First downer here is that the writer starts out with the lamest goof on "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan" album title. You just want to slap him. But it gets worse. This is a real phenomenon, where an artist demonstrates that he or she can conquer ANY field. It's really prominent with actors, who are good at EVERYTHING, but there are musicians who pull this shit too. The freewheeling artistic style of Bob Dylan, who has drawn on a variety of sources in creating his music and has previously raised questions of attribution in his work, is once again stirring debate — this time over an exhibition of his paintings at the Gagosian Gallery on the Upper East Side.
When the gallery announced the exhibition, called “The Asia Series,” this month, it said the collection of paintings and other artwork would provide “a visual journal” of Mr. Dylan’s travels “in Japan, China, Vietnam and Korea,” with “firsthand depictions of people, street scenes, architecture and landscape.”
But since the exhibition opened on Sept. 20, some fans and Dylanologists have raised questions about whether some of these paintings are based on Mr. Dylan’s own experiences and observations, or on photographs that are widely available and that he did not take.
A wide-ranging discussion at the Bob Dylan fan Web site Expecting Rain has pointed out similarities between several works in “The Asia Series” and existing or even well-known photographs — for example, between a painting by Mr. Dylan depicting two men and a Henri Cartier-Bresson photograph of two men, one a eunuch who served in the court of the Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi.
Observers have pointed out that a painting by Mr. Dylan called “Opium,” which is used to illustrate a Web page for the “Asia Series” exhibition on the Gagosian site, appears to be closely modeled on a picture by Léon Busy, an early-20th-century photographer.
Separately, Michael Gray, in a post on his blog, Bob Dylan Encyclopedia, points out that a painting by Mr. Dylan depicting three young men playing a sidewalk board game is nearly identical to a photograph taken by Dmitri Kessel.
Mr. Gray, an author who has written extensively about Mr. Dylan’s work and its artistic influences, writes on his blog:
“The most striking thing is that Dylan has not merely used a photograph to inspire a painting: he has taken the photographer’s shot composition and copied it exactly. He hasn’t painted the group from any kind of different angle, or changed what he puts along the top edge, or either side edge, or the bottom edge of the picture. He’s replicated everything as closely as possible. That may be a (very self-enriching) game he’s playing with his followers, but it’s not a very imaginative approach to painting. It may not be plagiarism but it’s surely copying rather a lot.”
Fruit juice, often considered one of our 'five-a-day', could actually boost the risk of colorectal cancer, Australian researchers have found.
[...]
The large load of sugars carried by most fruit juices make them a potential risk, according to researchers writing in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association.
[...]
While total fruit and vegetable intake can cut the risk of colon cancer, they discovered that increased fruit juice consumption was linked to an increased risk for rectal cancer.
[...]
Those who drank more than three glasses of fruit juice daily were more likely to develop rectal cancer in particular.
One possible explanation, they wrote, was that many of the beneficial substances found in fruit were actually lost during the commercial process of making juice.
The owners of Ice Cream Family Corner and Sandwiches at the busy intersection of South Pine Avenue and Southwest 17th Street say their two-month-old business is getting creamed because passers-by have mistaken their white-hooded ice cream cone mascot for a KKK protester.
[...]
Liza Diaz, who manages the store ..., said an employee at the bank where she does business told her a co-worker was so frightened by the white dollop patrolling the street corner that she called her husband crying and refused to drive through the intersection.
"One (customer) told me, ‘I had to think twice before coming in here because I thought it was KKK,' " Diaz said.
[...]
Close up, the costume looks nothing like the white-hooded Klan garb that evokes such strong emotions. Its fluffy white top, flecked with colored sprinkles, curls slightly at its peak, and it sits atop a brown waffle cone.
But the costume tends to sag around the wearer's shoulders, and the waffle cone is mostly obscured by the sign the mascot holds in front of him. So to a motorist who gets only a glance cruising past at 40 mph, it can — and apparently does — look like a menacing Klansman.
Although this corner location has been a graveyard for eateries over the years, mostly because getting into and out of the parking lot can be tricky, Liza Diaz believes the costume is to blame for the rocky road the shop finds itself on. The clientele, she said, melted away right after the mascot hit the street. Indeed, just before lunch Monday, there wasn't a soul in the store except for a handful of employees.
This story reflects a simple but sad fact about humanity. When something happens that DEFIES explanation people will COME UP with an explanation whether it makes sense or not. This goes back to the Bible. Trying to explain the world. You look around and say "in six days God created the world." Sounds perfectly reasonable, right? A man who died near a fire had "spontaneously combusted", a coroner in Ireland has ruled.
Michael Faherty, a 76-year-old pensioner in Galway, died at his house three days before Christmas last year in circumstances that had baffled investigators, the Irish Times reported.
Forensic experts said the death had not been caused by a fire in Faherty's fireplace, and that no accelerant had been found, nor was there evidence of foul play.
Faherty had been found lying on his back with his head near the fireplace, in the sitting room, but fire fighters said the blaze had not spread from the hearth.
Coroner Ciaran McLoughlin, who researched the matter heavily before giving his verdict, said he had never encountered such a case in his 25 years working in the region.
He said a book on forensic pathology noted that such reported cases were almost always near an open fireplace or chimney.
"This fire was thoroughly investigated and I'm left with the conclusion that this fits into the category of spontaneous human combustion, for which there is no adequate explanation," the BBC reported him as saying.
Bed bugs do not transmit disease or cause illness — but the insecticides used to kill them do. A total of 111 illnesses associated with bed bug-related insecticides were reported in seven states between 2003 and 2010 (mostly in the last three years), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said Thursday. Most cases of poisoning were not severe, but the data included one death.
That case involved a 65-year-old woman in North Carolina who died in 2010. After she complained to her husband about bed bugs, the CDC report said, he saturated the interior of their home, including the baseboards, walls and the area around the bed, with the insecticide Ortho Home Defense Max. He then applied a different product, Ortho Lawn and Garden Insect Killer, to their mattress and box spring. Neither insecticide is registered for use against bed bugs, the CDC said.
That day, the couple also released nine cans of Hot Shot Fogger in their home. Two days later, they reapplied the insecticides and unleashed nine more cans of Hot Shot Bedbug and Flea Fogger. The woman then applied the pesticide Hot Shot Bed Bug and Flea Killer directly to her arms and chest, and doused her hair with it before covering her head with a plastic cap.
Two days later, her husband found her unresponsive. She was taken to the hospital where she remained on a ventilator for nine days until she died. The woman had had a history of health problems, including kidney failure, heart disease, Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol, and depression, the CDC report said. She had been taking at least 10 medications at the time of her death.
I enjoyed this one and found it buried in my mailbag from awhile ago. Kids are wonderful and so cute but there are times THEY CAN DRIVE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND! So what do you do when they act up? A lot of parents I see solve this problem by doing absolutely nothing while their kids run amok like they have Earth all to themselves. Others flip out and I've even seen a few hit their kids in public, including a memorable occasion at Disney World where I was able to point and say to my kids, "now you guys think about what a wonderful dad I am." Every once in awhile you can use someone else's misfortune to your advantage (not that it really changed my kids or their attitude in any real way - as soon as you don't buy a $15 lollipop you're Hitler to them).A man accused of throwing his 7-year-old son overboard during a sightseeing cruise around California's Newport Harbor says he and the boy were just "horse playing" and talked about jumping in the water together.
"I was not trying to kill my son. We were playing in the shallows," Sloane Briles told KTLA-TV on Tuesday. "I discussed it with him. We'd jump in together and just thought it would be funny, ha ha."
Two of 85 people who were on the Sunday afternoon tour saw things differently. In 911tapes released Tuesday, the passengers expressed shock and disgust after seeing Briles toss the boy into the water.
"I'm on a boat tour called the Queen and there's a man who just threw his son overboard," a woman told an Orange County sheriff's dispatcher.
"This man has been bad on our whole trip and he's swimming back to our boat now," she said.
Sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino said Briles, 35, was on the tour with his girlfriend and two sons from a previous marriage. Amormino said they got into an argument and Briles threatened to toss the boy into the water if he didn't stop crying.
Staff members on the 42-foot boat said Briles told the boy he needed to toughen up then threw him into the water five feet below, said Charlie Maas, who oversees the tour company.
Someone on the boat threw the boy a life ring, and he was safely rescued, uninjured, by another boater. The father also jumped in to save him before swimming back to the tour boat.
Another 911 caller said she thought Briles was "drunk and violent."
Briles was taken into custody for child endangerment and resisting arrest. He denied witnesses' accounts that the boy was crying and said he had never hit his son.
His girlfriend told the New York Daily News that he was only "roughhousing" with his son as he often does and regretted his "stupid" judgment.
The President of the United States was saying this to Tony Bennett while sending in the troops? Whoa! In a way I understand it. You can't always tell the truth, but if you were talking to Tony Bennett, he's like truth serum. He really is a better singer than Frank Sinatra. If you don't believe me listen to "Just In Time," LOUD. He's totally got more range and pure vocal chops than Old Blue Eyes. Tony Bennett sings pop music like it's opera. It sounds like he was recorded in an elevator shaft but the vinyl records they made in the 50s still sound better than the digital push button shit they make today. Tony Bennett is under fire for telling Howard Stern that President George W. Bush admitted to him that the Iraq War was a mistake. The 85-year-old singer visited Stern’s satellite radio show on Monday to promote his new album of duets, and he shared his encounter with the then-president from the 2005 Kennedy Center honors. “He told me personally that night, he says, ‘I think I made a mistake,’” Bennett said, referring to the Iraq War.
A spokesperson for Bush told NBC News that “This account is flatly wrong … President Bush never said that to Tony Bennett or anyone else.”
Bennett, who fought in Germany during World War II and considers himself a pacifist, also holds America’s foreign policy responsible for the attacks on 9/11. “But who are the terrorists? Are we the terrorists or are they the terrorists? Two wrongs don’t make a right,” Bennett said, when asked how the U.S. should fight terrorism. “They flew the plane in, but we caused it. Because we were bombing them and they told us to stop.”
A Ukraine dumpling-eating contest to find the person who could eat 10 of the dough balls most quickly went horribly wrong when the 77-year-old champion keeled over and died.
The winner, Ivan Mendel, had just won his prize, a one-litre jar of sour cream, when he began to feel ill.
"The old man got sick and fell to the ground," an unnamed witness told Interfax news agency. "The ambulance arrived when he was already dead. The doctor said that he probably choked on vomit."
[...]
Dumplings, known in Ukraine as vareniki, are a staple of the regional diet; they are usually stuffed with mushrooms, potatoes or cherries. Organisers of the contest said the dumplings they used – filled with potatoes – had been frozen and packaged and bought from a local supermarket.
Organisers struck back at accusations that the contest had killed the man, saying Mendel had eaten just 10 dumplings in all. He ate them, reportedly, in half a minute.
"A 77-year-old pensioner ate his portion more quickly than his opponent," Viktor Khalamovsky, one of the contest organisers, told Interfax. "He won a prize for that – a jar of sour cream. What happened to him after his victory, the organisers don't know."
Just a few months ago Gwyneth Paltrow had a new cookbook out. Since her record deal fizzled, she seems to be more into writing, and next up is a diet book. Of course this emaciated bitch has never had a weight problem, and she doesn't know any more about dieting than say...acting...but NOTHING can stop her from weighing in (ha) on EVERY subject under the sun. Gwyneth Paltrow Weight Loss Diet Program - Isn't amazing how all of the celebrities you see have a celebrity diet plan for weight loss to maintain their weight. Some of them are shapely and healthy looking, and look good on camera. Others look like they haven't eaten in weeks, like they just got back from the famine in Ethiopia for a few weeks. Like they had been starving themselves to lose weight, and that is probably what they have been doing. You see it in all the tabloids, this person lost 100 pounds again, this one gained 100 pounds, and then lost 150 pounds. Some are not as dramatic; this one lost 40 pounds and is a television spokesperson, because the previous celebrity diet spokesperson gained the weight back. The fact is they may be starving themselves to lose weight, fasting like they are going through a famine.
Celebrities make dieting look so easy, don't they? One month they're on the cover of US Weekly for gaining too much weight and the next they're headlining the "sexiest beach bods" story. It is true that seriously overweight people can lose large amounts of fat in a quick amount of time, because of the large fat content in their cells. But those that are only a few pounds overweight, losing 40 pounds in a month, is not only starvation, it is malnutrition and can have serious side effects. Our body weight can fluctuate day to day and the best diets take the weight off gradually, the way it came on.
Celebrities do not have secrets about dieting. They are normal people like the rest of us but, unlike most of us, they have people working for them such as diet advisors and personal trainers. Celebrity diets involve a level of commitment and dedication which we struggle with. The best celebrity diets involve eating sensibly and limiting our calorie intake. Having these factors in mind will allow you to have safe and easy weight loss that will provide you with short term and long term consistent results.
This is great because he is apologizing but NOT apologizing. "I'm sorry BUT she's a whore." That's basically what's going on here. "I did have an inappropriate relationship, but she was a gold digging maid and I'm sorry for the ERROR but it did not involve VIOLENCE only a failing on my part but really SHE'S A LIAR but I'm sorry to my wife for doing this but SHE'S TRYING TO GET MY MONEY finally I am so sorry for the fact that SHE'S A WHORE. This other woman who is accusing me of doing this is ALSO A WHORE. Thank you." Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former head of the International Monetary Fund, acknowledged Sunday his sexual encounter with a New York hotel maid was a "moral failing" on his part, but didn't involve violence, constraint or aggression.
In his first interview since his May 14 arrest over sexual assault accusations, Strauss-Kahn told France's TF1 television channel what happened between him and the maid, Nafissatou Diallo, "was not only an inappropriate relationship, but more than that, it was an error."
Strauss-Kahn, a Socialist politician who was widely considered a top contender in next year's presidential race until the case broke, said "it was a failing, a failing vis-a-vis my wife, my children and my friends but also a failing vis-a-vis the French people, who had vested their hopes for change in me.
"I think it was a moral failing and I am not proud of it. I regret it infinitely. I have regretted it everyday for the past four months and I think I'm not done regretting it," he said at the start of the 20-minute interview. Much of the exchange came off as staged, with Strauss-Kahn appearing calm and unruffled throughout and not surprised by the questions.
Strauss-Kahn's initial contrition was peppered with anger at his accuser, a Guinean immigrant who maintained he attacked her after she came into his room at New York's Sofitel hotel to clean.
He said the New York prosecutor concluded "Nafissatou Diallo lied about everything — not only about her past, that's of no importance, but also about what happened. The (prosecutor's) report says, it's written there, that 'she presented so many different versions of what happened that I can't believe a word.'"
Strauss-Kahn suggested that financial motives might have been behind Diallo's accusations.
He also dismissed as "imaginary" separate claims by a French writer that he tried to rape her during a 2003 interview, again insisting "no act of aggression, no violence" had taken place between the two.
The writer, Tristane Banon, has maintained she and Strauss-Kahn tussled on the floor during an interview in an empty apartment, with the politician trying to open her jeans and bra and putting his fingers in her mouth and underwear.
New York prosecutors dropped all criminal charges against him in the Diallo case last month, though Strauss-Kahn is still facing a lawsuit brought by the maid.
Asked whether he had any intention of returning to politics, Strauss-Kahn said he would "take time to reflect" and rest first.
"But all my life was consecrated to being useful to the public good," he said, adding "we will see."
Despite all our problems, America may be producing better morons than ever. And more of them! Here's a story about one of our best and brightest morons right here. A man zapped by a stun gun-toting Cowboys fan says his assailant instigated the upper deck fracas by showing more respect for Dallas' colors than the red, white and blue.
Leroy McKelvey insulted former President George Bush, jabbered during a moment of silence for 9/11 victims and sat during the national anthem at MetLife Stadium last Sunday, Ian Cummings told the Daily News.
"It was the most disrespectful thing I had ever seen," said Cummings, 46, of Farmingdale, L.I.
Cummings said the F-bombs started flying in Section 324 when McKelvey, in a Cowboys jersey, arrived and immediately bad-mouthed the former President.
A former Marine at the end of the aisle took offense, and words were exchanged - but the bad feelings really escalated during a moment of silence for the 3,000 victims of 9/11.
"As that happens, the guy starts going, 'C'mon, let's get the game started,'" Cummings said. "I was kinda shocked. I looked around to make sure everybody heard what I heard."
The final straw: McKelvey was sitting and chatting on a cell phone during "The Star Spangled Banner," according to Cummings.
"The Marine leans over and says, 'You sit during the national anthem, you f---ing this and that. Don't come back this way,'" Cummings said.
McKelvey's son insisted his father meant no disrespect to anyone when he stayed in his seat.
"My father's 59, he's got high blood pressure," said Leonard McKelvey, better known as DJ Charlamagne Tha God. "He did stand at first, but he got dizzy."
When McKelvey tried to leave the seats just before halftime, Cummings acknowledged busting his chops.
"I'm like, 'You couldn't get up before, and now you want me to get up?'" he said. The next thing Cummings knew, he heard the sound of electricity and saw the flash of blue light from the stun gun.
"It hurt," he said. "He got me in the back of the neck. I felt my body shake, and did a header right over the seats in front of me."
McKelvey also zapped the ex-Marine and a third man before he was subdued. The victims all suffered minor injuries.
Cummings, who is considering a lawsuit over the attack, blames lax security as much as McKelvey.
"I said to my friend, 'The patdown is a joke. I've been more uncomfortable in a crowded elevator,'" he said. The NFL announced this week that full-body patdowns are now mandatory at all stadiums.
The younger McKelvey said his father is feeling better - except about all the negative attention.
"He's good," said Leonard McKelvey. "The main thing that bothers him is people painting him like he's part of Al Qaeda, sneaking a stun gun in the stadium. It's crazy."
If the death of this dwarf saved the life of just one badger, he shall not have died in vain. A DWARF porn star who was Gordon Ramsay's double has been found dead in the most bizarre of circumstances, according to UK tabloid The Sunday Sport.
Percy Foster's 107 centimetre (3'6") body was discovered in a badger's den in Wales.
The report says the 35-year-old was found, "deep in an underground chamber by Ministry of Agriculture experts ahead of a planned badger-gassing program."
Investigators have not ruled out the possibility of suicide, according to the report.
In a recent interview Foster spoke of his excitement about his growing career as Ramsay's double.
"Porn lookalikes get more money than normal actors. Dwarf lookalikes are as rare as hen's teeth and so can command top dollar.
"I've already ordered a new BMW and a diamond-encrusted Soda Stream," he said.
Zhang Nan was bathing with live eels to cleanse his skin when one rogue serpent took a liking to his manhood.
[...]
Thinking that the eels would make him look ten years younger, Nan dived into the water and let them feast upon layers of dead skin.
But after laying in the spa bath, Nan felt a sharp pain and realised a small eel was working its way up his urethra and into his bladder.
'I climbed into the bath and I could feel the eels nibbling my body. But then suddenly I felt a severe pain and realised a small eel had gone into the end of my penis,' the 56-year-old from Honghu, Hubei province said.
'I tried to hold it and take it out, but the eel was too slippery to be held and it disappeared up my penis.'
[...]
Rushing himself to hospital, the man underwent a three-hour operation to remove the six-inch eel which was dead by the time doctors found it.
Surgeon Jin Wang said that, because of the eel's slippery nature, it was able to make a smooth entry into the genitals of Nan.
'The diameter of the urethra in a man's penis is just a little narrower, but because eels are quite slippery, its body worked as a lubricant and so it got into the penis smoothly,' he said.
This shows a strong current in our society hard at work, where people are more heartless than their representatives, reminding me of stories of the Holy Roman Empire, and we know how that went. Even these craven bastards Paul and Perry were shocked at the reaction of the PEOPLE! If you're uninsured and on the brink of death, that's apparently a laughing matter to some audience members at last night's tea party Republican presidential debate.
Texas Rep. Ron Paul, a doctor, was asked a hypothetical question by CNN host Wolf Blitzer about how society should respond if a healthy 30-year-old man who decided against buying health insurance suddenly goes into a coma and requires intensive care for six months. Paul--a fierce limited-government advocate-- said it shouldn't be the government's responsibility. "That's what freedom is all about, taking your own risks," Paul said and was drowned out by audience applause as he added, "this whole idea that you have to prepare to take care of everybody …"
"Are you saying that society should just let him die?" Blitzer pressed Paul. And that's when the audience got involved.
Several loud cheers of "yeah!" followed by laughter could be heard in the Expo Hall at the Florida State Fairgrounds in response to Blitzer's question.
Paul disagreed with the audience on that front. "No," he responded, noting he practiced medicine before Medicaid when churches took care of medical costs--a comment that drew wide audience applause. "We never turned anybody away from the hospital."
Paul voiced support for legalizing alternative health care and argued that the reason medical costs have skyrocketed is that individuals have stopped taking personal responsibility for their health care.
Though Paul spoke to the larger issues of health care and government-backed health insurance--both pivotal in the 2012 election--the audience's reaction has overshadowed the substance of the exchange between the candidates. And the day after the event, Texas Gov. Rick Perry offered his own criticism of the audience response.
"I was a bit taken aback by that myself," Perry told NBC News and the Miami Herald of the audience reaction after appearing at a breakfast fundraiser in Tampa Tuesday morning.
A Pennsylvania mother who donated her kidney to save her son's life has been left without a job, after her employer fired her for taking a leave of absence.
Claudia Rendon received some of the worst news a mother could get when doctors delivered the news her son Alex was in desperate need of a life-saving transplant.
She had used up her holiday earlier that year, following her mother and her uncle's deaths - and her father's diagnosis with leukaemia.
A year painfully marked by her bereavement, she said the best news she had received all year was when doctors told her she was a match for her son's kidney.
[...]
But her bosses at the Aviation Institute Of Maintenance, in Northeast Philadelphia, were not so understanding.
Executives at the company, which teaches would-be mechanics how to fix airplanes, asked Ms Rendon to sign an agreement indicating her job may not be secured for her should she take medical leave.
She complied, and late last week, when she attempted to return to work, her supervisor told her he had filled her position - despite the company touting her as a 'good employee.'
A company spokesman would not comment on details surrounding the case, while noting such a termination was within their legal rights.
A MAN suffocated to death when he became trapped in the rungs of a clothes horse.
Father-of-two Brian Depledge, 38, fell backwards on to the drier, causing it to collapse, and then fatally lodged his head between the rails.
An inquest heard that his desperate efforts to free himself only made the compression worse, creating a “cat’s cradle” effect.
He suggested he could have tripped over a small stool in his living room, which was found at his feet. When Brian, of Bradford, was found in February, the clothes at the top of the airer were still wet, which would have put even more pressure on his neck.
Dr Philip Batman, a consultant pathologist, said the effects would be similar to hanging.
These guys sound like they are in an ice cream parlor. Double dip recession? When did the first dip end? When did it start? Where are the sprinkles and tiny walnuts? If history is a guide, the odds that the American economy is falling into a double-dip recession have risen sharply in recent weeks and may even have reached 50 percent.
Hiring has slowed to barely a crawl. History shows that meager job growth happens near recessions. Economies have a strong self-reinforcing nature. When people are optimistic, they spend, which begets hiring and then more spending. When people are anxious, they pull back, which leads to a cycle of hiring freezes and further anxiety that often lasts for months.
The United States appears to have entered some version of the vicious cycle. Most ominously, job growth has slowed to a pace that typically signals the start of a recession.
Over the last 50 years, every time that job growth has been as meager as it has been over the last four months, the economy has been headed toward recession, in a recession or in the immediate aftermath of one. From early 2010 through this spring, by contrast, employment was growing fast enough to make the economy look as if it were in a recovery, albeit a modest one.
“The chances that we are in something that is going to feel like a recession are close to 100 percent,” said Joshua Shapiro of MFR Inc. in New York, who has diagnosed the economy more accurately than many other forecasters lately. “Whether we reach the technical definition” — which is determined by a committee of academic economists and based on gross domestic product, employment and other factors — “I think is probably close to 50-50.”
A colouring book for children which depicts scenes of terrorism related to 9/11 - including pictures of the burning twin towers and the execution of a cowering Osama bin Laden, has provoked outrage among American Muslims.
The book - entitled We Shall Never Forget 9/11: The Kids' Book of Freedom has just been released by the Missouri-based publisher Really Big Colouring Books.
They market the book as a 'tool that parents can use to help teach children about the facts surrounding 9/11'.
[...]
Showing scenes from 9/11 for children to colour in and telling the story of the attacks and the subsequent hunt for Osama bin Laden, 'the book was created with honesty, integrity, reverence, respect and does not shy away from the truth', according to its publisher.
[...]
Wayne Bell, publisher of Really Big Coloring Books, Inc, in St Louis, says that the book is a memorial tribute as the tenth anniversary approaches.
'It is an informational piece to help educate children on events on 9/11,' Bell said. He added that it is 'a simplistic, honest tool'.
As he describes it, the book is a 12-hour narrative of the events that happened on the day that forever changed America. Kids can colour in the twin towers, Navy SEALS and former president George W. Bush.
[...]
Really Big Colouring Books said that it will donate a portion of its proceeds from sales of the book to Bridges for Peace, 'a Jerusalem-based, Bible-believing Christian organisation supporting Israel and building relationships between Christians and Jews worldwide through education and practical deeds expressing God's love and mercy'.
Looks like Pokey is going to be spending some time alone.SAN DIEGO -- Police are searching for a man who wore a unique costume during an attempted robbery of a Rancho Penasquitos-area 7-Eleven store.
The bizarre robbery attempt happened just after midnight on Labor Day, when a man dressed as TV character "Gumby" entered the store on Carmel Mountain Road with another man and approached the clerk behind the counter.
Initially, the man in the Gumby costume asked for a pack of cigarettes but then told the clerk, "This is a robbery."
The clerk thought it was a joke and told the man dressed as Gumby, "Come on man, don’t waste my time. I have things to do."
The Gumby impersonator responded that he had a gun and then began fumbling with his costume as if he was trying to pull it out.
[...]
[San Diego police Detective Gary] Hassen kept a straight face while explaining that wearing a Gumby costume is no different than any other disguise worn by potential robbers.
"It could have been a ski mask. It could have been a bandana. It could have been a hoodie. It just happens to be a Gumby costume," said Hassen.
[...]
Because the robbery attempt was so bizarre, the clerk did not call police. He was seen on video leaning down to pick up the $0.27 the Gumby impersonator dropped while fumbling inside his costume. Later Monday morning, the clerk's boss saw the surveillance video and called police.
The clerk said he had never even heard of Gumby until he was almost robbed by a man dressed as him. He told his boss the costume looked something like a green version of the TV cartoon character "SpongeBob SquarePants."
A 25-YEAR-OLD man who ate his hunting partner’s dog after it was killed in a monkey attack was shot dead by the canine’s owner with a crossbow last Tuesday. Police said the suspect and the victim were friends who were hunting together in Kratie’s Snuol district. It is understood the suspect shot his friend because he would not help save his dog from being killed in a monkey attack. The victim then took the dead dog home to eat. When the suspect saw this, he fired his crossbow at his friend killing him instantly. Police say the suspect confessed to the crime following his arrest.
Look at this, people who take vacations end up depressed. O wah, wah, wah. Look at this guy. Ask him about HIS vacation. Holy crap. Labor Day stirs up a unique range of emotions. While some people love the prospect of crisp, cool air, football and fall fashions, others experience a stab of dread this time of year as vacations end, school starts up and pressures mount at the office.
For many people, the end of summer brings dread. Psychologists say several major stressors come together this time of year, including fear of change, waning daylight and mourning for good times past. Melinda Beck explains on Lunch Break. There are few studies or statistics on the end-of-summer malaise, but therapists, career coaches—even marriage counselors—report an increase in people seeking help in early fall. "Change is always hard and this is a time when both nature and our lives are changing," says Betsy Stone, a psychologist in Stamford, Conn.
A big component is what some researchers dub Post Vacation Syndrome (PVS), characterized by a combination of irritability, anxiety, lack of motivation, difficulty concentrating, and a feeling of emptiness that lasts up to a few weeks after returning to work. Some people get a mild version every Sunday night after getting the weekend off. Surveys suggest that 35% to 75% of workers in Spain, where many businesses close for the month of August, suffer from PVS.
Several studies have found that vacations do lift peoples' spirits, but the effects don't last long. A study of 96 Dutch workers, published in the journal Work and Stress last year, found that health and well-being returned to prevacation levels during the first week back at work.
Some adults who get the summer off face Labor Day blues "because they've had a taste of life outside of the hamster wheel," says Farrah Parker, a corporate trainer in Los Angeles. "They've done things they love and it reminds them of what is truly important in their lives. And when the fall comes, they feel like they are losing a part of themselves. I see it all the time, especially in high-profile industries with demanding schedules."
There is no specific test, but for people who think they are susceptible to such depression, experts suggest sitting near a specialized lamp with a very bright fluorescent (10,000 lux) for about 30 minutes a day for two to four weeks. The sessions should be done in the morning, because light therapy in late afternoon or evening may lead to insomnia. Some studies have also found that getting sufficient vitamin D, B-12 and omega 3 fatty acids may help boost mood, but more research is needed.
Some people find buying something new particularly tempting this time of year. But be wary of overdoing it. "Retail therapy is a slippery slope," says Barbara Neitlich, a Beverly Hills, Calif., psychotherapist.
RESIDENTS OF Birem in the Kwaman Traditional Area of the Ashanti region were stunned last Saturday morning when they woke up to the news of the invasion of their cemetery by human-eating pigs.
The pigs are not letting the dead in Birem and surrounding farming communities rest in peace, as they exhume their graves and eat the carcasses afterwards.
The sad development has placed a financial burden on residents in the area as they are compelled to bury their dead relations all over again.
The man-eating pigs, from the cemetery, dash straight into a stream that provides drinking water for residents in the area, and pollute the water.
[...]
Exactly four months after the first case ... the community woke up last Saturday morning to realize with horror that the man-eating animals had entered the cemetery once again to eat dead human bodies.
[Local man] Nana Agyekum said the owners of the pigs wanted to create trouble in the community, thereby flouting his orders by letting loose their animals to eat dead human bodies.
To avert any trouble or bloodshed, the Birem chief implored the government and the appropriate authorities to intervene immediately since the man-eating animals were gradually getting out of hand.
If you are young and talented you better put every ounce of that money in the bank. Everybody is going to try and screw you. Tiki Barber was a good running back, but no Jim Brown. For one thing he used to fumble a lot. Here's a picture of him fumbling, they are easy to find. When Tiki Barber told HBO that he was returning to football because he "needed the game," and because he "needed to prove to [himself] that he could be successful at something," I thought it sounded like a recipe for a personal mental health disaster.
Now that NFL rosters are set at 53, and Tiki Barber never got to sniff one, I hope that's not true. According to Peter King at Sports Illustrated, Tiki isn't taking it well.
I tried to reach Barber on Sunday, but he wasn't talking. I hear he's devastated that no team gave him a chance. You might wonder if teams would bring him in after the first game of the season, so his contract wouldn't be guaranteed, and that could still happen. But with no team calling Lepselter with even a hint of interest, it's more likely teams would start with backs who've been in some football competition this summer.
[Barber's agent Mark] Lepselter told me Sunday: "We are flabbergasted that Tiki has not had an opportunity with any team, especially when rosters were at 90 players this year. I certainly thought some team would be intrigued to see what he had left in the tank.''
Where this will leave Tiki Barber the person, I don't know. He's also recently proposed to his girlfriend, the one with whom he was involved while still married to his pregnant wife. So that's good news.
This guy plays a cop or something in the movies, and then he acts as a "reserve deputy" and films his escapades for a TV show. As millions of unemployed can attest, nice work if you can get it.
Steven Seagal is being threatened with a lawsuit over his part in a police raid that was taped for his A&E reality show, TMZ reported.
The actor, who has served as a reserve deputy sheriff since the mid-'80s, was part of a team that arrived at Jesus Sanchez Llovera's Arizona house in March with a tank and armed in full riot gear, Llovera alleges in his legal documents.
Llovera claims that the raid, carried out by the Maricopa County Sheriff's Department, was "unfounded" because they believed Llovera was raising roosters for illegal cockfighting. But he says the roosters are only "for show."
Llovera -- who served both Seagal and Sheriff Joe Arpaio with an official notice of claim, the first step toward a lawsuit -- says his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid and that police also killed more than 100 of his roosters.
Additionally, he says the police rammed the tank into a gate on his property and that his home suffered "substantial damage."
Llovera is seeking $100,000 in damages and wants a "formal written apology" from Seagal to his children for the death of their puppy, "a beloved family pet."
According to TMZ, the entire incident was recorded for Seagal's reality show, Steven Seagal Lawman.
A&E declined comment when contacted by The Hollywood Reporter. Seagal and the Maricopa County authorities have yet to comment.
I am constantly bombarded with this crap about my credit score. I see it on TV, I get it in the mail, and I'm nailed in my email as well. I thought to myself, "if it's free how do they make money?" I wonder about a lot of eCommerce, but how is it possible that so many businesses have sprung up to do this nonsense? The answer is below. They hope you will join and forget it, and maybe you're the kind of person that doesn't check your credit card bill line by line, and before you know it they have charged you $14.95 a month for a year for doing nothing. It's actually a brilliant business model.
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
When you order your free credit score here, you will begin your 7-day trial membership in freecreditscore.com. If you don't cancel your membership within the 7-day trial period*, you will be billed $14.95 for each month that you continue your membership. You may cancel your trial membership anytime within the trial period without charge.
When you hear the name Jesus, is the first image that comes to mind a dewy-eyed pretty boy with flowing locks? If so, think again. After 2,000 years, the Messiah is getting a makeover.
This time he's less "gentle Jesus, meek and mild" and more of a kick-ass action hero – a Chuck Norris in sandals.
No more cissy Kumbaya stuff. In this testosterone-fuelled theology, the Saviour finally has the rippling biceps he would have developed as a carpenter from a working-class home in Nazareth.
[...]
As Kentucky-based [artist Stephen] Sawyer, 58, points out: "I scarcely think Jesus could have overturned the tables of the money-lenders and driven them from the temple if he was a wimp. The model I use for my paintings is a surfer guy who's built like a brick shithouse."
HAMILTON - A repeat public indecency offender has been arrested for allegedly engaging in "sexual activity" with a pink inflatable swimming pool raft, according to Hamilton police.
Edwin Charles Tobergta, 32, was arrested at his Harmon Avenue home early Sunday after he was spotted in the act in an alley in the 1800 block of Howell Avenue behind a residence, a police report shows.
A male witness, who owns the raft and lives in the home near the alley, told Hamilton Police Officer William Thacker he shouted at the suspect to stop.
Tobergta took the raft and fled, the report states.
When police caught up with him, he admitted to the crime and begged for help, according to police.
"Defendant advised officers that he was doing it but only because he has a problem and that he needs help and please don't send him to prison but send him somewhere to get help," the report reads.
[...]
“He has a lot of mental problems and he’s always had a fascination for plastic,” [Tobergta's grandmother] said. “That’s just it. That’s all of it. We never could get the proper care for Edwin. It’s like nobody cares.”
