9/11 - 6 Month Anniversary.
In 6 months we've had 3.7 light years worth of media coverage. Not much has
changed it seems, except that now when you're on an airplane and the
stewardess starts the pre-flight safety talk, she says "In the case of a
high-jacking, baseball bats will drop from the overhead compartment. Feel
free to apply these to the head, knees and groin of anyone attempting to
take over the plane..."
U.S. to seek cigarette restrictions
* WSJ: Marketing, manufacture, sale
They plan on making cigarettes cost $20 a pack. Each pack has to be printed
with a picture of an aborted fetus on the back, and a autopsied lung on the
front. Pack lids will contain a razor blade tipped with the aids virus.
All brand names have to be changed to not mention "low-tar", "light", or
"extra-light" and explicitly mention "this will kill you mutha
forker".
Sales are expected to jump 1.9%
WashPost: U.S. skirts extradition
* Suspects sent to third countries
Smart guy: "Hey, who cares about human rights... As long as they keep us
safe."
Me: "Right."
Let the madness begin: NCAAs set
* No. 1s: Duke, Maryland, KU, Cincy
"Huh, I'm sorry, I feel asleep on the couch."
* TRUE STORIES
In December, Colorado Republican Party activist Randal David Ankeney, 30,
was charged in another sexual assault incident, following his July arrest
for assaulting a 14-year-old girl he had met in an Internet chat room. (The
December arrest involved what the Colorado Springs Gazette termed a "girl"
but whose age was not disclosed.) And in February, the National Republican
Congressional Committee withdrew the "Republican of the Year" award that had
been scheduled to be presented to Virginia party activist Mark A. Grethen,
44; the committee had just learned of his conviction on six counts of sex
crimes involving children. [Colorado Springs Gazette, 12-18-01] [The
Virginian-Pilot, 2-13-02]
Matsushita Electric Industrial runs a state-of-the-art retirement home near
Osaka, Japan, and according to a BBC News report in February uses robotic
companion bears to comfort the residents (average age: 82) and also to
continually check health signs. Among the fur-covered bears' skills: They
can respond to voice command and can monitor residents' alertness by timing
their responses to spoken questions. [BBC News, 2-21-02]
* Proof all terrorists are moronic idiots
The Washington Times reported in December that the U.S. Forest Service had
admitted that three of its employees, and other government
environmentalists, had planted endangered lynxes' hairs in Washington state
forests, thus skewing a research project on whether to restrict development
in those forests. And the FBI disclosed in February that the largest U.S.
domestic terrorist group (600 attacks in five years) is the environmentalist
Earth Liberation Front, whose spokesman took the Fifth Amendment 50 times
during a February congressional hearing. And a Cloverdale, Australia,
terminal cancer patient complained that he suffered through an agonizing
Christmas because a Greenpeace protest shut down the Sydney nuclear reactor
that makes his high-tech pain-relieving radioisotope Quadramet.
[Washington Times, 12-17-01] [Tampa Tribune, 2-13-02] [Sunday Times
(Perth), 1-13-02]
* And you thought asking someone to dance was tough.
Now operating in Seoul are at least eight "booking clubs," in which males
and females pay waiters to forcibly introduce them to each other because
South Korean social rules discourage voluntary contact with strangers.
According to a January Wall Street Journal report, men may pay several
hundred dollars a night to demand introductions, and women pay a similar
amount knowing (and preferring) that they will be physically delivered by
the waiters to prospective suitors' tables. [Wall Street Journal,
1-9-02]
* More Vodka, it will hurt less
Licensing officials in New York City declined to issue a permit for the
highlight of the two-day Russian end-of-winter gala in February at Prospect
Park in Brooklyn because the festival's signature event, the centuries-old
"stenka na stenku," calls for two teams of 50 men to engage in vicious
fistfights. Said one organizer, "We will have an ambulance standing by (but
if) we lose a tooth, we lose a tooth. No big deal." [New York Post,
1-28-02]
* Take my wife please.
A January Los Angeles Times report described a dozen emerging businesses in
Tokyo and Osaka, Japan, devoted to staging elaborate break-up schemes (for
couples and for business partners) so that the dumping partner does not have
to convey the bad news personally. In complicated cases (highly resisting
dumpees, or with much money at stake), the breakup agent might charge
$100,000 and employ schemes as elaborate as a CIA caper, perhaps creating
false identities and false companies or staging sham events. [Los Angeles
Times, 1-10-02]
* Hey Fluffy, you want some puppy?
A December report by St. Louis's KMOV-TV caused an uproar when it revealed
that the city's 3,500 euthanized dogs and cats a year are disposed of at a
local rendering plant that sells some of its product (recycled fat and
protein) to pet food manufacturers. The rendering plant subsequently stopped
accepting dogs and cats (which it had been taking for free, as a public
service), but the city's crisis continues, in that cremation and other
alternate forms of disposal are very expensive. [Los Angeles Times,
1-6-02]
* Quincy loses his mind.
Among the 39 charges leveled by the Tennessee Health Department against
former state medical examiner Dr. Charles Harlan in December were that he
deliberately mutilated bodies during autopsies so that "no one (could)
second-guess me"; vastly overused "sudden infant death syndrome" as the
cause of death for babies; and let animals "roam freely in his facility and
consume the organs of deceased persons." [The Tennessean,
1-12-02]
* People who's Christmas trees have a few too many burnt out
bulbs.
Bad Habits: Mohammad Saboor, 56, was arrested in January as the well-dressed
man who has spontaneously kissed at least nine female strangers on Toronto
streets since November. And Melvin G. Hanks, 54, was arrested in Belleville,
Ill., in February, accused of stealing 92 ponytails in 13 attempts from a
salon that was collecting the hair to make wigs for children who had lost
theirs because of disease. And Ronald Castle Sr., 54, was arrested in
Syracuse, N.Y., in January, suspected as the man who has been masturbating
into colleagues' coffee cups at the county Department of Social Services.
[Toronto Sun, 1-24-02] [Belleville News-Democrat, 2-19-02] [Syracuse
Post-Standard, 1-24-02]
* Why soft minds do hard time.
Three Alaskans were charged recently with ill-thought-out thefts: Todd
Shobe, 38, was arrested in Anchorage in January when his SUV got stuck in
the mud at a construction site after being weighed down with all the tools
he was trying to drive away with. And Roger D. Yost, 40, and William Isberg,
40, were arrested in Fairbanks in February when they tried to get a
500-pound safe out the door of a Moose Lodge hall, seemingly forgetting that
they had arrived at the Lodge only on bicycles. [Anchorage Daily News,
1-17-02] [Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, 2-5-02]
* The Middle Name Game! Or what not to name your children.
Arrested for murder: Christopher Wayne Davis (Pearl River, La.,
November), Jerry Wayne Dean (Jackson County, Ky., November), Billy Wayne
Cope (Rock Hill, S.C., November), Joshua Wayne Andrews (Woodbridge, Va.,
January), Jeffrey Wayne Gorton (Flint, Mich., February), Timothy Wayne Adams
(Houston, February). Murder Warrant Issued: Jason Wayne Johnson
(Comal County, Texas, December). Sentenced for Murder: Mark Wayne
Campmire (Litchfield, Conn., January). Executed for Murder: Randall
Wayne Hafdahl (Huntsville, Texas, January), Stephen Wayne Anderson (San
Quentin, Calif., January). Avoided a Murder Charge Only Because He Was
Killed in a Shootout With Police: Danny Wayne Sand (Brandon, Manitoba,
December). Appealed or Sought Parole: convicted murderers Kenneth
Wayne Woodfin (Richmond, Va., January), Gary Wayne Sutton (Knoxville, Tenn.,
January). [Times-Picayune, 11-11-01] [Lexington Herald-Leader, 11-19-01]
[NBC6.com-AP, 11-30-01] [Washington Post, 1-13-02] [abc12.com, 2-9-02]
[Houston Chronicle, 2-22-02] [Austin American-Statesman, 1-1-02] [Hartford
Courant, 1-26-02] [Austin American-Statesman, 1-31-02] [San Francisco
Chronicle, 1-29-02] [CBC News, 1-7-02] [Winchester Star, 1-4-02] [Knoxville
News-Sentinel, 1-10-02]
* Proof we are about to nuke ourselves out of existence.
An education law firm in Adelaide, Australia, recommended that its client
private schools obtain student permission in writing before sending report
cards home, so as not to violate new privacy legislation that took effect in
December. And biology teacher Christine Pelton resigned in December from
Piper High School near Kansas City, Kan., after the school board refused to
allow her to give grades of zero to the 28 students who plagiarized their
term projects. And to cut absentee rates, a school in Sooke, British
Columbia, began passing out perfect-attendance coupons this year, good for
free fast-food sandwiches and french fries. A half-ton cow jumped a 6-foot
slaughterhouse fence and hid out so heroically for 12 days that when she was
finally captured, the mayor said he'd present her a key to the city
(Cincinnati). A tenured University of Texas chemistry professor was fired
for having a messy office (so many books as to be a fire hazard) and a messy
laboratory (corrosive materials) (San Antonio). A 42-year-old man was
hospitalized after being stabbed in the stomach with a swordfish during a
brawl outside his home (Madeira Beach, Fla.). A University of Greenwich
professor announced the discovery of the oldest fossilized vomit on record
(of a four-flippered reptile from 160 million years ago) (London). [The
Advertiser (Adelaide), 2-16-02] [New York Times, 2-14-02] [Victoria
Times-Colonist, 2-6-02] [United Press International, 2-26-02] [Chronicle of
Higher Education, 2-19-02] [St. Petersburg Times, 2-22-02] [Reuters,
2-11-02]
