barley wine flavored with licorice soon, also Belgian. The company is based in Wellington, New Zealand and enjoys a cult following around the world. Their beers are available in grocery stores around New Zealand, as well as gourmet stores and import stores globally.

The Tuatara Supercar will feature wheels made of carbon fiber, a 7 speed manual transmission and a 7 liter V8 engine.

Like rainbows? Well you just might enjoy moonbows too. Moonbows are rainbows that appear only at night, usually near waterfalls and only in places where there isn’t any artificial light, ie., you won’t find them in big cities or small towns.

No, you need to visit some waterfalls at night, and probably the most spectacular waterfall in the U.S. is the one at Yosemite Park in California.

Yosemite is the hot spot for viewing moonbows with people flocking there from all over the state and all over the country for photographic opportunities.

With tonight, July 15th 2011, being a full moon, Yosemite is expecting crowds just for moonbow viewing.

Moonbows are especially prevalent on spring and summer nights during a full moon, of course, the sky needs to be clear.

The much stronger than normal snowmelt runoff from the abundant snowpack is producing some of the best conditions for moonbows in years.

While conditions have to be just right for moonbows to appear, people are still flocking to the park to see if they can see these mysterious rainbows for themselves.

Google Maps has just made available numerous street view galleries of popular tourist attractions around Japan. The company sent more than their usual street view camera cars to the attractions, instead sending an actual camera crew to film the spots instead.

Popular tourist attractions now available on Google Maps include Unesco World Heritage attractions, notable stadiums, the Hiroshima area, popular parks, Japanese gardens, castles and palaces, universities, landmarks and scenic areas.

For example, the Tokyo Gallery includes sites like Senso-ji Temple, the Asakusa Shrine and Nezu Shrine, as well as areas in Sumida, Zojoji, Yushima Tenmangu and Shibamata.

People can virtually walk around the sites, even zooming in and out to see architectural details in more detail. The faces of other tourists are blurred out, presumably for privacy purposes. In one shrine, you can even see bald monks in their golden robes walking around the site.

It’s the next best thing to being there, or not. Rather, consider traveling to the country to help support tourism related businesses who are struggling mightily thanks to the March 11th earthquake and tsunami. Japanese tourism officials say travel by foreign tourists plummeted more than 60% in the months after the quake, with many tourists afraid of possible radiation contamination.

E-reader market share is booming, thanks to lower prices and increasing availability of titles available for the devices. This is not good news for tablet makers, as e-readers market share has now surpassed tablets like the iPad and Xoom.

In fact, ownership of  popular e-readers like the Kindle and Nook has doubled in just the last 6 months. It is now estimated that around 6-12 percent pf American adults owns an e-reader device.

Tablets are still doing well and their adoption has grown at a slower but still steady pace than e-reader devices. Notably, a significant number of people who own an e-reader, also own a tablet.

The Amazon Kindle is by far the #1 e-reader device on the market, with the Kindle becoming Amazon’s #1 selling product over the last year. With a lowering of prices and the availability of an advertising supported version at a lower cost, the Kindle looks to remain on top of the e-reader market.

That’s not to say that tablets are going anywhere, in fact, Apple and Android app markets are bursting with e-book and e-readings applications to allow people with these devices to take advantage of reading on their device. On an iOS device, for example, readers can download many free ebooks and can also choose from many options for reading, such as reading white text on a black screen, something that is not available on the Kindle device.

The Nook Color is also making a strong run at Kindle, with a major advantage being their device is available in color, so people can read their magazines or illustrated books as they were originally intended.

The Kindle ad-supported option is one strong reason for the increasing e-reader adoption. The Kindle with Special Offers version is available for just $114 in the wi-fi model, a significant price drop when compared with the Kindle’s original price points. The Kindle with Special Offers version places advertising on the home page of the device, but does not interfere with e-reading. Many people are choosing to buy this version.

In addition, Kindle adoption has been helped by the Kindle Direct Publishing platform, which allows any fledgling author to very easily publish their book. While the KDP ease of use has led to some spam and copyright violations, it has also led to the availability of many thousands of books that would otherwise be unavailable, whether at your local book store or library. Also, due to the ease of publishing and lack of a middleman, authors are using the platform to make a name for themselves, offering their books for a few dollars, 99 cents or even free.

That leads me to the last advantage of the Kindle, and that is the availability of tens of thousands of e-books for free. Whether you want to have all of Emily Dickinson’s works, the Art of War, the latest vampire fiction or mystery bestseller, they will all fit on your Kindle, at the same time. No more carrying around those bulky, heavy paperbacks, which is making the Kindle a must-have for vacations and trips, and just about everyone else who reads.

If you look at the Kindle bestsellers list, it’s easy to see that the romance genre is enjoying quite the renaissance these days. From contemporary romance to fantasy romance to gay romance to historical romance to paranormal romance, even erotic romance and erotica. The Kindle bestsellers list, bot the free and paid list, is loaded with romantic fiction titles.

Classical romances including love story books and Jane Austen titles are also quite popular. With summer heating up, it’s clear that readers are stocking up on romance novels of all types.

Recency romance is a particularly popular genre at the moment, however, most popular, by far are the paranormal, fantasy and vampire romance genres. Sparked by the Twilight phenomenon, many who have already read the Twilight series multiple times, are looking for something new to satisfy their romantic vampire craving. Many authors are eager to fill these readers desires, with a slew of vampire and werewolf romance and fantasy novels released in time for summer. Most are from lesser known authors, even first-time authors who are taking advantage of the ease of publishing allowed to them by the Kindle platform. Many romance novels are available for as little as 99 cents.

Classical romances are also filling up Kindle’s, with the advantage to them being that they are mostly available for free.

As usual, murder mystery novels and something called the cozy mystery novel are also lighting up the bestseller charts, with no shortage of mystery and crime based novels on the bestseller list. Novels featuring female sleuths are extremely popular, with Janet Evanovich enjoying the top spot for her latest in the Stephanie Plum series.

No doubt that the summer of 2011 will be the summer of e-reading, thanks to the massive popularity of e-readers like the iPad, Kindle and Nook. You might even see a few people by the pool with that old standby, the paper book.

People enjoying the outdoors this summer have something new to worry about, babesiosis. Babesiosis, like lyme disease, is contracted from a deer tick bite and presents itself with malaria like symptoms, most saying they experience flu-like symptoms. The extent of the symptoms range from mild to moderate, and can include chills, sweating, appetite loss, joint pain, muscle pain and fever.

Babesiosis is becoming prevalent in the northeastern United States and the upper mid-western states. Particularly being hit are suburban areas to the north of New York City. The illness has also been seen in Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and in areas of Long Island. Over 1000 cases have been reported.

Current treatments for babesiosis includes antibiotics and the malaria drug quinine.

While some will contract the illness and never experience any symptoms or after effects, babesiosis is potentially fatal for people who have weaker immune systems, including children, the elderly, diabetics and people with any type of disease that compromises their immune system, including chemotherapy patients, AIDS patients and people without a spleen.

Experts say that, for those that present with symptoms of the illness, and are hospitalized, it is fatal in 1 of 20 people. The illness can drag on for days, or last for months in some people.

The parasite called babesea microti is responsible for the illness, and when contracted, it begins to destroy red blood cells.

The parasite can be transmitted through the blood and there is the possibility that it can be spread through blood transfusions, as there is no screening method yet available.

Experts say, to prevent infection, it is best to take steps to minimize the possibility of a tick bite. When outdoors, use of tick repellents, constant checking of your body for ticks and when a tick is present, careful removal of the tick. Simply staying away from areas where deer may have been is also a smart idea.

Today is National Chocolate Eclair Day. The famous French pastry was invented in France around 1900.

Eclairs are defined as a long pastry made of pâte à choux, a pastry dough which fluffs up when baked, creating a hollow center, perfect for filling in with a pastry cream, typically a rich vanilla cream. It is also typically topped with a chocolate glaze. The dough used for eclairs is also used to make profiteroles, another famous French pastry.

Other types of filling include coffee or chocolate flavored cream, fruit, nuts or chestnut puree. Caramel glazing is also sometimes used instead of chocolate.

The first time an eclair recipe appeared in a published cookbook was in the mid-1880′s, in a cookbook from the Boston Cooking School.

In French, eclair means “flash of lightning” or “lightning”. It is assumed that the French gave this name to the little dessert because the glaze, often chocolate, placed on the top shined and glistened.

Eclairs have always been a popular dessert pastry and can be seen in pastry shop windows all over the world. Eclairs are especially popular choices for Las Vegas buffets, as they hold up well on the buffet line and make for a great presentation. In addition, they can be made in large batches.

Many historians of food claim that French chef Antonin Careme was the first to make éclairs.

Learn how to make chocolate eclairs with the video below:

Wild unicorns are making a comeback, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The organization said that the Arabian Oryx, sometimes known as the wild unicorn, and considered be the animal that inspired the legend of the unicorn, now numbers over 1000 animals roaming in Arabian deserts.

The comeback of the Arabian Oryx is thanks to the success of a captive breeding program which began in the early 1980′s in Oman.

The last wild Oryx was shot by poachers and was extinct in the wild until the breeding program started releasing animals back into the wild from it’s breeding program.

The Oryx now roams countries including Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Jordan.

The Oryx is a type of antelope and boasts two long horns rising from it’s head and is a mystical figure for many Arab poets and artists. The Oryx is famous for being able to sniff out a water source from miles away. It also has hooves that are well adapted to walking on the hot, unstable sand that inhabits their roaming grounds. They typically roam in herds of 8-10 animals.

Though the Oryx is believed to be the inspiration for the unicorn legend, there exists another antelope species, called the Saola, which is also through to be a possible inspiration. The Saola lives is found in Southeast Asian countries.