189 complaints of STM bus drivers on cellphones (Montreal Gazette)
(On average, between August 2010 and March 2011, a complaint was filed every other day about a Société de Transport de Montréal driver using an electronic device while behind the wheel, but it remains unclear what, if any, action was taken as a result. Detailed records obtained by The Gazette through an access to information request show that the grievances came in from people across Montreal Island, travelling on different routes at different times of the day, and heading in every direction imaginable.)
Judge won't stop NYPD from busing protesters (Forbes)
(City bus drivers are told when they are hired that they someday may be called upon to assist the police department, a judge noted Tuesday as he rejected a request to ban police from using city buses to transport arrested protesters. U.S. District Judge Paul E. Engelmayer made the ruling from the bench after listening to arguments from a lawyer for The Transport Workers Union of Greater New York and attorneys for the city and the New York City Transit Authority.)
Sarah Palin will not run for president (CNN)
(Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has decided not to pursue a bid for the 2012 GOP nomination for president.
The 2008 Republican nominee for vice president said the decision was "prayerfully considered" on the Mark Levin radio show Wednesday.)
Amish Accused In Bizarre Crime Wave (News Register)
(Numerous members of the Amish community near Bergholz are under investigation by at least four sheriff's departments involving incidents in which homes were broken into and Amish victims had their hair and beards cut off. The Jefferson County Sheriff's Department received two reports on Tuesday from individuals in Holmes and Carroll counties involving hair-cutting incidents.)
Mom Sells Baby for $15K Disney Trip (MSNBC)
(A new mom is in hot water after selling her newborn son for $15,000 so she could take her other two sons on a trip to Disney World, according to court documents. Bridget Wismer, 33, was arrested at her home in New Castle, Del. after she and the alleged baby buyer, John Gavaghan, 54, of Philadelphia, were caught on a surveillance camera taking care of the last bit of paperwork, according to New Castle County detectives.)
Extreme jacuzzi fanatics take a dip dangling 130ft from bridge (Daily Mail)
(Relaxation in a jacuzzi is normally guaranteed, but for these 25 daredevils it might be harder to switch off. They decided to take a soothing dip in a jacuzzi hanging from the Gueuroz Bridge in Switzerland with only cables and ropes preventing them from plunging to their deaths. Even though the stunt was organised by a self-confessed group of 'extreme jacuzzi' fanatics called 'jacuzzi.ch', they admitted it was their most daring dip ever.)
Martha Stewart's Daughter Rips Into Her Mom – and Childhood – in Tell-All Book (People)
(Was über-hostess and domestic darling Martha Stewart more like Mommie Dearest as a parent? Her daughter Alexis, 46, levies some harsh claims in her new book, Whateverland: Learning to Live Here, co-authored with Jennifer Koppelman Hutt.)
Tennessee High School Student: Principal Assaulted Me for Wearing T-Shirt Supporting Gay-Straight Alliance (ACLU)
(A 17-year-old senior at Sequoyah High School was reportedly shoved, bumped in the chest and verbally harassed by his principal last week for wearing a T-shirt in support of efforts to establish a gay-straight alliance (GSA) club on campus. In response, the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Tennessee sent a letter to the school district today demanding that students’ rights to free speech be protected in the classroom.)
Mother 'shaved off her five-year-old son's hair for two years to pretend he had cancer' in £100k benefits fraud (Daily Mail)
(A mother claimed £100,000 in benefits by pretending her young son was suffering from cancer, a court heard today. She even convinced the boy himself that he had the disease, and shaved his head to make it look like he was undergoing chemotherapy, it is alleged.)
Naked man harassing hikers in Mill Creek Canyon (Salt Lake Tribune)
(A naked man made his fifth appearance this year in Mill Creek Canyon on Sunday morning, when he exposed himself to a woman on the Burch Hollow Trail. The woman was running the trail about 11 a.m. when the man stood up from behind a bush, exposing himself, said Unified Police Department spokesman Justin Hoyal.)
Pair in hospital after Kismot 'killer' curry contest (BBC)
(Two people have been taken to hospital following the "world's hottest chilli" competition at an Edinburgh Indian restaurant. Emergency services were called to the Kismot restaurant in St Leonards Street on Saturday afternoon after some competitors became "very unwell". The competition involves people eating the "Kismot Killer" curry.)
DOG TERRIFIED OF JULIA ROBERTS (Short List)
(Julia Roberts evokes a wide variety of mixed emotions in many people. Arousal, annoyance, exasperation, confusion, the list is almost infinite. But one thing she doesn't usually stir up is a feeling of fear. Try as she may, with her dead eyes and Joker smile, she's just not that scary.)
NM fraternity finds severed goat head on porch (AP)
(University of New Mexico police are trying to determine who left a severed goat head on the porch of a fraternity house. KOB-TV reports that members of the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity found the head last week and reported it to authorities. Phi Gamma Delta President Javier Manriquez says that after he saw the head, he took a photo of it and threw it out.)
TV star Massi Furlan cast in new Batman film (Metro)
(The Italian actor has been cast in the third Batman in a unspecified part, according to Monsters And Critics. Furlan has appeared in US TV shows General Hospital, One Tree Hill and Criminal Minds. He also had an uncredited role as a missile launcher in JJ Abrams' 2009 version of Star Trek.)
BATMAN TRIUMPHANT Would Have Starred Nicolas Cage As Scarecrow (What Culture)
(After directing Uma Thurman and Arnold Schwarzenegger to the most embarrassingly over-the-top, ludicrously pantomime and camp performances of their career’s in 1997′s Batman & Robin, just who was the man responsible thinking about one-upping himself with for the casting of his follow-up? Well to the surprise of nobody, it seems it would have been the crazy eccentric Nicolas Cage. Though at that time, he was only 20% loony. He was coming off his Best Actor Oscar victory for Leaving Las Vegas and was the most in-demand actor in Hollywood after a run of cool turns in Face/Off and The Rock. It would have been yet another astonishing A-list casting coup for the Bat franchise, especially considering Tim Burton’s attempts to use him as Superman were just falling apart.)
Is President's Rs6cr car for her or for Batman, asks Varun Gandhi (India Times)
(BJP today took potshots at President Pratibha Patil for getting a Rs 6 crore armoured Mercedes car for her use, saying it appears to have been made for superhero Batman, and has been procured at a time when the poverty line is being fixed at a mere Rs 32 per day. "Colossal extravagance of spending 6 Cr on President's car laughable, if not tragic, at a time when aam aadmi expected to live on Rs 32 a day," BJP national secretary Varun Gandhi said on Twitter today.)
Go easy on that stroppy teen, their brains don't work properly during adolescence (Daily Mail)
(Teenagers could be stroppy and anti-social simply because their brains are not working properly, according to scientists. Researchers found that during adolescence, the process which creates new brain cells is interrupted, with dramatic consequences.)
Pill that can wipe away bad memories? Scientists unfold the secrets of how the brain handles stress (Daily Mail)
(Traumatic experiences could soon be no more than a distant memory thanks to a ground-breaking pill. Scientists have unlocked some of the secrets of how the brain deals with stress – paving the way for a drug that eases painful memories.)
Vindicated: Ridiculed Israeli scientist wins Nobel (SF Gate)
(When Israeli scientist Dan Shechtman claimed to have stumbled upon a new crystalline chemical structure that seemed to violate the laws of nature, colleagues mocked him, insulted him and exiled him from his research group. After years in the scientific wilderness, though, he was proved right. And on Wednesday, he received the ultimate vindication: the Nobel Prize in chemistry.)
Monkeys Control Virtual Limbs With Their Minds (Wired)
(When it comes to prosthetic hands, you can’t beat the one Luke Skywalker receives in The Empire Strikes Back. Not only did that robotic limb allow him to wield a lightsaber with great dexterity, each of his fingers twitched when a robot poked them. Although real-life brain-controlled prosthetics that enable a person to, say, pick up a pencil continue to improve for amputees, limbs that can actually feel touch sensations have remained a challenge. Now, by implanting electrodes into both the motor and the sensory areas of the brain, researchers have created a virtual prosthetic hand that monkeys control using only their minds, and that enables them to feel virtual textures.)
What Do Your Games Say About You? (Wired)
(After you’ve found the final treasure with Nathan Drake, helped Solid Snake sneak past the last enemy soldier, or zapped another gang member with Cole MacGrath, you may have felt an emotional bond with these characters that you’ve controlled for countless hours. It makes sense, you’ve spent a lot of time with them and been through some difficult spots together. But have you ever wondered, after you shut down your PS3, charged your controller, and headed for bed, if these guys ever thought about you? It turns out that maybe, just maybe, they do — as depicted in this excellent commercial for the Sony PlayStation 3.)
Microsoft to bring cable programming to Xbox (CNET)
(Microsoft's long-rumored plans to bring cable television content to its Xbox video game console will become reality over the holidays. The software giant announced this morning that nearly 40 television content providers--including Comcast, Verizon, and HBO in the United States--will roll out programming over Xbox Live. The company also has deals lined up with providers in the U.K., Spain, Canada, Mexico, Germany, and Italy.)
HTC Scrambles to Fix Android Smartphone Flaws (Tech News World)
(Following the revelation of a startling security hole in some of their Android devices, smartphone maker HTC says it's working on creating a fix. The security patch will first be sent to carrier partners for testing and then sent over the air to customers to download and install. "This is another reminder that our mobile phones are computers too," said Lookout Mobile Security's Tim Wyatt.)
Swiss speedster trapped by his own mobile phone (Reuters)
(A Swiss motorist used his mobile phone to record himself driving on an autoroute near Geneva at 320 km an hour, nearly three times the speed limit, police said Wednesday. But the offence was only uncovered six months later when the 28-year-old was questioned in another case and investigators found the images still on the phone.)
Scorsese's George Harrison doc: Within Him Without Him (Time)
("Dear Mum and Dad — The shows have been going great with everyone going potty, and everywhere we go we have about 20 police on motorbikes escorting us." George Harrison might just have turned 20, with Britain in its first flush of Beatlemania, when he wrote this letter to his folks back in Liverpool. Throughout his eight-year tenure as the lead guitarist in the planet's premier pop band, Harrison kept in touch with his parents, filling them in, calming their fears. "Don't think that I've gone off my rocker, because I haven't," he wrote to his mother Louise during the Beatles' 1968 transcendental-meditation trip. "But I now love you and everybody else much more than ever. So it's not that bad, is it?")
India Announces $35 Tablet Computer for Rural Poor (Time)
(India introduced a cheap tablet computer Wednesday, saying it would deliver modern technology to the countryside to help lift villagers out of poverty. The computer, called Aakash, or "sky" in Hindi, is the latest in a series of "world's cheapest" innovations in India that include a 100,000 rupee ($2,040) compact Nano car, a 750 rupee ($15) water purifier and $2,000 open-heart surgery.)
An Early Bedtime May Help Keep Teens Fit (Time)
(India introduced a cheap tablet computer Wednesday, saying it would deliver modern technology to the countryside to help lift villagers out of poverty. The computer, called Aakash, or "sky" in Hindi, is the latest in a series of "wA new study finds that teens who went to bed early and got up early were thinner and fitter than kids who slept late. The findings, published in the journal Sleep, suggest that it's not just the amount of sleep that kids get, but when they get it that matters. The researchers tracked the sleeping habits, weight and use of free time of 2,200 Australian children aged 9 to 16 over four days.)
Can Banning Hand-Raising Promote a Calmer Classroom? (Time)
(Another school in the U.K. is jumping on the 'banned'-wagon, eliminating a very basic classroom tradition: raising your hand. Administrators at Burlington Junior School in Bridlington, East Yorkshire are modifying the way students ask a question, prohibiting their students from raising a hand and instead directing them to give a thumbs up.)
Steve Jobs, Apple founder, dies (CNN)
(Steve Jobs, the visionary in the black turtleneck who co-founded Apple in a Silicon Valley garage, built it into the world's leading tech company and led a mobile-computing revolution with wildly popular devices such as the iPhone, died Wednesday. He was 56.)
California Quarry Shooting: Two Dead, Six Wounded (Yahoo)
(An employee of a quarry opened fire during a company safety meeting today, killing two and wounding six before escaping, officials and witnesses said. Shareff Allman, 45, reportedly left the quarry and went to the Hewlett-Packard campus where he shot a woman in the leg before carjacking her vehicle, according to ABC's San Francisco affiliate KGO-TV.)
100 Infected, 18 Dead; Listeria Outbreak Continues (Food Safety News)
(The outbreak of listeriosis linked to whole Rocky Ford-brand cantaloupes from Colorado's Jensen Farms is now more than six times larger than it was when the first public warnings about contaminated melons were issued just three weeks ago. In its eighth update on the rapidly expanding outbreak, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta said 100 people from 20 states have been confirmed infected with one or more of the four outbreak associated strains of Listeria monocytogenes.)
Director Lars Von Trier vows public silence (Reuters)
No comments:
Post a Comment