Weird News Thread ....

[Jolie Rouge]

Lifeguards: Vending Machines Kill, Sharks Don't

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Great White sharks may have been sighted off a popular Los Angeles beach in the last few days, to the delight of breathless TV newscasters looking for news on slow summer days.

But officials are reassuring residents that there's nothing to worry about: the sharks aren't that big, they are always off the coast and they only eat fish -- not people. And besides, even vending machines are more dangerous.

"There are sharks in the ocean off our coast," Capt. Garth Manning of the Los Angeles County Fire Department's Lifeguard Division said. "There have always been sharks off our coast. And we have never had a shark attack in Los Angeles County."

Manning was responding to reports on local television that Great Whites had been spotted by swimmers about 150 yards off popular Will Rogers State Beach.

He said that experts had been unable to confirm the sighting, but that it was not surprising. "If they are Great White sharks they are only about 5 feet in length and they feed on small fish, they do not feed on people," Canning said. "But it's difficult to tell if they are because it's difficult to tell a juvenile Great White from a juvenile Mako."

Canning said that despite common fears over shark attacks, more people are killed in the United States each year by vending machines. He said that last year dogs killed more people than Great White sharks had killed in the last 100 years.

07/03/03 14:09

[Jolie Rouge]

Solar system similar to ours discovered

http://channels.netscape.com/ns/news...02.htm&sc=Spac

Astronomers searching for signs of a solar system like our own said Thursday they had found a planet very similar to Jupiter orbiting a star resembling the sun 90 light-years away.

"This is the closest we have yet got to a real solar system-like planet and advances our search for systems that are even more like our own," said UK team leader Hugh Jones of Liverpool John Moores University.

The planet was discovered by British, American and Australian astronomers using the 3.9-meter Anglo-Australian Telescope in New South Wales.

With a mass twice that of gas giant Jupiter, the planet circles star HD70642 in the constellation Puppis once every six years.

In relation to its own distance from its star, if it were in our own solar system it would be about halfway between Mars and Jupiter.

"The long-term goal of this program is the detection of true analogs to the solar system," the UK Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council said in a statement. "This discovery of a Jupiter-like gas giant planet around a nearby star is a step towards this goal."


07/03/2003 10:09

[Jolie Rouge]

'Brady Bunch' Films Hawaii Documentary

HONOLULU (AP) - Thirty years after their family vacation was almost ruined by the curse of an ancient tiki doll, the Bradys are back in Hawaii.

``Is this like an acid flashback or what?'' joked Barry Williams, who played oldest son Greg on ``The Brady Bunch.''

Several original cast members from the '70s sitcom have been in the islands this week filming a 90-minute documentary for the Travel Channel. Robert Reed, who played father Mike Brady, died in 1992.

``The Bradys are the foremost family in television history,'' said executive producer and creator James Romanovich. ``I thought with the 30-year anniversary of their filming in Hawaii, it would be great to bring them back and have them be themselves in a 'Real World'-style show.''

Cast members have visited most of the locations the TV family toured 30 years ago. Even famed island crooner Don Ho makes a surprise appearance, just as he did in the 1973 episode, and sings a song with Carol Brady herself, Florence Henderson.

``It's like a wonderful children's book that you loved as a child that you want to share with your children,'' Henderson told the Honolulu Star-Bulletin for Thursday's editions. ``When another generation comes along and finds the show, their parents know it already, so it gives the family something to relate to.''

Other cast members taking part are Christopher Knight (Peter), Mike Lookinland (Bobby) and Susan Olsen (Cindy). Producers said Ann B. Davis, who played wisecracking housekeeper Alice, is retired and doesn't like to travel.


The documentary is scheduled to air early next year.



07/03/03 20:35

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BERLIN (Reuters) - A German man woke up to find himself stark naked in the middle of a street after sleepwalking from home, police said Thursday. The 37-year-old man called police in the southern town of Buchen at around 6 a.m. after discovering he had left his house keys at home.
"The man waited naked for police at the phone booth, who gave him a raincoat to wear," said a police spokesman.

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HELSINKI (Reuters) - A Finnish man killed his wife on Saturday and cut the corpse in half so it would fit into a single plastic bag. He turned up for work on Monday but left early to confess to police.
Police spokesman Jorma Jantunen told Reuters the man, in his mid-30s, arrived at the police station and said his wife's body was in the trunk of their car at home.

Jantunen said there was no clear motive for the crime, which the man committed after the couple had been drinking at home in Vaasa, 400 km (250 miles) northwest of the capital n2Helsinki.

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OKLAHOMA CITY (Reuters) - An Oklahoma man arrested on suspicion of beating his wife faced year in prison and a fine. But when he spit in an arresting officer's face, he got a life sentence instead, officials said on Wednesday.
John Carl Marquez, 36, was convicted of "placing bodily fluid upon a government employee," a felony that can carry a life sentence because of the possibility of transmitting a potentially deadly disease.

State judge April Sellers White sentenced Marquez this week even though Marquez and the officer tested negative for any communicable disease.

Marquez also was convicted of assaulting a police officer, and a jury recommended the maximum sentence because he had previous convictions.

Marquez, arrested several months ago, could have received one year in prison and a $3,000 fine for wife beating, according to the Creek County court clerk's office.

His lawyers said they plan to appeal.

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BANGKOK (Reuters) - Not satisfied with being dubbed the "land of smiles," Thailand's culture ministry is launching a campaign to encourage Thais to smile even more, the Bangkok Post reported on Thursday.
"Smiling is a good habit as well as a good welcome gesture to tourists," a ministry spokeswoman told the daily.

"People who smile three times a day should make it six. This doesn't mean smiling has disappeared, but it would be better if people smiled more."

Thailand has in recent months suffered a massive drop in tourist arrivals due to the impact of the deadly SARS virus and fears surrounding the threat of Bali-style terror attacks at tourist hotspots.

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OSLO (Reuters) - European church leaders boiled holy water for a riverside ceremony in Norway this week because local officials feared it might otherwise kill fish when poured into the river.
"The danger was probably small but we had to be cautious about pouring water brought from around Europe into a salmon river," Johan Aurstad, senior advisor at the Norwegian Animal Health Authority, told Reuters Thursday.

A gathering of 126 bishops and other Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox Christian leaders in the Norwegian city of Trondheim boiled flasks of holy water for 10 minutes to kill any bacteria before pouring it into the Nidaros River Wednesday.

The delegates, at the Conference of European Churches, each brought about 0.1 liters of water from countries ranging from Greece to Estonia for the ceremony to symbolize unity.

"The water was of a type used for baptisms so you have to assume it was drinking water quality. But we had to be cautious," Aurstad said.

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PARIS (Reuters) - Paris is launching a champagne and flowers charm offensive to woo U.S. tourists after France's opposition to the U.S.-led war in Iraq triggered a large drop in the number of transatlantic visitors.
Around 100 hotels, restaurants, shops and other businesses will be laying on the bubbly, blooms and other treats for American visitors in a promotional campaign timed to coincide with the U.S. Independence Day celebrations on July 4.

"This campaign is aimed at Americans who would like to visit France, but are worried about what kind of welcome they might receive," the tourist office said in a statement.

Last year, Paris hosted 1.7 million tourists from the United States, more than from any other country, but in the first four months of this year numbers have slumped by almost a quarter.

Across the Atlantic, France last month launched a new promotional video, in which film director Woody Allen urged fellow Americans to visit France and eat French fries.

[Jolie Rouge]

... could have received one year in prison and a $3,000 fine for wife beating

- or -

"placing bodily fluid upon a government employee," a felony that can carry a life sentence because of the possibility of transmitting a potentially deadly disease

Am I the only one who sees something WRONG with this ?

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NEW YORK (Reuters) - It may be illegal, immoral and certainly ill-advised, but selling every usable part of your body could fetch upward of $45 million, according to a survey in the August issue of Wired magazine.

Even an overweight, out-of-shape body could bring millions when broken down to its valuable fluids, tissues and germ-fighting antibodies.

There is, of course, a major catch: Many of the valuable human body parts are those a person could not live without.

But it does lay to rest the old concept that the human body, when broken down to its basic elements, is only worth pocket change.

Wired Editor-In-Chief Chris Anderson said the price tag gives an idea of the progress of medicine and biology, and shows how much more sophisticated we have become at understanding the complexity of the human body.

"We tried to find some number through which you can quantify the magnitude of the change in technology that we are all experiencing," Anderson said.

The prices, Wired warned, are based on maximum dollar values for some of the most marketable substances, and makes the unlikely assumption that every trace of those substances could be extracted from living tissue for sale.

To avoid issues such as illegal black market trade in organs, the survey was based on projected prices in the United States and did not take into account potential differences in poverty stricken Third World countries.

Due to advances in science and biotechnology, vital organs are no longer the most valuable body parts, the survey demonstrated. That distinction now belongs to bone marrow at $23 million, based on 1,000 grams at $23,000 per gram.

DNA, found in every cell, could fetch $9.7 million at $1.3 million per gram, while extracting antibodies could bring $7.3 million. The accompanying article did point out that the cost of living in a sterile plastic bubble could eat up a lot of the profit from immune system sales.

By comparison, a lung was priced at $116,400, a kidney at $91,400 and a heart was worth a mere $57,000, based on research of cost estimates from hospitals and insurance companies.

On the reproductive front, the survey found a fertile woman could sell 32 egg cells over eight years for a grand total of $224,000. To approach that amount, a man would have to make 12 sperm donations a month for 20 years.