2-year-old killed in kitchen knife fight.

This story reminds me of Kill Bill. Only sucky cuz it's real.

Houston, TX: Police are investigating the death of a 2-year-old toddler who was fatally stabbed at a northwest Houston apartment Friday afternoon, authorities said.

Keenan Bernard Conner, 23, the mother's boyfriend, got in a fight around 3:25 p.m. with his 16-year-old brother in the 5700 block of Thousand Oaks Circle, authorities said. At some point, one of the brothers pulled out a kitchen knife. During the struggle, Avery Rhodes Williams, 2, was accidentally stabbed in the chest, authorities said. He was taken to Memorial Hermann Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

US officer: Pakistan forced aided Taliban.

From the Army Times:

Pakistani military forces flew repeated helicopter missions into Afghanistan to resupply the Taliban during a fierce battle in June 2007, according to a Marine lieutenant colonel, who says his information is based on multiple U.S. and Afghan intelligence reports.

The revelation by Lt. Col. Chris Nash, who commanded an embedded training team in eastern Afghanistan from June 2007 to March 2008, adds a new twist to the controversy over a U.S. special operations raid into Pakistan Sept. 3.

Pakistani officials strongly protested that raid, with a statement issued by the foreign ministry calling it a “gross violation of Pakistan’s territory.”

But fewer than 15 months earlier, Pakistani forces were flying cross-border missions in the other direction to resupply a “base camp” in Nangarhar Province occupied by fighters from the Taliban, al-Qaida and the Hezb-i-Islami faction led by Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Nash told Army Times in a Sept. 17 telephone interview.

Worst raffle prize ever?

Tourism bureau's raffle grand prize is so morbid, the winner doesn't want it. From Ananova:

An Italian raffle winner has turned down the first prize - a VIP coffin, complete with pillow and an antique brass reading light.

A spokesman for the local Borgo Magna association which promotes tourism in the city of San Marco in southern Italy and which organised the raffle said: "The prize is still valid.

"Whoever won it can give it to someone else if they don't want it and there is no deadline on when it can be claimed."

Why would a tourism group think this was a good idea? Though this is still a better prize than this one giveaway at Shea Stadium. I was there once when they had one of their "choose a seat randomly and give the ticketholder an awesome prize" raffles. Usually it's a free upgrade to a box seat, so it's pretty awesome when you're chosen. Anyway, they randomly chose this big, burly guy who started jumping up and down, shouting into the camera, totally stoked. Then they gave him a free Celine Dion CD. The look on his face was priceless - he looked like he was just handed a flat tire or a bag of dog shit. It was awesome.

Illuminati agent gets stuck in air vent.

People may laugh at this kid, but we Discordians know exactly what happened and why his precious mission failed. #0931 won't be ruining our plans anymore. YOU HEAR THAT ILLUMINATI?!! Hail Eris! All hail Discordia!

It wasn't the preferred way to enter the Knoxville Museum of Art, but Richard Anthony Smith told police he was on a mission. The 25-year-old Knoxville man called 911 from his cell phone before dawn Wednesday saying he was trapped in an air conditioning duct leading from the museum roof, Knoxville police spokesman Darrell DeBusk said.

Police and firefighters reached the roof, found a rope and cable and followed them to a vent shaft. Peering inside, they spotted Smith about 45 feet down.

"Mission failed," he told them.

Hoisted up and read his rights, Smith told police he was a "special agent from the United States Illuminati, badge number 0931" and had rappelled onto the museum from a helicopter, a police report said.

He said he was following orders to "defuse and confiscate" a Soviet-made nuclear warhead, specifically a "MERV6SS-22AN" warhead, according to the report. The bomb supposedly was hidden in a blue, plastic cow sculpture in the museum basement, he said.

However, Smith told officers his "agency" called while he was in air-vent limbo to say it made a mistake and the bomb might be in a Memphis museum instead.

Article here.

I hate Joseph Petcka.

Joseph Petcka needs to suffer horribly in prison. From the Daily News:

Responding to questions from his lawyer, Petcka admitted he kicked the cat "hard." He denied intending to hurt the cat, who he said hissed at him regularly.

[...] Dr. Robert Reisman, the ASPCA's top animal cruelty investigator, said Norman died an agonizing death after possibly being whacked against a countertop.

"The easiest way to cause those injuries would be to control the cat and hit its face on a hard surface," Reisman said. The animal doc said Norman's horrific injuries were similar to those caused when a pet tumbles out a window or gets hit by a car.

He compared the blows inflicted on the cat with a soccer kick and rejected Petcka's claim he "swatted" the cat in self-defense. "This is kicking it at a goal," Reisman said. "This was not pushing it away."

Norman suffered three broken ribs, a ripped lung and liver, chipped teeth and torn tongue.

He likely survived for up to 15 minutes following the initial attack, and could have dragged his crumpled body into a bedroom where he was found.

The cat died when blood filled his chest, Reisman said.

This just makes me sick to my stomach. Since I can't legally take a hammer to Petcka, I'll be donating to the ASPCA in Norman's memory.

One-legged man beats mother to death with crutch.

Jesus.

A one-legged Queens man beat his 80-year-old mother to death with a crutch Friday - then called the cops and confessed.

"I just killed my mother and I don't know why," Sergeui Mamontov said, according to a police source.

When cops arrived, they discovered that Mamontov had also tried to castrate himself, telling the officers he was "trying to remove the evil," a police source said.

Mamontov, who has a history of mental illness and tried to commit suicide before, was taken to Bellevue Hospital, the source said.

Coolest tax write-off ever?

He may have erectile dysfunction, but this guy's got balls. Oh, and check out the article - the best part is that he looks like Woody Allen.

This was not the "happy ending" William Halby was looking for.

The 77-year-old Brooklyn lawyer owes tens of thousands of dollars in back taxes for wrongly deducting more than $300,000 in prostitutes, porn, sex toys and erotic massages, a state tax judge ruled yesterday. The ruling came despite the meticulous efforts of Halby - a tax lawyer - to prove the deductions were reasonable medical expenses in his effort to fight depression and erectile dysfunction brought on by age.

"I was depressed," Halby, who's divorced, semi-retired and living alone in a Bay Ridge apartment, told The Post yesterday. "I live a solitary life. I have no social life. I needed that release."

[...] All told, Halby spent about $322,000 to satisfy his desires, according to court papers.

In 2002 alone, Halby deducted $111,364 for "therapeutic sex" and massages "to relieve osteoarthritis and enhance erectile function through frequent orgasm."

He claimed another $2,173 on porn "to enhance sexual performance in lieu of taking Viagra."

In 2003, his $101,930 in deductions included $162 for "sexual performance aids" such as lubes, condoms and nipple clamps, the court papers said.

FDA is trying to kill us all with plastic.

So the FDA recently told everyone that the ubiquitous plastic all around us is safe. And yet a more recent scientific study just confirmed that it can cause every debilitating disease under the sun. So why would the FDA lie? From WebMD:

A recent draft report by FDA scientists concluded that the amount of BPA humans typically consume in food and drinks does not pose a health risk.

Craig Henry, chief operating officer for the Grocery Manufacturers Association, submitted testimony at the hearing that the FDA performed a thorough, well-documented review of the available toxicological information. He said the research used a sound analytical approach and that the FDA's evaluation of the science on BPA was comprehensive.

And Steven Hentges, PhD, a scientist with the American Plastics Council, called the FDA's preliminary review "completely appropriate." He also said the industry supports more research into alleged brain and other health effects of BPA.

Glad to hear the Grocery Manufacturers Association and the American Plastics Council provide information to the FDA and supports their "completely appropriate" review. I am sure these groups are completely unbiased and not looking after their own interests, which would be the manufacturing and selling of plastic products.

Plant pain & communication Part 2.

Just to reiterate the awesomeness in layman's terms, here's that second section rewritten by LiveScience:

Scientists think that the methyl salicylate has two functions: stimulating a process similar to the immune response in animals that helps plants resist and recover from disease, and acting as a form of chemical communication to warn neighbors of threats.

"These findings show tangible proof that plant-to-plant communication occurs on the ecosystem level," said study team member Alex Guenther. "It appears that plants have the ability to communicate through the atmosphere."

Plants produce their own painkillers.

I'm glad now I don't have a lawnmower. From NSF:

Walnut trees respond to stress by producing significant amounts of a chemical form of aspirin, scientists have discovered.

The finding, by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo., opens up new avenues of research into the behavior of plants and their impacts on air quality, and also has the potential to give farmers an early warning signal about crops that are failing.

"Unlike humans, who are advised to take aspirin as a fever suppressant, plants have the ability to produce their own mix of aspirin-like chemicals, triggering the formation of proteins that boost their biochemical defenses and reduce injury," says NCAR scientist Thomas Karl, who led the study. "Our measurements show that significant amounts of the chemical can be detected in the atmosphere as plants respond to drought, unseasonable temperatures, or other stresses."

This part is even more interesting.

Karl and his colleagues speculate that the methyl salicylate has two functions. One of these is to stimulate plants to begin a process known as systemic acquired resistance, which is analogous to an immune response in an animal.

This helps a plant to both resist and recover from disease. The methyl salicylate also may be a mechanism whereby a stressed plant communicates to neighboring plants, warning them of the threat. Researchers in laboratories have demonstrated that a plant may build up its defenses if it is linked in some way to another plant that is emitting the chemical.

What this means is that plants can communicate with each other! Holy crap.

Coozer-Bits.

ABC News: Gov't bailout of greedy corporations to cost taxpayers 1 TRILLION.

BBC News: Australia rethinking $800m uranium sale to Russia.

BBC News: Crazed mob kills man for smoking in bar.

FTC: Natural, herbal "cancer cure" may actually cause acute toxic hepatitis. (see Native Essence Herb Company)

The Hill: GOP turns on Bush because of his economic crisis response.

Chicago Sun-Times: Ike's pet victims saved thanks to Katrina law.

Philanthropy News Digest: GAO: Major charities not prepared to respond to catastrophic events. (Then again, neither is the government.)

$200 billion in gold sits under NYC subway.

I had no idea about this, and I can sniff out gold pretty well. 1/4 of the world's gold sits under a urine-soaked, rat-infested subway. From ABC News:

Nearly $200 billion worth of gold rests on bedrock five stories underground, 30 feet below the city's subway system, inside the Federal Reserve Bank of New York's vault.

That's more than can be found in Fort Knox.

Very little of it belongs to the U.S. government.

There are roughly 540,000 gold bars belonging to 48 foreign central banks and 12 international organizations such as The International Monetary Fund or The Bank for International Settlement. The United States has about 5 percent of its gold stored there.

Fed officials were very tight-lipped about who owns what gold. Accounts are just identified by number, not name.

[...] This vault contains about 25 percent of the world's gold reserves.

Study: Replacing coaches doesn't solve problems.

Science Daily tells us what we Mets fans already know.

Bringing in a new coach rarely solves problems, regardless of when it is done. This is the conclusion of a study from Mid Sweden University about hiring and firing coaches in the Swedish Elite Series ice-hockey league during the period 1975/76-2005/06. Despite this fact, coaches are nevertheless very publicly fired. The study shows that it is a mistake to replace the coach.

[...] “The Study shows that replacing the coach seldom solves the problem, no matter when it is done,” says Leif Arnesson. “If you’re thinking about getting a new coach, you should at least avoid making your move while the season is underway. A word of advice to those who are in charge of recruiting coaches is therefore: ‘Don’t replace the coach, at any rate if you have a good coach, if you’re in the middle of the season, or if the team is in trouble.’”

The findings are also generally applicable. The situation is roughly the same in all major team sports, including soccer.

Finding Nemo... in a boy's penis.

From the Daily Telegraph:

A 2cm long fish apparently found its way into the penis of a 14-year-old boy from India in a bizarre medical case.

The patient was admitted to hospital with complaints of pain, dribbling urine and acute urinary retention spanning a 24-hour period. According to the boy, the fish slipped into his penis while he was cleaning his aquarium at home.

Professor Vezhaventhan and Professor Jeyaraman, who treated the boy and later wrote a paper on the case, explained: "While he was cleaning the fish tank in his house, he was holding a fish in his hand and went to the toilet for passing urine. When he was passing urine, the fish slipped from his hand and entered his urethra and then he developed all these symptoms.

[...] He was later admitted into counseling to help him overcome any trauma.

Pregnant women love eating rocks.

This is pretty wacky, but then again I secretly love Taco Bell.

From BBC:

Researchers from the University of Nigeria interviewed 1,071 pregnant women attending a prenatal clinic at the Pumwani Maternity Hospital in Nairobi.

At least 800 of those interviewed said they ate soil, stones and other non-food items during their pregnancy.

But it is not only those who are pregnant who indulge in this habit.

Sylvia Moi still finds the soft stones irresistible, 14 years after she gave birth.

"I cannot do without it... Walking without it makes me feel bad, as if I'm lacking something [or] I'm hungry," Mrs Moi says.

Cell phones can affect sperm quality.

I'm only reprinting this cuz I like when mainstream media says "gonads." From CNN:

Keeping a cell phone on talk mode in a pocket can decrease sperm quality, according to new research from the Cleveland Clinic.

"We believe that these devices are used because we consider them very safe, but it could cause harmful effects due to the proximity of the phones and the exposure that they are causing to the gonads," says lead researcher Ashok Agarwal, the Director of the Center for Reproductive Medicine.

* Snicker snicker *

Large Hadron Collider already breaks down, dooming us all.

I guess this malfunction happened last week but is only now being reported? Or did I miss the fanfare? From CNN:

A 30-ton transformer that cools the world's largest particle collider malfunctioned, forcing physicists to stop using the atom smasher just a day after launching it to great fanfare, the European Organization for Nuclear Research said Thursday.

The Japan Times profiles Doreen Shaffer and The Skatalites.

This one goes out to all my rudie peeps. Pick it up, y'all.

From the Japan Times:

Making musical history was the last thing on Doreen Shaffer's mind when she joined The Skatalites. Still a schoolgirl, she was just happy to be singing in a band.

Looking back, the vocalist, now 65 and one of three original members still touring with the group, realizes the extent of their impact. In a burst of creativity during the early 1960s, The Skatalites defined the sound of ska, the forebear of a myriad of Jamaican musical styles. Often described as the Caribbean island's first indigenous form of music, ska spawned rocksteady, which morphed into reggae. From there, the list goes on.

"At that time, it didn't register," Shaffer says by phone from her home on New York's Long Island ahead of a five-date Japan tour that starts Sept. 26. "Everybody had anxiety because you so badly wanted to be on a record. Young people think about the present. It's not like you're looking back after 10 years."

Skittish wimps more likely to be Republicans.

No word yet if these wussy participants also got "two for flinching." From LiveScience:

Individuals who are more easily startled by threats are more likely than others to support protective policies, such as military spending, the Iraq War and the death penalty, finds a new study.

[...] The researchers also measured the intensity of the participants' eye blinks in response to sudden, jarring noises. Harder blinks are linked with a heightened state of fear, the researchers say.

Participants who scored high on the skin and blinking stress tests also tended to support military spending, warrantless searches, death penalty, the Patriot Act, obedience, patriotism, the Iraq War, school prayer and the concept of Biblical truth. And they tended to oppose pacifism, immigration, gun control, foreign aid, compromise, premarital sex, gay marriage, abortion rights and pornography.

Those who were less startled by threatening images and noises were more likely to favor foreign aid, liberal immigration policies, pacifism and gun control.

Ben Kingsley as Ian MacKaye.

This is the strangest thing I've ever seen.

Sir Ben Kingsley fronting Minor Threat. For reals.


Sir Ben Kingsley STOMPS into the shoes of Minor Threat's Ian MacKaye from Mean Magazine on Vimeo.

Bizarre McCain remarks reject Spain as an ally.

Insert joke here about his age and bitterness toward the Spanish Armada.

From HuffingtonPost:

Late Wednesday night, news made its way from the other side of the Atlantic that John McCain, in an interview with a Spanish outlet, had made a series of bizarre responses to a question regarding that country's prime minister.

"Would you be willing to meet with the head of our government, Mr. Zapatero?" the questioner asked, in an exchange now being reported by several Spanish outlets.

McCain proceeded to launch into what appeared to be a boilerplate declaration about Mexico and Latin America -- but not Spain -- pressing the need to stand up to world leaders who want to harm America.

[...] The implication seemed fairly clear: McCain was refusing to commit to meet with Zapatero, the "socialist" party leader, whose country is a member of NATO and intricately involved in many of America's global financial and national security objectives.

Aussie police not really into disclosing child abduction attempts.

Apparently, Sydney police aren't into telling the media and public about crimes happening in their community. Strangely, that includes a recent spate of attempted child abductions. Yeah, I mean, why help parents protect their kids when you could be a cool secretive police officer? From the article:

Police have been criticised for not releasing details of serious crimes since police radios were encrypted in May.

The new system means the media, and the public, do not find out about incidents until notified by police, often many hours or several days after the event.

"Secrecy and a lack of confidence in not revealing things to the public actually has the potential to work in favour of the criminals," Opposition police spokesman Mike Gallacher sid yesterday.

By the way, what's the Opposition Police?

Aussie bar banned from "no undies" promotion.

Weird that this should cause a public outcry in Australia. I kind of assumed this happened in every Australian bar, if not every Australian institution (stores, banks, churches, etc.).

From Ananova:

An Australian pub has halted a promotion offering free drinks to girls who took off their knickers and showed them to the customers.

The "No Undie Sundie" at the Saint Hotel in Melbourne, Australia, offered $50 worth of drinks to girls who whipped off their garments and hung them over the bar.

The event was criticised by women protection groups, reports The Sun.

Italy Fascism Watch: Rome cracking down on miniskirts.

Man, this is the second miniskirt ban in as many days. But this is actually just a veiled attempt by the fascist Rome mayor to harass Romanian immigrant workers. Item here.

Coozer-Bits.

BBC News: Uganda seeking miniskirt ban; claims they cause car accidents.

New Scientist: The Vatican believes in evolution.

NIH: 1 out of 4 US women are incontinent.

Health News Digest: Patients' hospital bills jumped $70 billion in one year.

HuffingtonPost: Russia threatening to steal the Arctic.

Belfast Telegraph: Children's author to write next Hitchhiker's Guide book.

Consumerist: New Best Buy ad sets women's rights back by 50 years.

Hackers break into Sarah Palin's email account.

Update: Gawker has the screenshots. Meh, I don't find these emails too saucily revealing, and I think what the hackers did was lame, but I did like someone's take along the lines of: "If she can't protect her emails, how can she protect national security secrets?"

From SignOnSanDiego:

Hackers broke into the Yahoo! e-mail account that Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin used for official business as Alaska's governor, revealing as evidence a few inconsequential personal messages she has received since John McCain selected her as his running mate.

"This is a shocking invasion of the governor's privacy and a violation of law. The matter has been turned over to the appropriate authorities and we hope that anyone in possession of these e-mails will destroy them," the McCain campaign said in a statement.

The Secret Service contacted The Associated Press on Wednesday and asked for copies of the leaked e-mails, which circulated widely on the Internet. The AP did not comply.

Man has sex with car.

Ananova's got the goods:

A drunk man has been arrested after being caught having sex with a car.

The car's owner left the SUV on a quiet street in the US.

The man, who has not been named, was seen with his pants down and getting friendly with the front of the car.

He was arrested after passers-by called the police, reports Metro.

Talk about a Chevy impala!

Okay, in this case...

Some readers of my blog may think I'm a bleeding heart liberal (Louie D, I'm looking at you!). But I'm all for the death penalty in cases like this:

A man who raped and murdered a 93-year-old woman in her Dallas-area home was executed Wednesday after he apologized to his victim's relatives.

[...] Murray had been sentenced to 10 years in prison for burglaries, but was released on probation after three months. The Ratcliff slaying occurred three months after his release.

Besides the burglaries, his record showed he escaped from jail while awaiting trial and sexually assaulted two other inmates while he was locked up.

Good riddance.

Japanese school ordered to compensate lightning victim.

I would've sued Thor instead, but different strokes...

The Takamatsu High Court on Wednesday ordered a high school and an athletic association to pay some ¥300 million in compensation to a man left blind and paralyzed after lightning struck him during a high school soccer match in 1996.

The court said the accident would have been avoided if a teacher who had led the plaintiff's team requested that the match in Takatsuki, Osaka Prefecture, be postponed.

A lightning advisory had been issued for the area as a typhoon was approaching.

Follow-up: Microsoft axes Seinfeld-Gates commercials.

I think a lot of people wanted the Seinfeld-Gates merger to fail, including me, but were the media critics too harsh? Nah.

From AdWeek:

Jerry Seinfeld's classic sitcom ran for nearly a decade before it went off the air. The iconic comic's tenure as a Microsoft pitchman will apparently last just two commercials.

Valleywag today broke the news that Microsoft's much derided effort teaming Seinfeld and the software giant's chairman and cofounder Bill Gates would cease.

Microsoft could not immediately be reached, but a company representative told the LaTimes.com's technology blog: "All along we said we were having a teaser campaign. We're getting ready to start the second phase. This was the plan all along."

Andrea Peyser is disgusting.

I read a lot of stupid and ignorant op-eds (I do read the Post, you know), but my reaction tends to remain bemused and dismissive. This op-ed contributor, however, is fucking disgusting and seriously needs counseling.

She heartlessly argues that the sadistic, brutal beating of a defenseless cat by a 200+ lb. athlete (minor leaguer Joseph Petcka) isn't a big deal and trying him in court is a waste of time and money. The way she describes the event is so flippant, and she thinks she's so witty ("pawsitively looney!"), I hope reincarnation exists so she could come back the next 50 times in similar paws.

For all her lame attempts at shock value, I don't even think Ann Coulter would condone beating a cat to death. I hope if Peyser has a pet, the ASPCA takes it away from her ASAP. She clearly has no value for living things, which puts her in the same boat as Petcka.

Doctors surgically remove something from Bush's head. Guess what.

From Breitbart:

President Bush underwent treatment for a benign lesion over the weekend, leaving a noticeable scab on his forehead as he went about his business on Tuesday.

Bush had a common skin lesion, known as a seborrheic keratosis, that looked like a brown spot on his forehead. A dermatologist "froze" the spot over the weekend, a typical procedure that destroys the cells and forms a scab as the skin repairs itself.

Feds laundering $ for lumberjacks?

From the Chronicle of Philanthropy:

Three conservation groups are suing the federal government over a decision to give $350-million to forestry foundations, charging that the money illegally bypassed the U.S. Treasury and Congress, reports the Associated Press.

At the center of the case is $350-million in contributions made by Canada to settle a 2006 lumber trade dispute. Officials at the office of the U.S. Trade Representative chose which timber groups would receive the donations, and the conservation groups allege that since the money was distributed without congressional approval or public process, it was a form of money laundering.

Peter Goldman, director of the Washington Forest Law Center and a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said the way the payments were made violated federal laws because money owed to the United States in the settlement of a lawsuit is supposed to go directly to the U.S. Treasury.

United Airlines charges $130 to check two bags.

I hate the airlines. I need to move to Europe where flights are $20.

From McClatchy:

On Monday, United Airlines doubled its fee for a second checked bag, from $25 to $50 each way. Including a $15 one-way fee for a first checked bag, the airline now charges $130 to check two bags on a round-trip ticket.

It’s the most expensive baggage fee in the industry. And unless passengers rebel, some other carriers may raise their own fees to match United’s new charges.

Albanian parliament erupts in violence over corn.

You know, I read this article three times and I still don't understand what it's about.

From Reuters:

Tempers popped over corn when guards in Albania's parliament grappled with two lawmakers who tried to bring supposedly sterile samples of a French variety into the chamber.

"I told them these objects were not allowed in and blocked the door, but they hit and punched another officer," guard commander Arben Nika said in a statement after the tussle with two opposition legislators on Thursday.

"I fell down and my leg bled," he said.

Satanic gang kill, eat 4 goth teens.

Is there nothing sadder than goth-on-goth violence? From the Daily Mail:

A gang of Satan worshippers murdered four teenagers by stabbing each of them 666 times, police believe.

The number of wounds is the same as that revered by followers of the devil.

The three girls and one boy, all described as Goths and aged 16 and 17, were allegedly forced to drink alcohol by the gang before they were attacked.

The killers then allegedly lit a bonfire under a tree near their cottage in Russia's Yaroslavl region, 300 miles north-east of Moscow, where they cooked and ate their victims' body parts.

Unclean dishes leads to sword attack.

Woman upset over unclean dishes attacks boyfriend with sword. From Breitbart:

The 21-year-old man told police that he became involved in an argument because the woman was upset that the dishes were not clean. Police Lt. Paul Henderson said the woman told the man to leave the apartment, but he refused.

Henderson said the woman then tried to physically remove the man. During the ensuing struggle, the woman bit the man's right shoulder and broke a picture frame across his face, causing visible cuts, Henderson said.

The woman then grabbed an approximately 2-foot sword and swung it at him, but missed, police said.

Coozer-Bits.

BBC News: UN pulls out of north Sri Lanka.

BBC News: Common plastics (plastic bottles, food packaging, etc.) linked to major diseases.

Boston Globe: "Disastrous" deregulation strategies by Bush and his treasury secretary helped melt down the financial sector.

AdWeek: Best Buy to acquire Napster for $120M.

The Independent: The 50 Best Cookbooks. (I want the Ultimate Curry Bible.)

Live Science: No matter our intentions, we're all snack monkeys.

Raw Story: Planning begins for prosecution of Bush war crimes.

NY Sun: Conservative NYC newspaper close to shutting down. (It's always a little pitiful when a media outlet reports on its own woes.)

UFO spotted in Texas.

You know, Stephenville is maybe an hour outside of Crawford, TX. Maybe the mothership is returning for Laura Bush. From ABC News:

More than a dozen people said they saw it -- the big bright lights in the January skies over Stephenville, Texas. It was unlike anything they'd seen before.

"I look off to the east, see some very intense bright lights coming this way at a high rate of speed," witness Steve Allen said.

The lights reconfigured into different formations several times, he said.

"Then they burst into a flame, a very unusual bright white flame," he said. "Two or three seconds of that, and then it simply disappeared."

Former military air traffic controller Paul Colcleasure said he also saw something remarkable that night.

"I honestly don't know what to think it was. I know what it wasn't," he said. "I've seen pretty much every military aircraft you can think of in the dark, and these lights were -- just the scale of the lights, the size -- not anything I can conceptualize."

In the nine months since, those lights still have not been identified.

PSA: Beware the weeping angel.

I made a huge mistake - I just watched the Steven Moffat-penned Doctor Who episode "Blink."

Holy crap, I don't scare easily, but I am not going to sleep tonight. This episode is easily one of the creepiest, spine chilling things I've ever seen, and I watched the Republican National Convention.

Terrifying or not (it is), it was also brilliantly written and directed. If you're not a Doctor Who fan, start with this one, though I don't think any other episode approaches such creepy heights. (The Moffat two-parter about the girl in the gas mask comes close.)

And remember, don't blink. Whatever you do, DON'T BLINK.

PSA: 14 brands of pet food recalled.

From Consumerist: Mars Petcare US is recalling 14 brands of dry dog and cat food made between February and July of this year, after two people who may have had contact with some of the food became infected with Salmonella.

Click here to check the brands and package codes.

Top 10 All-Girl Bands.

My 10 ten. Yes, I like Puffy Ami Yumi.

1. Le Tigre
2. All Girl Summer Fun Band
3. Cub
4. Puffy Ami Yumi
5. Akiakane
6. Halo Friendlies
7. The Pipettes
8. The Runaways
9. L7
10. Metallica

Honorable Mentions: Go Betty Go, Lunachicks, Betty Blowtorch, The Bodysnatchers (even though they only had two songs).

By the by, anyone know of any good all-girl or female-fronted punk bands from South America?

Coozer-Bits.

Boston Globe: Study: Non-college educated white women more likely to make a very bad decision on Election Day.

NY Times: New Manhattan restaurant only sells globs of mozzarella.

Science Daily: Bees do "The Wave" to repel wasps, Mets bullpen.

Universe Today: First photo taken of likely planet around another sun. (Check out the pic!)

WikiNews: Bin Laden's greatest hits leaked to web.

US Food Policy: Chinese company sells contaminated milk formula for infants.

Slashdot: Nokia creates new technology to scribble notes on the back of digital photos.

Revealing Errors: Glitch in Google News crawler nearly ruins United Airlines stock price.

Human noise underwater is killing whales, dolphins.

Before you ignore this, let me remind you that fewer dolphins means fewer cans of tuna.

Levels of noise in the world's oceans are causing serious problems for whales, dolphins and other marine mammals, a report warns.

The International Fund for Animal Welfare (Ifaw) says undersea noise blocks animals' communication and disrupts feeding.

Naval sonar has been implicated in the mass deaths of some cetaceans.

In some regions, the level of ocean noise is doubling each decade, and Ifaw says protective measures are failing.

"Humanity is literally drowning out marine mammals," said Robbie Marsland, UK director of Ifaw.

Carjackers toss baby girl from car.

Bill Bryson once said that capital punishment is only justified when someone uses two spots to park their car. I'd add this offense to the list.

From News.com.au:

A FOUR-MONTH-OLD baby girl is recovering after being tossed from a stolen car in the US city of Phoenix, Foxnews reports.

The baby was in a car with her mother when two armed men allegedly fired a gun at one of the windows, spraying glass all over the infant, police said.

After forcing the mother out of the car, one of the men allegedly jumped in and fled with the baby girl still strapped in her car seat, said Sergeant Andy Hill, a Phoenix police spokesman. The other man escaped in another car.

As the man drove off, witnesses allegedly yelled that a child was in the back seat.

Witnesses said the man stopped and flung the baby girl onto the pavement, Foxnews reports.

The child, who was still in the car seat, received only minor injuries, Sgt Hill said.

The two men were arrested a short time later after a police chase through the city.

The history of "Kilroy Was Here".

Interesting article on the history of "Kilroy Was Here" - historians have even tracked down the original Kilroy. I liked this part:

Japanese troops were so mystified by a "Kilroy Was Here" painted on a bombed out tank on the Pacific island of Guadalcanal that they reported the find to their senior intelligence officers, according to a U.S. Marine interviewed by World War II author Timothy Benford.

Hitler supposed that Kilroy was some kind of "Super-GI" or spy, other unconfirmed reports have stated, and ordered a contingent of men to track down the sneaky American. He would never be found.

Article here.

Unidentified submarine shows up in Japan.

But how do they know it was a submarine? I think it may have been an Evangelion!

From Japan Times:

An unidentified foreign submarine temporarily entered Japanese territorial waters between Shikoku and Kyushu on Sunday morning, Defense Ministry officials said.

[...] "It was very regrettable," Defense Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi said. "We need to do our utmost tracking down the submarine and getting to the bottom of the incident."

33-year-old woman poses as teen to be cheerleader.

Ananova reports:

A 33-year-old US woman posed as her 15-year-old daughter to enroll at school because she wanted to be a cheerleader.

[...] She attended cheerleading practices and a party at the cheerleading coach's house. She was given a cheerleader locker and paid for her uniform with a check that later bounced.

Bush admin wants to turn FBI into CTU.

From ABC News:

The Bush administration is proposing guidelines that give FBI agents far more latitude to assess foreign intelligence and terrorism threats in the same way that they do in more routine criminal cases.

Under the new guidelines, the FBI would be allowed to use the following tools to assess national security threats before launching preliminary investigations: physical surveillance, developing informants, and so-called "pretext interviews," in which agents can ask questions without having to identify themselves as from the FBI.

LSD-like drug legal in Canada.

Salvia is a plant that, when smoked, creates the most powerful hallucinations in the natural world. You can pick it up at the Canadian equivalent of 7-11. From Canoe:

The first time Ryan Fentie smoked salvia, he was overwhelmed by the sudden, intense feelings that swept over him.

A huge hole opened in the ground before him, vines snaked out of the pit and encircled his feet and he felt himself become a part of them.

"I had no idea what the drug was doing to me," Fentie recalled. "It feels like you entered another world."

His high came from a powerful hallucinogenic drug that can be bought -- legally -- at convenience stores and head shops across Toronto.

Saudi Arabia ok's killing "immoral" TV executives.

Not that I haven't daydreamed about issuing a fatwa on Time Warner Cable, but this is pretty scary.

Saudi Arabia's top judiciary official has issued a religious decree saying it is permissible to kill the owners of satellite TV networks that broadcast immoral content.

The 79-year-old Sheik Saleh al-Lihedan said Thursday that satellite channels cause the "deviance of thousands of people."

[...] Among the most viewed Arabic satellite networks is Rotana, which airs movies and music videos. It is owned by Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, a billionaire businessman and member of the royal family whom Forbes ranks as the world's 13th richest person.

NYT destroys Palin.

I avoid discussing Palin here (too cliche), but this article is quite an indictment. Some snippets.

On her cronyism:

When there was a vacancy at the top of the State Division of Agriculture, she appointed a high school classmate, Franci Havemeister, to the $95,000-a-year directorship. A former real estate agent, Ms. Havemeister cited her childhood love of cows as a qualification for running the roughly $2 million agency.

Ms. Havemeister was one of at least five schoolmates Ms. Palin hired, often at salaries far exceeding their private sector wages.

On her petty vendettas and Cheney-like secrecy:

Throughout her political career, she has pursued vendettas, fired officials who crossed her and sometimes blurred the line between government and personal grievance, according to a review of public records and interviews with 60 Republican and Democratic legislators and local officials.

[...] Interviews show that Ms. Palin runs an administration that puts a premium on loyalty and secrecy. The governor and her top officials sometimes use personal e-mail accounts for state business; dozens of e-mail messages obtained by The New York Times show that her staff members studied whether that could allow them to circumvent subpoenas seeking public records.

Rick Steiner, a University of Alaska professor, sought the e-mail messages of state scientists who had examined the effect of global warming on polar bears. (Ms. Palin said the scientists had found no ill effects, and she has sued the federal government to block the listing of the bears as endangered.) An administration official told Mr. Steiner that his request would cost $468,784 to process.

When Mr. Steiner finally obtained the e-mail messages — through a federal records request — he discovered that state scientists had in fact agreed that the bears were in danger, records show.

“Their secrecy is off the charts,” Mr. Steiner said.

David Foster Wallace killed himself?!

This is really shocking... The LA Times reports:

David Foster Wallace, the novelist, essayist and humorist best known for his 1996 novel "Infinite Jest," was found dead Friday night at his home in Claremont, according to the Claremont Police Department. He was 46.

Jackie Morales, a records clerk at the department, said Wallace's wife called police at 9:30 p.m. Friday saying she had returned home to find that her husband had hanged himself.

Wallace, who had taught creative writing at Pomona College since 2002, was on leave this semester.

Times book editor David Ulin was in New York City for a National Book Critics Circle Board meeting Saturday. "What was a party is now a wake," Ulin said as the news of Wallace's death circulated. "People were speechless and just blown away.

"He was one of the most influential and innovative writers of the last 20 years," Ulin said.

I have to say that I could never decide if I liked his books/stories/essays or not. He was so strange and challenging that oftentimes I thought the "Infinite Jest" was on me. But that's also what made him so interesting and important. He was a true artist and a true original. R.I.P.

GOP forum sells racist Obama Waffles.

Good to know these are the 'values' at the GOP Values Voter Summit. From the Jerusalem Post:

Activists at a conservative political forum snapped up boxes of waffle mix depicting Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama as a racial stereotype on its front and wearing an Arab-like headdress on its top flap.

Values Voter Summit organizers cut off sales of Obama Waffles boxes on Saturday, saying they had not realized the boxes displayed "offensive material." The summit and the exhibit hall where the boxes were sold had been open since Thursday afternoon.

The box was meant as political satire, said Mark Whitlock and Bob DeMoss, two writers from Franklin, Tennessee, who created the mix. They sold it for $10 a box from a rented booth at the summit sponsored by the lobbying arm of the Family Research Council, a Christian conservative group.

[...] Republican Party stalwarts Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney were among speakers at the forum, which officials said drew 2,100 activists from 44 states.

Michael Phelps is....

...the guy from My Giant. I noticed it while catching Olympics snippets, and his monologue during SNL confirmed it. I couldn't find a clear pic, but the blurry VHS cover (I assume it's not on DVD) should remove all doubt.

Koozer's Kitchen: Chocolate Toffee Bars

To make this dessert you will need a lot of time on your hands and resistance toward diabetic shock. These bars are so sweet, they were once a diner waitress in Missoula with a sharp tongue but a heart of gold.

CHOCOLATE TOFFEE BARS O' DEATH

Okay, lots of steps here, so keep up.

1. Preheat oven to 350. I couldn't tell you which oven pan to use. Most people use shallow pans for bars, but I used something closer to a casserole dish. Use your best judgment. I can't do everything for you, you know. God, you're so needy.

2. In a bowl, cream together a stick and a half of butter, 3/4 cup of light brown sugar, packed, and 1 and a half cups of flour. Press down into the greased pan. Bake for 15 minutes or until it looks tan. Take out and let cool.

3. In a saucepan, melt together a can of sweetened condensed milk (take it out of the can first) and 2 tablespoons of butter. Heat for 5 minutes but don't boil, and keep stirring the whole time.

4. Pour and spread evenly over crush. Bake for 10-15 minutes, until golden. Take out and sprinkle a bag of milk chocolate chips over it. Put back in oven for 2-3 minutes, until chips are melty. Using a rubber spatula, spread around melted chocolate chips evenly.

5. Smash up some Skor bars or toffee pieces. Sprinkle evenly over chocolate and push down into chocolate using the spatula. Let cool. Put in fridge for an hour or so. Cut into bars and then put back in fridge for another hour.

6. Eat one and have the sugar rush equivalent to a Red Bull mixed with espresso mixed with the first time you ever listened to Motorhead.

Koozer's Kitchen: Ricotta Gnocchi with Pesto

Okay, time for the big guns. This is how you get that barista girl to fall in love with you, since the kidnapping and Rush album rockathon didn't work. This gnocchi is so good, I've been mistaken for French (nevermind it's an Italian dish - my friends aren't smart).

LITTLE PILLOWS OF DOUGHY GOODNESS (w/ pesto)

PESTO

Start with the pesto; fridge it if you need to while making the gnocchi.

1. In a food processor, add two bunches of basil leaves, 2 garlic cloves, 3 or 4 oil-cured black olives, a pinch of hot pepper flakes, a handful of pine nuts, olive oil, and a bunch of arugula leaves. I blanch the arugula first to make it less bitter. To do so, boil water, throw arugula in for a minute, take out and run under cold water so it stops cooking, then wring out the arugula and get all the water out. That huge bunch of arugula will end up looking like a small cat turd. That's a good thing.

2. Process the mixture, adding olive oil as necessary.

3. Move to bowl and fold in 1/2 cup of grated pecorino romano.

GNOCCHI

I'm really bad with measurements. Try this out and keep extra flour and ricotta on hand to even it out. Too sticky, add flour. Too dry, add ricotta. Too boring, add 2 Fast 2 Furious.

1. Okay, don't sue me if these measurements suck or cause illness. Try 2 cups of flour (use good quality stuff, like King Arthur), 1/2 - 2/3 cup of grated pecorino romano, and a small tub of ricotta.

2. Use your hands and mix together. Don't overwork it - just knead it gently, like a young woman's buttocks. When it's a nice big ball of dough that isn't too sticky or too dry, take small slabs and roll out with your hands, pressing gently. Roll each slab into a chubby worm the thickness of a highlighter (man, where have I heard THAT before!). Take a butter knife and slice off at 1" intervals. They'll look like little pillows. If you want to get fancy, press down gently with a fork for that cool gnocchi pronged indent look.

3. Boil water. Throw in your gnocchi and keep an eye on it. As soon as the gnocchi start floating to the top, scoop out with a slotted spoon. Put on plate and mix with pesto. Laugh maniacally as people eat it. (You should laugh maniacally in any social setting.)

Koozer's Kitchen: Crispy Tofu

Tofu is wonderfully versatile. You can use it as both packing material AND as adhesive. But did you know you can also eat it? It's true! Just fry the hell out of it, the Coozer way.

CRISPY TOFU YOU CAN INGEST

1. Put your oven rack thingy close to the top. Preheat the oven at 400.

2. Pat dry a brick of extra firm tofu. Slice somewhat thin (maybe 1/4 - 1/2" thin, I dunno), and put on lightly greased cookie sheet. Put in oven for 15 minutes, flipping over halfway. Take out of oven and let cool.

3. In a small bowl, mix two egg whites with a couple of tablespoons of Japanese or Korean barbecue sauce. (I used tonkatsu sauce.) In another bowl, add flour. (Or use breadcrumbs or panko if you want. Whatever man, I don't care. Gosh!)

4. Pour oil 1/2" deep in pan. (I used sunflower oil because it doesn't exude too much flavor and it's not as unhealthy as canola.) Heat super hot. Dip the tofu slices first in the egg/bbq mixture and then the flour. Fry, and watch out for spurting oil!

5. Fry on both sides til brown and crispy. Dry off the pieces on paper towels. When a little cool, brush on some more bbq sauce, then put in oven again for 5-10 minutes. I know, crazy!

6. Remove, put on plate, and add a nice dipping sauce. I went with some crazy spicy Chinese sauce. I don't know the name of it, or what exactly it was, because the label was in Chinese. It could've been children's toys melted with asbestos and lead. But I threw some sesame seeds in there and it rocked.