‘Hundreds of chickens have been found dead in east China — and a court has ruled that the cause of death was the screaming of a four-year-old boy who in turn had been scared by a barking dog, state media reported on Wednesday. [..]
“One neighbour told police that he had heard the boy’s crying that afternoon and another villager confirmed the boy screaming by the henhouse window,” the newspaper said.
A court ruled the boy’s screaming was “the only unexpected abnormal sound” and that 443 chickens trampled each other to death in fear.
The boy’s father was ordered to pay 1,800 yuan ($230) in compensation to the owner of the chickens.’
`The world of marine biology is scratching its collective head after a female shark gave birth to a pup even though it had apparently been nowhere near a male of the species.
The bonnethead shark has been swimming in a tank at the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha, Nebraska, US, with two female companions for the past three years. [..]
The pregnancy could be a case of parthenogenesis – or asexual reproduction – which, although common in some amphibians, has never been reported before in sharks.
More likely, say the zoo’s scientists, the shark was impregnated before she came to the center and retained a male’s sperm in her reproductive tract until she was mature enough to conceive.’
The Ergopod 500 lets you use your computer whilst laying in bed on your back.
If you had a catheter and someone to bring you food, you’ve never have to move. Ha! :)
Another Tom Mabe clip, also quite funny. :)
Feeding the homeless like that is pretty cool.
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‘You’re the angel of death, man..’
This is a recording made by Tom Mabe, who likes to record phone calls from telemarketers and harass them a bit. It’s pretty funny. :)
(3.9meg Flash video)
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`A 19-year-old man has been charged over an attack in which another young man had a chair leg embedded in his brain in a fight outside a Melbourne nightclub.
Police said the man turned himself in yesterday.
The victim, also 19, was injured during a gang fight on Sunday morning outside the Metro nightclub on Bourke Street in the CBD.
The 1.9cm-wide metal chair leg pierced his left eye and became embedded in his brain.
Firefighters had to cut away part of the chair before the man, from suburban Northcote, could be treated.’
`Anglo-Dutch consumer products group Unilever NV/Plc sent knives to 200,000 Dutch families in a direct mail campaign which resulted in some children suffering injuries, the company said on Tuesday.
The company had sent the letters, which included a small knife with a metal blade and plastic hilt, in the first half of January to promote the use of one of its brands of margarine.
But Unilever said three children had needed to visit a doctor and around 50 parents had filed a complaint.
“Parents said the knife was too sharp, after which we decided to send a second letter and ask the families to throw away the knife,” a Unilever spokeswoman said.
Unilever said it had contacted the families which had complained and had offered them a cuddly toy as consolation. It said it had not received any requests for compensation.’
`An elderly Brisbane woman who killed a dog by sealing it in a plastic bag and putting it in a wheelie bin has been fined $2500.
The 71-year-old woman, from Holland Park in Brisbane’s east, pleaded guilty to animal cruelty today in Brisbane Magistrates Court .
She was charged by the RSPCA after she put the dog in a plastic bag which she then dumped in a wheelie bin on October 13 last year.’
`A Buffalo teenager who said he killed and slowly dismembered his mother over several days at the urging of the 50-year-old man who was sexually abusing him was sentenced Monday to six months in jail.
Angel Rosa, 16, pleaded guilty in June to a first-degree manslaughter in the death of Madeline Irene, 46, whose head and hands were found encased in cement in a garbage can at the 50-year-old’s home after other body parts were found floating in a nearby river.
Psychiatrists for both the prosecution and the defense determined Rosa was emotionally under the control of Edwin Gimenez, a convicted child molester who was his co-defendant in the homicide.’
`Prosecutors intend to charge President Moshe Katsav with rape and other crimes against female employees, the Justice Ministry said on Tuesday, in what would be an unprecedented indictment against an Israeli head of state.
Katsav has denied wrongdoing. His post is largely ceremonial and the scandal is unlikely to have a direct impact on Prime Minister Ehud Olmert — who has himself been hurt politically by a string of investigations into suspected corruption, which he has denied.
The case against Katsav, months in the making, appeared certain to strengthen the feeling among many Israelis that misconduct is rampant at the top.’
`We are surprised to see our work on reprogramming adult stem cells used to support arguments that research involving human embryonic stem cells is unnecessary. On the contrary, we assert that human embryonic stem cells hold great promise to find new treatments and cures for diseases. …
The work that we performed and that was cited in the White House policy report is precisely the type of research that is currently being harmed by the President’s arbitrary limitation on federal funding for human embryonic stem cell research. …
We feel that the President’s restrictive policy has directly impeded research that provides a hope for cures for millions of Americans. …’
`Des Moines police this morning used a striking instrument and pepper spray on a woman they later learned was pregnant in an effort to stop her from eating what they believed was marijuana.
Barbara Brown, 20, of Des Moines, was taken to Broadlawns Medical Center to be treated for what police believed was marijuana consumption.
Police said they were trying to preserve evidence, but Brown managed to chew and swallow all of it.
She was charged with public consumption. The charge refers to the beer she allegedly was drinking, not the marijuana police believe she had eaten.’
`32. TradingMarkets [..]
TradingMarkets – a Web site that provides its subscribers with professional stock-market expertise for as much as $100 a month – in January invites 10 Playboy models to participate in an investing contest.
When results are tallied toward the end of the year, 40 percent of the bunnies deliver better returns than the S&P 500, compared with just 29 percent of actively managed mutual funds.’
`Sydney councils are paying private detectives thousands of dollars to have sex with prostitutes so they can gather sufficient proof against illegal brothels.
Nine councils across Sydney have forked out $25,000 in fees to private investigators over the past three years.
The Sunday Telegraph has learned that Ku-ring-gai Council spent $7000 in the past month employing detectives to have sex with prostitutes.
Ku-ring-gai Mayor Nick Ebbeck said the extreme measures were necessary to prove the businesses were illegal.’
These guys have attache some rocket motors to a little scooter. They take it for a test drive in this video, and it works better than I think they expected. :)
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`Tom Cruise is the new “Christ” of Scientology, according to leaders of the cult-like religion.
The Mission: Impossible star has been told he has been “chosen” to spread the word of his faith throughout the world.
And leader David Miscavige believes that in future, Cruise, 44, will be worshipped like Jesus for his work to raise awareness of the religion.
A source close to the actor, who has risen to one of the church’s top levels, said: “Tom has been told he is Scientology’s Christ-like figure.
“Like Christ, he’s been criticised for his views. But future generations will realise he was right.”’
`The drug cartels here are clearly Goliath, heavily armed with automatic weapons.
The municipal police, stripped of their guns this month as part of a corruption probe, are now playing the role of David.
About 60 officers were issued slingshots yesterday for use on patrols in the tourist section of Avenida Revolucion and the business district of Zona Rio, according to a police department spokesman. Some of the officers bought bags of marbles for ammo.
“It’s obviously very denigrating to them to be carrying these kinds of instruments, but they have to look for ways to provide security for the public,” spokesman Fernando Bojórquez said. ‘
It’s amazing how efficient these guys are. I’m certainly not going to commit any crimes if I ever go to Europe. :)
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`A diver has survived a terrifying attack by a shark, which seized him first by the head and then bit into his torso before he fought free of the predator. [..]
The shark seized Mr Nerhus by the head, crushing his face mask inwards and breaking his nose, said friend and fellow diver Dennis Luobikis.
“He was actually bitten by the head down, the shark swallowed his head,” Mr Luobikis said.
Taking a second bite, the white pointer clenched its jaws around his torso, tearing deep lacerations in either side of his body.’
.. while with another crackhead smokes in the background.
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`According to several well informed intelligence sources, hundreds of CIA operatives have become virtual prisoners in the Green Zone, the sprawling American enclave whose high walls and guards separate the U.S. embassy, military command and related civilian agencies from the raging sectarian violence in Baghdad’s streets.
The CIA operatives cannot safely roam the city to meet their few agents, much less recruit new ones.
It’s just too dangerous. CIA chiefs don’t want to risk one getting kidnapped, tortured on camera and beheaded.
That would certainly dampen the allure of a career in the CIA.’
`A Chinese thief has returned a mobile phone and thousands of yuan he stole from a woman after she sent him 21 touching text messages, Xinhua news agency said on Monday. [..]
She gave up hope of seeing her possessions again after sending 21 text messages without a reply.
But on her way out on Sunday morning, she stumbled over a package that had been left in her courtyard only to discover it was her stolen bag. Nothing had been taken.
“Dear Pan: I’m sorry. I made a mistake. Please forgive me,” a letter inside said.
“You are so tolerant even though I stole from you. I’ll correct my ways and be an upright person.”‘
`North Korea today described US soldiers serving in South Korea as “infected with an abnormal sexual desire” and said sexual abuse was part of their daily routine.
The ruling party’s newspaper Rodong Sinmun was commenting on the alleged rape by a US soldier of a 67-year-old woman. The 23-year-old private soldier is in a South Korean prison awaiting trial.
The 29,500-strong US military in South Korea has issued an apology for the incident this month.’
`A teenager has been accused of being a deadbeat dad by a government agency that claims he fathered a child – when he was three years old.
Tyler Holden, 15, and his family were shocked when he received a letter of demand from the state agency that chases child support from fathers.
The Victorian Legal Aid’s Child Support Legal Service said it was pursuing child support for a son it claimed Tyler fathered on July 27, 1994.
The letter says if the high school student refuses to sign a statutory declaration confirming he is the child’s father, he must pay $550 for a DNA test to prove otherwise.’
‘Man gets excited at his wedding and cant hold his praise down no longer.’
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`Madam Suametor Denou, 75, died after one Robert Ashitey, 30, had allegedly subjected her to a gruelling bout of sexual intercourse last Monday at Batorme, a suburb of Aflao. Ashitey, fisherman, whose plea was not taken when he appeared before the circuit court at Aflao on a provisional charge of murder was remanded until February 15.
[..] about 09:30 hours on January 15, this year, the witness arrived with food for Madam Denou but to her astonishment saw Ashitey in serious copulation with her.
Mrs Assan said not even the witness’s shout could compel Ashitey to stop the act, until the witness hit him on the forehead with a stick forcing him to take to his heels.’
`Yet most shoppers who use the five-finger discount in the meat aisle are neither so brazen nor so desperate. Carts brimming with groceries, they’ll stealthily slide a single tenderloin or T-bone into a coat pocket, then hit the checkout line alongside their nonlarcenous peers. In this way, millions of pounds of beef, pork, and veal disappear from supermarket shelves each year. Meatlifting is a grave problem for food retailers: According to the Food Marketing Institute, meat was the most shoplifted item in America’s grocery stores in 2005. (It barely edged out analgesics and was a few percentage points ahead of razor blades and baby formula.)
Meat’s dubious triumph is due in part to a law enforcement crackdown on methamphetamine use. [..]’
‘Coastguards and anti-pollution teams are on alert after a ship carrying potentially dangerous chemicals was beached off the Devon coast.
The MSC Napoli, which was holed in storms on Thursday, was run aground following “serious structural failure”. [..]
According to the MCA, 50 coastguards are out looking for the missing 40ft long containers, which include one containing hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of BMW motorbikes.’
The video shows people discovering the motorcycles and wheeling them away. And there’s free shoes for everyone! :)
(4.7meg Windows media)
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