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*The Daily News Thread* - a place to post compelling daily news stories
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AWR
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: State of Flux
 
2006-09-18, 10:15

And what if she's out with another guy now, cause her man doesn't have any gear. THAT would be over the line.
  quote
Windswept
On Pacific time
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Moderator's Pub
 
2006-09-18, 10:39

Quote:
"Clearly, in the Chinese case the failure at a very early stage was first psychological. It involved the recipient's wife and raised many questions."
My god.

What a stupid effing bitch.

Just what IS her problem anyway.

She deserves international condemnation. *seethe*



It's clear that *she's* what he should have gotten rid of.
  quote
thegelding
feeling my oats
 
Join Date: May 2004
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2006-09-18, 12:51

and what's up with a 10cm penis...if i'm getting a transplant you know i'm going with the magnum model...10cm? 10 inches at least...and i don't care much at that point if cuffs and collar don't match, i would be quite happy with an ebony avenger

g

crazy is not a rare human condition

everything is food if you chew hard enough
  quote
Sauvblanc
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Mel-Bun!
 
2006-09-18, 16:08

UK mothers deliver junk food to their kids

OK, so the premise is that the UK school system has completely overhauled their food program and are now offering *gasp* healthy foods and have banned kids from going to fish'n'chip joints. The school system asked Jamie Oliver to help them in this process-there was a TV program about this some time ago.

Apparently two (figuratively speaking) deaf and blind and oblivious mothers with rocks in their heads think that the kids aren't given any freedom of choice so they've been bringing in burgers and fries and shit. Completely ignoring all the warning bells that says that the UK is heading for an obesity crisis.

WT fucking F?

Specialists are people who know more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing. Generalists are people who know less and less about more and more until they know nothing about everything. I'm somewhere in the middle.
  quote
Dorian Gray
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Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
 
2006-09-20, 12:35

Straight from the category of "pscates2.0's examples of the unfettered genius of Homo sapiens sapiens" comes this touching story of one man's attempt to out-bite a Panda bear.

From the BBC article:
Mr Zhang was bitten first on his right leg, and then on his left.

Newspaper photographs showed him lying on a hospital bed with blood-soaked bandages over his legs.

"I bit the panda on its back but its fur was too thick," Mr Zhang recalled.
But it bit me first!
  quote
DMBand0026
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Chicago
 
2006-09-20, 12:38



Wow, that's just too good.


I wonder what that guy was thinking as the panda was probably inches away from having its way with him.

"I could kick it...no. I could punch it...no. I'll bite back!"


After reading the article, it's clear that this man would have been better off killed by the "huggable" panda.

Come waste your time with me
  quote
Windswept
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Join Date: May 2004
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2006-09-24, 15:59

Cool, retired, mountain-biking prof missing, probably killed by ex-con handyman.

What a sad story.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...=la-home-local

Quote:
Prof's Disappearance Unsettles a Community

John Finley Scott, 72, who taught sociology at UC Davis and helped make the town a bastion of bicycling, hasn't been seen since early June.

DAVIS, Calif. — The last time friends saw retired UC Davis sociology professor John Finley Scott was nearly four months ago when the 72-year-old bicycle pioneer and resident contrarian tooled away from a local bistro on his beloved two-wheeler.

Scott fired off a few e-mails over the next few days but then went silent. After friends reported him missing, Yolo County sheriff's deputies went to his rural ranch home, where they found blood in the bedroom and foyer but no sign of a body.

Initial investigation has focused on a handyman with a criminal record whom Scott hired to trim trees on his property.
  quote
Windswept
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Join Date: May 2004
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2006-09-24, 20:16

Mystery surrounds deaths of male and female Coast Guard divers under Arctic ice:

http://articles.news.aol.com/news/_a...00010000000001

Quote:
Lt. Jessica Hill and Boatswain's Mate Steven Duque seized the chance for a training dive and slipped into a patch of open water near the Healy's bow. A team held ropes attached to the divers, lest they become disoriented under the ice. Several research scientists watched from the deck.

But no one knows what happened on the other end of those ropes on that cold, brilliant summer day - except that both divers died.

The Coast Guard has started two investigations, relieved the Healy's captain, pulled all diving equipment off the ship and suspended all polar diving. But nothing has been said about what might have killed Hill, 31, and Duque, 22, on Aug. 17, or when the investigations will conclude.

"We can get no word whatsoever, and that's tough," Hill's father, William Hill Jr., said. "We can't even get the death certificates."
  quote
Windswept
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Join Date: May 2004
Location: Moderator's Pub
 
2006-09-25, 14:41

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/TECH/spa....ap/index.html

Iranian woman travels in space.

Quote:
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Dozens of space travel enthusiasts, most of them women, burst into applause at dawn at an observatory near the capital as the spacecraft carrying the first Iranian woman to travel into space appeared in the sky.

Space tourist Anousheh Ansari, who began her journey into space Monday aboard a Soyuz TMA-9 capsule from Baikonur, Kazakhastan, has become an inspiration to women in male-dominated Iran.

Space enthusiasts gathered Saturday at the Zaferanieh Observatory in Tehran were rapt as they followed the progress of the craft, visible to the naked eye for about two minutes, as it streaked across the sky.

"Anousheh is my hope," said teenager Delagah Dadbeh, watching the spacecraft as tears of joy rolled down her cheek.

"She will shine in Iranian history as a woman who broke barriers and succeeded in conquering space with her endeavor," Dadbeh said.

"Ansari has shown Iranian women the road to progress. We only need to believe in ourselves," Dadbeh said, as another woman, Homa Parvaei nodded in agreement.


Ansari, the world's first paying female space tourist left Iran with her family a few years after the 1979 Islamic revolution that toppled the pro-U.S. Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and brought hardline clerics to power. One of the reasons the family left Iran was that the opportunities for a young girl to study science were becoming limited.

Ansari has said she is eager to see Iran from space and hopes to inspire girls in her homeland to study science. Ansari says she has received e-mail messages from many of them.

Iran's state-run media has briefly mentioned Ansari's voyage.

But some hardline media criticized state television for even this, dismissing Ansari as a "wealthy woman."
Of all places this woman could have come from, she comes from Iran!!! . What delicious irony. She gets educated in America, becomes a telecommunications entrepreneur worth millions, and then becomes the first female tourist in history to travel to the stars.

And the leaders of Iran can't even crow about it. What a great story. Must give them knots in their stomachs.
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Windswept
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2006-09-25, 21:39

Brazilian guy pops eyes out of his head.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/...ory?id=2454633

Be sure to click on this link. It's pretty amazing.



Edit: Video clip:

http://journals.aol.com/aolvideo/AOL...ing-talent/441

Last edited by Windswept : 2006-10-22 at 13:43. Reason: Added video clip link.
  quote
Windswept
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2006-09-27, 14:05

Cool video clip about a goose that loves to fly alongside his motorcycle-riding pal.

Edit: Changed link.

http://journals.aol.com/aolvideo/AOL...ated-goose/446

Last edited by Windswept : 2006-10-22 at 13:40. Reason: changed link
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Windswept
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2006-09-30, 14:30

Burglar settles in to do a load of laundry and order a pizza, when suddenly confronted with the returning homeowner.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15074123/

Quote:
BAKERSFIELD, Calif. - A burglar who made himself at home after a break-in overstayed his visit, police said.

Larcellus Angelo Scott, 23, had ordered a pizza and was doing a load of laundry Wednesday when Denise Bealessio returned home from work.

Bealessio, 51, arrived just as the pizza did. She turned the delivery driver away and was met inside the door by Scott.

Scott attacked, but Bealessio was able to escape unharmed. A neighbor called police, who found Scott rummaging through Bealessio's purse. He had written one of Bealessio's checks to pay for the pizza.

He was arrested on suspicion of burglary, robbery and forgery and was being held Friday in Kern County Jail in lieu of $85,000 bail.

Scott used to live next door, Bealessio said.
  quote
hiltond
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Join Date: Aug 2005
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2006-10-22, 06:34

Sports stories don't get a lot of time here so I thought I would post one. Now I know what some of you, cough Carol, are thinking, a sports story in my thread , but this is a good positive story that you just might like.

From SI.com

Quote:
There's this really weird thing happening at Rutgers. People are going to football games. Lots of people. They're wearing red, they're slapping Block R decals on their cars, and they're turning Rutgers Stadium's closed north end into the Northeast's version of the Swamp.

Sure, the part of this story hooking columnists in Minneapolis and Los Angeles is that Rutgers is 5-0. The same school that was 1-11 four years ago and broke a three-year Big East losing streak only two years ago is now ranked 23rd in the nation. But that's not the real shocker.

If you spent any time around Scarlet Knights coach Greg Schiano over the last six years, you kind of knew Rutgers couldn't be horrid forever. The man's sheer force of will is so strong that his wife admits to throwing card games just so he'll let her go to bed. He's incredibly obstinate and totally charming. He cajoled a short-of-money athletic director into trading a planned $3 million expansion for a $13 million as-good-as-any-in-the-SEC football facility, and you knew he'd get at least a few kids like stellar sophomore running back Ray Rice to play for him.

But the wild part of this story, the best part of Rutgers' coming out, is that New Jerseyans are into it.

New Jersey's a funky place. People place their towns as X minutes out of New York or Y miles from Philadelphia. There are three pro football teams, three baseball teams, three hockey teams and three basketball teams within an hour of most anywhere in the state. There are casinos in the south and a couple of racetracks.

Worse, New Jerseyans aren't really into being New Jerseyans. When state senator Richard Codey was acting governor last year, he was sure that holding a contest to come up with a new state slogan was a killer idea. Until the entries started rolling in.

New Jersey: All the corrupt politicians money can buy.
New Jersey: You got a problem with that?
OK that one was submitted by Joe Pesci and was very popular.

Quote:
New Jersey: Don't come. There's no more room.

These days, Codey gets a little thrill every time he hears one of those SportsCenter anchors say, "Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey." He thinks the biggest "handicap" the state has is not having a Division I university with "New Jersey" in it. "People don't know Rutgers is a public school," he said.

When assistant coach Darren Rizzi was recruiting placekicker Jeremy Ito, who is from California, Ito initially asked: "What's Rutgers?"

Rutgers is 240 years old. Its $450 million endowment ranks 112th, smaller than any other major state university. Yet now, "everywhere I go in the state," First Fan Codey said, "people are talking about this team."

Fans packed Rutgers' first two home games. Not once since the Scarlet Knights' inaugural 1869 season had Rutgers sold the place out twice in a single year.

There's never been anything like this out at the state school. There's never been anything so many New Jerseyans can be personally connected to. The backup quarterback's the kid you taught ninth-grade geometry to. The starting quarterback's the kid who mowed your brother's lawn.

"This is a pro area," my editor has said to me, oh, about a hundred times.

"Everyone loves a winner," he says to me now.

After cutting $66 million out of the school's $1.6 billion budget, the first time school president Dick McCormick felt safe smiling publicly was at a pep rally the night before the second home game this season. Not that Schiano's loving it, but even Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis keeps talking up being from New Jersey.

Last Sunday, a month after a New York Times news reporter wrote about how the football program has improved morale at the budget-crunching school, a New York Times sports columnist ripped Schiano for hiring people to monitor his players' class attendance. Hey, they don't rip around here if you're irrelevant.

So it's not like Tony Soprano had to worry about taking any flack when he first started shilling for Schiano's program six years ago. But James Gandolfini, long past his whacking days, was shuffling along the Rutgers Stadium concourse in a Brian Leonard jersey a few weeks ago.

There have been murmurs that renowned chef Mario Batali, another alum, might man a charity concession stand at the Thursday-night Louisville game in November. The Rutgers athletic department tripled its previous fund-raising tally after last year's Insight Bowl appearance, and that $5.8 million record is suddenly looking vulnerable.

Schiano said that would happen one day. He grew up in New Jersey; his first college job was at Rutgers. During coaching stops at Penn State and Miami and with the Chicago Bears, every so often he'd call his old college coach, Joe Susan, another Jersey guy and his current tight ends coach, and say New Jersey deserves better.

After Rutgers opened the season with a win at North Carolina, one of the first things Schiano said was, "New Jersey deserves this."

Rutgers is never going to be to New Jersey what the University of Texas is to Texas. Schiano's never going to get a Boone Pickens to donate $165 million to his program, like the Oklahoma State booster did. Five games does not make a juggernaut.

Still, weird things are happening. People all over the state are wearing Rutgers gear. Codey, a bleeds-blue Seton Hall guy, wore a Rutgers hat golfing the other day. Applications are up.

"It's only the start," Codey said. "Wait till people call me up, 'Hey, Dick, can you get me Rutgers tickets?'"

Now that would really be weird.
This football team really has generation a sense of community in a state that has long suffered from regionalism and a bit of an inferiority complex from being wedged between New York City and Philadelphia. The state's nickname The Garden State comes from Abraham Browning who said
Quote:
our Garden State is an immense barrel, filled with good things and open at both ends, with Pennsylvanians grabbing from one end and New Yorkers from the other.
Browning may or may not have borrowed this imagery from Benjamin Franklin, but this isn't a story about our self-depricating nickname.

People from North Jersey look down on people from South Jersey, South Jerseyans may at times be distrustful of those from the north and both refuse to admit that central Jersey even exists. Now everywhere you go you will here people talk about the football team and they don't mean the Eagles, Jets or Giants. Scarlet hoodies are everywhere. Everybody likes a winner.

We may never like each other, we may never be as revered as our neighbors but we will always have our giant underfunded University which somehow manages to make advances in science, art, education, public policy and, apparently, football. For a school that played in the *sport* opener it feels good to have that last one back.

PS after besting Navy and Pitt, Rutgers is now 7 and 0, go Knights.
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thegeriatric
geri to my friends
 
Join Date: May 2006
Location: Heaven
 
2006-10-22, 07:14

Quote:
Originally Posted by Windswept View Post
Brazilian guy pops eyes out of his head.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/...ory?id=2454633

Be sure to click on this link. It's pretty amazing.
Wow that looks really painful. I would be concerned about possible long term damage though.
  quote
InactionMan
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2006-10-23, 10:22

This bit of oddness is on the front page of the Star. An American judge has sentenced an American teacher to one year in jail for shagging a 15 year old student. The judge also said he could avoid prison if he accepted a three year exile in Canada. The teacher works in the States but lives in Ontario with his Canadian family. I don't really get this one. Although the age on consent in Canada is 14, it doesn't apply if one of the people involved is in a posistion of power or trust (like a freaking teacher!). So this guys shagging habits would've landed him in prison in Canada as well. It's very odd. And it's not like this guy is going to get a job teaching up here.
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Windswept
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Join Date: May 2004
Location: Moderator's Pub
 
2006-10-23, 16:41

He was sentenced to 'one year' in jail?

And basically was given a suspended sentence?

Well, it would definitely be interesting to hear details of how the judge arrived at that decision. Sounds like the parents wanted to end the ordeal quickly and with the least publicity. Perhaps their requests led to the leniency.

Of course Debra LaFave got a similar sentence.





It would seem unfair to give him fourteen years in prison when she got none.

*shrug*
  quote
Windswept
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Join Date: May 2004
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2006-10-23, 17:25

Elk-crossing warning-flashers - help keep drivers and animals safe.

Quote:
An adult elk can weigh up to 600 pounds, and when elk meet with motor vehicles, the results are often fatal for both animal and driver.

"You don't want to hit an elk," says Norris Dodd, a wildlife biologist for the Arizona Game and Fish Department. "A deer will do damage, but an elk can kill you."

So starting next month, the Arizona Game and Fish Department, with help from Electrobraid Fence, a Canadian electronics company, goes online to test infrared cameras that use military-grade, target-acquisition software to identify the presence of wildlife at roadsides.

When the software detects an animal, the system sends a message to a computer that triggers warning signs. The hope is that the signs, which are solar powered, will give drivers time to slow down.
I read elsewhere that a great deal of the money for this project comes from state lottery proceeds, which flow into the education system as well as the Fish and Game Dept. Pretty good use for lottery money, don't you think?

I think a lot of states with abundant wildlife could use a safety system like this.


http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/sto...2599992&page=1
  quote
AWR
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: State of Flux
 
2006-10-25, 02:56

Meth and Nukes seems like a bad combo.

Drug Raid Yields Los Alamos Documents
Wednesday October 25, 2006 7:46 AM

By LARA JAKES JORDAN, AP

WASHINGTON (AP) - A drug bust at a trailer park in New Mexico turned up what appeared to be classified documents taken from the Los Alamos nuclear weapons laboratory, authorities said Tuesday.

Local police found the documents while arresting a man suspected of domestic violence and dealing methamphetamine from his mobile home, said Sgt. Chuck Ney of the Los Alamos, N.M., Municipal Police Department. The documents were discovered during a search of the man's records for evidence of his drug business, Ney said.

Police alerted the FBI to the secret documents, which agents traced back to a woman linked to the drug dealer, officials said. The woman is a contract employee at Los Alamos National Laboratory, according to an FBI official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the case.

The official would not describe the documents except to say that they appeared to contain classified material and were stored on a computer file.

FBI special agent Bill Elwell in Albuquerque, N.M., confirmed that a search warrant was executed on Friday night, but he refused to discuss details.

``We do have an investigation with regard to the matter, but our standard is we do not discuss pending investigations,'' Elwell said.

A spokesman for the Los Alamos National Laboratory, in Los Alamos, N.M., declined to comment.

Los Alamos has a history of high-profile security problems in the past decade, with the most notable the case of nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee. After years of accusations, Lee pleaded guilty in a plea bargain to one count of mishandling nuclear secrets at the lab.

In 2004, the lab was essentially shut down after an inventory showed that two computer disks containing nuclear secrets were missing. A year later the lab concluded that it was just a mistake and the disks never existed.

But the incident highlighted sloppy inventory control and security failures at the nuclear weapons lab. And the Energy Department began moving toward a five-year program to create a so-called diskless environment at Los Alamos to prevent any classified material being carried outside the lab.

Even though Los Alamos is now under new management, Danielle Brian, executive director of the watchdog group Project on Government Oversight, said the lab has not done much to clean up its act.

``Los Alamos has always seemed to be rewarded for its screw-ups,'' Brian said. ``We're waiting with bated breath to see if anything has changed.''

The idea that police found classified documents at a home where a drug sting was being conducted is disturbing, she said.

``The problem is when you actually have those materials that are supposed to be protected inside the lab and you find them outside the lab in the hands of criminals - that should worry everybody,'' Brian said.

The FBI and the U.S. attorney's office in Albuquerque were ``evaluating the information obtained as a result of the search warrant,'' Elwell said.

The federal charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material is a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of a year in prison and up to a $100,000 fine.
  quote
tannenhauser
Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
 
2006-10-25, 16:17

heres one:
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599...5-1702,00.html

and here is another reason why americans need to lay off the snacks:
http://www.abc4.com/local_news/local...7-2EEA839D3D98
  quote
Windswept
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Join Date: May 2004
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2006-10-25, 16:58

Quote:
Originally Posted by tannenhauser View Post
and here is another reason why americans need to lay off the snacks:
http://www.abc4.com/local_news/local...7-2EEA839D3D98
Oh god. That is so... just... ick.

Quote:
Fire officials said the six-hundred pound man was in being cremated when his body fluids were too much for the oven.

The body fluids seeped out onto the floor and ignited causing a fire at the Garner Funeral Home in Salt Lake City.

"Those fluids can be very flammable," said Scott Freitag of the Salt Lake City fire department. "Sort of like a grease fire."

An employee used an extinguisher to put out the fire.
  quote
Wyatt
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Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Near Indianapolis
 
2006-10-25, 17:07

Yeah, it's sick, but it says they'll notify the family to tell them their loved one wasn't harmed. I'm not trying to be an asshole, but how much harm can you do to somebody you're burning anyway?

Twitter: bwyatt | Xbox: @playsbadly | Instagram: @bw317
  quote
Windswept
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2006-10-25, 17:15

Quote:
Originally Posted by fcgriz View Post
Yeah, it's sick, but it says they'll notify the family to tell them their loved one wasn't harmed. I'm not trying to be an asshole, but how much harm can you do to somebody you're burning anyway?
Okay, I'm going to hell, because your comment made me laugh.

I am a very, very, very bad person.

Guess that qualifies me to board that bus that Kickaha's driving.
  quote
thegeriatric
geri to my friends
 
Join Date: May 2006
Location: Heaven
 
2006-10-25, 17:23

Quote:
Originally Posted by Windswept View Post
Okay, I'm going to hell, because your comment made me laugh.

I am a very, very, very bad person.
I don't believe you are bad person. Not from your posts i have read. Therefore i will put in a good word for you with the big feller up here. It should be okay.

I used to be undecided.....But now I'm not so sure.
No trees were harmed in the sending of this message. However, a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
  quote
Wyatt
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Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Near Indianapolis
 
2006-10-25, 17:27

Quote:
Originally Posted by Windswept View Post
Okay, I'm going to hell, because your comment made me laugh.

I am a very, very, very bad person.

Guess that qualifies me to board that bus that Kickaha's driving.
Maybe Kickaha's just leading the caravan and I'm driving another bus now.
  quote
Windswept
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Join Date: May 2004
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2006-11-01, 16:02

Mischief afoot when man breaks into house and licks sleeping woman's toe.

Quote:
Man allegedly licks sleeping woman's toe

Associated Press
Nov. 1, 2006 10:20 AM

STUART, Fla. - A man with mischief afoot entered a home and licked the toe of a sleeping woman over the weekend, police said. The man reportedly licked the woman's left big toe while she was sleeping early Sunday, the Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers reported.

The woman was sleeping next to her husband, who chased the suspect from the house and down the street.

The suspect was wearing a black, hooded sweat shirt, white shorts and white shoes.

http://www.azcentral.com/php-bin/cli...licker-CR.html


She was sleeping next to her husband when the intruder licked her toe? Jeez Louise!!!
  quote
Windswept
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2006-11-28, 20:04

Scientists train bees to sniff out bombs.

Researchers say military could use honeybees in Iraq.

Reuters -
Quote:
Scientists at a U.S. weapons laboratory say they have trained bees to sniff out explosives in a project they say could have far-reaching applications for homeland security and the Iraq war.

Researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico said they trained honeybees to stick out their proboscis — the tube they use to feed on nectar — when they smell explosives in anything from cars and roadside bombs to belts similar to those used by suicide bombers.

By exposing the insects to the odor of explosives followed by a sugar water reward, researchers said they trained bees to recognize substances ranging from dynamite and C-4 plastic explosives to the Howitzer propellant grains used in improvised explosive devices in Iraq.

“When bees detect the presence of explosives, they simply stick their proboscis out,” research scientist Tim Haarmann told Reuters in a telephone interview. “You don’t have to be an expert in animal behavior to understand it as there is no ambiguity.”

The findings followed 18 months of research at the U.S. Energy Department’s Los Alamos facility, the nation’s leading nuclear weapons laboratory.

“We are very excited at the success of our research as it could have far-reaching implications for both defense and homeland security,” Haarmann said.

Haarmann said the bees could be carried in hand-held detectors the size of a shoe box, and could be used to sniff out explosives in airports, roadside security checks, or even placed in robot bomb disposal equipment.

“It would be great to start saving some lives with this,” he said.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15938954/
  quote
Sauvblanc
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Mel-Bun!
 
2006-12-07, 03:07

Lighting matches on an airplane?

OK, so I'm not really sure how to feel about this article. Apparently a woman who was embarassed by her flatulence odors-caused by some kind of medical problem-lit some matches while a plane was in flight to try to mask the smell. Alerted to the smell of burning sulfur, the pilot made an emergency landing, passengers get searched, dogs go through plane, the whole nine yards.

The woman eventually 'fessed up after a while, but not before the passengers were thoroughly inconvenienced.

On the one hand I feel sorry for someone who is so embarassed by her body odors that she needs to resort to such extreme measures even if it's a medical condition. But when it gets to a point that you start to see everything unravelling-that the plane is making an emergency landing etc-wouldn't you eventually say something before it went too far? Even if it's just discreetly to a flight attendant to inform the captain? The captain can make a more informed decision either way.

I know it's not that simple, and the woman probably panicked and wasn't able to think rationally-my comments are strictly in hindsight. At least the media had the sense to save the woman from further embarassment by not naming her, AFAICT.

That said, however, I once spent 10 hours on a packed plane sitting directly behind a guy who was farting every couple of minutes and releasing the most noxious odors. Smelled like something had crawled up his ass, died, and was decomposing. I get exposed to some pretty strong smells at work, but this was...ugh...I had to tuck my nose into my shirt to try to minimize exposure. Under those circumstances, I'd have happily lit some matches on the plane.

Specialists are people who know more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing. Generalists are people who know less and less about more and more until they know nothing about everything. I'm somewhere in the middle.
  quote
AWR
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: State of Flux
 
2006-12-07, 04:42

More TVs than people? I must admit that when friends tell me their kids have TVs in their bedrooms I cringe.

Meanwhile: My days are numbered
Rick Moranis
International Herald Tribune
December 5, 2006

The average American home now has more television sets than people
... according to Nielsen Media Research. There are 2.73 TV sets in
the typical home and 2.55 people, the researchers said. - The
Associated Press, Sept. 21.

I have two kids. Both are away at college.

I have five television sets. I have three DVD players, two VHS
machines and four stereos.

I have 19 remote controls, mostly in one drawer.

I have three computers, four printers and two non-working faxes.

I have three phone lines, three cell phones and two answering
machines.

I have no messages.

I have 46 cookbooks.

I have 68 takeout menus from four restaurants.

I have 116 soy sauce packets.

I have 382 dishes, bowls, cups, saucers, mugs and glasses.

I eat over the sink.

I have five sinks, two with a view.

I try to keep a positive view.

I have two refrigerators.

It's very hard to count ice cubes.

I have 39 pairs of golf, tennis, squash, running, walking, hiking,
casual and formal shoes, ice skates and rollerblades.

I'm wearing slippers.

I read three dailies, four weeklies, five monthlies and no annual
reports.

I have 506 CD, cassette, vinyl and eight-track recordings.

I listen to the same radio station all day.

I have 26 sets of linen for four regular, three foldout and two
inflatable beds.

I don't like having houseguests.

I have 184,000 frequent flier miles on six airlines, three of which
no longer exist.

I have "101 Dalmatians" on tape.

I have 14 digital clocks flashing relatively similar times.

I have nine armchairs from which I can be critical.

I have a laundry list of things that need cleaning.

I have lost more than 1,000 golf balls.

I am missing 37 umbrellas.

I have over 400 yards of dental floss.

I have a lot of time on my hands.
  quote
Windswept
On Pacific time
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Moderator's Pub
 
2006-12-07, 05:15

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sauvblanc View Post
But when it gets to a point that you start to see everything unravelling-that the plane is making an emergency landing etc-wouldn't you eventually say something before it went too far? Even if it's just discreetly to a flight attendant to inform the captain? The captain can make a more informed decision either way.
Well, I think it's entirely possible that the passengers as a group *weren't* informed by the crew or pilot of the exact nature of the concern. I doubt if the pilot would make an announcement that "we have reports of the smell of burning" to a planeload of people. Some passengers might panic and make the situation worse. So perhaps the woman never really knew that it was 'her' actions that had started the security concerns.

Quote:
That said, however, I once spent 10 hours on a packed plane sitting directly behind a guy who was farting every couple of minutes and releasing the most noxious odors. Smelled like something had crawled up his ass, died, and was decomposing. I get exposed to some pretty strong smells at work, but this was...ugh...I had to tuck my nose into my shirt to try to minimize exposure. Under those circumstances, I'd have happily lit some matches on the plane.


I hope you will forgive me for laughing at your desperate plight, but I can't help picturing you sitting there with your nose tucked into your clothes. The fact that it was for a full TEN HOURS raises this dilemma into the realm of tragi-comedy, or comi-tragedy, whatever those might mean.
  quote
Windswept
On Pacific time
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Moderator's Pub
 
2006-12-07, 05:43

AWR, that was a great article - and all so very true.

I think it's funny how people save those damned soy sauce packets. I have some now that I've *tried* to throw away, but found myself stopped by the thought that throwing them away would be 'wasting' something useful.

Know what I mean?

Quote:
I have 19 remote controls, mostly in one drawer.
Oh, *such* a mistake to put all those remotes together. How in the *world* are you ever going to figure out 'which' remotes go to 'which' machine. Brand names, yeah, but still...

Quote:
and two non-working faxes.

Quote:
I eat over the sink.

I have five sinks, two with a view.



Quote:
I have 506 CD, cassette, vinyl and eight-track recordings.

I listen to the same radio station all day.
Bet he listens to National Public Radio.

Quote:
I have 184,000 frequent flier miles on six airlines, three of which
no longer exist.

I have 14 digital clocks flashing relatively similar times.
His whole list makes me smile. Thanks for posting this.
  quote
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