You wouldn't know it under our cloudy summer night sky, but there is a huge meteor shower going on right above our heads this month; so stare into cyberspace at www.hubble.stsci.edu for a good gander at all things Patrick Moore. Launched as a cyber-branch of the Hubble Telescope Project, the site hosts a stunning array of out-of-this-world photographs, including black holes, galaxies, star clusters, cosmic silhouettes and the odd 1,000mph storm on Saturn. With its easy-to-understand science-speak the site explains away the most complex intergalactic phenomena under headlines such as "young stars found in cosmic dance" or "star tears neighbourhood apart", banners more at home in the Sun (or should that be the Star).

Of course, if you want to know how the Hubble, or telescopes in general, work, log on to http://howstuffworks.com, to find out, courtesy of resident expert Marshall Brain (yes, it is his real name), how anything from telescopes to lavatories, or from WD40 to MP3s, work. With more than 1m visitors a month, it is a stellar offering.

Anyone wanting to buy a telescope factory should visit www.businessesforsale.com, a site featuring thousands of firms for sale right across the globe; be it a fish'n'chippie in Lincolnshire (£22,500) or a sparkling wine factory in Hungary ($2.5m). If that doesn't whet your appetite there's always a floating prison ship for 450 inmates, moored in Hawaii ($7.5m), a private university in California ($798,400) or a zoo in Cape Town: offers, please.

Once you buy your dream business, you will have to leave work, which means you will have to find out how much cash your colleagues will put in the envelope. Go to www.collectioncalculator.com to see just how much you should put in a colleague's envelope. Answer "yes" or "no" to hard-hitting questions such as: whether or not they ever bought you a pint; if they earn more than you; if they know your name; if they groped you at a Christmas party; and whether you liked it. The calculator will then suggest a fitting contribution.