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21 November, 2009

Sexist ads from the wicked past







More here



THE NEWS

What’s in a name?: "A London-based translation firm is offering parents-to-be the chance to check the meaning of prospective baby names in other languages to avoid inadvertently causing their offspring future embarrassment. Celebrity couple Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes might have thought twice about naming their daughter Suri if they’d known that it means ‘pickpocket’ in Japanese, ‘turned sour’ in French, and ‘horse mackerels’ in Italian, suggest Today Translations. For 1,000 pounds ($1,678), the company’s linguists will carry out a ‘basic name translation audit’ of names, checking their meaning in 100 languages, or more for an additional cost. While open to everyone, the firm said it expects the service is likely to attract celebrity clients, who are known for giving their babies unusual names.”



Actress loses hip: "She once made international headlines for her naked and pregnant Vanity Fair cover but actress Demi Moore has been caught up in a controversy of a different kind after appearing on the December cover of the American high-fashion bible W (pictured above). A super-svelte Moore, draped in Balmain leather and metal mesh dress gold, appears to have been heavily photoshopped in the image, with some blogs calling it the "worst photoshopping disaster ever". One even points out that a whole chunk of her left hip was erased, so the lines don't match up with the curve of her thigh. The Chaser's Chas Liccardello has even pitched in his 10-cents worth, twittering yesterday: "Either Demi Moore's been photoshopped or she needs hip replacement surgery."

Spray could help men in bed: "Men who are too hasty in bed could be helped by a spray that numbs sensation. Trial volunteers who used the anaesthetic spray lasted five times longer during sexual intercourse than they did when given a dummy treatment. The spray, known as PSD502, consists of a combination of two sensation-numbing drugs. Results of a study involving 256 men suffering from premature ejaculation (PE) in the US, Canada and Poland were presented in California. It showed that administering the treatment five minutes before intercourse delayed ejaculation up to five-fold. The men also reported improved levels of control and sexual satisfaction and reduced stress. Lead researcher Professor Stanley Althof, from the Centre for Marital and Sexual Health of South Florida in West Palm Beach, US, said: "Premature ejaculation can have a powerful negative impact on the emotional and sexual lives of men and their partners. "Recently, the international sexual health community agreed that PE should be defined as ejaculation occurring within approximately one minute of penetration that causes the patient distress. Now we need to work to develop treatments, and these encouraging results with PSD502 seem to be a step in the right direction."

China: Scaredy-cat tigers: "Zoo-keepers in China say their tigers have grown so tame that they’re frightened of the chickens they’re supposed to eat. Keepers have been trying to encourage them to follow their natural instincts by throwing them live chickens — but without success. … Feeder Shi Ruqiang said: ‘They’re supposed to be wild and scary, but due to their soft lifestyles and human care they have gradually lost their wild nature. I have been trying to interest them with live chickens but it was quite a funny scene. The tigers were so scared that they wouldn’t go near them. One chicken passed out and the tigers did eventually approach it — but then it woke up again and squawked and they ran for their lives!’”

Christmas “bongs”: "Customs officials say they got a surprise when they found 316,000 glass bongs disguised as Christmas ornaments at the Los Angeles harbor. U.S. Customs and Border Protection said Thursday that agents found the highly decorated drug pipes in 860 boxes shipped from China. The cargo, estimated to be worth more than $2.6 million, had been described as glass figures and Christmas ornaments. The bongs were seized Tuesday at the Los Angeles/Long Beach port complex.”



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




20 November, 2009

Some wise words for today

1.. My husband and I divorced over religious differences. He thought he was God and I didn't.

2.. I don't suffer from insanity; I enjoy every minute of it.

3.. Some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them.

4.. I used to have a handle on life, but it broke.

5.. Don't take life too seriously; No one gets out alive.

6.. You're just jealous because the voices only talk to me

7.. Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder.

8.. Earth is the insane asylum for the universe.

9.. I'm not a complete idiot -- Some parts are just missing.

10.. I'm out of my mind. Back in five minutes.

11.. God must love stupid people; He made so many.

12.. The gene pool could use a little chlorine.

13.. Consciousness: That annoying time between naps.

14.. Ever stop to think, and forget to start again?

15.. Being 'over the hill' is much better than being under it!

16.. Wrinkled Was Not One of the Things I Wanted to Be When I Grew up.

17.. Procrastinate Now!

18.. A hangover is the wrath of grapes.

19.. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a cash advance.

20.. Stupidity is not a handicap. Park elsewhere!

21.. They call it PMS because Mad Cow Disease was already taken.

22.. He who dies with the most toys is nonetheless DEAD.

23.. A picture is worth a thousand words, but it uses up three thousand times the memory.

24.. The trouble with life is there's no background music.

25.. I smile because I don't know what the hell is going on.



THE NEWS

Worried pimp called off Rabbi's three-day drug-fuelled orgy: "An eminent rabbi was so exhausted after three days of constant cocaine-fuelled partying with escorts that his pimp grew worried and cancelled that day’s supply of girls, a jury was told. Rabbi Baruch Chalomish, 55, who has a £6 million fortune, was a scholarly academic, an accomplished businessman, a charity giver and a dutiful family man until his first wife died of cancer and his world fell apart. He turned to alcohol in his depression, then took refuge in cocaine, spending up to £1,000 a week. He lived in squalor, seeking comfort from prostitutes, Manchester Crown Court was told. The prosecution said that Chalomish was the financier in a commercial cocaine supply business while Nasir Abbas, 54, a convicted drug dealer, provided the drugs and the customers. The pair rented a luxury flat in Manchester and for ten days over the new year enjoyed a non-stop party. Mr Abbas admitted to police that he procured a supply of girls from an agency called Pure Class. They were also offered cocaine. The court was told that on the ninth day, and after the rabbi had stayed up for three straight days, Mr Abbas was so concerned about his health that he scrapped that day’s supply of prostitutes. In a text message to a woman called Clio he wrote: “Hi Clio, I have tried to wake Shel up but I don’t want to wake him. He was very tired because he had no sleep for three days, needed to rest, because he is going to his office to work on Monday at 8. Please cancel the party today.”

Tokyo has more top restaurants than Paris (and it is the French who say so): "Paris has been overtaken by Tokyo as the city with the most three Michelin-starred restaurants in the world. The French capital is traditionally viewed by the so-called 'foodie's bible' as the world centre of gourmet dining. But now 11 restaurants in the Japanese city have been awarded the coveted three stars - one more than in Paris. Japan is also the world's most-starred city with 261 stars in total --34 more than last year - awarded to 197 restaurants. Tokyo overtook Paris two years ago for having the highest total of stars in the city, but now has the highest number of the coveted three-star awards, although Paris points out it has only 40,000 restaurants in the city, compared to 160,000 in Tokyo. Jean-Luc Naret, director of Michelin Guides, said: 'Tokyo is by far the world capital of gastronomy and now also has the most three-star restaurants. 'The city has great quality ingredients, from the sea, from the mountains and the quality of the chefs is excellent.' London has just one three-starred restaurant in the 2009 Michelin guide - Gordon Ramsay in Chelsea."

Nicknames win official standing: "The inhabitants of a small Italian town where 8000 residents share the same surname have won a legal battle to use their nicknames, including "Fat", "Mad" and "Peasant", on official documents. For more than 200 years, the people of Chioggia, near Venice, have used nicknames to distinguish between distantly related families, but they were never officially recognised. Now, after a decree from the Interior Ministry, families Chioggia will be allowed to adopt their soubriquets as a second, official surname. This would "avoid a lot of confusion, as well as making filling out forms less complicated", said the mayor, Romano Tiozzo, whose family nickname is Pagio, or straw. His ancestors were straw sellers. In many small towns where families have lived for centuries, the entire population often shares just a few names. Chioggia, at the southern end of the Venice lagoon, is an extreme case, with 8000 Boscolos and 5000 Tiozzos out of 52,000 people. Mr Tiozzo's opponent in the last mayoral election was Lucio Tiozzo "Fasiolo", dialect for bean."

British grandmother who was sterilised - twice - gives birth to 'miracle baby': "A grandmother has just given birth to a 'miracle' baby boy 13 years after being sterilised twice. Debbie Amos, 43, had the operation to stop her falling pregnant again after having her first three children. But three months ago she felt strange movements in her stomach and a test revealed she was six months pregnant. Now she is mother to health baby boy Connor, born last week and weighing in at 8lbs 8oz, who is younger than her grandchildren. Mrs Amos, of Colchester, Essex, said: 'At the end of July, I started feeling tired and then felt movements in my stomach. Mrs Amos made a trip to the doctor who told her he thought she was about 18 weeks pregnant but a scan revealed she was actually 23 weeks pregnant. Mrs Amos said: 'I was doubly sterilised - my fallopian tubes were both cauterised and clipped so I thought there was no way i could get pregnant again. 'And as you get older it is harder to conceive anyway, so it is the last thing I expected.' But when baby Connor arrived at Colchester General Hospital last Thursday, the couple were just happy he was healthy. Mrs Amos said: 'We were very relieved he is fit and healthy. I didn't have any tests as I didn't know I was pregnant until so late on and there were obviously added risks because of my age. 'When you think of all the things that could have gone wrong, he is just a little miracle. 'We are getting used to the nappies and the lack of sleep - my husband has taken to it again and he is coping well. 'We wouldn't change him for the world.'

Indian Air force attacked over commonsense rule: "The Indian Air Force has drawn flak from women activists after it suggested it might allow female pilots to fly fighter jets but only if they promised not to have babies. The air force, which in 1994 allowed women to fly transport planes and helicopters, argued pregnancy could cause millions of dollars worth of lost training. Women's forums attacked air force deputy chief P K Barbora who made the suggestion at a news conference yesterday. "India is a democratic country and such regressive comments are only a reflection of the patriarchical mindset of the decision makers," said Anju Dubey of Delhi-based Centre for Social Research forum."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




19 November, 2009

Good planning?





THE NEWS

Japan wants more babies: "With the recovery tenuous, deflation afflicting all levels of commerce and the country at risk of sovereign debt crisis, it seemed an odd time for Japan's biggest and most austere banking group to be telling its staff to knock off early. Particularly when they realised how they were supposed to be using the extra one hour and 50 minutes of free time. The national birth-rate is low, ran the round-robin e-mail that landed in people's in-boxes on Monday, so let's all enjoy "family time". The unambiguous note of encouragement heralded Mitsubishi UFJ's week-long effort to help to reverse Japan's ultra-low fertility rates and declining population: joining a national campaign in which both enthusiasm and participation is expected to be miserably low. MUFJ is believed to be among only a tiny number of companies taking the scheme seriously. Management's idea, according to a woman who works on the bank's Tokyo trading floor, seemed to be that by getting everyone out of the office by 5.10pm, rather than the 7pm that most staff were used to, couples would be reunited earlier after work, passion would not be crushed by exhaustion and Japan's chronic population decline would be reversed. At only 1.3 per cent in 2007, Japan's fertility rate - the average number of children for each woman aged between 15 and 49 - is among the lowest in the world. Nearly a quarter of the population is over the age of 65. Last month the domestic market for incontinence pants and baby nappies drew exactly level."

First personalised newspaper rolls off presses: "A newspaper tailored to readers' individual wishes, and delivered to their door before 8am made its first appearance in Berlin yesterday. Billed as Europe's first "personalised paper", niiu, made its first appearance in Berlin yesterday. Customers of the paper choose what topics they want to read about -- be it sport, politics, fashion or any from a wide choice -- and receive news only on their chosen subject collated together and delivered like any other paper. Articles are pulled together from major German papers such as Handelsblatt, Bild and Tagesspiegel, foreign titles such as the International Herald Tribune or the New York Times, as well as major blogs and Internet news sources. For the right to print their news, niiu pays a licence to these papers, which in turn reach a younger audience, as niiu is aimed mainly at students, who pay €1.20 ($1.90) to get their news fix."

How to woo a man... flash 40% of your flesh: "It is the question that has troubled many a young woman as she dresses for a night out: How much should she dare to bare? After all, if her clothes are too revealing, she may catch the eye of the wrong kind of man. But too prim and she may attract none at all. British scientists believe they have the answer, with an outfit that reveals 40 per cent of a woman's skin providing just the right amount of attention. To hit on the figure, Leeds University psychologist Colin Hendrie sent four female researchers to one of city's biggest nightclubs. There, they stood on a balcony overlooking the dancefloor, and noted what the female clubbers were wearing and how many times they were approached by men. All their observations were taped on dictaphones hidden in handbags. Specifically, women who showed off around 40 per cent of their skin were approached by twice as many men as those who were more covered up. For the purposes of the study, each arm accounts for 10 per cent, each leg for 15 per cent and the torso for 50 per cent. The head, hands and feet are not included in the calculation. Dr Hendrie said: 'Any more than 40 per cent and the signal changes from "allure" to one indicating general availability and future infidelity. 'Show some leg, show some arm, but not any more than that.' The women who proved most popular combined the 40 per cent rule with tight clothing and sexy dancing."

Women banned from wearing trousers in Paris: "A decree banning women from wearing trousers in Paris is still technically in force, it emerged on Monday. The rule banning women from dressing like men – namely by wearing trousers - was first introduced in 1800 by Paris' police chief and has survived repeated attempts to repeal it. The 1800 rule stipulated that any Parisienne wishing to dress like a man "must present herself to Paris' main police station to obtain authorisation". In 1892 it was slightly relaxed thanks to an amendment which said trousers were permitted "as long as the woman is holding the reins of a horse".



More folly from Australia's wild North: " Two bikini-clad girls have been photographed swigging champagne on top of a croc trap in a crocodile-infested river. The girls were photographed singing in the rain, using champagne bottles as microphones, while atop of the trap in Maningrida, Northern Territory, reports the Northern Territory News. Their male friends were also pictured laughing and joking while posing as cowboys riding on the trap. Park ranger and crocodile expert Garry Lindner said the behaviour of the men was absurd. "Crocs are attracted to the bait in the traps, so it is extremely dangerous to fool around like this," he said."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




18 November, 2009

The 10 biggest mathematical disasters in the world

Kerry Cue, who runs the splendid - and rather unique - mathspig blog, has emailed me to point out a couple of recent posts she's run. I would highly recommend them both, especially if your maths is at a higher level than mine (some of it's a bit complicated for me). The first has a film bent, but it's the second that I'm going to mention here. Kerry has picked out what she calls the "10 biggest mathematical disasters in the world." I wonder if they'd be the same as yours (if indeed you have any.....)?

Here they are (for more explanation and detail, please visit Kerry's blog)

1) The Millennium Bug:

Probably the most famous - and feared - mathematical event in the last few decades. The Y2 bug was supposed to destroy the world, making everything stop functioning because computers, apparently, wouldn't recognise that going from 99 to 00 meant a new century rather than an error.

The Maths Error: guessing the answer.

In the end it didn't happen like that - a disaster that didn't really occur, or the perfect way to illustrate why you shouldn't guess, but instead test a system.

How did we waste so much time - and money - on it? For, as Kerry points out, while consultants claimed their advice saved the world from catastrophe, countries that spent very little on the Y2K bug problem (eg. Italy and South Korea) experienced as few problems as those who had spent a good deal of money on it (i.e us!).

The solution: Don’t guess. Test parts of system by plugging in x00.

2) Tulip Mania

We're going back in time for this one, to the 17th century in fact (see Deborah Moggach's book Tulip Fever for more on this) when the price of tulip bulbs began to rise. Soon the bubble burst...(as so many bubbles have done since).

The Maths Error: assuming a graph is linear!

"People look at graphs", writes Kerry, "and assume they are straight-line graphs. But many are not based on a rule or formula, but rather, hope. And when hope crashes, so does the value of a stock."

3) The Millennium Bridge, UK

Remember the bridge which was too wobbly (but is fine now, luckily)? Well, Kerry says that it was a maths problem. "The bridge was designed in 2D. The engineers allowed for up and down movement, but not sideways. As any kid running across a suspension bridge in a playground knows that as you run, it wobbles sideways!"

The Maths Error: designing 3D Bridge in 2D.

Oops.

4) NASA Mars Climate Orbiter.

As Kerry says, "the unmanned NASA Mars Climate Orbiter reached Mars and executed a 16 minute 23 second main engine burn on 23rd September 1999 to establish an orbit around Mars at 150km. It orbited behind Mars and was never heard from again."

The Maths Error: muddled units of length!

The Mars Climate Orbiter (which naturally, cost millions) disappeared, says Kerry, because a Lockheed Martin engineering team used imperial measurements while the JPL (Jet Propulsion Lab) team used the more conventional metric system. The wrong navigation information was sent to the Mars Climate Orbiter. It probably burnt up in the atmosphere.

5) The Superconducting Super Collider

This was the forerunner to the large Hadron Collider and it cost billions of dollars - spiralling completely out of control. However, it never actually got made and the project was cancelled in 1993.

The Maths Error: assuming mathematicians can count

See more on this on Wired Science.

6) Air Canada Flight 143

On 23rd July 1983, Air Canada Flight 143, a Boeing 747, ran out of fuel at 41,000 feet about half way through its flight.

The crew managed to guide the aircraft safely to an emergency landing - despite it having no fuel, which means no engines and no steerage.

Maths Error: Mudding units of volume.

There were two errors. One was that the fuel tank gauge wasn't working. The second was that the ground crew filled the tanks according to their records - assuming them to be in litres. However, they had been recorded in gallons.....

See more on Wikipedia.

7) Conviction by Maths Error

Many of you will remember the tragic story of Sally Clark, who was wrongly convicted of killing her babies after a very high-profile court case when she was completely vilified. It was the evidence of Professor Roy Meadow which is held largely responsible for influencing the jury to convict. He said that the likelihood of both her children dying from cot death was one in 73 million.

Maths Error: not understanding statistics

Professor Meadow appears to have arrived at his figure by squaring 1 in 8,500 for likelihood of a cot death in similar circumstances. But, says Kerry, this only works if events are independent (like flipping a coin). It doesn't any suggestion of genetic similaries into account, for example.

You can see more on Sally's story on the Sally Clark website.

8) US Patriot Missile Problem

Maths Error: Numbers too big for the software programme

- apparently the programme was not designed to fit the size of the numbers involved (see Kerry's blog for a more detailed explanation).

9) The Quebec Bridge Collapse

In August 1907, two compression cords in the south anchor arm of the Quebec Bridge failed. The bridge was intended to be the longest in the world, but it took just 15 seconds for it to collapse. 75 people lost their lives.

Maths Error: not doing the maths....

Kerry explains that the span of the bridge was lengthened, but the assumed weights were not changed. Lives were lost because of a basic error about which engineers had warned the authorities.

See more on this story.

10) Hurricane Katrina Levee Design

Hurricane Katrina caused terrible damage and resulted in almost 2,000 deaths. It was the largest natural disaster in US history.

The maths error: the 100 year flood won't happen for 100 years

As Kerry writes: On July 31, 2006 the Independent Levee Investigation Team released a report on the Greater New Orleans area levee failures.

Their report “identified flaws in design, construction and maintenance of the levees. But underlying it all, the report stated, were the problems with the initial model used to determine how strong the system should be.” The hypothetical model storm upon which storm protection plans were based is called the Standard Project Hurricane or SPH. The model storm was simplistic, and led to an inadequate network of levees, flood walls, storm gates and pumps. The report also found that “the creators of the standard project hurricane, in an attempt to find a representative storm, actually excluded the fiercest storms from the database.”

Original story here (With links)



THE NEWS

British mothers rely on just nine recipes to feed their families: "The average mother relies on just nine different meals to feed her family, a study has found. Researchers found that hectic lifestyles, fussy children and partners who work long hours mean mothers are stuck in a rut when it comes to experimenting in the kitchen. Nine in ten mothers polled admitted cooking the same meals over and over again while one in four make the same meals on the same day of the week. The most common meal among the nation's mothers was spaghetti Bolognese followed by roast dinners, a shepherd's or cottage pie and a pasta dish. Yesterday a spokesman for Merchant Gourmet, a food product company who carried out the study of 4,000 Britons, said: 'It's not surprising, given the demands of modern family life, that home cooks revert back to the recipes they know and love. 'What we found most interesting was the rise of the fussy family. 'A massive 81 per cent of respondents claimed they have to make two or more meals every night and 23 per cent said that they would stick to the same meals because their children are fussy eaters.' And nine most relied-upon meals are.... 1. Spaghetti Bolognese; 2. Roast dinner; 3. Shepherds Pie/Cottage Pie; 4. Pasta dish; 5. Meat and two veg; 6. Pizza; 7. Casserole/stew; 8. Sausages and chips/mash; 9. Indian/Curry". The average mother cooks just three meals from scratch, a week."



"Oasis of the Seas" arrives in Port Everglades: "The world's biggest cruise ship has caused traffic jams in the US as hundreds of people clambered to get their first glimpse. The 225,000-ton megaship the Oasis of the Seas arrived at its new home at Port Everglades after its maiden voyage from Finland. Standing sixteen decks high and rising 20 stories, crowds applauded as the Oasis of the Seas pulled in accompanied by a flotilla of small boats and doused by water cannons. Carrying crew and construction workers, the vessel braved high seas and hurricane force winds in the North Atlantic Ocean along its 14-day journey from Finland. In Denmark the giant cruise liner came within half a meter of a bridge the Great Belt Fixed Link on its maiden voyage to Florida. The Oasis of the Seas can accommodate 6360 passengers, 2160 crew and offers a world of luxuries, including: 21 swimming pools, an ice rink, an aqua park, a casino, a zip line and real trees. With six levels of staterooms, a turf-covered chip and putt golf course, the world's first open-air amphitheatre at the stern, two surfing simulators and a boardwalk surrounded by restaurants, it is more like a giant ritzy resort than a cruise ship."

Expedition aims to recover Ernest Shackleton's whisky: "A rare brand of whisky that British explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton left behind in Antarctica is the holy grail for a New Zealand drilling expedition. The New Zealand Press Association reports that the whisky was among supplies abandoned by Shackleton on his unsuccessful expedition to the south pole in 1909. The brand of McKinlay and Co no longer exists. Whyte & Mackay, the drinks giant that owned McKinlay and Co, had asked for a sample of the drink for a series of experiments, the NZPA quoted London's Telegraph as reporting. The NZPA said the New Zealanders would use special drills to free the trapped crates and rescue a bottle from the crates, discarded near the Cape Royds hut used by the Nimrod expedition, or at least draw off a sample using a syringe. The crates were discovered in January 2006, but the bottle couldn't be removed as they were too deeply embedded. The whisky was found under the floorboards of the hut while workers were clearing out a century's worth of ice. The Shackleton expedition's whisky could still be drinkable and taste exactly how it did 100 years ago."

Agency wrongly announces royal death: "BELGIUM'S national press agency Belga erroneously announced the death of the country's queen mother, after a mischievous posting on its new twitter-style service. On day one the new service was victim to a hoaxer who announced "the death of Queen Fabiola", widow of Belgium's king Baudouin. She had been, the message said, affected by the divorce of Prince Laurent, the younger son of Belgium's current King Albert. The new service, called "I have news", is aimed at allowing ordinary citizens to tell of any interesting event they may have witnessed, such as a train crash or a violent protest. The messages, which must be a maximum of 160 letters, can be left with any pictures on www.ihavenews.be and are delivered to Belga clients - newspapers, TV channels, etc - via the same wire service as their regular journalist-generated news. The false information was written in Dutch and signed by the equivalent of "Mr Everyone". Later in the day the Belga management apologised for the "unfortunate" incident. However in a separate statement Belga journalists called for the new service to be scrapped, voicing concern that the uncontrolled dissemination of information could affect the agency's credibility."



Hippos kill crocodile in rare clash: " Bathing hippos usually have a tolerant attitude towards their fellow creatures — until something snaps. And then, as this crocodile discovered the hard way, they are the most dangerous wild animals in Africa. Vaclav Silha, a Czech wildlife photographer, had set up his camera on the banks of the Grumeti in the Serengeti National Park, Tanzania, to take pictures of a group of 50 placid hippos when an explosive fight erupted — a thrashing scrum that ended seconds later in the crocodile’s violent death. “Mutual respect between these animals means fights occur very rarely,” Mr Silha said. “One of the only reasons you might see a conflict is if the hippos have young. The incautious croc got too close to a female who had calves and the whole group gathered into a defensive circle. “The crocodile suddenly raced across the backs of the hippos. It might have panicked and thought it was an escape route. It was the worst choice the reptile could ever have made. And it was definitely its last. “The island of hippos erupted with teeth and all I could see was the crocodile being repeatedly crushed in their huge mouths. His body slipped below the water and I didn’t see him again.” The hippo is an extremely aggressive, unpredictable animal and totally unafraid of humans. Its formidable size, weight and turn of speed have led to the deaths of far more humans than have been killed by lions."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




17 November, 2009

Is this the police officer who recently arrested paedophilic movie-director Roman Polanski?

If not, why not?



The picture is in fact of Polanski himself, playing the part of a French police officer in a movie



THE NEWS

Coffee shop with topless staff to reopen: "A COFFEE shop with topless waitresses in the US is officially reopening after being burnt to the ground by an arsonist. Donald Crabtree, the owner of the Grand View Topless Coffee Shop at Vassalboro, Maine, has been granted a permit to reopen in a business trailer on the site. The shop has been operating in a tent since the arson attack in June, which is still being investigated. The coffee shop’s opening in February angered many residents in the small town and the fire occurred hours after Mr Crabtree discussed with local officials the idea of making the business more like a strip club. Mr Crabtree told the Boston Herald that business is currently slow, but customers are trickling in. The Grand View’s topless waitresses have volunteered to work just for tips and take home between $30 and $200 a day doing a job criticised by many. Star Cunningham, a 22-year-old waitress at the shop, told the US’s Sunday Best that they have encountered so much resistance due to the lack of similar venues in the area. Another topless waitress, Lisa Beaudreau, 23, said lack of employment options made working at the shop an attractive option. “It’s really hard to find a job in this area. The unemployment rate is really high," Ms Beaudreau said."

Problem gambler lent $1m despite $5m Las Vegas debt! "High stakes problem gambler Harry Kakavas was lent $US1 million by a Bahamian casino despite knowing he owed $US5 million to casinos in Las Vegas, a court has heard. An internet search showing Mr Kakavas had sold his home on the Gold Coast's Hedges Avenue for a record $18 million allayed any fears management at Atlantis Paradise Island Casino had about his finances, the Victorian Supreme Court was told. It was decided Mr Kakavas should be allowed a $US1 million line of credit when he visited the casino during his November 2006 honeymoon in The Bahamas. In a four hour $US1.6 million gambling spree at Paradise Island Casino's baccarat table, Mr Kakavas blew the credit and more than $US600,000 of his own money. The casino is suing Mr Kakavas, hoping to recoup the $US1 million and $US13,300 in commissions."



Cruise ship trapped in ice: "More than 100 penguin-loving tourists including dozens from Britain are trapped by ice off Antarctica aboard a Russian ice-breaker cruise ship, officials and the tour operator said on Monday. The Kapitan Khlebnikov is in a bay near Snow Hill island, located off the northeastern end of the Antarctic Peninsula, and cannot leave as the bay is sealed off with ice, the Russian transportation ministry said. "The wind has currently slowed down in the area and the massing of the ice has ended. Everything is calm aboard the ice-breaker, nothing is threatening the passengers and crew," the ministry said in a statement. "When the wind changes to a favourable direction, the ice-breaker will head into clear water and on to the port of Ushuaia," at the extreme southern end of Argentina, the ministry predicted. There were 105 passengers aboard the vessel and the total delay in the ship's scheduled trip could be around two days, it added. The ship has been at its current location for four days, German Kuzin, an official with the Far Eastern Shipping Company, the ship's owner, said in televised remarks." [Must be all that global warming]



Giant rock nearly crushes sleeping family: "A 1500-tonne boulder came within metres of crushing a sleeping family of four after breaking free from a large overhanging rock face on Black Friday. Jenny and Michael Day were asleep in their Wyberba home near Stanthorpe on the Granite Belt in southern Queensland when they were jolted awake by an "almighty crash" about 3am. They had to wait until daylight to discover the offending object – and could barely believe what they saw. "My husband rushed back inside with his camera and showed me the pictures he took," Mrs Day said. "I said, 'Holy crap'!" The enormous boulder had broken off a large rock face overhanging their property and tumbled about 150m. "About 50m more and we would have been gone. It would have completely crushed the house," Mrs Day said. Mrs Day said they would just have to live with the rock, planted firmly next to the water tank. "It's not like we can move it," she laughed."



British doctor jailed for abortion attempt: "A doctor has been jailed for six years for trying to poison his pregnant lover to bring on an abortion. Judge Richard Hone told the Old Bailey, UK’s Central Criminal Court, that Dr Edward Erin had been exposed as a "liar, cheat and predator" who led a fantasy life where he preyed on women by dazzling them with his wealth. The couple had a brief relationship following a Christmas party. Six weeks later she discovered she was pregnant. Ms Prowse, 33, refused to have an abortion. Erin wrote a prescription for anti-inflammatory, abortion-inducing drugs, made out in the name of his German teacher, according to The Times. He ground up the tablets on February 2, where his wife saw him but was told he was doing it for work. He put powder in her Starbucks coffee February 7 but she noticed it had been opened, The Times reported. The following day, he put some in orange juice at St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington, west London, where they both worked, but she noticed the seal was broken. Though tests showed they contained drugs to induce abortion, Ms Prowse later gave birth to a healthy boy, Ernie. Erin was arrested on February 14 last year, after Ms Prowse's visit to the police."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




16 November, 2009

The New York way





THE NEWS

China: Man invents stair-climbing wheelchair: "A Chinese pensioner sold his apartment to fund his dream of creating a wheelchair that can climb stairs. Li Rongbiao, 67, of Beijing, came up with the idea after his wife, Wang Huifang, 65, broke her leg, reports West China City Daily. … So, despite a complete lack of mechanical knowledge, Li sold his apartment for £44,000 to fund the project. ‘I bought a lot of books, and used half a year to learn the computer designing, and then another half a year to design the wheelchair,’ he said. With one charge, his foldable electric wheelchair can climb nearly 3,000 steps — the equivalent of 50 floors, he claims. … He has already been awarded two patents for his invention and is now looking for partners to help him market it commercially.”

Desire drug may prove sex is really all in her head: "Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH is banking on sex really being all in women’s heads. The German drugmaker is putting the finishing touches on a pill designed to reawaken desire by blunting female inhibitions. Unlike Viagra, which targets the mechanics of sex by boosting blood flow to the penis, this drug works on the brain. … The U.S. market for medicines to rekindle female libido could be bigger than the $2 billion a year in U.S. sales for erectile dysfunction treatments because more women report sexual problems, BioSante Pharmaceuticals Inc. Chief Executive Officer Stephen Simes estimated last year.”

Cancer appeal paid for bigger breasts: "A Texas woman lied about having breast cancer and spent $10,800 raised at a benefit to have her breasts enlarged, US authorities say. McLennan County sheriff's investigator James Pack said in court records that 24-year-old Trista Joy Lathern shaved her head to look like a cancer patient undergoing chemotherapy. Mr Pack said Lathern wanted breast implants to try to save her seven-month marriage."

Economic uncertainty means business is booming for Swiss gold smelters: "As the temperature in the furnace rose to 1,200C, a broad-shouldered worker prepared to melt the gold rings, chains and bracelets — which constituted a lifetime’s memories for countless families. They had been given for births, christenings and weddings, but in this hot, dark workshop on the southern edge of Switzerland, love had been stripped away to leave a value that investors say is more durable — that of precious metal. The jewellery had been sold by often hard-up families seeking cash as gold prices hit a record $1,110 (£665) an ounce this week. “We’ll get hundreds of kilos of scrap jewellery from Europe this year and I’ve never seen that amount before,” said Erhard Oberli, chief executive of Argor-Heraeus, a large gold refinery. Here in Ticino, the Italian-speaking Swiss canton that is the world’s gold processing capital, with about a third of total global output, no one is complaining about the trend. In the US, some pawnbrokers say they are doing better than at any time since the Great Depression. In France hundreds of bistro owners are boosting their usual income from meals and cigarette sales by offering to buy unwanted gold."



Venice not such a good place to live: "Residents of Venice are to have their DNA samples taken today as part of a campaign to save the city — which has a population declining so fast that there are fears Venetians may soon be extinct. The move is to provide a record of Venice’s residents, whose numbers have dropped to fewer than 60,000, nearly outnumbered by the 55,000 tourists who crowd into the city each day. According to Matteo Secchi, a local hotelier and campaigner for the revival of Venice, demographers predict that by 2030 there will be no permanent residents, leaving a ghost city sinking into the lagoon. Mr Secchi said that when he began keeping a tally of the population three years ago, there were 62,027 permanent residents, compared with 145,000 in 1960. He and others formed an online campaign, Venessia.com, to hold a “funeral for Venice” when the number dipped below 60,000. It did so last month, with a new low of 59,984. Today campaigners will take a three-gondola cortege carrying a symbolic red coffin through the canals from the railway station to the city hall, where local poets will deliver a “funerary oration”."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




15 November, 2009

"Belle de Jour" unmasked

Revealed as research scientist Dr Brooke Magnanti



The secret life of Dr Brooke Magnanti, an obscure research scientist, is revealed today as she unmasks herself as the writer behind the pseudonym Belle de Jour. Her identity has been one of the great literary mysteries of the decade after the publication of bestselling books about her secret life as a prostitute.

Magnanti is a respected specialist in developmental neurotoxicology and cancer epidemiology in a hospital research group in Bristol. Six years ago, in the final stages of her PhD thesis, she ran out of money and turned to prostitution through a London escort agency, charging £300 an hour. Already an experienced science blogger, she began writing about her experiences in a web diary that was adapted into books and a television drama starring Billie Piper.

There has been huge speculation about Belle’s real identity, including a theory that she was a well-known author because of the quality of her writing. The blog and books were also criticised for suggesting prostitution could be glamorous. Last week Magnanti contacted one of Belle’s sternest critics, India Knight, the Sunday Times columnist, saying she wanted to reveal her identity.

The scientist, a petite 34-year-old, has no regrets about her 14 months as a prostitute. “I’ve felt worse about my writing than I ever have about sex for money,” she said. Anonymity had become “no fun”, however: “I couldn’t even go to my own book launch party.”

Until last week, not even her agent knew her real name. A month ago she revealed her secret to her colleagues at the Bristol Initiative for Research of Child Health, who were “amazingly kind and supportive”. She was preparing to tell her parents this weekend.

Magnanti said she was working on a doctoral study for the department of forensic pathology of Sheffield University in 2003 when she took up prostitution. “I was getting ready to submit my thesis. I saved up a bit of money. I thought, I’ll just move to London, because that’s where the jobs are, and I’ll see what happens. “I couldn’t find a professional job in my chosen field because I didn’t have my PhD yet. I didn’t have a lot of spare time on my hands because I was still making corrections and preparing for the viva; and I got through my savings a lot faster than I thought I would.”

When she could no longer afford her rent, she started to think: “What can I do that I can start doing straightaway, that doesn’t require a great deal of training or investment to get started, that’s cash in hand and that leaves me spare time to do my work in?” She found an escort agency and started her secret life. “I did have another job at one point, as a computer programmer, but I kept up with my other work because it was so much more enjoyable.”

Her future lies in medical science, but she also has a literary streak. She has been writing a novel, and the Belle blog will “continue for a bit — I’d like her to have happy ending”.

Original story here



MORE NEWS

Cash stunt scrapped as huge crowd gathers: "A FRENCH internet company that planned to throw envelopes of cash to passers-by from a bus stop had to cancel the publicity stunt for security reasons after thousands of people turned up. About 5000 people gathered near the Eiffel Tower in Paris, with groups spilling into neighbouring streets and bursting through crowd barriers before the planned handout of banknotes by the online marketing company Mailorama.fr. "Given the serious traffic problems noted in the Champ de Mars area and significant crowd movements, the police requested the organisers not to go ahead with this distribution of money," a police spokesman said."

Brit charity wants men to pee outdoors: "EMPLOYEES with a British heritage charity are being urged to help the environment by eschewing indoor toilets and relieving themselves outside. The experiment applies to male gardening staff at Wimpole Hall, a stately home about 80km north of London. The National Trust, which runs the property, says the staff are being encouraged to urinate on straw, which is then placed on compost heaps. The trust said on Friday that the chemical reaction helps the composting process, while the absence of flushing by 10 members of staff could cut the estat e's water use by almost a third. Officials warned the gardeners to make sure they urinate in spots where they cannot be seen by people passing by." [I wonder how that fits with Britain's ubiquitous health & safety regulations?]

Drunk husband hammers nail into head to escape wife's nagging: "A HENPECKED husband took drastic action when his wife nagged him over his boozing - he took a hammer and knocked a 20cm nail into his own head. Sozzled Lin Ma's disapproving spouse Su, 60, did his head in when he returned from a drinking binge so he tried to end it in gruesome fashion. The 66-year-old, of Yuyi, southern China, was rushed to hospital where stunned medics at the Shantou Medical College were able to remove the nail which astonishingly had missed his brain by fractions of an inch. Lin said: "I thought life wasn't worth living so I tried to end it. I woke up with a very bad headache - worse even than the biggest hangover I've ever had."

This guy has a right to teach?: "A "hoon" teacher banned for tailgating a school bus, swearing at children and allowing students to stand on tables says he deserves another chance to front a classroom. Alf Hickey, 36, hopes to overturn a Victorian Institute of Teaching ban through the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal on Tuesday. Mr Hickey, a woodwork teacher, was deregistered in February over a long list of bizarre behaviour during a six-month stint at Vermont Secondary College in 2007. A VIT hearing found Mr Hickey turned up 90 minutes late on his first day, left classes unsupervised and said "f---" when yelling at students. It also found Mr Hickey let students stand on tables in class, did not call in sick when he failed to arrive and tailgated a school bus on a year 9 camp to Phillip Island. Mr Hickey admitted to the Sunday Herald Sun doing "wheelies" in a school car park and that a colleague had called him a "hoon" over his driving on the school camp."

Latvian 'cheddar' now outselling the original in Britain: "Cheddar cheese eaten in Britain is now more likely to come from Latvia than from the area of Somerset from which it takes its name. test figures show record levels of the cheddar bought in Britain now comes from abroad, although little of it is labelled with its country of origin. Tesco even sells foreign cheddar as being "packaged in the UK" without admitting it is from overseas. By far the largest exporter is Ireland, but the cheese is also shipped thousands of miles from as far away as New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the US. Several European countries also export vast quantities to the UK, including Latvia, which supplies around 86,000kg. This compares with about 50,000kg produced by the Cheddar Gorge Cheese Company, the only firm still making cheese in the village of Cheddar itself. In total, more than 40 per cent of cheddar eaten in Britain now comes from overseas. John Spencer, managing director of the company, said: "The British cheese industry would get a huge boost if it said on the label the country of origin of the cheese. "That would encourage people to ignore imports and only buy original cheddar. You can't imagine Italians buying mozzarella from Bolton."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




14 November, 2009

In your dreams!





THE NEWS

Woman jailed for poisoned dessert -- but sends "love" to victim: "A stripper who tried to poison her lover by lacing his mousse dessert with anti-freeze has been jailed for 33 months. Sophie Mardon, 26, poured half a bottle of the toxic liquid into a purple dessert and served it to Martyn Kay, 31, his brother Neal, 26, and their father Neil, 55. The three men tasted it but found it so disgusting they refused to eat any more. Mardon later wrote them notes apologising for trying to poison them. She wrote to Neil: "I apologise the pudding I made had half a bottle of de-icer mixed in it. Glad now you didn't eat it. Maybe next time I'll get away with it. "Thanks for allowing me to be a guest. I'm leaving at half three today. Good luck with the boys. Lots of love, despite attempted murder. "Hugs and kisses, Sophie." She was arrested but then stabbed Martyn in the leg while on bail. Bristol Crown Court heard how Mardon, a clerical assistant, carried out the attacks because she was in an abusive relationship with Martyn, who forced her to work as a stripper at night for extra cash."

British authorities think that their police are morons: "British police chiefs have come under fire for a 93-page guide telling officers how to ride their bikes, including how to brake and how to balance to avoid falling off. The Police Cycle Training Doctrine also warns policemen not to try to tackle suspected criminals while still "engaged with the cycle" - on the bike - and gives a diagram on "deployment into a junction" - turning left or right. The guide was produced by the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), which insisted it had not been fully approved for publication after the document was reported in the Sun newspaper. Other advice includes to wear padded shorts for "in-saddle comfort," while officers must always remember to "rear-scan" - look over their shoulders. Undercover police are advised that they may have to cycle without a protective helmet to avoid being found out. But, underlining the importance of sometimes-criticised health and safely laws, it warned: "This lack of protection must be noted and a full risk assessment of the required role ... be undertaken." The Sun - which noted that the original US constitution ran to only four pages, and the Bible takes less than a page to recount God's creation of the universe - said the guide had cost thousands of pounds. Critics said it was a waste of money. "This is an absurd waste of police time and thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money," added Mark Wallace, head of the Taxpayers' Alliance lobby group which campaigns against misuse of public money."



'Battle of the bulge' begins as US troops stand easy: "They call it the “Baghdad bulge”. Standing outside a Burger King on the Camp Liberty military base near the city’s airport, a group of American soldiers ponder whether to order a second Whopper. “Not me, man,” said Specialist Joe Lorenzo, “I put on so much goddam weight, who knows if my wife will recognise me when I get home?” Now US troops have been withdrawn from Iraqi city streets and are spending more time behind barbed wire awaiting withdrawal, commanders are struggling to keep them entertained. Offering ever-increasing food options is the first line of defence in the fight against boredom. The favourite is lobster night at the D-Fac — American military vernacular for the official “dining facilities”. Thousands of sea creatures are regularly taken to the Iraqi desert by cargo plane." ... Many of the 117,000 US troops here still conduct “red zone” operations, but usually now with Iraqi army soldiers, who are encouraged to take the lead in patrols. The number of monthly US deaths has dropped from more than 100 two years ago to fewer than 20 now. But new dangers loom. Obesity is rising dramatically, according to a recent Pentagon report that called it “a significant military medical concern because it is associated with decreased military operational effectiveness”. Since 2003, the number of overweight soldiers has doubled, with one in 20 now clinically obese."

More thick crooks: "Six people who allegedly carjacked a vehicle and then crashed it at high speed are facing a raft of charges when they get out of hospital. The four men and two women are alleged to have confronted a man while he was sitting in his Holden Berlina waiting for a mate to finish work in Kerry Avenue at Archerfield in Brisbane's west, just after midnight. He told police, they pulled out a gun and demanded he get out of the car which he did. They then jumped in and drove off. A couple of hours later, police were notified of a single vehicle crash on the Pacific Motorway at Helensvale. Police said the allegedly stolen car had left the M1 and crashed into a tree on an access road leading to the motorway. The six people were taken to the Gold Coast Hospital for treatment to non-life threatening injuries. Detectives from Coomera and Oxley police stations are expected to question the group in relation to unlawful use of a vehicle and robbery with violence. [They did not even start out well. Six people in a mini car is quite a squeeze]

Barbie dolls have a new home in China: "Sitting in a beauty salon in Shanghai, watching girls pick out polish in various shades of pink – "Ballet Shoes", "Pink Lemonade", "Bikini Bottoms", "Midday Rendezvous" – I'm thinking anthropologists might want to look into nail colour as a barometer of socio-economic change. Here in China, pink is the thing. My five-year-old niece has nothing on these women: their pink T-shirts are emblazoned with nonsensical but jolly assertions such as "Happy Me!" and "Kiss Kiss Girl"; they sport tiny pink trainers; Hello Kitty bags dangle from their arms; and their mobile phones are barnacled in pink sequins. Barbie – that old feminist foe – is such a draw that she's just opened her very own café not far from People's Square. When I pop in for a Fashionista Salad (you don't get her 36-24-36 measurements by eating Barbie Burgers) I watch a gaggle of schoolgirls, aged between six and 10, taking part in Barbie's "I Can Be a Chef" programme. There's no negative cultural subtext: mothers and daughters are simply enjoying one of the many novelties their burgeoning city has to offer."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




13 November, 2009

Joker





THE NEWS

Muscle-headed Marine: "Marine reservist Jasen Bruce was getting clothes out of the trunk of his car Monday evening when a bearded man in a robe approached him. That man, a Greek Orthodox priest named Father Alexios Marakis, speaks little English and was lost, police said. He wanted directions. What the priest got instead, police say, was a tire iron to the head. Then he was chased for three blocks and pinned to the ground — as the Marine kept a 911 operator on the phone, saying he had captured a terrorist.... Bruce ended up in jail, accused of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon. He was released Tuesday on $7,500 bail. Marakis ended up at the hospital with stitches. He told the police he didn't want to press charges, espousing biblical forgiveness.” Bruce is a sales manager for APS Pharmacy in Palm Harbor. His blog entries tout the benefits of increasing testosterone and human growth hormones. He was charged with misdemeanor battery in 2007 for hopping over the bed of a tow truck and shoving its driver. He pleaded no contest. Online photo galleries depict him flexing big muscles wearing little clothing. [Sounds like he would be a bigger danger to his buddies than to the enemy]



Ryanair 2010 sexy calendar causes controversy: "RYANAIR boss Michael O'Leary has hit back at criticism of the airline's raunchy cabin crew calendar by sending it to an MP. Mr O'Leary posted the 2010 Ryanair Cabin Crew Charity Calendar to "anti-fun" Labour MEP Mary Honeyball [A misleading surname, it seems] after she accused Ryanair of "forcing" cabin crew to take part in the calendar, the Daily Mail reports. The calendar, which hopes to raise money for the UK KIDS charity, shows some cabin crew topless and others stripped down to a bikini. But Mr O'Leary insists staff volunteered to do the shoot. "Ryanair's cabin crew volunteer to take part and this year over 800 of the airline's 4000 cabin crew applied for this great charity event," Mr O'Leary said. Reports say Mr O'Leary has already bought the first 100 copies of the calendar. Proceeds of the 2010 calendar will bring the total raised by Ryanair's stripped-down cabin crew to almost £300,000 ($500,000) since the first calendar was published in 2008."



More wackiness from Australia's wild North: "Chubb sure does have tight security. So much so, these security officers were left red-faced when they were locked out of their armoured security van after doing a drop-off at the Nightcliff Shopping Centre in Darwin just before noon on Friday. The van is understood to have gone into automatic lock-down mode. NEWSBREAKER Martin Urban said it was a priceless moment. "They were trying everything to get in and it just wouldn't let them in," he said. "There was a lot of huffing and puffing and kicking like the three little pigs but they could not get in. "It was a good laugh actually. I should have taken a video." Mr Urban, 49, from Millner, said he noticed the pair's plight when he entered the shops, and about an hour later they were still there. "That's Chubb security for you - it's that tight," he said. "It's a beauty."



Scotland's first goldmine : "The view from the base of Ben Chuirn is perfect, even on a November morning. A procession of mountains marches eastwards along Glen Cononish, the snow-capped peaks emerging from a swirl of mist. It is a glittering prospect; what lies beneath is also dazzling — Scotland’s first goldmine. When production begins in earnest in 2011 some 20,000 ounces of gold will be mined annually, representing revenues of $22 million (£13 million), along with $1.2 million-worth of silver. Chris Sangster, the chief executive of Scotgold and a mining engineer, slaps the rock wall in a proprietorial way. Each tonne of the best rock is likely to yield up to 10 grams of high-grade gold, worth around £200, enough for a very large wedding ring. Ever since the British Geological Survey found evidence of gold in the Western Highlands in the 1960s, there has been talk of commercial extraction in the mountains around the village of Tyndrum. Although mining companies have tested the area, successive ventures have foundered on the low price of gold and eventually Cononish was mothballed. Scotgold bought the old mine in 2007, just as prices began to rise. The company had estimated that it needed a price of around $650 per ounce to have a viable business, but with the recession pushing the price to $1,113 it now has the prospect of reaping untold riches."

TN: Eight-year-old kicks dog, stabs cop: "A school resource officer is recovering after he was stabbed in the leg by an 8-year-old boy and assaulted by the boy’s mother Tuesday, police said. Metro police said students and staff at Dupont-Hadley Middle School told Officer Randy Fowler that the boy was kicking a dog in the street just off school property. The boy ran away when he saw Fowler approaching despite the officer’s commands for him to stop, police said. Fowler caught up to the boy outside his home, arrested and handcuffed him. Police said Fowler tried to explain what happened to the boy’s mother, Rachel Swafford, 31, but Swafford grabbed her son, pushed the boy inside and began fighting with Fowler, telling the officer that her son wasn’t going to be arrested. During the scuffle, the boy slipped out of the handcuffs, came back outside and began stabbing Fowler in the leg with a pen. Mother and son were both arrested.”



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




12 November, 2009

A likely story





THE NEWS

Bloodied woman bit sex attacker on 'sensitive part of body': "Police are hunting a sex fiend with a nasty bite wound to a ``sensitive part of his body''. About 9pm yesterday a 23-year-old woman got off a train at Holmview Station at Beenleigh and started walking home along Spanns Road. Around the same time, a man hopped off another train and followed the woman, engaging her in conversation. A short distance along the road, the man grabbed her and dragged her up a driveway in a dark industrial area and tried to rape her. Police said the woman managed to fight him off, after biting him deeply in a ``delicate area''. The bite was hard enough to break the skin, and as a result the victim had blood all over her face, an officer said. She then ran off and alerted police. Detectives from Logan CIB are today expected to examine CCTV footage from the train station to try to identify the man".



London society snobs treated me like an Eastern European mail-order bride, says millionaire banker's wife: "With riches beyond her dreams, a happy marriage, two children and a packed diary, what more could Diana Jenkins have wanted? Well, a few friends might have been nice. But the former Bosnian refugee who became the wife of Britain's highest paid financier found that London's glittering social circle can be a very lonely place. She has told how she endured years of being treated 'like an Eastern European mail-order bride' by high society wives in the capital. In a candid magazine interview, Mrs Jenkins, 36, said it was that sort of snobbery that drove her to move to California. She now spends much of the year there with her children Innis, 11, and Eneya, seven, while husband Roger flies around the world brokering deals. Recalling her arrival into London society ten years ago, she said: 'I realised that, unfortunately, with social girls, if you have a big diamond ring they will talk to you, so I wore a diamond ring. 'My lovely husband bought me a diamond ring. It hurt him to see how snobbily I was treated.' Mr Jenkins is the former £40million-a-year head of Barclays' tax avoidance division, and the highest-paid employee of a FTSE 100 company ever, earning an estimated £ 75million in 2005 alone. They married in 1999 and Roger Jenkins, 52, has credited her business sense for helping him win a number of lucrative deals. In fact, he believes it was her charm that persuaded the Qatari royal family into parting with the £7.3billion that saved Barclays at the height of the credit crunch.

Indian pilots, crew come to blows at 30,000 ft: "The Maharaja witnessed his first in-flight Mughal-e-Azam at 30,000 feet above sea level on Saturday, as two members of the cabin crew—one male and one female—slugged it out with the pilot and co-pilot. Endangering the lives of 106 passengers and grossly violating safety norms, the airline staffers came to blows in the cockpit and galley of the Indian Airlines Airbus A-320 as the aircraft cruised over Pakistan en route to Delhi via Lucknow from Sharjah. The cabin-vs-cockpit tiff originated on the ground in Sharjah itself and then turned into a full-blown fight once IC 884 took off soon after midnight. The cabin crew alleged that pilots harassed a 24-year-old female colleague who later filed a molestation complaint against them with the cops after the flight landed in Delhi. The pilots, on the other hand, accused a male flight purser of misconduct that seriously compromised flight safety, and said the accusation of molestation aimed to protect the complainant's purser friend—who has a commercial pilot licence (CPL)—from facing action. No party denied that blows and abuses were exchanged as bewildered passengers looked on. Sources said that the female cabin crew member and the co-pilot sustained bruises. Confirming the in-flight fight, Air India said it had ordered an inquiry and had grounded the staff members involved. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has also ordered a probe. There were unconfirmed reports that at one stage the cockpit was unmanned"

Britons among the "ugliest people": "Britons are among the ugliest people in the world, according to a dating website that says it only allows "beautiful people" to join. Fewer than one in eight British men and just three in 20 women who have applied to BeautifulPeople.com have been accepted, an emailed statement from the website showed. Existing members of the "elite dating site" rate how attractive potential members are over a 48 hour period, after applicants upload a recent photo and personal profile. Swedish men have proved the most successful, with 65 percent being accepted, while Norwegian women are considered the most beautiful with 76 percent accepted, the website said. The way that BeautifulPeople.com accepts new members is simple. A potential member applies with a photo and a brief profile. Over 48 hours, existing members of the opposite sex vote whether or not to admit them, the site said. The site was founded in 2002 in Denmark and went live across the globe last month. Since then, the site has rejected nearly 1.8 million people from 190 countries, admitting just 360,000 new members. "I would say Britain is stumbling because they don't spend as much time polishing up their appearance and they are letting themselves down on physical fitness," Beautiful People managing director Greg Hodge said. "Next to Brazilian and Scandinavian beauties, British people just aren't as toned or glamorous."

Kilo of metal found in man's stomach: "DOCTORS in northern Peru have removed almost a kilogram of nails, coins and scrap metal from a man's stomach, a surgeon that operated on him said today. "The patient came in with severe abdominal pains. After examinations we discovered that he had hundreds of nails in his stomach,'' Carlos Delgado, a surgeon at the hospital in the town of Cajamarca, told AFP. Requelme Abanto Alvarado was admitted to the hospital on Friday. After a two-hour operation doctors removed 900 grams of nails, coins and scrap metal from his stomach, as well as a small knife. "I have never had a case like this,'' the surgeon said. "I have operated on plenty of patients, but so many things in a stomach, it's really extraordinary.'' Alvarado was in a stable condition following the operation, Dr Delgado said, adding that he was now being examined by mental health specialists."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




11 November, 2009

Retired guy creates model of Herod's temple in Jerusalem



More here



THE NEWS

Noisy lover loses sex appeal: "A British woman has lost her appeal against a ban on her noisy sex sessions, after a court heard how her marathon romps that kept neighbours awake sounded like someone being murdered. Caroline and Steve Cartwright's "howling" lovemaking sounded "unnatural", "hysterical" and "like they are both in considerable pain", Newcastle Crown Court in north-east England heard. A 10-minute recording of their sex sessions was played in court, which also heard how she tried covering her face with a pillow to muffle her cries of passion. Neighbours at their home in Washington, County Durham, south of Newcastle, complained about the noise - as did passers-by and the postman. The couple were banned from "shouting, screaming or vocalisation at such a level as to be a statutory nuisance", but Mrs Cartwright, 48, appealed under human rights laws against her conviction for breaching the ban. However, a judge on Tuesday upheld the original conviction and ordered that the banning order should stay."

The girl who can't cry or she might die: "Little Tianna Lewis McHugh is the girl who cannot cry because it could kill her. The two-year-old has a rare condition which means tears could trigger a fatal fit. Other children with the condition react to pain, fear or fright, but Tianna has a form so extreme that simply crying can trigger a fit. She was diagnosed with the condition aged 18 months and has since survived 10 seizures. The most serious lasted two hours. Mother Ceri, 23, an hotel receptionist from Wrexham, North Wales, says she was hysterical when she saw her daughter's first fit. She said: "I picked her up out of her high chair and put her on the floor and she cried for seconds and then she looked like she had died. "She went a deathly grey, her lips and around her eyes were blue and her eyes rolled back in her head. "When she has fits it's horrendous,' said Andy. 'When she starts to cry we usually have to flick water in her face to bring her out of the shock. "She can do whatever she wants but for 18 months we have been cautious with her so that she doesn't get hurt or shocked and cry. "She is our little angel and this makes you appreciate her more."



Mystery holes in roof: "Large holes were blown in the roofs of two Grovedale homes on Saturday afternoon, baffling emergency workers and weather experts. One couple reported hearing a loud bang, while a neighbour also heard the crashing sound about 3.30pm. SES and police told Sturt Court couple Tony and May Giuffre the damage was caused by an unusual weather phenomena called a microburst. But weather expert Lindsay Smail dismissed that claim because that weather pattern was only associated with thunderstorms, and none were present on the weekend. The Astronomical Society of Victoria's president Perry Vlahos predicted a marble-sized piece of space junk or meteorite could have caused the damage and the evidence would be found in the area around the two houses."

UK: Man provides photo for his own wanted poster: "A British man on the run from police sent a picture of himself to his local paper because he disliked the mugshot they had printed of him as part of a public appeal to track him down. South Wales Police had issued media with the photo of Matthew Maynard, wanted by officers investigating a house burglary, as part of a crackdown on crime in Swansea. When it appeared in the South Wales Evening Post, the 23-year-old sent the newspaper a replacement photo of himself standing in front of a police van. They obligingly printed it on the front page. The police thanked him for helping them in their appeal, saying: ‘Everyone in Swansea will know what he looks like now.’”

Iceland says goodbye to the Big Mac: "The Big Mac, long a symbol of globalization, has become the latest victim of this tiny island nation's overexposure to the world financial crisis. Iceland's three McDonald's restaurants -- all in the capital Reykjavik -- will close next weekend, as the franchise owner gives in to falling profits caused by the collapse in the Icelandic krona. "The economic situation has just made it too expensive for us," Magnus Ogmundsson, the managing director of Lyst Hr., McDonald's franchise holder in Iceland, told The Associated Press by telephone on Monday. Lyst was bound by McDonald's requirement that it import all the goods required for its restaurants -- from packaging to meat and cheeses -- from Germany. Lyst plans to reopen the stores under a new brand name, Metro, using locally sourced materials and produce and retaining the franchise's current 90-strong staff."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




10 November, 2009

Weird: Brazilian Student expelled over short dress



In Brazil, famed for its tiny bikinis and carefree attitude, a university student has been expelled after violent protests by students outraged at the short outfit she wore on campus. The Universidade Bandeirante (Uniban) said it had expelled the student, Geysi Villa Nova Arruda, 20, for "flagrant disrespect of ethical principles, academic dignity and morality", in a statement published in some newspapers.

Her dress sparked student protests on October 22. Six military police officers had to protect her as she left the campus wearing a white jacket. A line of students stood by chanting "whore". Another video showed a mob stopping and kicking her car and blocking her when she tried to escape on foot.

Comments on Brazilian websites pointed out the irony of the hatred directed at Arruda by fellow students in a nation obsessed with physical beauty and said the university's actions were unfair. "Pure hypocrisy ... once February and the Carnival comes round everyone will be naked and no one will find it abnormal," said one comment posted by a reader on the O Globo news website.

Uniban said it had also suspended a number of students identified by video footage and witness accounts of taking part in the violence last month. The university's legal advisor said Arruda had been expelled for "gestures" and "attitudes" she had manifested rather than because of her short outfits. He would not give details.

Original story here

Note that the outrage came from her fellow students. Brazil has profound social class divisions. She was probably seen as letting down her social class



MORE NEWS

UK: Fire warnings over drunk cooking: "People should get takeaways instead of cooking while drunk, a senior fire officer has warned. It follows an early morning rescue from a house fire of a 24-year-old man in Prestatyn, Denbighshire. North Wales Fire Service said the man had been drinking and not heard the smoke alarm during the fire in Grosvenor Road at 0432 GMT. Neighbours saw the smoke and dialled 999. The fire service said the man had fallen asleep while cooking. Tom Pye from the brigade said: ‘Our advice is to never cook after drinking — please prepare a sandwich before you go out or get a takeaway instead.’ He said firefighters entered the property and led the man, the only occupant, outside to safety.”



Maine: Topless coffeeshop owner wants to re-open in trailer: "The owner of a topless coffee shop that burned down in an arson fire wants to reopen his business in an office trailer. Donald Crabtree told the Kennebec Journal he will go before the Vassalboro Planning Board on Tuesday seeking a new business permit. He said he hopes to reopen in a trailer and save money so he can eventually get into a newer building. The opening of the Grand View Topless Coffee Shop last February angered many residents in Vassalboro, a small town outside of Augusta.”

Puff goes his driver's licence after mystical dragon talk: "A stoned driver passed a breath test but blew his cover when he talked to police about mystical dragons. Heavily bloodshot eyes, slurred speech and talk of dragons worked against Jay Danny Crawford, 22, when he was pulled over by police for a random breath test at Babinda last month. The Cairns man returned a negative blood alcohol reading. But suspicious police then asked him to get out of his car and Crawford’s unsteadiness on his feet sparked a fresh round of inquiries, the Innisfail Magistrates’ Court was told yesterday. "They saw he was unsteady, his speech was slurred and when they asked him simple questions he took long and unusual pauses," police prosecutor Sgt Scott Moon recounted. "He began talking about mystical dragons." Crawford was charged with driving under the influence of drugs and possessing a dangerous drug."



British beauty queen loves the army: "Lance Corporal Katrina Hodge, the soldier dubbed ''Combat Barbie'' after being crowned Miss England is joining fellow beauties to launch the Miss World 2009 Festival. L/Cpl Hodge, who was drafted in to compete in the Miss World contest after Rachel Christie relinquished her title following her arrest over an alleged nightclub brawl, said she planned to join comrades on the frontline in Afghanistan. The 22-year-old soldier has already served in Iraq but said she was hoping to join the effort in Afghanistan after stepping down as Miss England in July next year. She said: ''It is something I want to do'', adding: "People just do not appreciate the Army enough."

Youths steal drugs from Australian Keystone Kops: "Youths are breaking into one of the state's biggest police complexes to steal cannabis from an evidence storage area. The Advertiser has been told that local youths were caught twice last weekend as they desperately swept up the remnants of drug seizures at Christies Beach police complex. One youth was understood to have been caught in the back of a police ute literally collecting a pile of cannabis, while others have been gathering their stash from the ground around fenced-off industrial storage bins. "It is ridiculous," said one South Coast police officer, who would not be identified. "It's happening every week. They're (youths) just laughing at us and we're not going to do anything about it." The compound, believed to hold impounded cars at times, as well as the drugs and other seized items, is barely distinguishable from the adjacent building site. The Advertiser has been told youths are simply cutting their way through the mesh fence into the supposedly secure area. The area is not under camera surveillance and police officers patrol on foot "when they can" at the busy station."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




9 November, 2009

No need to shout





THE NEWS

Brave boy with stupid mother: "Police say a 9-year-old boy tried to fight off a Charleston man who attempted to steal his family's car at a West Side convenience store. Charleston police said Jonathan Martin, 32, of Sissonville Drive approached a 2001 Buick LeSabre in parking lot of the One Stop convenience store, located in the 100 block of Lee Street West. Lt. Kim West said Stephanie Medford of Charleston had left the Buick in the lot Wednesday night with the keys in the ignition and the engine running while she went into the store. Waiting inside the vehicle were her four children: a 9-year-old boy in the front passenger seat and three younger boys, aged 3 years, 19 months and 4 months, in safety seats in the back, police said. Martin allegedly got into the vehicle and tried to shift it into drive, according to a complaint filed in Kanawha Magistrate Court. At that point, the oldest of Medford's children, who had been sitting in the front passenger's seat, grabbed the car keys and pulled them out of the ignition, the complaint said. Martin reached for the keys, trying to take them away from the boy, but was unable to, police wrote in the complaint. Police said Martin then got out of the car and tried to run across Lee Street to get away from the scene. He didn't get very far before tripping in the middle of the road, the complaint said. Officers said they found Martin lying in a parking lot across the street from the convenience store".

Space lift to the stars is now more than a dream: "A start-up company from Seattle has won a NASA contest to build a miniature prototype of a machine that could one day climb from Earth to outer space. The idea of a space elevator – passengers and cargo travelling up and down a 97,000 kilometres cable – has long been a fixture of science fiction, notably in Arthur C. Clarke's novel The Fountains of Paradise. A real space lift is still decades in the future but NASA and the non-profit organisation Spaceward Foundation sponsored the contest, Centennial Challenges, to encourage the development of needed technologies. Three competing teams built prototypes designed to climb a one-kilometre cable held aloft by a helicopter. Each shone lasers at photovoltaic cells on the machines to power the electric motors. Last Wednesday a five-kilogram pyramid-shaped contraption built by LaserMotive made the climb in four minutes, two seconds, to qualify for a $US900,000 ($979,000) second prize."



A shrine to a squirrel: "Beside the grave lie gifts, flowers and heartfelt messages, some in verse. A tribute page on the social networking site Facebook has attracted more than 250 members. And the cause of this remarkable outpouring of grief? Albi the albino squirrel is no more. Albi, also known as Snowy or Percy, fell foul of a hit-and-run driver outside the churchyard where he used to live and play in Dorking, Surrey. Dozens of tearful mourners have made the pilgrimage to his grave in a flower bed and turned it into a shrine to their 'light that has gone out'. Cards, flowers and bags of nuts surround the small wooden cross which marks the spot where his body lies. One message reads: 'Bye my beautiful albino squirrel. Miss you. I will always remember you forever. Rest in peace. Love you.'"

Too much time in the gym 'can reduce women's fertility': "Spending too much time in the gym can reduce a woman's chances of having children, a study shows. Researchers found that 'superwoman work-outs' made fertility problems three times more likely. While experts agree that a certain amount of physical exercise has obvious health benefits, it is believed that too much saps the body of the energy it needs for a successful pregnancy. The findings were made by Norwegian University of Science and Technology after a study of 3,000 women. Although it is known that some elite female athletes have problems starting a family, other women who push themselves to the limit also appear to be affected."

World's oldest couple to divorce: "A British man and his wife have become the oldest couple in the world to divorce – at the age of 98. Bertie and Jessie Wood got a decree absolute to end their 36-year marriage when they were both two years away from their 100th birthdays. Both had been married before when they wed in Elstree, Hertfordshire, in 1972. They moved to Falmouth, Cornwall, four years later, but by 2008 the relationship was over. Both were 97 at the time and it is unclear why their marriage failed although a decree absolute is believed to have been granted subsequently. According to neighbours of the former couple, Mrs Wood now lives in a care home. Mr Wood, however, died shortly before he turned 99."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




8 November, 2009

An unwise man





THE NEWS

Grumpy folk less gullible, more capable: "Bad moods can actually be good for you, with an Australian study finding that being sad make people less gullible, improves their ability to judge others and also boosts memory. The study, authored by psychology professor Joseph Forgas at the University of New South Wales, showed that people in a negative mood were more critical of, and paid more attention to, their surroundings than happier people, who were more likely to believe anything they were told. "Whereas positive mood seems to promote creativity, flexibility, cooperation, and reliance on mental shortcuts, negative moods trigger more attentive, careful thinking paying greater attention to the external world," Prof Forgas wrote. "Our research suggests that sadness ... promotes information processing strategies best suited to dealing with more demanding situations."

US woman calls police to report herself as drunk driver: "The call came into the US emergency dispatcher: "I don't want to hurt anybody. I'm drunk." And with that, Mary Strey, 49, of Granton, reported herself as a drunken driver in central Wisconsin. Clark County Sheriff's Chief Deputy Jim Backus said that Strey's call on October 24 led deputies to cite her for misdemeanor drunken driving with a blood-alcohol level double the legal limit to drive. She makes her first court appearance December 10. Backus said drunken drivers reporting themselves is rare. In the 911 call, Strey said she wanted to report a drunken driver and the dispatcher asked if she was behind the suspect vehicle. "I am them," Strey said. She then followed the dispatcher's advice to pull over and turn on her flashers, telling him she had been "drinking all night long".

Illiterate British council workers: "Council officials were left embarrassed after an eight-year-old boy gave them a spelling lesson. Matthew Spurgin was appalled when workmen from Knowsley council installed road signs with a glaring error near his house. Matthew lives on an avenue in Liverpool but the new signs said “avenune”. Matthew, who got full marks in a spelling test at school this week, said: “They should learn to spell correctly. If they aren’t sure, they need to look it up.” A spokesman for the council insisted that the error was made by contractors and that correctly spelt signs had been ordered."



Soldier becomes new Miss England: "Lance Corporal Katrina Hodge (centre above) has become the new Miss England after Rachel Christie stepped down following her arrest over an alleged nightclub brawl. A statement from Miss England organisers said Miss Christie, 21, had stepped down as she wanted to concentrate on clearing her name. It was later announced that L/Cpl Hodge, who was first runner-up in the 2009 national contest, has become the new Miss England. L/Cpl Hodge has been given leave from her duties as a soldier in the British Army and will represent England in the Miss World Final in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Saturday December 12. She was previously given an award by her unit in the Royal Anglian Regiment for her actions during a posting in Basra and has earned the nickname "Combat Barbie". She has also previously worked with lingerie chain La Senza on its Face of the Armed Forces campaign. Lisa Bond, marketing director of La Senza said: "Not only is she absolutely gorgeous but she is also an intelligent, inspiring young woman who does such an amazing job for her country." [Ms Manchester, who was allegedly bashed by the black woman, on the left above]

South African man wins lottery - twice: "A South African man has become one the luckiest lottery players in history after scooping the jackpot twice in seven years. The 34-year-old came forward this week to claim £2.4 million (30 million rand) on South Africa's PowerBall draw - less than a decade after he collected £880,000 (11 million rand) in a previous competition. Lotto chiefs on Friday said the winner had beaten "galactic odds" to scoop the top prize twice. Statistics showed he beat odds of 14 million to one to scoop his first jackpot, and 24 million to one to claim the second. Thembi Tulwana, spokesman for South Africa's Lottery operator Gidani, said: "It's simply incredible. The odds on him winning twice were galactic. "I have no idea what his secret is. He's just a lucky bloke." The double winner has asked to remain anonymous but is believed to be a successful businessman from South Africa's Limpopo province. Officials said he had indicated he would invest most of the windfall for the future of his four children".



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




7 November, 2009

Why Dogs Don't Like Halloween...?







THE NEWS

SC: Intoxicated man arrested on his way to jail: "As a deputy was at the Edgefield County Law Enforcement center he noticed a man ’stumbling down the hill from the courthouse towards the jail.’ The location was handy because not only was that were he ended up, but it also was where he was heading. … According to incident reports, Mr. Butler told the deputy he was coming to turn himself in to the jail where he is serving weekends for a previous conviction. Due to Butler’s highly intoxicated state, he was helped to the jail and summarily charged with another offence, disorderly conduct for public drunk.”



Snake slithers up van windscreen. Driver exits in haste: "A telecommunications engineer made “a pretty sharp exit” from his van when a 4ft snake emerged from under the bonnet. James Denton and his colleague Morne Aspeling were driving back to their office when the snake slithered up the windscreen. “It took me a moment to realise it was real,” Mr Denton said, but added that when its tongue flicked out the two men jumped out and called for help. The Jersey Animal Shelter, which is caring for the snake, said it was a non-venomous corn or milk snake, probably an escaped pet that went under the bonnet for warmth."

Track-suit/shell-suit a no-no on airline: "A passenger says he was "humiliated" at being refused a first-class seat for wearing trackies. Armando Alvarez, an executive from Gaithersburg in the US, said he was stopped at the gate of his United Airlines flight and told he was dressed too casually for first class. "I was humiliated and embarrassed," Mr Alvarez told FOX 5. A frequent flyer with the airline and a Red Carpet Club member, Mr Alvarez said he used air miles to upgrade to first class on a flight from Dulles to Connecticut. "I was handed a first-class boarding pass and then it was pulled back out of my hand," Mr Alvarez said. Mr Alvarez was wearing a Puma track suit with white trainers when he was stopped by the gate agent. He said he checks-in his suits to stop them from getting wrinkled and travelling in a track suit just makes sense. Mr Alvarez said he complained to United Airlines Customer Service Department and the airline's board of directors, but hasn't received a response. "If this happened to me and I'm a United Airlines Red Carpet Club member then I believe it's happening to other people and this must stop," Mr Alvarez said."

Woman discovers she is allergic to husband's sperm on their wedding night: "Julie Boyde's wedding night was ruined when she discovered she was allergic to her husband Mike's sperm. The couple had been lovers for two years before they got married and decided to have unprotected sex for the first time on their wedding night. Almost immediately the bride was in unbearable pain. She found out it was because of Mike's sperm. Plans of conceiving a baby have had to be abandoned reluctantly as it seems Julie's own body destroys the sperm. Mike, 27, and Julie, 26, from Ambridge, Pennsylvania, started going out while at university and became engaged two years later, finally having a dream wedding in 2005. They wanted to consummate their union on their wedding night. "Before we were always very careful and used protection - this time we didn't,' said Julie, 26. "We figured, "we're married, if we get pregnant, we get pregnant". "Pretty much right after I knew something was not right because I was in a lot of pain. "The pain that I was feeling was inside, like somebody sticking needles up inside of me like a real painful burning. "It was really scary." The pain, and at times blisters, would go on for weeks, she said... The couple have started adoption proceedings to start their family."



Black Miss England loses crown after rival is 'punched at club': "Miss England has been forced to relinquish her crown after an alleged duel with a rival beauty queen over a TV Gladiator. Rachel Christie, niece of Olympic gold medallist Linford Christie, stepped down after being accused of punching Miss Manchester, Sara Beverley Jones, 24, in the face during a night out at a nightclub. Trouble allegedly flared after Miss Jones showed Miss Christie a message on her phone claiming that it was sent to her by Miss Christie’s boyfriend, David McIntosh, who appears as Tornado in the Sky One television show Gladiators. Miss Jones, who was dressed as a cavewoman, was taken to hospital, where she was treated for “superficial facial injuries”. Miss Christie, 21, was arrested on suspicion of assault and released on bail pending a hearing in January." [She's not exactly a head-turner. Probably an affirmative action winner]



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




6 November, 2009

Some logic





THE NEWS

PA: Robbery victim finds suspect in yearbook: "After being robbed of his jacket, cellphone, keys, and $300, a Pennsylvania man was left with the odd feeling that his assailants looked familiar. Police say that is because they went to school together about 15 years ago. Erie police arrested Anthony Williams, 30, Monday on charges of robbery, terroristic threats, and simple assault. The other suspect has not been found. They say Williams was one of two men who accosted the victim outside a convenience store Oct. 17. Police say the victim recognized Williams because they both attended Central Career and Technical School in the mid-1990s. The victim brought old yearbooks to the police station and identified a newer picture of Williams from a photo lineup.”



Lucky duck as big bird spares it: "With a thick, broad bill capable of devouring baby crocodiles, the giant shoebill can make short work of most other birds. This duck, though, was lucky. The shoebill apparently merely wanted to move the protesting creature away. Mark Kay, an amateur photographer who took the picture at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, California, said: “I thought the shoebill was going to eat the duck but soon realised he was moving him out of the way. “After the duck fell to the ground, he seemed flustered and just walked away. The shoebill just stayed there and went on his way. Professor Kay, 51, said he had grabbed his Canon 1Ds camera as soon as he saw the shoebill, a threatened species with only between 5,000 and 8,000 estimated to be living in the wild. Shoebills, which live in large swamps in eastern Africa, can grow to more than 5ft tall and can have a wingspan of up to 10ft. The species was formally discovered only in the 19th century when some of the birds’ skins were brought to Europe."

Report: Psychics, Tarot readers profiting: "Fortune-tellers, tarot card readers and psychics are reporting an uptick in business during the current economic downturn as people look for guidance, employment advice and a window into their personal economic future. In the past, the majority of customers flocked to psychics for advice on their relationships and love lives, but the questions today revolve mostly around finding a job and money. … And while many might view astrology or fortune telling as a luxury service, many medims say their business is holding steady and — and in some cases doing even better — as people look for guidance in the difficult economic times.”

Hotels come to the rescue of Taipei’s pet dogs: "Taipei’s dogs are living it up at hotels, complete with VIP suites and pools, that aim to ease the problem of strays that has plagued the city for decades. Hoping to discourage people from dumping unwanted pets on the streets, two Taipei proprietors have opened giant hotels dedicated to dogs, with pools, salons, classes and playrooms. The hotels offer an alternative to pet owners who lack the time or space to look after dogs and who can pay the room rate of $14 a day plus food, which is more expensive than home care but affordable to the average Taipei family.”

Adults admit stealing from nine-year-old: "Instead of jail time, a woman and her adult daughter have agreed to stand outside a courthouse holding signs saying they stole a gift card from a nine-year-old girl on her birthday. Fifty-six-year-old Evelyn Border and 35-year-old Tina Griekspoor stood outside the court for four-and-a-half hours on Tuesday. They held signs that read: "I stole from a 9-year-old girl on her birthday! Don't steal or this could happen to you!" Because the women agreed to hold the signs, Bedford County District Attorney Bill Higgins says he'll ask for probation instead of jail when they plead guilty to the theft. Higgins says they swiped a gift card that the girl set on a shelf while a Walmart employee helped her. The girl's mother planned to drive past the courthouse to teach her daughter the importance of obeying the law."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




5 November, 2009

Find the invisible artist

This guy just paints himself, no kidding, no trick photography he just paints himself... But can you find him in the picture below?





THE NEWS

'Dead man' turns up alive at his funeral: "A BRAZILIAN man reportedly killed in a car crash shocked his mourning family when he showed up alive at his funeral. Relatives of Ademir Jorge Goncalves, 59, had identified the bricklayer as the victim of a car crash in Parana state, in southern Brazil, AP reports. But Goncalves had not died. He had spent the night chatting with friends at a truck stop. Goncalves did not learn about his own funeral until the service had already started the following day. It is customary for funerals in Brazil to be held within 36 hours of a death. As soon as he realised the mistake, Goncalves rushed to the funeral to let his family know he was not dead. “The corpse was badly disfigured, but dressed in similar clothing,'' a police spokesman said. “People are afraid to look for very long when they identify bodies, and I think that is what happened in this case.”"

"We're not dead!" Say Chinese villagers: "Hundreds of Chinese villagers are protesting after they were registered as dead and struck from village lists. The taxes villages pay to higher levels of government and the social warfare payments allocated by the central Government are both based on the number of households. By recording the false deaths, local officials held back payments. And the victims are also deprived of newly established medical insurance and pension schemes. The 300 members of Zhouzhuang village - a sixth of the population - discovered they were "dead" when a man tried to apply for a new identity book for his parents, according to a report on China National Radio's website. Most were struck from the rolls between 1996 and 1998. In China, every person is entered in a household record at birth and the record is deleted after relatives report the death. "There has been no information on us for nearly 10 years," one villager said. Online commentators mocked the village officials' contention that they could not re-enter the villagers on the rolls and urged a public investigation."

Croc steals fish catch off fishermen in Australia's wild North: " Three fishermen were forced to make a dash for safety after a curious crocodile crept up on them before stealing a shark they had just reeled in at a Territory beach. And in what has been described as "a National Geographic moment" it was all caught on camera. The footage shows the 3m saltie watching the anglers as it lurked in the shallows about 50m from the shore, before eerily darting through the water at speed towards them. But the croc was not after the burly blokes - it was more interested in the 1m-long whaler shark flipping around on the sand that they had just netted. The Darwin-based tour operators had taken a group of American tourists out to the Cobourg Peninsula, about 270km northeast of Darwin, and were throwing in a line off the coast when they noticed the croc watching the action. Mrs Hurt said the croc moved through the water "pretty quickly". "It headed straight in for them so they legged it up the beach," she said." [Video at link]

Airline 'sorry' for kicking noisy kid off flight: "An airline has apologised to a mother who was kicked off a plane with her "noisy" two-year-old son. Southwest Airlines spokesman Chris Mainz told MSNBC that the airline has called Pamela Root to apologise, and also offered her a refund and a $300 travel voucher. Mr Mainz said 38-year-old Mrs Root was removed from the flight to San-Jose, US, because passengers could not hear pre-flight safety announcements. Her son Adam screamed: “Go! Plane! Go!” and “I want Daddy!” while the plane was preparing for take off in Amarillo, Texas. The plane taxied back to the gate and the pair was escorted off. The airline acknowledged that removing a crying child from a flight is unusual."

Save the British earthworm! "The worms live mostly in leaf litter, are entirely dark in colour and can grow to 3cm long. The species is found throughout northern Europe because it is able to withstand temperatures below freezing point, thanks to its ability to shelter in a cocoon during the winter. However in southern England scientists have found evidence of the species being pushed out by a relative Dendrobaena attemsi . The new species was previously extremely rare in Britain but appears to be on the march from southern Europe via pot plants and import of soil. To most gardeners, the earthworm looks similar to the British species although it may be a little smaller and lighter in colour. Crucially it can survive drought much better as because it is able draw nutrients from arid soils."



British motorist 'saved from tree by divine intervention': "A motorist credited divine intervention after she escaped unharmed when a 65ft tree was blown down onto her car. Chris Challinor, 70, was driving to church on Sunday morning when the beech crashed onto the bonnet of her Volkswagen Polo. The front of the car was completely crushed by the trunk - meaning she would have been killed if the vehicle was just a few yards further along the road. She suffered only shock during the incident at 10.30am on Sunday and the grandmother-of-six says she is "very lucky to be alive". Mrs Challinor, of Cheltenham, Glos., said: "I feel incredibly fortunate. If the tree had come down half a second later I would have been killed. "The whole thing is a blur because it happened so quickly. I just remember coming to an immediate stop with the huge trunk smashing into the bonnet. "I was frozen in shock until the police and fire service came to release me. "I was sorry not to make it to church but I think someone may have been looking down on me after all."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




4 November, 2009

Be warned!





THE NEWS

Irish accent voted world's sexiest by 5000 women: "THERE was a time when a Frenchman only had to open his mouth and women would collapse at his feet with desire. Well those days, they are, "ow you say . . . fini!" The Irish accent was yesterday voted the world's sexiest – knocking the Gauls off the top spot they've held for decades. Men with an Emerald Isle brogue, as promoted by stars such as Colin Farrell and James Nesbitt, came top in a poll of 5000 women worldwide. The fall from grace of the French accent was laid firmly at the feet of president Nicolas Sarkozy, who has been accused of giving his countrymen a bad name by leering at women while married to former model Carla Bruni. The Italian accent was deemed to be second most sexy, followed by Scottish. French limped into fourth place, just ahead of Australian. English was sixth. The study also found six in 10 women admitted they had been seduced by someone purely because of their accent."



Teacher posed nude to 'annoy boyfriend': "When young Kiwi teacher Rachel Whitwell decided to pose nude for Australian Penthouse she wasn't thinking of the fame or the fortune. She just wanted to annoy her boyfriend. But the ploy has backfired badly, with saucy pics of Whitwell frolicking in a spa splashed across New Zealand papers, leaving both her career and her relationship in tatters. This messy scenario can be explained by the fact that her boyfriend is New Zealand's notorious porn industry king, Steve Crow, producer and distributer of X-rated movies. The pair had been dating for nearly two years and planned to marry. That was until Whitwell, 27, decided to test the 52-year-old's commitment by sending him a series of raunchy anonymous texts and Facebook messages. "I wanted to prove to everyone who thinks he's a sleaze that they were wrong about him," she told New Zealand's Woman's Day. The problem was he fell for it, flicking back enthusiastic messages and organising a rendezvous. A distraught Whitwell confronted him and moved out of the couple's Auckland home, and sent her sexy photographs to the Aussie mag as a form of payback."

Obese German dies after refusing zoo x-ray: "A German man weighing 230 kilograms has died after refusing to go to the zoo for an X-ray because he was too heavy for machines designed for humans, it was reported today. "It sounded like they were trying to wind us up," Thomas Lessmann's widow Petra told Bild newspaper. Complaining he was feeling ill and frequently losing consciousness, the 51-year-old Mr Lessmann went to a clinic in Eppendorf, near Hamburg in northern Germany, which referred him to the nearby Hagenbeck Zoo. His pride wounded, he refused to go and died 13 days afterwards, the paper said. The cause of death was unclear. A spokeswoman for the clinic said that Mr Lessmann was entitled to the same treatment as anyone else but added: "The upper weight limit for machines in human medicine is around 200 kilograms."

Passengers attack plane hijackers in Africa: "Two armed men onboard a plane were set upon by fellow passengers after they attempted to hijack the plane. The hijackers drew their guns onboard a Diallo Airlines flight but were challenged by some of the 30 passengers, the airline's marketing manager, Ahmed Yare, told Sky News. The plane returned to the north-eastern Somali town of Bosasso, where the men tried to escape. Police arrested the men after a gun battle that wounded one hijacker. Mr Yare says no passengers were hurt. The plane was not damaged and resumed its flight to neighbouring Djibouti."



Google invents a British town: "Argleton, a 'phantom town' in Lancashire that appears on Google Maps and online directories but doesn't actually exist, has puzzled internet experts. The town appears on Google Maps in the middle of fields close to the M58 motorway, just south of Ormskirk. Google and the company that supplies its mapping data are unable to explain the presence of the phantom town and are investigating. Roy Bayfield, head of corporate marketing at what would be Argleton's closest university, Edge Hill, in Ormskirk, was so intrigued by the mystery that he walked to the where the internet indicated was the centre of Argleton to check that there was definitely nothing there. When Mr Bayfield reached Argleton – which appears on Google Maps between Aughton and Aughton Park – he found just acres of green, empty fields. Joe Moran, an academic at Liverpool John Moores University and map expert, said: "It could be a deliberate error so people can't copy maps. Sometimes they put in fictional streets as the errors would prove they were stolen. I haven't heard of it before on Google Maps."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




3 November, 2009

In case you were wondering





THE NEWS

Japanese fishing trawler sunk by giant jellyfish: "The trawler, the Diasan Shinsho-maru, capsized off Chiba`as its three-man crew was trying to haul in a net containing dozens of huge Nomura's jellyfish. Each of the jellyfish can weigh up to 200 kg and waters around Japan have been inundated with the creatures this year. Experts believe weather and water conditions in the breeding grounds, off the coast of China, have been ideal for the jellyfish in recent months. The crew of the fishing boat was thrown into the sea when the vessel capsized, but the three men were rescued by another trawler, according to the Mainichi newspaper. The local Coast Guard office reported that the weather was clear and the sea was calm at the time of the accident. One of the largest jellyfish in the world, the species can grow up to 2 meters in diameter. The last time Japan was invaded on a similar scale, in the summer of 2005, the jellyfish damaged nets, rendered fish inedible with their toxic stings and even caused injuries to fishermen."

Burglar forced elderly woman to make him a sandwich: "A 39-year-old man has confessed to breaking into the home of an elderly woman early Monday in Fort Worth, Texas, and forcing her to watch as he performed a sex act on himself, police said. Mitchel Wayne Stewart also ordered the 77-year-old woman to make him a sandwich before he fled with her cell phone, police said. Stewart, 39, was being held Thursday at the Mansfield Jail on charges of burglary of a habitation with intent to commit sexual assault and theft of property. The burglary happened at about 1:30 a.m. CDT Monday, said Sgt. Pedro Criado, police spokesman. The woman, Criado said, awoke at the sound of her doorbell. She went to the front door, and it was suddenly kicked in by a man later identified as Stewart, who grabbed her by the arm and forced her to a living room chair. "After he committed the sex act," Criado said, "Stewart demanded that the victim make him a sandwich." She complied and then told the man to leave, which he did, but not before grabbing her cell phone, Criado said. At about 11 a.m. Monday, a police detective working security at a Walmart, stopped Stewart on suspicion of theft. Stewart still had the woman's cell phone, Criado said."



Plastic surgeon builds himself a wife: "A plastic surgeon has described how he chose a woman as his bride - so he could sculpt her into his ideal wife. Dr Reza Vossough performed eight operations on 33-year-old Cany's body to create his perfect wife. He said he decided to marry Cany after he spotted her "potential". He described her as a fairly average, flat-chested woman with saddlebag thighs, a tummy and puffy, hooded eyelids. The surgery changed her chest, thighs, eyes and face. Dr Vossough spent five years pumping 1,600g of silicone into her body, boosting her size A chest to an F cup. He also enhanced her lips, lifted her eyelids and decreased her forehead. The former waitress also had nip-and-tuck ops to her bum, tummy and thighs and countless Botox injections. Only after $32,500 of cosmetic surgery did Dr Vossough, 48, feel he had married his dream girl. Cany, now a model, is thrilled with her new image. "When your husband is a plastic surgeon, then the scalpel is your friend," she told Bild newspaper in Germany. Dr Vossough, who operates on about 1,200 patients a year at his clinic in Berlin, said of his skills: "It's almost like being God - you have the ability to change nature."



The $250 million man: "On Tuesday, New Yorkers will choose a Mayor who has spent $US250 million of his own money to keep a job which pays him $US1 a year for heading 250,000 staff and running a $US60 billion budget. Nobody, anywhere, has ever spent as much of their own money to keep a job. And never for one that pays so little. It comes with $US195,000 a year but Michael Bloomberg, Mayor of New York since January, 2002, takes only one dollar. Lest anybody feels he's underpaid, hold your tears; Bloomberg, 67, is New York's richest man and is worth $US17.5 billion. Within the last year his wealth has spurted faster and higher than anybody's. It grew by about $US4 billion, courtesy of the increased value of the financial news and information titan he built from the ground up, Bloomberg PLC. It employs 10,000 people and Michael Bloomberg owns 88 per cent."



Caught on camera: naked love rival flees furious husband: "A naked man who climbed out of a window and hid on the ledge to escape his lover's furious husband has been caught on camera. Sun Meng has been given the cold shoulder by his community after the extraordinary picture of him cowering naked outside the flat were posted on the internet. The terrified 25-year-old fled from the balcony window when he was caught in bed with the man's wife at the married couple's flat in Chengdu, central China. Photographs of the anrgy showdown, taken by a startled neighbour, were uploaded to a local community website. They show Sun perched on the first floor ledge while his lover is confronted by her un-named husband inside. "My family is ashamed and none of my own neighbours will talk to me any more," said Sun. "I know what I did was wrong but I was afraid he would kill me. "People are even laughing at how I look naked - but I have to point out it was a very cold day," he added."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




2 November, 2009

An amazing cab ride

I ORDERED a cab for a 6.50am pickup one day last week. I am a regular user of B&W Cabs and normally the early-morning airport-run drivers are really good, but my driver on this day arrives late and informs me it is his first day on the job. I tell him we have to do a second pick-up at Nundah, but he keeps programming the airport into his sat-nav, until I ask him to start driving because we were already running late.

Thirty metres up the road I instruct him to turn right. He attempts to turn left. I see he's wearing an earphone and I suspect he is on the phone. I manage to guide him to Nundah where he proceeds to drive past the house by 100 metres. When we do pick up our passenger, the driver still has no idea where the airport is.

I direct him down the Sandgate Rd ramp from Buckland Rd next to Toombul shopping centre, which is when the real fun starts. As we take off from the lights the car stalls. With the car still rolling at probably 30km/h, the driver jams the gearbox into park, and heads left, mounting the kerb with two wheels. He then rolls back off the kerb into the traffic, stops in the left-hand lane in peak hour, puts on the hazard lights and tries to restart it. Horns are blaring and vehicles around us start taking evasive action. We are probably in grave danger.

The driver restarts the car but doesn't immediately drive off. We yell at him to do so, and eventually he does, without looking, which produces more horn-blowing from behind.

We then hear a clunk from the rear of the car and the driver slams on the brakes, undoes his seatbelt and tries to climb out of the moving car, which is still in drive. We yell at him once again, this time for him to remain in the car, which thankfully he does.

Unfortunately he doesn't close his door properly and as we turn on to the East-West Arterial his door is still unlatched and liable to swing open at any moment. We call out for him to close it properly but realise he is chatting to someone on his phone in a foreign language, frequently mentioning the word "airport". I finally attract his attention by yelling at the top of my lungs from a range of 20cm. He slams on the brakes once more. More horns and cars taking evasive action and yet again we're screaming for him to keep driving, and to open and close the driver's door on the move, which he does.

After directing our driver around the Gateway roundabout we then have two moments when the cars in front are obviously braking to slow in traffic, and our driver is gleefully accelerating. We are once again screaming, this time for him to "STOP", which he fortunately does.

He then heads for the international terminal even though we've told him we're catching a domestic flight. His radio then starts blaring, but he doesn't know how to use it.

We guide him to the domestic terminal drop-off point and I ask him if he knows how to use the credit card machine. He insists he does After 10 swipes and much button-pushing he asks for cash. I ask if he can change a $50 note for the $33 fare. He says yes. I give him the $50, but he then looks in his wallet and says I need to give him another $3. I glare and say no. He hands me $20 change and I get out. The base is still yelling through the radio while we walk into the terminal, just a tad agitated but happy to still be alive.

I later contacted B&W which told me they would be sending the driver "back to class".

Original story here



THE NEWS

Passenger blasted into sky after pulling on eject handle: "A man was blasted into the sky from a plane after he accidentally pulled on the emergency eject handle during a joy flight in South Africa. The man was sitting in a South African airforce Pilatus PC-7 Mk II jet during a flight over Langebaanweg Air Force Base when he was believed to have accidentally pulled on the handle, South Africa's Times newspaper said. Two rockets at the back of his seat activated, and the man was thrust through the plane's perspex canopy and high into the air, it said. He then floated back down to earth on a parachute, which had opened automatically. The incident most likely occurred during an acrobatics display, The Times said. A retired air force pilot told the paper the ejection would have stunned the passenger. "You get one almighty kick under the backside and then you're gone," he said. He said the man was lucky to have survived uninjured. "We train for this and if you don't get it right, and are not in the correct ejection posture, you can sustain severe spinal cord injuries or even worse," he said."



After seven unlucky years, man sues for deodorant 'failure': "An Indian man claims he has been cheated by the cosmetics firm that makes popular deodorant Lynx after failing to land a girlfriend for the past seven years. Vaibhav Bev has been using Lynx deodorant since 2002, in the hope the company's promotional campaign - which features scantily clad women throwing themselves at men [See above] - had some basis in real life. Mr Bev is suing the maker of Lynx - marketed as Axe in his home country - for more than $100,000, seeking compensation for "depression and psychological damage". "I used it for seven years but no girl came to me," he told the Daily Record. Indian compensation lawyer Ram Jethmalani advised the company that makes Axe, Unilever, to settle out of court. He said any claims by Unilever that Mr Bev failed to find a girlfriend because he was unattractive were unlikely to succeed. "In fact, some of the best-looking women have been known to marry and date absolutely ghoulish guys," he told the Daily Record."

Dumb and dumber botch car-jacking: "Police say a carjacking attempt in Perth last night came to an abrupt halt when the alleged carjacker discovered she couldn't drive a manual. Three women have been charged over the incident, in which a 27-year-old woman was dragged by her hair out of her car. The woman was driving home from work along Garratt Rd, Bayswater, when a pedestrian stepped out in front of her car, said Sgt Greg Lambert. The driver was forced to stop her car while three women allegedly surrounded the vehicle, opened the doors and tried to grab the keys. Sgt Lambert said the driver was dragged out of the car by her hair. He said the three women allegedly got into the car, but only managed to drive 150m because the driver could not drive a manual. Witnesses called police, who arrested the women. A 33-year-old has been charged with aggravated robbery and stealing a motor vehicle and a 32-year-old and 38-year-old were charged with stealing a motor vehicle. Police said the driver was left shaken by the incident but suffered no injuries."

Crazy Canadians: "Dudley Do-Right would be proud. When a policeman outside Windsor, Ontario, saw a tractor-trailer driver smoking a cigarette alone in his cab, he sprang into action, pulling the miscreant over and writing a ticket for a fine of $305 Canadian. The driver's offense: violating the Smoke-Free Ontario Act, which bans smoking in enclosed workplaces, including vehicles. Officials interviewed after the incident all vigorously defended the law, though they seemed unsure about what purpose it is meant to serve (a safety measure to avoid distraction, a protection for other drivers who might later use the same truck, an encouragement to quit) and whether it applies to truckers who own their vehicles. To make things even more confusing, trucks that are driven in more than one province are apparently governed by a separate federal law that allows smoking in designated vehicles, though even this is subject to dispute. Such are the results when a nanny province meets a bureaucratic state. We suggest a simple solution: Let drivers light up, if they wish, and let Canada's numerous busybodies lighten up."



‘Great Map’ of Scotland (section above) to be shown after 250 years: "He was an English Army draughtsman sent to Scotland after the Battle of Culloden to help to control the natives. Paul Sandby’s task was to go where no mapmaker had gone before, to chart ways for the Redcoats to traverse the Highlands and suppress future rebellion. Part of Sandby’s “Great Map” of Scotland, the first representation of the wilder parts of the country, and laid down on a vast scale of 1 inch to 1,000 yards, is returning to Scotland for the first time in 262 years. The project, begun in 1747, is a monument not only to the anxiety of the English military at the time — “it was of infinite importance that a country, so inaccessible by nature, should be thoroughly explored and laid open,” fretted government officials — but also to the brilliance of its creator, who spent four years on the intricate work. A section of the map featuring Culloden Moor and its surrounds is one of the key works in an exhibition of Paul Sandby at the National Galleries in Edinburgh. The work’s intricacy and scope, showing trees, bridges, fields and the relief of mountains, was beyond anything ever attempted."



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




1 November, 2009

Keeping up with your neighbors in Christmas decorations



THE NEWS

MI: Another dumb robber: "It was nearing 9 p.m. on Oct. 13 when a man approached the manager of a Muskegon dollar store, working at the cash register, and muttered, “I hate to do this to you...” and then pulled out a gun. That’s according to testimony Thursday by Mark Visscher, a manager at Dollar General, 1355 E. Apple, during the preliminary examination for Tyrell Alexis Wallace, 38, in Muskegon County’s 60th District Court. Visscher told the court that the man — whom he later identified as Wallace — made the statement and then “reached behind him and pulled out a gun.” “I asked him what he wanted, and he indicated that he wanted the money,” he said. But as he hurried to hand over the money, the cash register jammed, Visscher said. “It flashed on the screen, ‘Please wait,’ but I was trying as fast as I could to get it open. (Wallace) said, ‘You better hurry up,’” Visscher told the court. When the register finally opened, Visscher said he handed cash to Wallace, who took it and a bag of merchandise and left. In his haste, Wallace left behind his wallet containing photo identification, Visscher said."

The unromantic truth about why we kiss - to spread germs: "It is an international symbol of love and romance. But the kiss may have evolved for reasons that are far more practical - and less alluring. British scientists believe it developed to spread germs. They say that the uniquely human habit allows a bug that is dangerous in pregnancy to be passed from man to woman to give her time to build up immunity. Cytomegalovirus, which lurks in saliva, normally causes no problems. But it can be extremely dangerous if caught while pregnant and can kill unborn babies or cause birth defects. These can include problems ranging from deafness to cerebral palsy. Writing in the journal Medical Hypotheses, researcher Dr Colin Hendrie from the University of Leeds said: 'Female inoculation with a specific male's cytomegalovirus is most efficiently achieved through mouth-to-mouth contact and saliva exchange, particularly where the flow of saliva is from the male to the typically shorter female.' Kissing the same person for about six months provides optimum protection, he added. Previously scientists have claimed that kissing acts as a form of evolutionary quality control, with saliva holding clues to fertility, health and genes. But the psychologists from Leeds and the University of Central Lancashire said these things can be judged without getting quite so intimate."

Psychic computer shows your thoughts on screen: "Scientists have discovered how to “read” minds by scanning brain activity and reproducing images of what people are seeing — or even remembering. Researchers have been able to convert into crude video footage the brain activity stimulated by what a person is watching or recalling. The breakthrough raises the prospect of significant benefits, such as allowing people who are unable to move or speak to communicate via visualisation of their thoughts; recording people’s dreams; or allowing police to identify criminals by recalling the memories of a witness. However, it could also herald a new Big Brother era, similar to that envisaged in the Hollywood film Minority Report, in which an individual’s private thoughts can be readily accessed by the authorities. Jack Gallant and Shinji Nishimoto, two neurologists from the University of California, Berkeley, last year managed to correlate activity in the brain’s visual cortex with static images seen by the person. Last week they went one step further by revealing that it is possible to “decode” signals generated in the brain by moving scenes."



Here is the news: the BBC is no damm good at spelling: "The BBC has been criticised after broadcasting a major spelling error on its flagship News At Ten bulletin. In a blunder that would make any schoolchild blush, a graphic headlining the official review into the 2006 Nimrod air disaster was titled 'Damming Report'. The caption should, of course, have read 'Damning Report'. The story, which was the lead item on last Wednesday's bulletin, was presented by newsreader Sian Williams and watched by about four million viewers. Internet message forums were buzzing after the broadcast. One post read: 'Can this be proper use of English? Perhaps the Lefties that run the Beeb all went to the local comprehensive?'

British Keystone Kops include pictures of actors on 'wanted' posters: "Police 'wanted' pictures of suspected hooligans issued after rioting broke out at a match included images of actors from a hit film, it emerged today. Scotland Yard sent out 66 pictures of people supposedly caught on camera during violent clashes at a West Ham game with Millwall this summer. But they blundered by including stills of six actors from the recent hooligan-themed film The Firm. The error was described by Yard insiders as a 'bad day at the office' for those responsible. The Metropolitan Police have now been forced to say sorry for the error, and have apologised unreservedly. Police used a Sky TV report to capture images of fans fighting at the Carling Cup clash in August. But it appears that because the officers turned off the sound from the report, they failed to realise it included footage from the movie. Vertigo Films, which made the movie, told The Sun: 'We are delighted our scenes are so realistic people can't tell the difference between them and real events.'"



And don't forget to catch up with all the Strange Justice before you go.




October postings now at Wicked Thoughts Archive.




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