Painting the Town Red-Orange

For the last 48 years, inhabitants of the Spanish city of Bunyol, near Valencia, have celebrated the end of summer by throwing overripe tomatoes at each other. This year the Bunyolese tossed 164,000 pounds of tomatoes around.

Fishing, the Philosopher’s Occupation

In Seattle there’s a supplier of professional fishing equipment named Oh Well Inc.

First-Class Ghastliness

Yes, this is what the world needs: Eyeball Truffles for Halloween. They’re white chocolate with truffle centers ( gianduia or bittersweet chocolate, mint, praline-peanut), $24 a dozen from Divine Delights, 24 Digital Drive, Suite 10, Novato, Calif. 94949.

One Lump or Two?

If you think tea is for dieters, you haven’t tasted the new Tropicana Fruit Tea. It comes in a bottle; it comes in peach, raspberry or tangerine flavors. And a single serving comes in at 120 calories--that’s 240 calories if you accidentally drink the whole pint bottle--which works out to about 36% more calories per ounce than the average cola. (There are diet teas on the shelves, though, in the 0 to 8 calorie area.)

Vanilla: It’s a Bean, It’s an Orchid

Only 1,500 tons of vanilla beans go on sale a year, so there’s big money in this indispensable spice. Madagascar long produced nearly all the world’s supply, but in recent years its agriculture has been a mess and vanilla production has mostly shifted to Bali and Tahiti. Meanwhile, Mexico is getting into the vanilla game, or rather, back into it; the vanilla orchid has been raised in Mexico since Aztec times, but production was cut down a few decades ago when oil was found in the vanilla-growing area.