Lenin Takes A Bath

And for once I mean that literally. Check this out. Seems they take the "skin sack" - aka Lenin - out of its glass case each year to give him a nice restorative bath in a mixture of formaldehyde, methanol and ethanol. Only surprise in this recipe is that there's no vodka included, but perhaps that's just to try and dissuade the workers from drinking it after the event .....

On the plus side, at least this annual ritual keeps some small set of the proletariat employed and, more importantly, Vladimir Ilyich himself from smelling bad and going green. On the minus side, however, it leaves him looking like Oddjob, sidekick of the villainous Goldfinger of James Bond fame, albeit sans bowler hat.

Think that's really what the architect of the world's first true socialist revolution had in mind for his twilight years? Likely not (Wikipedia says he wanted to be buried next to his mother) but I guess even members of the 100 most influential men in history club don't always get what they asked for!