Gunning for promotion, rugby players to eat each other, couple report stolen pot to police, how not to open a bag of cash, and grannies - go mad

Sadly no news this week on whether plumbers are as keen on golf as black cab drivers, but considering I seem to be the only person I know who doesn't either consume music like air and write music reviews and suchlike (no really, I seem to be the only one), I feel doubtful about the following "... New Black" statement that "jive is the new jazz". I'm thinking of looking for a poll of what is the new rock'n'roll. I reckon that rock'n'roll is the new rock'n'roll. I'm willing to put money on it.

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"This was the first advanced gun and was constructed by Geir. It is made by assembling several Mauly clips and a thick rubberband and has tremendous firepower. With a regular pencil as projectile it can penetrate thick cardboard and empty soda cans. Never point this gun at anyone!"



"This gun is not practical for random battles, but more of a gun for the determined assassin. This gun IS dangerous!"

I have built this gun (with admittedly larger Maulys for greater stopping power) and can confirm that it is possible to put a ballpoint through most things softer than a can. I don't have the full power laccy bands, however... probably a good thing.

Mom Pleads Guilty to Hosting Sex Parties

AP

Dateline: Golden, Colo. - A woman who told police she wanted to be a "cool mom" pleaded guilty to sexual assault charges Monday for having sex with high school boys at parties where authorities said she supplied drugs and alcohol.

Silvia Johnson, 40, pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts of sexual assault and nine felony counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. As part of a plea agreement, prosecutors dropped two counts of distribution of methamphetamine.

"She described herself as a `cool mom,'" Detective R.J. Vander Veen wrote in the affidavit. He said Johnson told investigators "she was never popular with classmates in high school and now began `feeling like one of the group.'"

Prosecutors did not recommend a sentence, but each sexual assault count carries up to two years in prison, and each count of contributing to the delinquency of a minor carries up to six years, district attorney's spokeswoman Pam Russell said.

Johnson, who is free on bail, held parties for the boys almost weekly between October 2003 and October 2004, authorities said. She was accused of providing drugs and alcohol to eight boys and having sex with five of them.

Police said the investigation began after one of the boys told his mother about the encounters, and she reported it to authorities. (:/)

Martin Apologises For Jerusalem Message

ContactMusic.com

Ricky Martin has issued an apology, after he donned a traditional Arab kaffiyeh headscarf with the slogan "Jerusalem Is Ours" written in Arabic on it.

The LIVIN' LA VIDA LOCA singer was in Jordan yesterday (25JUL05), where he attended the silver jubilee of the Arab Children's Congress, which was set up 25 years ago by the country's QUEEN NOUR to promote creativity, peace, cross-cultural understanding and tolerance.

And at one point while posing for photographs with fans, he draped the kaffiyeh over his shoulders, without being able to understand the statement it carried.

Martin says in a statement, "I had no idea that the kaffiyeh scarf presented to me contained language referring to Jerusalem, and I apologise to anyone who might think I was endorsing its message.

"My role is entirely humanitarian, and I will continue to promote the elimination of stereotyping anyone - be they from Latin America, the Middle East, or anywhere across the globe."

Late yesterday, Martin travelled to Thailand where his organisation, the Ricky Martin Foundation, has built 225 homes to protect children orphaned by 26 December's (04) Indian Ocean tsunami. (:/)

Victim in trouble after reporting stolen pot

KENS 5 Eyewitness News

He was the victim of a home invasion, but he's the one who's in trouble with the law this morning.

That's because of the marijuana that the robbery suspects were after last night in the 3900 block of Fredericksburg Road.

Police say the victim and his girlfriend waited 30 to 40 minutes before calling police about their stolen pot.

According to police, the invaders knocked on the front door. When the victim opened it, they pulled a gun and started demanding the marijuana.

When the girlfriend returned, she found the victim tied up in the bedroom.

"When our officers first arrived here, they weren't cooperative in the beginning," said SAPD Sgt. Curtis Coolidge. " We didn't even get the basic description until about 15 or 20 minutes here at the scene to get the victim to cooperate with the investigation."

Police say they have a vague description of the robbers, who are described as three Hispanic males, 18 to 20 years old. The trio will face aggravated robbery charges.

As for the young couple, no one was injured, but police believe that possession of marijuana charges are very likely. (:/)

Erm, yeah.

Britons fear dognapping spate - survey

Reuters

London - More than a third of British dog owners are worried their pet will be stolen while one in 20 who have lost their four-legged friend think they were victims of thieves, according to a survey Wednesday.

Almost half of owners have now had their dog fitted with a microchip because of fears that thieves will strike, the research by Direct Line insurance found.

Fears may have been inflamed by the recent high-profile disappearances of singer Engelbert Humperdinck's German Shepherd puppy and actress Liz Hurley's black Labrador.

"There have been a few cases of dognapping reported recently and this type of crime appears to be on the increase," said Chris Price of Direct Line Pet Insurance.

The survey found that dog owners are prepared to offer an average rewards of more than 450 pounds to get their stolen dog back while almost four percent said they would hire a private detective. (:/)

Attentive TAR readers (there are other kinds?? Surely not) will recall several stories in the past about people 'seeing' 'images' related to their pet religion in everyday places and objects, such as under flyovers and in fruit and so forth. This definitely takes the biscuit for now, however...

Pilgrims flock to image of Jesus on Bosnian tree

Reuters

Sarajevo - Christians are flocking to a northwestern Bosnian town to view an image of Jesus Christ that allegedly appeared in a section of a cut tree branch two days ago, Bosnian media reported on Friday.

The image resembling Jesus' face cannot be seen from a close distance but only from a few metres away. The branch in the town of Bijeljina was cut about a year ago, said Oslobodjenje daily.

Sceptics have dismissed the image as a freak of nature, but pilgrims have been streaming to the tree, kneeling before it to pray, lighting candles, leaving money and cutting off bark to take home.

The region's Serb Orthodox bishop Vasilije visited the site and said church officials would discuss the phenomenon and advise believers how to behave. He appealed to visitors not to destroy the tree and not to leave money at the site. (:/)

Unless, of course, you want to know about thousands more sightings of 'our lord'... doo-weeep!

Visions of Jesus Christ

A car crash of a different kind...

Ananova

Dateline: Santiago, Chile - A newly opened restaurant called Car Crash had to close down - after a car crashed into the building.

The car lost control in wet weather and smashed into the entrace of the restaurant in Santiago.

Owner Nancy Araya says she named the restaurant Car Crash because the area was an accident blackspot.

She told Las Ultimas Noticias: "It is unbelievable, it is black humour that a car crashes into Car Crash. The restaurant is now a joke."

Nobody was hurt in the accident. The restaurant is expected to reopen within a week. (:/)

Celebrity skin

Cruise tops 'celebrity meltdown' poll

Stuff.co.nz

Tom Cruise has been judged to have had the wildest celebrity meltdown in a new American poll.

Cruise's antics on the Oprah Winfrey show, on which he jumped up and down on a sofa and declared his love for his new girlfriend, Katie Holmes, has been judged the "Wildest Celebrity Meltdown" by American TV Guide readers.

Cruise beat Mariah Carey's MTV breakdown, Michael Jackson's baby-dangling incident, Whitney Houston's startling drug admissions and Farrah Fawcett's spaced out interview on David Letterman's chat show to claim the top spot.

The top 5 Celebrity Meltdown Moments judged by US TV Guide readers are:

1. Tom Cruise loses control on The Oprah Winfrey Show (2005). Tom, when questioned by Oprah about his new relationship, jumped up and down on his couch, got down on one knee and repeatedly pumped his fist before declaring his love for Katie Holmes.

2. Michael Jackson dangles his baby from a hotel balcony in Berlin (2002). Screaming fans waiting outside Jackson's hotel window were astonished to see the popstar bring his baby son out to the balcony, then briefly dangle him over the edge. The incident drew worldwide condemnation.

3. Farrah Fawcett's "space out" on David Letterman's The Late Show (1997). Upon entering the stage, Farrah required Letterman's help to sit down, repeatedly lost her train of thought and became entranced by the fake skyline behind Letterman's desk. She was supposed to be promoting her new Playboy pictorial.

4. Mariah Carey's impromptu appearance on MTV's Total Request Live show (2001). Mariah appeared unnanounced on TRL, attempted to strip while wearing only a T-shirt and gave out ice cream to the audience. Citing mental exhaustion, she checked herself into a hospital just a week later.

5. Whitney Houston's "crack is whack" speech (2002). During an interview with Diane Sawyer in which she appeared withdrawn and extremely thin, Whitney Houston had this to say about her drug use: "First of all, let's get one thing straight. Crack is cheap. I make too much money to ever smoke crack. Let's get that straight. Okay? We don't do crack. We don't do that. Crack is whack." (:/)

In the grand tradition of I Want To Do That, Too! that saw a man releasing snakes into his bank, a Serb goes that one step further. Give it up for...

Tax office terror

Reuters

Dateline: Belgrade - After twice receiving a tax bill, an enraged Serb stormed the tax office, started shooting and tried to set the tax chief and the building on fire, Serb media reported on Friday.

Nebojsa Miladinovic, a saw-mill owner in his fifties, tried for days to convince tax officials in the central town of Gornji Milanovac he had paid his 192,200 dinar (1,576 pound) bill. They said he had not, sent the bill again and blocked his bank account.

After arguing his case on Thursday, Miladinovic returned, doused tax chief Gojko Stefanovic and the office files with petrol, shot at computers and yelled "I was ripped off".

Two people were injured in the melee and parts of the office caught fire, with panicked staff escaping through the windows.

Police arrested Miladinovic, who neighbours described as a hard worker who never made trouble. Witnesses said he even paid for parking his car in front of the tax office before the rampage. (:/)

Sport

If you can add two and two, you can make the connection between Ricky Williams's behaviour, and what he claims to have given up...

RB apologizes to fans, teammates after first practice

AP

Ricky Williams lines up in the Dolphins backfield as new coach Nick Saban watches.

Ricky Williams: "There's no way anyone could understand me. ... I have friends that I've known my whole life that don't understand me. I mean, I just started to understand myself."

Dateline: Davie, Fla. -- With an apology to fans and teammates, running back Ricky Williams returned from retirement and joined the Miami Dolphins for their first training camp practice Monday.

Lining up for his first play since the 2003 season, Williams took a handoff from Gus Frerotte and ran 20 yards to the end zone. But there was no defense on the field, and Williams is sure to meet stiffer resistance in the weeks to come as he tries to regain favor and reclaim a starting job.

At a team meeting Sunday after players reported for camp, Williams spoke briefly and apologized for the impact caused by his retirement a year ago. The Dolphins went on to finish 4-12, their worst season since the 1960s.

Williams reiterated his comments at a news conference after the first practice.

"There were things about life that I wanted to explore outside of football, and I had never had the chance," he said. "I realize by making that decision, I affected the team in a negative way and upset a lot of fans. I'm very regretful that people were hurt in the process of me doing that. I do realize that to a lot of people it comes off as being very selfish. So I do offer an apology to all the people who were negatively impacted."

Williams said he no longer smokes marijuana but declined to discuss the subject further. He faces a four-game suspension at the start of the season for violating the NFL substance abuse policy. (:/)

Now they want to eat each other

RugbyHeaven

Dateline: Cape Town - The Wallabies are eating humble pie again after another embarrassing revelation on their disastrous tour of South Africa.



The Australians had a bonding session this week in which players were asked which teammate they would eat if their plane crashed.

News of this latest gaffe appeared in the Cape Times newspaper, which led its front page on Thursday with a bizarre account of the team meeting at a cocktail bar where players were asked how they would survive if stranded in the middle of nowhere after a plane crash.

The report said the players were presented with "The Alive Scenario - who to cook?", an exercise based on the Uruguayan club rugby team whose plane crashed in the Andes in 1972. Several players ate dead teammates' bodies to survive, inspiring the 1993 film Alive.

At the meeting on Tuesday night, players were asked to nominate a teammate to be "sacrificed in the name of culinary delights". The Cape Times said the Wallabies "left their questionnaires lying on the tables at the restaurant".

The instructions included: "You must nominate a player for each dish and how you would prepare them. Ways to present them include on a spit, marinated, skewered, boiled, in dumplings etc. Be creative."

It seems Matt Dunning was popular with teammates, several of whom put the tight-head prop on their menu. Lote Tuqiri reportedly wanted to prepare him for starters in a sweet and sour sauce, while George Gregan said Dunning would be part of his main dish of "sweet pork, slowly roasted". Tuqiri was keen on Morgan Turinui for dessert, explaining: "The amount of sweets he puts in, it's got to rub off in his meat somewhere."

The report said five-eighth Stephen Larkham would like Drew Mitchell's testicles for dessert. Chris Whitaker's starter was Rocky Elsom's private parts "fried in butter, garlic, chilli and parsley".

Wallabies team management said the questionnaire wasn't meant for public consumption, but it has created further humiliation on this tour from hell.

Coach Eddie Jones laughed off the incident on Thursday.

"It was a bit of fun," he said. "The guys had a backs and forwards dinner ... they were at a restaurant eating.

"Apparently, the previous week when we split up into smaller groups, one of the convers- ations was just this fun topic. "We asked for the papers, which were left behind to be given back, and the restaurant wouldn't give them back. So it's pretty disappointing it has gone into the local newspapers because it's just an internal thing revolving around a bit of fun. No harm intended."

Thursday's Cape Argus, with the headline "Wallaby Tour Woes Get Worse", devoted nearly its entire back page to listing the misdemeanours of Australian players in recent seasons - including ACT's Cape Town taxi affair in 2000; Mat Rogers's altercation outside a Edinburgh nightclub; Justin Harrison's racial slurs; Cameron Shepherd being described as a disgrace by a magistrate for attacking a parked car; and the player survey that revealed widely held concerns about peers' alcohol and gambling habits.

The report also highlighted the management cover-up of why halfback Matt Henjak had become the first Wallaby in almost 40 years to be sent home in disgrace after an incident at a Cape Town nightclub last week, where he threw a drink and then had an argument with teammate Tuqiri.

On the front page of the Argus, a strapline read: "Wallabies In Turmoil." The paper wrote that "in recent years the image of Australian rugby has been tarnished by controversies". Other South African media have complained the Wallabies are "uncooperative".

Local journalists also targeted Jones during Thursday's media conference, where he admitted management had probably taken the wrong approach to public relations since the team arrived in Cape Town two weeks ago.

"We've taken an approach on this tour to really focus on ourselves," Jones said. "On other tours we've been very open, and that's our normal policy. We understand we have got very strong commitments and responsibility to make sure that we help promote the game of rugby. We've probably been a little selfish on this tour but certainly it's not going to be the normal policy."

Jones partly won over the home media by offering them another Nelson Mandela story. He suggested that in the Tri Nations opener in Pretoria on Saturday, the Springboks might struggle without Mandela in the main grandstand.

"It was interesting how the Springboks used their meeting with Mr Mandela [in the previous Test in Johannesburg]," he said. "We went back from the pre-match warm-up and couldn't get in our dressing room for about three or four minutes because Mr Mandela was being presented with a Springbok cap.

"So they used that situation to their advantage, and that's the advantage of being the home side."

Asked why the Wallabies "didn't barge through the Springboks", Jones said: "Mr Mandela is 87 years old. So I didn't think it would be a good idea.

"Maybe we might do the same thing when we play them in Perth, by standing outside the dressing room after the warm-up and present John Howard with George's [Gregan] jumper. I heard Bob Carr has just resigned, so maybe he'll do it." (:/)

Sprinter's plaque spells shame for council

The Scotsman

IT was supposed to be the Capital's chance to honour one of its most famous sportsmen.

Olympic champion Allan Wells was to be given a hero's welcome when he returned to his birthplace to be honoured by city and sporting leaders as one of Edinburgh's only gold medallists.

But the city chiefs' pride in their famous son soon turned to embarrassment when Wells unveiled the plaque to mark his success - only to reveal two glaring errors.

Not only was Wells' first name misspelt as Alan, but the word "achievement" was written as "achivement".



The sign, commissioned by Edinburgh City Council and Scottishathletics and placed in the foyer of Meadowbank Stadium, was taken down after the ceremony amid profuse apologies and much embarrassment.

Edinburgh City Council today said the engraver, whose identity they refused to reveal, had taken full responsibility for the mistake and the plaque is now to be replaced.

Deputy Lord Provost Steve Cardownie, who was at the event, admitted that the misspellings were a "bloomer" and said he was embarrassed.

But Wells, who unveiled the plaque yesterday - 25 years to the day that he won his gold medal in the 100m in the Moscow Olympics - was unperturbed by the blunder, laughing it off.

Councillor Tom Ponton said that there was no excuse for such an "obvious and outrageous" mistake. He said: "A proof always comes back for approval when something is engraved or printed and this must have happened in this case.

"The person who approved it must be held accountable. It is a bad show. If they took the trouble to honour somebody, then they should have got their name right." (:/)

Right, bugger the sport - we're off to Amish country!

Amish Teen Charged With Stealing Numbers

AP

Dateline: Huntsburg, Ohio - Callers complaining about loud music coming from a buggy led deputies to charge a 19-year-old Amish man with stealing house numbers and flower pots. David Byler was charged with theft and underage consumption of alcohol, both misdemeanors.Callers to the Geauga County sheriff's office told dispatchers early Sunday about a buggy playing loud music and stealing items from outside houses in a rural area of northeast Ohio.

"When our officer caught up with him in the middle of the road, there were flower pots and house numbers in the buggy," sheriff's spokesman John Hiscox said. (:/)

Weird.

Swearing parrot banned

AFP

A FOUL-mouthed parrot previously owned by a lorry driver has been banished from public areas in a British animal sanctuary after repeatedly embarrassing his keepers.



Barney, a five-year-old Macaw, is now kept indoors at Warwickshire Animal Sanctuary in Nuneaton, central England, when outsiders visit after abusing dignitaries with swearword-littered insults.

"He's told a lady mayoress to f--- off and he told a lady vicar: 'And you can f--- off as well'," sanctuary worker Stacey Clark said.

Nor did the forces of law and order escape, she added.

"Two policemen came to have a look at the centre. He told them: 'And you can f--- off you two w---ers'."

Clark said sanctuary workers believed Barney either picked up the phrases from television or was taught them by his previous owner, a lorry driver who emigrated to Spain.

Advertisement:
"He does say 'Hello, big boy' and 'Thank you' when you give him a biscuit," she added.

"But it's mainly naughty words and always to the wrong people. We're trying to teach him not to swear. Macaws are very intelligent birds." (:/)

"Fowl-mouthed", surely??

SCITECH

Rap Marketing Comes to Nerdcore

Wired

Tupac and Biggie, move over. A new hip-hop feud is brewing that glamorizes not guns and 'hos but Java and secure encryption algorithms.

While gangsta rap is seen as celebrating the violence and aggression that claimed two of its brightest stars, "geeksta" rap is a hip-hop genre celebrating coding skills and school grades.

Also dubbed "nerdcore," this branch of hip-hop is for geeks, by geeks. Geeksta rappers adopt the same combative verbal-assault stylings of their forerunners, but bust rhymes about elite script compiling and dope machine code.

The term was first coined in 2000 by nerdy New York rapper MC Frontalot in a track of the same name. Nerdcore now refers to artists waxing lyrical about topics as disparate as engineering and Lord of the Rings.

In recent months, the field has seen a growing number of releases from computer science labs, where egocentric grad students show off their Ph.D. credentials in tracks like "Have to Code" and "End of File."

"The stigma that was once attached to computer geeks and role-playing nerds is diminishing incredibly fast," said "digital gangster" Bryce Case Jr., aka ytcracker. "It has almost become trendy to have skills on a computer. Rather than guns and 'hos, I speak about DDOS attacks and camgirls."

The self-proclaimed "#1 greatest computer science gangsta rapper ever" is MC Plus+, a geeksta leading light whose moniker comes from the C++ programming language.

The Purdue University, Indiana, Ph.D. candidate and "CS pimp," whose album Algorhythms was recorded with pirated software, calls himself "the Tupac of the computer science world."

MC Plus+ rattles off lines like: "I'm encrypting shit like every single day; sending it across a network in a safe way; protecting messages to make my pay; if you hack me you're guilty under DMCA."

But Plus+'s flow is dissed on the opposite coast by geeksta peers like Dan Maynes-Aminzade, aka Monzy, a 25-year-old Minnesota-born Stanford grad student who recorded a dis track specifically to insult his rap rival.

"Our raps are filled with braggadocio, but instead of boasting about our bitches, blunts, Benzes or Benjamins, maybe we talk about our math skills or the efficiency of our code," Monzy said.

Monzy said competition between universities and academic departments is nothing new, and rivalries are a big part of the hip-hop tradition.

Plus+, who writes most of his rhymes in class, said he is about to release an insult track written in response to the Monzy's opening salvo.

"I saw two of my favorite rappers, Tupac and Biggie, get killed for no reason," he said. "But it's like this, man -- when you're at the top, there is jealousy and, needless to say, haters are coming at you. I'm gonna tell Monzy: 'You ain't even on my level' -- you got to know me and only me."

The aggression also mirrors 1998's war of words between LL Cool J and Canibus, a computer science major and tech-centric rhymester who fabricated a feud to generate publicity, according to Journal of Hip-Hop editor Andrew Ryan, who teaches both computers and hip-hop culture at George Mason University, Virginia.

"Computer scientists, by training, use divide and conquer in almost any task," said Ryan. "Rap music, with all its complexities, provides (them with) the perfect conundrum.

"I don't think this new subculture will really stick, though," Ryan added. "If the genre is to succeed, you're going to need some females." (:/)

The Arts

Bottle of water artwork stolen, presumed drunk

AFP

London - An artist appealed for the return of an artwork that consisted of a bottle of water on a plinth, saying he feared it had been stolen and then drunk.

US artist Wayne Hill, had devised the artwork, a two-litre (3.5-pint) clear plastic bottle filled with melted ice from the Antarctic, to highlight the dangers of global warming.

Entitled "Weapon of Mass Destruction" it was on show at an arts festival in Devon, southwest England.

"It looked like an ordinary bottle of water, but it was on a plinth, labelled, described and in the programme of the whole festival," Hill said.

"It was very, very clear what it was -- a work of art."

The purpose of the piece was to bring people in direct contact with the rapidly-diminishing West Antarctic ice sheet, the artist said.

"The concept is to take something as dangerous as that and to bring it immediately into somebody's presence," he said.

"Nobody has any idea what has happened to it. It was there and then it was gone," he added. (:/)

Criminal Negligence

Escaped convict thumbs lift back to Israeli jail

AFP

Jerusalem - An escaped Israeli convict experienced firsthand the perils of hitchhiking after he thumbed a lift only to be picked up by a prison warden who drove him straight back to jail.

"I didn't recognise him at first but when he leant over to ask which direction we were heading, I saw he was the prisoner we had been looking for for nine months," the officer told reporters on Sunday.

"I whispered to one of my friends that he was an escaped prisoner. After he sat down and shut the door, I called the police," added the off-duty warden who had been out day-tripping with friends to the beach.

Last week, police tried to re-arrest the escaped jailbird as he laid low at his mother's house in Tiberias, before he dodged the cops and ran off.

The prisoner, who is serving a nine-year sentence for assault and drug trafficking, had given his jailers the slip nine months ago after being granted a few hours' parole. (:/)

Go, Granny, Go!

'Raging Grannies'

AP

Dateline: Tucson, Ariz. - Five older women known as the "Tucson Raging Grannies" pleaded innocent Monday to misdemeanor trespassing charges lodged when they tried to enlist at a military recruitment center.

A judge set an Aug. 19 pretrial hearing for the women, who range from 55 to 81 years old - decades older than the maximum allowable age for recruits.

The women are "pretty thoroughly anti-war; we're concerned about the environment and what's happening to civil liberties," said Patricia Birnie, a spokeswoman for the group.

Birnie was with the women when they entered a recruiting center on July 13, but was not cited.

She said two recruiters told the group not to enter, but the women said they had come to enlist, read a statement and sang two protest songs. By the time they returned to the sidewalk outside, police had arrived.

The Raging Grannies have protested outside the recruitment center on Wednesdays for the past three years, and contend that recruits have been lied to, Birnie said.

The women were serious about enlisting, she added. "We feel that our lives are pretty well used up and that the young people so many times are killed in battle or come home traumatized," she said. (:/)

Tasered Mo. Grandmother Gets Probation

AP

Dateline: Kansas City, Mo. - A 67-year-old grandmother who was shocked with a Taser stun gun after she honked her car horn at a police cruiser has been given a year's probation for sparking a quarrel with officers.

A charge of improper use of the horn against Louise Jones was dismissed Wednesday in Kansas City Municipal Court. Her husband, Fred, 76, who became involved in the fray last year, also got one year of probation for the same charges — resisting arrest and attempting to inflict injury on an officer.

The only condition of the probation is that the couple obey all laws.

The incident, which resulted in a change in department policy and the disciplining of two officers, happened in June 2004 as police were responding to a disturbance call across the street from the couple's home. Officers said they approached Louise Jones after she honked her horn, thinking she had reported the disturbance or perhaps was in trouble. A defense witness testified the honk was accidental.

"She immediately became hostile to us," Officer Ryan VanDeusen testified. He said that she continued the verbal assault when the officers returned to their squad car.

"It was very loudy, it was antagonistic, it was very derogatory toward my partner and I," he testified.

Officer Cory LeMoine said he told Jones he could give her a ticket for honking the horn, and that a physical confrontation began after she wouldn't show him her driver's license. He said he and his partner struggled with Jones both inside and outside her house. The officers said that while VanDeusen was trying to handcuff her, Fred Jones came down the stairs and leveled his shoulder into him.

VanDeusen said he used the Taser on Louise Jones when his partner couldn't get her under control.

The Jones disputed the officers' account. Louise Jones and other defense witnesses said she wasn't confrontational and that the comments she made were directed to a friend, not to the officers.

"She says something to the neighbor across the street and the officer didn't like that," said defense attorney Basil North. "He decided he was going to teach her a lesson."

Louise Jones said she pulled away from the police when one of the officers grabbed her arm, and her husband said one of the officers had his knee on his wife's chest.

Municipal Judge Marcia K. Walsh told the couple they should fulfill their sentence easily, pointing out that Fred Jones' criminal history was perfect except for a traffic ticket.

"Your record is even better," she told Louise Jones. "You don't even have a ticket."

The couple's attorney said they plan to appeal the decision. North moved for dismissal of the horn-honking charges on grounds that the ordinance involved was worded vaguely, and the prosecutor agreed to drop it. (:/)

Get some. Not sure what AP's got with grannies this week, though.

Man Stabbed During Fight With Wife

AP

(or, Man's argument with wife escalates to "just get the sword, bitch." Hilarity ensues - Fark.com's headline)

Dateline: Jacksonville, Fla. - When taunting over the death of a dog escalated into an argument, a woman said her husband dared her to take a decorative sword above the fireplace to settle things, a police report said.

That resulted in John A. Kurceba, 53, being stabbed Monday though his right bicep and into his right side. His injuries were not life-threatening, authorities said.

Priscilla L. Kurceba, 52, was charged with aggravated domestic battery and booked into the Duval County Jail. She was freed on bond, but no information was available bond amount. Records do not show if she has legal representation.

According to a police report, Priscilla Kurceba told officers her husband taunted her when he came home about 7:30 p.m. and learned the family dog had been euthanized earlier in the day.

As the argument escalated, John Kurceba told her to "just get the sword bitch," she told police. She lunged at her husband and stuck him.

The couple is getting a divorce, authorities said. (:/)

The words "No" and "Shit" do spring to mind...

Brie Fly

Christmas comes but twice a year, Santas decree

AFP

Dateline: Copenhagen - Some 80 Santas from around the world, backed by their elves, have agreed to establish a second Christmas in July to ease their heavy workload each December, their spokeswoman said.

"At the special request of the Japanese Santa Claus, the congress decided to approve two Christmases, one on July 24-25 for the southern hemisphere and another one on December 24-25 for the northern hemisphere," spokeswoman Tina Baungaard told AFP Wednesday.

The decision was approved at their 42nd annual convention in Denmark by Santas from Canada, Europe, Japan and the United States who have been meeting since Monday at the world's oldest theme park, Bakken, north of Copenhagen.

"The Santa Clauses and other Father Christmases are too stressed with too much work to do at the end of the year," since they up until now have had to travel around the entire world in a race against the clock to deliver all their presents in time, Baungaard said.

"They're exhausted, so they agreed to a proposal from the Japanese Santa Claus which greatly improves their working conditions," she said.

On Wednesday, the Santas and their little helpers handed out gifts to delighted children at Bakken, after holding a parade in the streets of Copenhagen Tuesday.

The Santas have been meeting in Denmark every summer since 1963.

One noticeable absentee, however, is the Finnish Santa, who has boycotted the event for years over his refusal to acknowledge that the one true Santa is the one from Greenland, who lives in a secret location. (:/)

From the Metro Pulse, Knoxville:

Mark Nuckols, a business student at Dartmouth, has begun selling a tofu-like food, Hufu, that is flavored to resemble what he believes is the taste of human flesh. His target audience is those who already enjoy cooking with tofu, as well as any actual cannibals who might settle for artificiality in order to avoid legal problems and logistical hassles. Nuckols said he has never tasted human flesh but based his recipe on cannibals’ reported descriptions of the flavor.

In April, according to a New York Times story, when a Japanese art collector sought to choose between Sotheby’s and Christie’s auction houses to handle a sale (which ultimately brought in $17.8 million) and quixotically asked the two houses to play rock-paper-scissors for the privilege, Sotheby’s lost out on the eventual $2.3 million commission by choosing paper. (A Christie’s executive quoted one of his 11-year-old daughters: “Everybody knows you always start with scissors.”)

Coke's Calorie-Burning Enviga Slated for 2006 Debut

ADWEEK

Dateline: New York - Coca-Cola is planning to launch Enviga, a soda that is said to burn 50 to 100 calories just by drinking a 12-oz. serving, next year, per one executive.

Enviga, a green tea-based, caffeinated, carbonated drink, is in clinical testing and is said to speed up the user's metabolism. The beverage will target active lifestyle consumers. A Coke rep said, "Some [of our projects] may find their way to market and some may not." Studies have shown that drinking green tea may promote weight loss by stimulating the body to burn calories.

My. Arse.

Supermarket cash box sends 19 to hospital

Birmingham Post

Nineteen people were treated in hospital after a cash-box security device was accidentally activated inside a supermarket yesterday.

Warwickshire Police said the casualties suffered temporary breathing difficulties and eye irritation after the device spewed out a cloud of purple dye inside an office at the Morrisons store in Alcester Road, Stratford upon Avon.

Emergency services were alerted shortly after 11.30am and the supermarket was evacuated. A police spokesman said: "It's believed that a security device on a cash-box accidentally activated, causing a cloud of purple dye to be discharged into the accounts department office, where staff were working.

"It is unclear why the security device activated but police are not investigating any crime or treating the incident as suspicious."

Nineteen people - thought to be staff members - suffered temporary breathing difficulties and eye irritation and were taken by ambulance for precautionary treatment at hospitals in Warwick and Redditch. (:/)

Hahahaha.

And Finally

Carburetor breast fantasy wins bad writing contest

Reuters

Dateline: Los Angeles - A Microsoft analyst has won an annual contest celebrating bad writing by comparing fixing carburetors to fondling a woman's breasts.

"As he stared at her ample bosom, he daydreamed of the dual Stromberg carburetors in his vintage Triumph Spitfire, highly functional yet pleasingly formed, perched prominently on top of the intake manifold, aching for experienced hands, the small knurled caps of the oil dampeners begging to be inspected and adjusted as described in chapter seven of the shop manual," went Dan McKay's winning entry in the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest.

McKay, 43, of North Dakota was said by organizers on Thursday to be visiting China "perhaps to escape notoriety for his dubious literary achievement." He wins $250 (142 pounds).

The California San Jose State University contest challenges entrants to submit bad opening sentences to imaginary novels and has attracted entries from around the world for 23 years.

It was inspired by 19th century novelist Edward George Earl Bulwer-Lytton, who opened his 1830 novel "Paul Clifford" with the now immortal words, "It was a dark and stormy night."

San Jose State English Professor Scott Rice said that judging the contest "is a hoot."

"By and large the entries are submitted by serious readers who have a notion about what is good and bad writing. That is what is heartening," Rice said.

In a contest that now has several sub categories, the winner in the children's literature section was sent in by Shelby Leung of New South Wales, Australia.

"The woods were all a-twitter with rumors that the Seven Dwarves were planning a live reunion after their attempted solo careers had dismally sputtered into Z-list oblivion and it was all just a matter of meeting a ten-page list of outlandish demands (including 700-threadcount Egyptian cotton bedsheets, lots of white lilies and a separate trailer for the magic talking mirror) to get the Princess Formerly Known As Snow White on board." (:/)

Indeed. Send your dreadful beginnings to thepitcanary@hotmail.com

Until next time...

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Scotty fails to change laws of physics, cabbies DO play golf, tales of the Naked Tickler, how to keep the wife indoors, and more really dumb crims

Last weekend I found myself in a sunny garden in South London, seated amidst a group of people I felt happily obliged to entertain, in the only way I know. This means, of course, making some kind of spurious statement like "Cabbies play golf. Loads of cabbies play golf. That's why you can't find a cabbie in afternoon - they're all off playing golf." There was, as I recall, reference also to plumbers, and a tentative correlation between plumbers, cabbies and golf. I can't remember it exactly.

However, the scoffing at my statement that a huge number of cabbies play golf was almost too much to bear. Also linked to this was a classic Rupert moment where I mouthed off about statistics and statisticians, only to have the lady sitting next to me turn round and say "Actually, I'm a statistician." Cold sweat. Gaping mouth. Thankfully, she agreed with me.

Nonetheless, I stated I'd prove myself right and everyone else wrong. How I was going to do this I hadn't formulated at the time, but determination doesn’t need focus, it just needs doggedness and a sense of pride constantly wounded by failure. Actually that's just me.

The Office of National Statistics didn't know. "You've asked a question we don't have an answer for!" said a press officer returning my call, a gleeful timbre to his voice. "Ah," I say. "But in this report it says you do correlate employment to sport/leisure activity..."

"Ah!" says the man from the ONS. "Yes, but we just find out whether someone's employed."

"So," I say, stroking my chin, "there's no way you might be looking into this in the future?" His maniacal cackle told me everything I needed to know. Actually, the ONS staffers have really got that maniacal cackle down, now. Impressive stuff. They were just beginning to give it serious work when I was phoning them up a few years back about how many people were now officially Jedi knights...

Next stop, TheLondonTaxi.co.uk and John Paul Pace.

"After a bit of research it works out around 30% of Black cab drivers are dedicated golfers playing 3 or more times per week. About 20% watch and play once a week mainly at weekends."

Thank you, John Paul and, I think, London Taxi Media and Marketing Consultants. Thanks also to the statistician, Antoinette Carey, for confirming that half of black cab drivers do, indeed, play golf at least once a week according to those numbers.

Now all I have to do is prove that plumbers moonlight as cabbies while the cabbies play golf...

So long, Scotty

Mind you, we should have known he'd go first - he's wearing red! S'obvious!

Dateline: Los Angeles, California -- James Doohan, the burly chief engineer of the Starship Enterprise in the original "Star Trek" TV series and motion pictures who responded to the apocryphal command "Beam me up, Scotty," died early Wednesday. He was 85.

Doohan died at 5:30 a.m. (1330 GMT) at his Redmond, Washington, home with his wife of 28 years, Wende, at his side, Los Angeles agent and longtime friend Steve Stevens said. The cause of death was pneumonia and Alzheimer's disease, he said.

The Canadian-born Doohan fought in World War II and was wounded during the D-Day invasion, according to the StarTrek.com Web site. He was enjoying a busy career as a character actor when he auditioned for a role as an engineer in a new space adventure on NBC in 1966. A master of dialects from his early years in radio, he tried seven different accents.

"The producers asked me which one I preferred," Doohan recalled 30 years later. "I believed the Scot voice was the most commanding. So I told them, 'If this character is going to be an engineer, you'd better make him a Scotsman.' "

The series, which starred William Shatner as Capt. James T. Kirk and Leonard Nimoy as the enigmatic Mr. Spock, attracted an enthusiastic following of science fiction fans, especially among teenagers and children, but not enough ratings power. NBC canceled it after three seasons.

When the series ended in 1969, Doohan found himself typecast as Montgomery Scott, the canny engineer with a burr in his voice. In 1973, he complained to his dentist, who advised him: "Jimmy, you're going to be Scotty long after you're dead. If I were you, I'd go with the flow."

"I took his advice," said Doohan, "and since then everything's been just lovely." (:/)

A great man. For more on his astounding wartime exploits, and to read him slagging off William Shatner, visit CNN and check out, of course, StarTrek.com's obit .

Chicago Man Steals Squad Car To Get To Work
Caught When He Stopped To Help Someone

CBS

Dateline: Chicago - A West Side man says he needed to get to work, and he made a decision that he'll probably regret.

Now Miguel Espinosa is in jail for stealing a marked Chicago police squad car.

Detectives say the 38-year-old Espinosa noticed the squad car outside a restaurant on North Western Avenue Thursday night.

The officer had left the keys in it while he went inside to eat. So Espinosa stole it and drove to work at the Whole Food Bakery House.

The suspect stopped to help someone who flagged him down Friday morning. That's when police nabbed him.

Espinosa is in jail on $350,000 bond. (:/)

Fire Captain Uses Fire Truck to Water Lawn

AP

Dateline: Kokomo, Ind. - A city fire captain has gotten in trouble for mixing work with his home life.

Capt. Kevin Shaffer must repay the department $120 for using a fire truck to water his yard. He also was reprimanded and must pay 35 cents per gallon for the water he used, officials said.

Shaffer and other firefighters were training recently on the south end of town, after which Shaffer wanted to purge the truck's tank.

Instead of dumping the water down on the street or down a drain as is normal procedure, Shaffer put the water on his lawn in the city 50 miles north of Indianapolis, Deputy Chief Pat Donoghue said Tuesday.

"We consider that a misuse of fire department equipment," Donoghue said. "He said he didn't want to waste it. If he didn't want to waste it, he could have watered the department's lawn." (:/)

Mugged Twice in 5 Minutes

AP

Dateline: Kailua-Kona, Hawaii
A tourist from Connecticut reported he was mugged twice within five minutes while walking Alii Drive, Big Island police said.

Derrick Schull, 50, was walking south on the oceanside-street at 3:25 a.m. Wednesday when a dark-colored sport utility vehicle pulled alongside him. Three men in their 30s got out, forced Schull to give up his wallet and drove away, police said.
advertisement

Five minutes later, Schull reported that four males, including two juveniles, emerged from some bushes and demanded his wallet. When he told them he had no wallet, two of them started punching and kicking him, police said.

Schull suffered minor injuries and refused medical attention. (:/)

Just where IS Magnum P.I. when you need him?

Woman barricaded in home

TownTalk.com

An Alexandria woman couldn’t get out of her house Thursday -- because her husband nailed the windows shut and put a dead bolt on the outside of the door, city police allege.

James Anderson also canceled his wife’s cell phone service so that she couldn’t call anyone for help, the victim told officers.

A caller, who did not provide any personal information, reported the woman trapped in her house.

The Alexandria Fire Department was able to get into the house and free the victim. She told officers that her husband “locks her inside every night when he leaves for work,” police reports state. Police did not say how long it had been going on or why.

The victim went to a relative’s home.

Officers called Anderson to his 7th Street house, telling him that his house was no longer secure. The 50-year-old was taken into custody when he arrived at the house. Anderson was booked in the Rapides Parish Jail on a charge of false imprisonment. (:/)

Councillor who wanted to marry Clinton’s daughter

East Africa Standard

As Former US President Bill Clinton makes his first visit the country, one man will be hoping for a man-to-man talk with him.

Councillor Godwin Kipkemoi Chepkurgor, who wanted to marry Chelsea Clinton (below).
Godwin Kipkemoi Chepkurgor, a nominated councillor in Nakuru, says he has some social business with Clinton that started in 2000, but of which the former American President has no clue. He seeks the former president’s only child’s hand in marriage.

In 2000 when Chelsea, her father and mother, now Senator Hilary Rodham Clinton, visited East Africa, Chepkurgor, then a Fourth Year student at Moi University, tried to make his intention clear. He wrote to Clinton, offering himself as a suitor for Chelsea.

He offered to pay 20 head of beef cattle and 40 goats to the Clintons in accordance to African traditions. He also named as his referees, then President Moi, Maendeleo Ya Wanawake chairman Zipporah Kittony and the Chepkoilel Campus Principal, Prof Margaret Kamar. He also gave the names his two college mates, John Tanui and Joseph Siror.

He sent the letter through then Foreign Affairs minister Dr Bonaya Godana and then US Ambassador to Kenya Johnny Carson.

But, instead of the positive response he was anticipating, Chepkurgor received visitors from the National Security Intelligence Service (NSIS). His letter had sent security chiefs in a spin.

It had been intercepted by the Foreign Affairs ministry and intelligence chiefs and he was summoned to a meeting with Godana.

National Security Intelligence Service officers began background checks on him both at his Kisanana village in Mogotio and at the university. They interrogated his family, villagers, university colleagues and lecturers.

Chepkurgor says he chose Moi as a referee because he was the chancellor of the public universities and the patron of his former school, Kabarak High School. And the president was his neighbour at home.

Kittony, he said, would represent the womenfolk since she headed the country’s leading movement for women and that his MP William Morogo (Mogotio) was married to Kittony’s sister-in-law Lenah.

Prof Kamar, the wife of then Minister for Trade and Industry Nicholas Biwott, was his principal at the university. Biwott’s Keiyo South constituency neighbours his.

So why did he write to the most powerful president in the world then?

Chepkurgor says he could not circumvent the security and diplomatic red tape to meet Clinton.

"I could not even meet Johnny Carson so I wrote the letter," he says.

In the letter, Chepkurgor praised Clinton’s leadership style, the Monica Lewinsky scandal notwithstanding. He commended Hillary for standing by her husband "like an African woman" in the face of the scandal. He told Clinton to consider retiring to Africa. (:/)

Mag offers free brothel session

Ananova

A German magazine sold out in a day after offering readers vouchers for a free sex session at a brothel in Austria.

Readers of the Freizeit Magazine said they were shocked when they opened the mag to find a full page advert for a brothel in Salzburg.

Prostitution is legal in both countries and the ad promised "half an hour free sex with a lady of your choice" for anyone who cut out the coupon and brought it with them on their next visit.

Local woman Vera Hahnen, who regularly buys the lifestyle magazine to find out what's going on at the weekends, said: "I was appalled by the advert.

"The magazine is supposed to be about leisure and entertainment activities, but I don't find paying women to have sex with them particularly entertaining. The advert is indecent and sexist."

But the head of the advertising section says he does not understand what all the fuss is about.

He said the advertisement was "in no way salacious neither in content nor visually", and accused complainants of "nitpicking". (:/)

Wow. Now that's adget.

Florida Police Search for Naked Tickler

AP

Dateline: New Smyrna Beach, Fla. - Police say one man could be responsible for a string of bizarre break-ins over four years involving a naked perpetrator who sometimes tickles the feet of sleeping elderly women.

The latest break-ins happened Saturday and Sunday in two separate homes, but investigators suspect the same man is responsible for five similar, unsolved cases reported in the area since 2001.

New Smyrna Beach police ay they've been unable to catch him in part because they haven't had much evidence.

The incidents vary slightly, but most of the victims are over 60, said police Cmdr. Wade Kirby.

Usually the intruder is naked, but sometimes partially clothed, Kirby said. Sometimes he tickles the women's feet, as he allegedly did Saturday night, and sometimes he's discovered and flees before touching them, Kirby said.

Each time the man ran off after being noticed.

Kirby said police know only that the suspect is white, thin and appears young.

"There's not been a lot to go on there," he said. (:/)

Builder stole panties for work

Ananova

A German builder admitted stealing hundreds of pairs of ladies' knickers because he likes to wear them for work.

Police arrested the 23-year-old for stealing pants from neighbours' washing lines after he was trapped by one of his victims.

Ingrid Volkmann, 53, had her hubby install a motion sensor under the washing line to catch the thief.

After he was arrested, the man reportedly told police: "I like wearing women's knickers to work but was too embarrassed to buy any myself, which is why I took my neighbours." (:/)

There's a missing apostrophe in that last paragraph. Can you spot where it should be?

scitech

Giant space mirror proposed to combat global
warming Mr. Burns unavailable for comment

headline: Fark/story: Popular Science

Stationed between the Earth and sun at a point where the gravitational forces nearly cancel each other out, a 600,000-square-mile space "mirror" scatters sunlight with a mesh woven of fine metal wires. (:/)

Really cool invention brings teens awards

Salt Lake Tribune

Dateline: Bluffdale - The code name, Space Beast, was one they came up with in the wee hours of the night.

Tyler Lyon, Daniel Winegar and Chad Thornley were overtired and giddy as they tackled a science fair project. Their idea: Eliminate the use of Freon in automobile air-conditioning systems by relying on the Peltier effect - of course.


Riverton High School students Tyler Lyon, left, and Daniel Winegar won Ricoh's Sustainable Development Award for their invention. (Danny Chan La/The Salt Lake Tribune )

"We aren't planning our lives around making air conditioners," Lyon explained. "We wanted to do something to help the environment and the economy."

But what began as a Riverton High School physics class assignment nearly two years ago has morphed into an award-winning, internationally recognized invention.

Lyon and Winegar, two recent Riverton graduates - Thornley graduated in 2004 and is now on an LDS Church mission - won the first-ever Ricoh Sustainable Development Award in May when they competed against 1,400 other worldwide invitation-only entries at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair in Phoenix.

Physics teacher Kari Lewis, who recently left Riverton High, said trusting in Lyon and Winegar was easy.

"They came up with this idea . . . and they made it work," she said. "It's a perfect solution to an incredible problem."

Today, the young inventors say, U.S. drivers use about 7.9 billion gallons of fuel each year to run their air-conditioners, which draw power from the engine. By adopting their contraption - which taps into the electrical system, using fans to blow hot air through five Peltier chips and then releasing cold air - they say the country stands to save 3.9 billion gallons of fuel annually, or about $10 billion based on current gas prices.

Furthermore, the product would free drivers from Freon - which despite improvements, remains an ozone-depleting chemical in current air-conditioners. The Peltier chips, which they purchased on eBay for $9.99 each, have a life span of 20 to 30 years and an unfaltering cooling capacity. And like every component in the Space Beast, which can be minimized in size to about 2 inches in width, the chips are recyclable. (:/)

Saving the world from Freon and overuse of petrol? Priceless.

picture story

brie fly

Ugandan legislator to reward virgin
girls with university scholarships

AFP

Dateline: Kampala - A Ugandan lawmaker said he would reward girls from his central constituency with university scholarships if they leave high school able to prove their virginity.

Sulaiman Madada, a member of parliament from Uganda's Kayunga district, said the scheme aimed to promote morality and that successful scholarship applicants would have to submit to a gynaecological exam to demonstrate their chastity.

"Our area has high incidences of early marriages and defilement," he told AFP. "I believe this bursary will make a difference. The criterion is that a student is virgin and from Kayunga district."

"This will promote morals, promote girls education and I have contacted some NGOs and well wishers to join me in this," Madada said, adding that the scheme was for girls only and that high school boys need not apply. (:/)

Christopher Lee to sing at heavy metal festival

Ananova

Octogenarian actor Christopher Lee is reportedly performing at a heavy metal festival in Germany.

The 82-year-old Lord of the Rings star is taking part in the Earthshaker Festival in Geiselwind, Bavaria.

He will sing with two bands, Manowar and Rhapsody, according to concert organisers.

Lee will be accompanied by a live orchestra and a choir and will perform alongside heavy metal bands such as Grave Digger, Dragonlord and Forces of Evil. (:/)

Fell in love with 999 operator's voice

Ananova

A German man was arrested after repeatedly dialling '999' after falling in love with the operator's voice.

Cops managed to track down Guenther Bergmann by following the line of telephone booths he used to make the calls.

Bergmann, 45, from Duesseldorf, who had been drinking, told police he couldn't help himself.

"The first time I called it was an accident, I just pressed the wrong buttons. But the operator had such a sexy voice that I lost control and had to keep ringing back. I think I'm in love with her," he said.

He now faces charges for wasting police time. (:/)

picture story

Two Hurt in ATV Accident After Funeral

AP

Dateline: Huntington, W.Va. - Two mourners who rode an all-terrain vehicle to the service for a man killed in an ATV accident were injured in a similar accident as they were leaving.

Jimmy Spry, 20, and Maggan Phillips were not wearing helmets Wednesday when Spry lost control of the ATV and hit a tree, said Clinton Burley of the Ceredo Volunteer Fire Department.

They were attending the burial service of Phillips' brother, Dustin "Duke" Phillips, 21. He died early Saturday from severe head injuries after his ATV hit a tree, said Barry Wellman of the Lavalette Volunteer Fire Department.

Spry was taken to a hospital in Huntington, which would not release his condition Thursday morning. Phillips suffered minor injuries and was not hospitalized, Burley said. (:/)

The irony of it.

Asbo orders teen to get drunk

Ananova

A teenager has been given an Asbo ordering him to get drunk in a court blunder

The error was only noticed when the 15-year-old ended up in front of magistrates again for an alleged breach of the conditions.

Magistrates heard the youngster, who cannot be named, was technically breaking the law if he was found walking the streets of a quiet market town without alcohol.

The order also required him to use threatening behaviour likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress to members of the public in Alnwick, Northumberland.

The Asbo - issued last February after a string of complaints - reads 'without' rather than 'with', reports the Daily Mirror.

An exasperated police source said: "It took a long time to bring him to book and get him before the court in the first place.

"It is maddening to spend all that time only for the order then to tell him to go out and misbehave. It really does beggar belief."

loons

Indian insurance agents jailed
for Bin Laden sales pitch

AFP

Dateline: New Delhi - Call it the really hard sell.

Five insurance agents in India have reportedly landed in jail for launching a sales promotion "jehad" that rewarded top salesmen with glasses bearing the name of
Osama bin Laden.

Officials from the ICICI Prudential insurance firm unveiled the sales ploy -- which was codenamed "Mission Jehad" -- at a meeting in the town of Kanpur on Tuesday, the Times of India newspaper reported.

Every agent able to sell 10 life insurance policies was offered a T-shirt as well as a glass tumbler etched with the Al-Qaeda mastermind's name.

"Kill 10, take a branded T-shirt and be the best terrorist in the group. Jehad begins from July 18-20 -- Osama bin Laden," the message to sales personnel said.

Police arrested five company officials who are facing sedition charges after a court ruled they had "glorified an international terrorist."

The company condemned the incident in a statement, saying it was a mistake. (:/)

Now, I've made some email errors in my time, but really.

Japanese to get thrill of slot machine at ATM

AFP

Dateline: Tokyo - Japanese people hoping their bank accounts carry a bit more cash could see their hopes come true with an ATM that doubles as a slot machine.




Ogaki Kyoritsu Bank, based in Ogaki city some 300 kilometers (185 miles) west of Tokyo, will on August 8 introduce slot games that run during the wait as cash machines process transactions.

A user who hits three straight 7s using the "stop" button on the ATM screen will get 105 yen (about 90 cents) to cancel the customary fee for using the machine outside regular hours.

The bank customer can even strike a jackpot of 1,000 yen (nine dollars) if the slot machine gives them a set of "gold" or "super gold" images, named after the accounts the bank has been offering.

To collect the prize, the winner has to come up to the bank counter.

"We want our customers to enjoy a little excitement during the waiting time when they operate an ATM," a bank spokesman said Wednesday.

"We also want people to come to our outlets as we have been offering various products and services," he said.

The slot game is not available during regular business hours when money withdrawal is free of charge.

Depositors with other banks' cards can also use the slot-game ATMs of Ogaki Kyoritsu -- but will be charged a fee of 210 yen.

The odds of winning are "good", according to the bank, being one in 10 for the 105-yen fee cancellation and one in 500 for the 1,000-yen cash prize. (:/)

'Ugliest man in the world'

Ananova

A wealthy lawyer says he must be the ugliest man in the world after having 5,000 marriage proposals turned down.


Croatian lawyer Emil Kacic who says he's had 5,000 marriage proposals rejected /Europics

Croatian lawyer, Emil Kacic, who has logged all the failures in a little black book, said: "Money can't buy you love, at least if you have a face like mine."

After placing adverts in local papers stressing his wealth with words like "tender and rich lawyer looks for a pretty lady to marry" and then "disgustingly rich lawyer looks for a pretty lady to marry", he was still unable to find a wife.

He said: "I've got to the point where I have even been asking women I am meeting in the streets to marry me, but they always say no."

Kacic, from Zagreb, said he had now accepted that he must be the ugliest man in the world.

In an interview with daily newspaper, Vecernji List, dejected Kacic said: "I've tried placing all kinds of different ads, but not a single woman I've met through my adverts has accepted my offer. What else is there to believe, other than that I must be the ugliest man in the world."

But disappointment has yet to defeat hope: "No success yet, but I will keep trying," he resolved, adding: "I hope all the publicity over my failed search for love might bring me love at last." (:/)

I should have thought of that. Sympathy votes. Damn you, Kacic.

Average British woman spends
54,000 dollars on shoes during lifetime

AFP

Dateline: London - The average woman in Britain spends more than 31,000 pounds (54,000 dollars, 45,000 euros) on shoes during her lifetime and almost 16,000 pounds on belts and other accessories.



One third of women say they have 25 pairs of shoes in their wardrobe, and around 1.3 million women claim to have well over 30 pairs, according to research carried out by the Churchill Home Insurance group.

About 44 percent of females admit that shoes are their biggest weakness when out shopping, with 86 percent of people claiming to buy at least one new pair a month, Churchill said Monday.

It said the average woman starts shopping for her own clothes at the age of 14.

If she spends an average of 40 pounds a month on shoes each month she will have bought 31,680 pounds worth of footwear by the time she is 80, it said.

At the same time, the insurance group said women spend around 15,840 pounds on accessories such as handbags and jewellery during their lifetime.

Six out of 10 women say they own 10 handbags and three percent have more than 25 different ones, while 80 percent of women have at least 10 belts.

Overall 42 percent of women admit they regularly splash out on accessories they don't really need.

Unsurprisingly, one in five women say they hide their purchases from their partner, while 22 percent lie about how much they have spent. (:/)

and finally

Dumb crim of the week. Of the month, I'm reckoning. Welcome to the Dumb Crims Hall Of Fame, Jada Coover.

After Chase, Man Ends Up in Own Courtroom

AP

Dateline: Yankton, S.D. - An Iowa man who led officers on a highway chase that ended at the Clay County Courthouse Wednesday ran inside and tried to barricade himself in the courtroom where he was scheduled to appear, authorities said.

The Clay County Sheriff's Office was asked to help find a pickup truck suspected in a hit-and-run accident on Interstate 29 in Union County.

A state Highway Patrol officer Wednesday was pursuing the vehicle on Highway 50 into Vermillion, where the man stopped the truck in the middle of the street and backed into the courthouse retaining wall, said Clay County Sheriff Andy Howe.

"It seemed to just get more and more strange," Howe told KVHT radio in Yankton Wednesday. "Typically the pursuits don't come right to us as this one did. Officers actually left the sheriff's office and the police department to go assist with the pursuit, only to find themselves right back here."

Jada Coover, of Sioux City, Iowa, had been scheduled to appear at the courthouse on charges of attempting to tamper with anhydrous ammonia, which is used to make methamphetamine.

After stopping the truck, Coover jumped out, ran into the courthouse and headed upstairs to the courtroom. The judge in his case had just dismissed the jury, and jurors were leaving the room as Coover burst in, Howe said.

Officers cleared the hallways and asked people to leave the building.

"He attempted to barricade himself in by holding the door shut, but officers were able to get in and take him into custody," Howe said.

Genius. Until next time...

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Tiger terror, bikini bribery, vegetarian meat, see-through loos, monkeys with human brains, and the man who thought taxi was spelled a-m-b-u-l-a-n-c-e

Bonuses for bikini-clad bathers anger South Korean women's group

AFP

A local government campaign to attract more bathers to a South Korean beach resort by offering incentives to swimmers wearing bikinis has upset women's rights activists.



Ahead of the peak summer bathing season, Buan County administration southwest of Seoul renamed its Byeonsan Beach Bikini Beach and promised wearers of skimpy swimsuits a 10-percent discount on bills for hotels, meals and beach equipment rentals.

The county put up wall posters with pictures of bikini-clad beauties and the inscription: "Show off your beauty and get a 10-percent discount."

Women's groups denounced the campaign as exploitation.

"This is an outrageous attempt to stimulate the regional economy by exploiting the female sex," said a statement from the association of women activists of North Jeolla Province.

A campaign to attract more visitors should focus on publicizing the southwestern county's "natural beauty instead of the naked female body," it said.

"We are appalled at this preposterous campaign and cannot suppress our mounting anger," it said.

But officials at the Buan county office were unrepentant and said by telephone that they had no plan to stop the campaign.

"I don't understand why they are so angry. This is just part of a publicity campaign aimed at promoting the name of the Bikini Beach. We have no intention to exploit or commercialize the female sex," an official told AFP.

No. Not at all.

Estonians snatch world wife-carrying title again

Reuters

Dateline: Sonkajarvi, Finland - Estonia reigned supreme once again in the wife-carrying world championship on Saturday, as Margo Uusorg sprinted home to win the Baltic country's eighth straight title in the offbeat competition.

Forty couples from 10 countries gathered in the remote Finnish village of Sonkajarvi to complete a 253.5-metre-long obstacle course. A man must carry a woman, not necessarily his spouse, through a pool and across hurdles.

The few rules require a minimum weight of 49 kg (108 lb) for the "wife" and state that all contestants must have fun.

Uusorg, 25, completed the course in 59 seconds with friend Egle Soll, 23, clinging to his back in the trademark "Estonian Carry" -- hanging upside down with her legs clenched around his neck.

Uusorg's prizes were his partner's weight in beer and a high-tech mobile phone.

It was his fourth victory, and the third in a row for his family. Brother Madis won in 2004.

"We don't have a secret, we just try to run fast and hope the legs work," said Uusorg, who works in Stockholm as an embassy driver. He warned that the family would be even stronger contenders next year when brother number three, Urmet, takes part.

"He holds the Estonian record for the 800 metres," Uusorg said.

Uusorg and Soll received first prize from the hands of visiting U.S. basketball legend Dennis Rodman, who declined to compete, saying he lacked both a wife and proper training.

"I'm not in shape ... It could hurt the back," said the former Chicago Bulls and Detroit Pistons forward. But he promised to train for next year. "I'll carry the kids around the house or something," he said.

Some 9,000 people came to view the event, set deep in forests and lakes a couple of hours' drive from the Arctic Circle. It began in 1992 as a purely Finnish contest based on local legend, according to which wife-stealing was once commonplace in the region.

Pete's Peach of an excuse

Ananova

Pete Doherty says his shambolic Live 8 act was down to Peaches Geldof squeezing his bum before he went on stage.

Critics accused the singer of being high on drugs as he stumbled, looked confused and forgot his words, says the Mirror.

But the Babyshambles star insisted it was all down to Bob Geldof's 16-year-old daughter: "I wasn't lost for words and I wasn't out of it on drugs.

"Just before I went on stage Peaches squeezed my bum hard and whispered something rather suggestive to me. It left me in such shock I didn't know where I was.

"Bob Geldof has organised this amazing global event, I was facing 210,000 people, the cameras are rolling, and f***ing Elton John is dueting with me.

"And Bob's daughter has secretly made a pass at me. It's all I can think about. It did my head in. I didn't think Bob would be very happy."

Doherty - wearing streaky mascara and struggling to keep his granny hat on - was booed as he forgot the words to T-Rex's Children of the Revolution.

But Peaches said: "I was starstruck. His performance was the most passionate of the night."

Pete admitted he was puzzled why Elton had taken him under his wing.

He said: "He seems to love me a bit. I can't think why. He knows how to have a good time and knows I like a crack. I hope we'll do more performances together." (:/)

I think he means "he knows I like crack". Surely.

Hong Kongers don't know what to do between the sheets

AFP

Dateline: Hong Kong - Hong Kongers usually rank near-bottom of the international list of lovers and a social worker may have discovered why: they don't know what to do between the sheets.

Grace Wong of the southern Chinese territory's Family Planning Association said the number of inquiries at her agency rocketed 50 percent last year, with many clients claiming to have no idea how to have sex.

"Some married couples are not familiar with their body parts," Wong was quoted as telling the Sunday Morning Post. "They don't know where their sex organs are.

"They don't know the physical changes associated with sexual response, like males getting an erection," she added.

Regular international surveys by condom manufacturers have found the city is less than amorous. Durex's last poll found Hong Kongers get it together 79 times a year, while the French manage it the most, at 137 times.

Another poll even suggested Hong Kong men prefer to go to work rather than have sex.

The frenetic work ethic in the former British colony is usually blamed for interfering with the course of nature.

But the paper said sociologists believe Chinese sensibilities, which deem discussion of sex even in school as taboo, are responsible. (:/)

And now, apropos the Finger In The Wendy's... turns out it happens everywhere...

Applebee's says it may have found
source of fingertip in salad

AP

Dateline: Kansas City, Mo. - Applebee's International Inc. says an internal investigation has discovered that a former employee at a Jefferson, La., restaurant cut the tip off his thumb a year ago and that likely is the fingertip found by a customer now suing the restaurant chain.

May Deal Chambers Johnson of Jefferson Parish claims she found a fingertip in a to-go salad she bought at the restaurant a year ago. She filed suit against the Overland Park, Kan.-based chain on June 24 in Jefferson Parish District Court, seeking unspecified damages.

In a statement released Saturday, Applebee's said "while some facts are still unclear, we now believe a former employee at this restaurant accidentally cut the very tip of his thumb last year." The company said the man described the cut as "roughly the size of a sunflower seed."

In its statement, Applebee's said it wanted to apologize to Johnson.

"We deeply regret this isolated incident from last year," the statement said. "Food safety remains our top priority." (:/)

Goof Puts Man in Major Poker Tourney

AP

Dateline: Killeen, Texas - A computer goof has Robert Guinther headed for a seat at the
World Series of Poker tournament in Las Vegas later this week.

Guinther, 65, entered what he thought was a $10 online poker tournament, but midway through he realized that he had accidentally clicked on a World Series of Poker satellite tournament with a $100 entry fee and it was too late to back out. He went on to win, defeating 180 other competitors and earning a spot in the WSOP $10,000 no-limit championship.

The tournament, which begins Thursday, will involve more than 6,600 players who either qualified by winning a satellite tournament or paid the $10,000 entry fee.

"This is the dream of a lifetime," Guinther said. "I watch these guys on television all the time, and I'm excited about the chance to sit down and play with them."

Guinther's son, Rik, kept tabs on his father's progress from his home computer in San Antonio and had to explain just what the victory meant.

"When I won, I let out a big Yes!" Guinther said. "I just thought I had won $11,000, but then my son told me over the phone, 'Dad, you've just won a seat in the World Series of Poker!' I screamed so loud, you wouldn't believe it."

Guinther, who settled in Killeen after retiring as an Army sergeant first class in 1985, says he's a little nervous about the next step but knows he'll be fine once play begins. (:/)

Wouldn't it be great if he won?

Motorcyclist recovering from injuries after plastic wrap prank

AP

Dateline: Wyoming - A western Michigan motorcyclist is recovering from injuries after crashing into plastic wrap that had been stretched across a roadway as a prank.

Jim Anderson suffered a fractured rib and internal bruises after he hit the industrial-strength wrap at about 1:20 a.m. Saturday while riding his Harley Davidson home. The 48 year old said he thought the plastic wrap was fog.

Wyoming, Michigan Police say three teenage boys told police they put the wrap between two sign posts as a prank not expecting something as small as a motorcycle to come down the street.

Police haven't decided whether to charge them. (:/)

Teacher Attire Becoming a Touchy Topic

AP

Dateline: Los Angeles— Teachers are expected to bear long days, challenging students and demanding parents. Now, apparently, some teachers are baring too much of themselves.

School boards and superintendents increasingly are pursuing dress codes for teachers. At issue is the same kind of questionable attire most often associated with students.

In some districts, teachers can get dressed down for wearing skimpy tops, short skirts, flip flops, jeans, T-shirts, spandex or baseball caps. Spaghetti is fine in the cafeteria, but shirts supported by spaghetti straps are not welcome in the classroom.

District 11 in Colorado Springs, Colo., for example, prohibits sexually provocative items. That includes clothing that exposes "cleavage, private parts, the midriff or undergarments," district rules say. (:/)

Teachers need to be told not to reveal their "private parts"?

Picture story

Toilet troubles WFMU Internet Radio

Would you use this loo?





For more about the Exhibitionist Excreter:

http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2005/02/my_bathroom_is_.html

SCI/TECH

If the wine talks to you, maybe it's time to stop

Reuters

Dateline: Rome - Who needs a sommelier? A "talking" wine label could soon tell consumers in Italy everything they want to know about a particular bottle -- from its production history to the kind of food it should accompany.

"The idea is to bring the oenologist to the table so that each wine can explain itself in the first person," said Daniele Barontini, whose Tuscan company Modulgraf is putting the final touches on the product to be launched in November.

"We envision our talking wine label in restaurants, wine stores and at vineyards that offer wine tasting," he told Reuters Wednesday.

The new "label" would consist of a chip implanted in the bottle that could be listened to with a small device about the size of a cigarette package in the wine shop or the restaurant.

"It could tell you how to enjoy the wine, where it came from, everything you'd hear from a sommelier," Barontini said. "You could even have music." (:/)

New hamburgers 'grown in laboratory'

Reuters

Laboratories using new tissue engineering technology might be able to produce meat that is healthier for consumers and cut down on pollution produced by factory farming, researchers said.
While NASA engineers have grown fish tissue in lab dishes, no one has seriously proposed a way to grow meat on commercial levels.

But a new study conducted by University of Maryland doctoral student Jason Matheny and his colleagues describe two possible ways to do it.

Writing in the journal Tissue Engineering, Matheny said scientists could grow cells from the muscle tissue of cattle, pigs, poultry or fish in large flat sheets on thin membranes. These sheets of cells would be grown and stretched, then removed from the membranes and stacked to increase thickness and resemble meat.
Advertisement:

Using another method, scientists could grow muscle cells on small three-dimensional beads that stretch with small changes in temperature. The resulting tissue could be used to make processed meat such as chicken nuggets or hamburgers.

"There would be a lot of benefits from cultured meat," Matheny said in a statement. "For one thing, you could control the nutrients."

Meat is high in omega-6 fatty acid, which is desirable, but not in large amounts. Healthful omega-3 fatty acids, such as those found in walnuts and fish oils, could be substituted.

"Cultured meat could also reduce the pollution that results from raising livestock, and you wouldn't need the drugs that are used on animals raised for meat," Matheny said.

Raising livestock requires million of gallons of water and hundreds of acres of land. Meat grown from tissue would bypass those requirements.

The demand for meat is increasing worldwide, Matheny said. "China's meat demand is doubling every ten years," he said. "Poultry consumption in India has doubled in the last five years."

Writing in this month's Physics World, British physicist Alan Calvert calculated that the animals eaten by people produce 21 per cent of the carbon dioxide that can be attributed to human activity. He recommends people switch to a vegetarian diet as a way to battle global warming.

"Worldwide reduction of meat production in the pursuit of the targets set in the Kyoto treaty seems to carry fewer political unknowns than cutting our consumption of fossil fuels," he said in a statement. (:/)

Left-handed human race to make the world a better place

Pravda

Scientists say that the number of left-handed individuals grows rather fast in the world today

Specialists calculated that every tenth human being is left-handed. The total amount of lefthanders living in the world reaches over 600 million. According to experts' estimates, there will be a billion of left-handed people living on planet Earth by 2020. The world will be different against the background of such a trend, scientists say.

"The number of left-handed babies that were born in 2005 doubled the amount of left-handed children, which saw the light in 1990," doctor of biological sciences, Alexander Dubov said. "Mankind is changing slowly. However, it is not about degradation of the human civilization at all. Quite on the contrary, people become more perfect," the professor said.

Latest research works conducted in many countries of the globe showed that the IQ level of left-handed people is higher in comparison with the one of right-handed individuals. Every fifth outstanding person is left-handed as a rule. Furthermore, the people, who can boast of having extraordinary abilities, are left-handed too.

"There are a lot of extrasensorial individuals among them," doctor of medical sciences, Alexander Lee said. "We checked the supposition. There are hardly any right-handers among those, who have the gift of remote viewing, telepathy, or X-ray viewing," the doctor said.

Right and left-handers are virtually different types of people with their own special mindsets and perception of the world. "They get along with each other perfectly, but there is a hidden evolutionary struggle taking place between them, which reminds the struggle between primeval humans, Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal men. It seems to me that left-handers will eventually win the fight owing to their anomalous abilities," scientist of anomalous phenomena, Pyotr Chereda said.

Modern scientists have already concluded that the left-handed human race will change the world; the humanity will become more intellectual and extrasensorial.(:/)

The Sinbin

Woman drove on three wheels, police say

AP

Dateline: Sparta, Wis. Her vehicle was missing a tire, and a large chunk of her right front rim was sitting in the second-story bedroom of a nearby home.

But Darkalena Large told Sparta police Monday evening that everything was fine and she wanted to continue driving home.

Large, 43, told police her car handled a little odd after someone hit her in a fast-food parking lot just after

8 p.m., but she said she got it under control and decided to head home, police said.

Officers said Large was intoxicated and her car was stuck on a curb when they caught up with her at West Wisconsin and South Court streets about 8:17 p.m. Monday. Witnesses told police Large smashed into another car in the McDonald's parking lot on South Black River Street, then sped off.

When a front tire came off, Large continued on the rim, which then shattered, but Large sped on, leaving a deep gouge in the concrete and dragging metal and part of the brake drum down the street, police said.

Witnesses said they saw flames coming from the right front wheel as Large drove by.

While talking to Large, a nearby resident told police a large chunk of her tire rim had sailed through the window of their second-story bedroom. The chunk of metal had jagged, sharp edges and was too hot to touch 20 minutes after the incident, according to police.

Large was booked Tuesday into the Monroe County jail on charges of operating while intoxicated, hit and run and recklessly endangering safety. She also is accused of destroying some of the arresting officer's paperwork at the jail. (:/)

Nice.

Man Lights Himself on Fire to Propose

AP

Dateline: Grants Pass, Ore. - To prove his love, a 38-year-old man set himself on fire before getting down on one knee and asking his girlfriend to marry him.

About 100 people gathered to watch Todd Grannis perform the flaming stunt on Monday, which involved wearing a cape soaked in gasoline.

Grannis climbed up a 10-foot scaffold, was set on fire and then plunged into a swimming pool, dousing the blaze. Emerging unscathed, he got down on one knee and proposed, as a friend standing nearby slipped him the engagement ring.

"Honey, you make me hot," he told his sweetheart, Malissa Kusiek. "I hope I'm getting the point across that I'm on fire for you."

Kusiek, who has been dating Grannis for several years, said "yes," but added that she was a little angry because of the danger.

"At first I was mad, because I thought, 'He's not a stuntman,'" Kusiek said. "Then, of course, the tears started flowing. Of course I said yes. I was so thrilled."

Grannis said he came up with the stunt through the help of his friend, professional stuntman Eric Barkey. Barkey pulled out a photo of himself on fire and said, "You could do that," Grannis said.

Grannis met Kusiek, the owner of a local hair salon, when she cut his hair.

"I kept telling her sometime before I'm 50," said Grannis, who co-owns an Internet wholesale company. "She wasn't expecting it. She had no clue." (:/)

Ohio man charged with exposing his breasts

AFP

Dateline: Chicago - An Ohio man with the breasts of a woman has been charged with indecent exposure after he was spotted shirtless.

"He's a guy. He's real tall, and he's got a full set of breasts," assistant Cincinnati solicitor Kevin Donovan told the Cincinnati Post.

Jerome Mason, 23, was spotted shirtless by police at 1:00 am on April 22. Since then, the 6-foot, 200-pound man's case has floundered in the courts because he has failed to meet with his court-appointed attorney.

But public defender Michael Welsh said the charges really ought to be dropped.

"It's not illegal for a man to expose his breasts," Welsh told the Cincinnati Post.

"It's also not even technically illegal for a woman to expose her breasts (in public)," he said Thursday. (:/)

Drunk called ambulance for lift home

Ananova

A Japanese man has been jailed for repeatedly calling an ambulance to take him home after going out drinking.

Satoshi Nakagawa, 55, was sentenced to three and a half years in prison after trying the tactic 50 times a year, reports the Mainichi Daily News.

Judge Hidenaga Manabe said: "He committed a selfish crime by obstructing the highly urgent duties of ambulances."

The final straw for Nakagawa came last June when he was sitting down on a road in Takamatsu and asked a passerby to call an ambulance for him.

An ambulance dispatched by a local fire station arrived, and Nakagawa demanded that paramedics take him home.

The ambulance, however, headed for the fire station, not his home, which prompted Nakagawa to poke one of the paramedics in the cheek.

Nakagawa had called for an ambulance about 50 times a year since August 2003, police said. (:/)

Tanzania declares war on poor quality toilet paper

AFP

Dateline: Dar Es Salaam - Concerned for the comfort and hygiene of its citizens, the Tanzanian government is warning the toiletry trade of legal action for producing or selling sub-standard toilet paper in the east African nation.

The country's chief regulatory body, the Tanzania Bureau of Standards (TBS), says it will take manufacturers or distributors of toilet tissue to court if their products do not meet national requirements for softness, size or alkalinity.

"It has come to our notice that there are firms manufacturing and selling sub-standard toilet paper," said Charles Ekelege, a senior TBS official, adding that sanitary concerns were not the bureau only reason for the crackdown.

"The production of sub-standard things like toilet paper is not only bad for the manufacturer but could tarnish the country's image," he told AFP at the ongoing 29th Dar es Salaam International Trade Fair.

The TBS has taken advantage of the fair to make manufacturers, importers and vendors of consumer products aware of the importance of adhering to national and internationally accepted standards for their products, Ekelege said.

The bureau said at the weekend that only one toilet paper producer in Tanzania was currently manufacturing rolls that met TBS requirements. (:/)

US TV ruining Australia's 'mateship and booze' culture

AFP

Dateline: Sydney - Australia's unique slang culture based on "mateship and booze" is under threat from American television shows, an historian said.

The "larrikin" culture, typified by the unofficial national anthem Waltzing Matilda, is fading, said Richard Magoffin, the author of a book on the song.

A larrikin is defined in the Australian Concise Oxford Dictionary as a "hooligan" or "one who acts with apparent disregard for social or political conventions". It is often a term of admiration in Australia.

Walzing Matilda, a simple song about a swagman (thief) who commits suicide, encapsulates the true Aussie spirit which involves "talking in opposites" to turn disaster into humour, Magoffin told the Australian Associated Press.

"We call a tall man Shorty, a red-headed bloke Bluey, a big fella's called Tiny and you can call your best mate a proper mongrel bastard," he said.

"Anzac Day commemorates a dreadful military disaster and we sing a silly song about a suicide. It all suits us because we are a silly lot."

But it is an attitude worth hanging onto, he said. "An extreme amount of television is dumbing down Australia and we don't want to turn into a little America."

"I met a kid the other day who had never heard of a schemozzle (brawl, commotion or muddle) ... another bloke at the pub called me buddy and I said, 'it's mate'." (:/)

There was a great piece in the Grauniad recently written in Strine - but sadly, using the G's CRAPPY Verity-powered search, I can't find it. As usual.

Sport

British journalist Bob McKenzie acknowledges the crowd as he runs semi-naked around the track before the British Grand Prix at the Silverstone race track in Northamptonshire, central England, July 10, 2005. Two years after a kilted Irish priest ran out on to the track and caused havoc at the British Grand Prix, McKenzie jogged out in front of 100,000 Formula One fans on Sunday. Daily Express reporter McKenzie declared last year, when McLaren were slow and struggling with repeated engine failures, that he would run naked around Silverstone if the Mercedes-powered team won a race in 2004.

Completely Terrifying

'Human-brained' monkeys

News.com.au

Monkey magic ... one day you really may be able to talk to the animals, if a human/monkey 'chimera' developed a human-like brain

Scientists have been warned that their latest experiments may accidently produce monkeys with brains more human than animal.

In cutting-edge experiments, scientists have injected human brain cells into monkey fetuses to study the effects.

Critics argue that if these fetuses are allowed to develop into self-aware subjects, science will be thrown into an ethical nightmare.

An eminent committee of American scientists will call for restrictions into the research, saying the outcome of such studies cannot be predicted and may in fact produce subjects with a 'super-animal' intelligence.

The high-powered committee of animal behaviourists, lawyers, philosophers, bio-ethicists and neuro-scientists was established four years ago to examine the growing numbers of human/monkey experiments.

These procedures, known as 'human-primate chimeras', involve the combination of human and monkey cells, tissue and DNA to observe any effect and examine the possibility that such combination could actually exist.

Chimeras are mythical monsters from Greek literature, which combined various bodyparts from lions, goats nd snakes.

This team will soon publish its conclusions in leading journal Science. In the report the committee will address such unsettling questions as whether introducing human cells into non-human primate brains could cause "significant physical or biochemical changes that make the brain more human-like" and how those changes could be detected.

The committee will also examine how detectable differences in the monkey's brains, for example emotional or behavioural changes, or if the monkeys developed 'self awareness', could be measured - and dealt with.

"What we were trying to do was anticipate - recognising that if science were to take that path there might be some different kinds of moral challenges." said committee co-chairman Dr Ruth Faden, a professor in biomedical ethics. (:/)

Very. Very. Frightening.

This next one isn't funny (well it is and it isn't) but it is downright weird.

Pet fish leaps into boy's mouth, chokes him to death

Harian Metro/Asia One

Little Samiun Ahmad had fallen in love with the four small fish that he had caught a few days ago.

The 8-year-old insisted on keeping the fish as pets, not realising that he would choke on one of them in a freak accident that would cost him his life.

His father, Mr Ahmad Johari, 43, a rubber tapper in Kedah, told Harian Metro: 'Samiun brought home four puyu fish that he had caught at Sungai Gunung Rambai.

'I asked his mother to fry the fish, but he refused as he loved the fish and wanted to rear them. I never expected that the fish would take his life.'

Samiun choked to death yesterday afternoon when one of the puyu fish (climbing perch) leapt into his mouth and got lodged in his throat.

The fish was about 7cm long and 4cm wide.

Mr Ahmad said: 'The fish slid into his throat and Samiun squeezed his throat to try and get the fish out, but failed.' (:/)

Dear. Lord. Be very afraid of all fish.

More Sinbin

Drive-through robber in U.S. gets bank loot

Reuters

Dateline: Chicago - A bank robber behind the wheel of his car on Tuesday sent a note through a vacuum tube to the teller at the drive-through window at a branch of Chicago's LaSalle Bank and the teller obliged, returning an undisclosed amount of cash, police said.

The exchange was completed through the bank's pneumatic tube communications system, in which canisters are passed back and forth between motorist and teller.

The FBI said it was investigating the drive-through theft. (:/)

Hero Of The Week

Barcelona president does striptease in airport dispute

Reuters

Dateline: Madrid - Barcelona president Joan Laporta has apologised after he stripped to his underpants during an argument with security staff at the city's airport.

An eyewitness told Spain's daily ABC that Laporta had become incensed with staff after the alarm on the security scanner sounded three times.

The irate Barcelona president was reported to have hurled his shoes into the air and then taken off his trousers after being asked to walk through the scanner again and again.

"I would like to apologise if any Barcelona fan felt offended," Laporta was quoted as saying in sports daily Marca on Tuesday.

"I was just trying to sort out a situation that occurred because the alarm kept going off.

"I would like to make it clear though that I did not lose my head nor did I insult anyone ... but I am really sorry that the incident caused such a fuss." (:/)

Cops On The Rocks

Man Tunnels Out of Trailer to Elude Cops

AP

Dateline: Minot, N.D. - Police say they spent several hours surrounding an empty trailer home here, after a man escaped by tunneling out the house and calling a cab.

"We negotiated and everything and nobody was there," said Sgt. Darin Egge. "Our negotiator talked about an hour to nobody."

Egge said police responded to a domestic disturbance at the mobile home at about 7:30 a.m on Tuesday. A woman at the home told police a man had a rifle and was threatening suicide, he said.

SWAT team members later surrounded the home.

Sgt. Winston Black said the man apparently crawled through a hole in the mobile home's bathroom floor, and then through the trailer's skirting.

"He was definitely there, " Egge said. "We figure he slipped out before the SWAT team got there."

Egge said the woman distracted police by pounding on the doors with a sledge hammer, to allow officers entry.

"She was taking up the attention of officers," said Egge, who was on the scene.

SWAT team members fired pepper spray into the mobile home at about 11:30 a.m., Egge said. "We searched and he was gone," he said.

Egge said police later found out the man ran to a nearby business and called a cab, which dropped him off at a gas station in town.

Police were still looking for the man Tuesday night.

Egge said police believe the man was not armed.

"We found his rifle," he said. (:/)

That's all right then!

Radio Uproar, As DJs Give Tips
About Hurting Police Officers

KSDK.com

The beat goes on at KATZ radio, 100.3 on the FM dial. But the radio station finds itself at the center of a major controversy, due to on-air comments about hurting police officers.

Wednesday morning, KATZ personalities "DJ Kaos" and "DJ Silli Asz" gave their audience tips on how to disarm and injure police officers. One bit of advice told people to fight for the officer's radio so he can't call for help.

O'Fallon Missouri police sergeant Tom Otten is livid. "They need to be fired, absolutely, they need to be fired. And I think there needs to be a public apology to officers on that radio station."

KATZ owner Clear Channel Communications suspended the employees for two days, and stressed in an apology that the station "takes pride in supporting and assisting local law enforcement whenever possible." The employees must also do a ride-along with police to see how they do their jobs.

St. Louis Police Chief Joe Mokwa called on-air comments wrong and inappropriate, but seemed willing to forgive. "They made a mistake. I'm willing to move on and forget about it." (:/)

Idiots Of The Week

Men Hospitalized After Purposely Driving Into Bee Yard

AP

Lake County, Fla. -- Deputies said some young men chose the wrong place to vandalize. They drove right into beehive colonies to see what would happen and the result was what you might expect. Several of them were taken to the hospital.

Beehives sit in David Miksa's vandalized bee yard.
"By throwing it off, the bees got all stirred up and come up in the air after 'em," explained beekeeper David Miksa. "It's very upsetting. We have a lot of work to re-do, to fix up the hives."

Two boxes make up a colony, with 25,000 to 30,000 bees in each one. So it's not the best idea to drive into them and see what happens. But Miksa said teenagers usually try it at least once a year.

"There's no excuse to be near the bee yard that close," Miksa said.

The bee yard is hidden away inside acres of orange groves. But deputies say 18-year old Adam Tyson, 20-year-old Jason Krueger and two younger teens found them anyway, backing their truck right in. But then their truck got stuck in the sand and they had to call 911 when hundreds of thousands of bees started swarming.

"A lot of 'em were probably just trying to get back to their home and their home was mashed all over the ground," Miksa explained.

All of the boys were stung. At least two went to South Lake Hospital for treatment. Miksa said, with millions of bees in his hives, the boys could have been killed.

"I don't want to see anybody get stung up bad and I think it's a lesson to be learned by anybody who wants to try to mess around with beehives that the possibility of being hurt is definitely there," Miksa said.

The trespassing charges the four already face are sort of like traffic tickets, but deputies said they could also face a more serious charge of criminal mischief for disturbing the hives.

Miksa said the damage to his hives could cost him up to $5,000. Many of the bees were queens that were disturbed in the middle of the mating season. (:/)

Ow.

Tiger tales swish through Atascosa

San Antonio Express-News

Dateline: Pleasanton — For six months, something has been prowling the countryside along FM 3006 in northern Atascosa County, snatching up dogs, roosters and calves.

One night in early May, rancher Brian Beam was baling hay on his tractor when he says he came face-to-face with what could be the culprit: a full-grown tiger, he said, lurking along the creek running through his 27-acre property.

"It was huge," Beam said. "I threw (the tractor) into reverse and I was gone. It just took off down the creek."

The cat was waist-high with orange fur and black stripes, Beam said.

He rallied two neighbors, grabbed some guns and flashlights and took off in pursuit of the creature, which Beam now blames for the March disappearance of two of his calves.

"We never could catch up to him, but we found a bunch of hair and tracks," he said.

While searching Gallinas Creek with Beam for an hour and a half, Jake Turner, 19, said he found "huge" tracks in the mud and orange and black fur stuck in a fence that crosses the creek.

Despite Beam's story — and other unusual events reported in recent months by neighbors — some remain skeptical that the beast is anything more than a rural legend.

"We have no substantiated reports of loose tigers whatsoever," said David Soward, chief deputy at the Atascosa County Sheriff's Department. "Everything I've heard is like fourth- and fifth-hand information. And none of this has come directly to the Sheriff's Office."

As for Beam, he no longer goes anywhere on his property without a loaded, long-barreled SKS rifle perched on the front seat of his pickup, and his wife has stopped venturing beyond the back lawn.

Bobcats and mountain lions are indigenous to this region. Tigers are not. They're the largest members of the cat family and typically roam Southern Asia.

But a tiger in Atascosa County makes perfect sense if someone was raising it, said Mark Turner, Jake's father.

"I saw (a man) drive by, and he was going real slow," said Turner, recalling an January incident in front of his house on north of Pleasanton. "Then he backed up and came over and asked me if I had seen a tiger. He told me they had one that had gotten away from them."

The man, whose name Turner could not recall, said the tiger was his son's "pet" and had escaped from a pen, Turner said.

Keeping wild animals — including tigers — is a Class C misdemeanor in Atascosa County. The government doesn't regulate ownership of exotic cats as pets, but anyone who breeds or raises a tiger needs a federal permit.

And while nobody else in the area has reported seeing a tiger, some believe it has made its presence known.

Across the creek, just beyond the strip of thick brush that flanks its now bone-dry banks, Manuel Rodriguez has had seven dogs disappear since January.

"At night, they bark and they run out to the woods," said Rodriguez, 73, resting in the shade with his two remaining dogs, a pit bull and a terrier. "I come out and shine a spotlight, but I don't see nothing. I go back in, and the next day, one's gone, two's gone. They just disappear."

Rodriguez has lost dogs in the past, but never at this rate, he said.

Just downstream from Rodriguez's property, his nephew lost some animals of his own. Standing on the porch of his trailer home, Ray Rodriguez spoke of five game roosters that vanished from his 50 acres last month.

"These things were gone," he said. "There were feathers all over the place, but they were totally gone."

Nearby was a mysterious sway in the thick nylon cords of his fence.

"It wasn't no coyote," Ray Rodriguez said. "It wasn't no raccoon. My fence is pretty tight, so whatever came over there must've been pretty good-sized."

About a mile up FM 3006, another alleged attack occurred in May, this time leaving a bloodied victim behind. Ray Casarez noticed two horses — a stallion and a 20-year-old mare — had broken from their pen on his 400-acre ranch.

"Something had to scare them pretty much, because these horses went right through the fence," Casarez said. "I went looking for the mare, and I found her with her chest wide open. There were scratches on her neck. She couldn't move because of the gashes being so deep and the loss of blood."

The stallion was unharmed. The mare survived, but is crippled. Casarez still doesn't know what nearly took her life.

"A pack of coyotes ain't gonna scare the horses, because the horses will attack coyotes," he said. "Mountain lions are not big enough to take down a 16 and a half (hands high) horse."

Scott Schmidt, the Pleasanton veterinarian who tended to the mare, believes she received her wounds from the pen's netting and single strand of barbed wire.

"What spooked it, I don't know for sure," Schmidt said. "But its injuries were from running through the fence."

But the mare's wounds also are consistent with a tiger attack, according to Richard Gilbreath, director of the International Exotic Feline Sanctuary near Fort Worth.

"A tiger's going to grab a horse by the neck," said Gilbreath, who has worked with big cats for 15 years. "They kill by suffocation around the neck."

If a tiger were in the area, it would prowl mostly along the creeks, where there's water, cover from the sun and animals to eat — such as South Texas' ubiquitous feral hogs and deer, Gilbreath said. Tigers' ranges in the wild can be up to 500 square miles, he said.

"If you're talking about a tiger that's been raised in captivity, you might throw all this out the window, because they haven't been taught to hunt," Gilbreath said. "... So the only thing they're going on is pure instinct. But he's going to have to eat somewhere, somehow."

The chances of a human becoming a tiger's entrée are unlikely, as long as the animal is left alone, Gilbreath said. Still, he calls a roving tiger "very dangerous."

"The problem is, people will agitate him, they'll startle him," Gilbreath said. "And it depends on if he's hungry."

Should someone encounter the beast, Gilbreath recommends leaving it alone or calling the sheriff.

"Don't approach it. Don't get into its space," he said. "Don't stand in front of a window, because it'll go through a window." (:/)

Christ on a stick! I actually loved FARK.com's sell for this link though:

Aside from many dogs missing, orange fur stuck in fences and a guy asking if anyone has seen his lost tiger, sheriff determines that "there's no facts or evidence to support that there is a loose tiger"

Scared yet?

Headline Of The Week

Trotsky icepick dug out at last

Metro

Ewww!

And Finally

For This Inventor, The Perfect Beer
Is All About the Tap

WSJ/byline Jonathan Eig & Bryan Gruley

Dateline: Chicago -- Matthew Younkle was a senior at the University of Wisconsin in Madison when inspiration struck. What the world really needs, he decided, is a three-second beer.

He was not the first college student to dream of ways to get to his alcohol more quickly. What set Mr. Younkle apart is that he chose, soberly, to follow through.

Ten years later, Mr. Younkle, 31 years old, is president and chief technology officer of TurboTap, a company marketing a finger-sized nozzle that attaches to standard beer faucets and pours draft beer at least twice as fast as traditional systems do, and with less spillage.

"I think this will change the way beer is poured," says Tom Geordt, director of training and business development for Micro Matic, a California maker and distributor of kegs, faucets and other beer-related equipment. If Mr. Geordt is right, pouring a draft could become as simple as flicking a light switch. Tilted cups and overflowing beer suds would be things of the past.

As an engineering student in college, Mr. Younkle concluded that gravity, not bartender incompetence, was to blame for long beer lines. Beer, like any liquid, accelerates as it leaves the tap. The force generated upon impact with the bottom of a cup causes the beer to foam. Too much force means too much foam. Too much foam means wasted beer and wasted time.

Mr. Younkle decided to create a nozzle that slowed the descent of the beer and reduced the force of its impact. He produced a prototype in college and won an inventor's prize in a campus competition. And after several more years of R&D ("research and drinking," he says), Mr. Younkle felt he had perfected his invention. The 41⁄2-inch stainless-steel nozzle attaches to a standard beer tap and reaches to the bottom of a glass, like an extra-wide straw. Each pour produces a half-inch head -- or "collar of foam" -- Mr. Younkle says. TurboTap can pour 16 ounces in 2.5 seconds. Normal is about eight seconds.

Once he found a way to pour the beer faster and with just the right amount of foam, he had to make certain that the new delivery system did nothing to change the product's taste. To that end, he hired members of the Chicago Beer Society, self-proclaimed beer geeks who sample microbrews and dwell on their subtlest characteristics. The beer aficionados tasted TurboTap Budweiser and regular tap Budweiser in a double-blind study.

"Most of us are not used to tasting Budweiser," says Randy Mosher, a beer society member who participated in the test. "There was a lot of, 'Let's see if the foam texture seems better or worse,' and 'How's the hops aroma?' But ultimately we couldn't tell the difference."

The draft-beer business has enjoyed little innovation in recent years. A pint of beer is poured today in most bars almost exactly as it was 100 years ago. Beer, powered by carbon dioxide, flows from a keg beneath the bar, through a tube and out a brass faucet, where a bartender tilts a glass at a 45-degree angle to help reduce the foam. There are still those who see no reason to change.

"I'm a bit of a romantic," says bartender Mike Miller, slowly pouring a Scottish ale at the Duke of Perth on Chicago's north side. "There are some things that are still nice to have the classic way."

Some naysayers wonder about sanitation. "That's kind of disgusting, the tap's in your beer," says Kevin Reichert, 21, of Oak Brook, Ill. "I worked in a bar, and I know they don't clean that every day."

But some people in the business of pouring fast and selling cups of beer by the thousands are more enthusiastic. "I've been looking for something like this forever," says Curt Radle, director of concession operations at Wrigley Field, where the Chicago Cubs play. Though he declines to say how much beer pours every season at Wrigley, Mr. Radle says the ballpark has one of the sports world's busiest beer-concession businesses. Since he installed TurboTap, he says, beer costs have fallen between 3% and 5%. In about half a season, the devices have already paid for themselves, he says.

For the moment, he's running the taps at about half their top speed. He says he might gradually ratchet up the speed by adjusting the pressure of the carbon dioxide, but he's in no hurry.

"People get their beer here fast enough," he says, adding that it was the increased yield per keg that persuaded him to install TurboTap, not the promise of a faster pour. Stadium vendors say they're getting six to eight additional cups out of each keg -- or $30 to $40 in added revenue -- since TurboTaps were added.

With a beer in each hand, the 22-year-old Cubs fan Ernest Walther stood in the centerfield bleachers on a hot summer night and said he was impressed with how quickly the beer had been flowing. "My sister's been getting them," Mr. Walther said, nodding at his cups, "and I noticed she's been fast as hell." (:/)

Indeed. Until next time...

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