desember 21, 2003
LATHAM DEMANDS P.M. SUPPORTS WARM KITTENS
Opposition Leader Mark Latham has promised to spend the Christmas holidays reading books to his two small sons.
MISC.
The Australian Defence Force said today RAAF surveillance planes had not flown over Iran.
Four National Guard members from Venezuela were shot dead on the border with Colombia, possibly as retalliaton after Venezuelans confiscated tonnes of drugs from traffickers.
Croatian Serbs win minority rights: Under the deal, the new HDZ-led cabinet will help Serbs who fled Croatia during the 1991-1995 war to regain possession of their properties by the end of 2004.
A British-based web hosting company has been accused of political censorship after shutting down a major Malaysian opposition website.
The highest court in Pakistan has ruled that Muslim women can marry anyone they want, of their own free will.
Hundreds of Chinese migrants, mainly poor farmers like him, arrive every day in Xinjiang in the far west of the country.
Around 3,000 Chinese farmers are expected to head west next year to start working the land in neighbouring Kazakhstan.
The United States has offered to take up to 15,000 Hmong refugees who fled the 1975 communist takeover in Laos and are living in a camp in Thailand.
Ninja clashes in Congo's capital.
John Halfpenny, left wing unionist and former Communist Party stalwart, died Saturday.
Glasgow Rangers blamed as Northern Spirit go into liquidation.
BIZARRE AND SALACIOUS
A member of the Singapore Parliament is being investigated by police following a report made by his wife who found photographs of him and their Indonesian maid, both naked [Straits Times]
G-strings have emerged as one of the ultimate symbols of "cool" among China's increasingly sophisticated youngsters [AFP]
A consignment of edible undies has been impounded because their artificial colouring and flavouring ingredients are banned by Food Standards Australia New Zealand [Sun Herald]
'Too big' contestant wins British Idol - supershite producer Pete Waterman walks out [BBC]
The Vatican has recognised a miracle performed by Charles, the last emperor of Austria and a relative of the colourful 19th-century empress "Sissi", officially setting him on the path to beatification [Reuters]
Beijing authorities plan to issue special cards to married women that will allow them to get condoms for free from vending machines placed throughout the city [AFP]
A top Vatican official said Tuesday he felt pity and compassion for Saddam Hussein and criticized the U.S. military for showing video footage of him being treated "like a cow" [Reuters]
AFP's roundup of 2003's Bizarre and Salacious stories [AFP]
He even tried to make me wear only a dog collar while running a lap naked around the hotel where we were staying [Spa!]
Downing pints of beer and telling blue jokes at funeral services will no longer be tolerated by Roman Catholic priests in Ireland [Reuters]
A woman in the Perth suburb of City Beach has received an unexpected delivery when a window from a small plane fell into her backyard [ABC]
"Old Europe" has been named phrase of the year in Germany by a panel of language experts [Reuters]
Women face a £9,500 bill if they want to have a remote controlled instant orgasm device implanted [triad.bizjournals.com]
A Belgian man was charged with speeding at 1,154mph in his Citroen car [Ananova]
Former U.S. Congressman Gary Condit sued The National Enquirer and other tabloids for $209 million on Friday, alleging they falsely connected him with the 2001 murder of federal intern Chandra Levy [Fox]
The governor of the strait-laced New England state of Connecticut has rejected calls for his resignation over corruption allegations, saying he is in direct contact with God [telegraph.co.uk]
Wiltshire man to swim for Kiribati in Olympic Games [Ananova]
There was nothing for the older folk of Appalachia to smile about in the government's latest study of toothlessness among the elderly, which found the poverty-stricken region leading the nation in tooth-loss [Reuters]
Space burials: Celestis Inc, a Houston-based firm that in 1997 arranged the launch of 1960s pop icon Timothy Leary's remains, is planning an April send-off in Russia for as many as 150 ash-filled capsules as part of the cargo on a Kosmos 1 satellite [Reuters]
A woman has won more than half a million dollars on a slot machine in a New Jersey casino eight months after her son hit the jackpot on the same machine [Ananova]
A unicyclist has been fined after sparking a manhunt by sneaking into a US park and riding unaware through a deer cull [Shelbynews.com]
An 11-year-old Dutch boy's classmates forced him to apologise for putting up two fingers behind the prime minister's head while he was being photographed [Ananova]
An electrician for the Macy's Department Store in Douglaston apparently was electrocuted on the job Monday and lay dead in the ceiling for two days before being found [AP]
A Florida woman who ordered a breakfast at a McDonald's drive-through was also given the restaurant's takings [Sth Florida Sun Sentinel]
Cat fight: Tara Reid vs Cindy Margolis [via newsfilter.org]
Cholesterol-free mice that would make healthy snacks for cats have been created by scientists [telegraph.co.uk]
Japan: Since September, 36 liquor store owners have committed suicide and a staggering 2,880 are missing [Shukan Shincho]
An Iranian man faces a possible lengthy prison term or even the death penalty for attaching a sticker to the rear window of his car proclaiming "The era of arrogant rulers is over" [via fark.com]
The U.S. Justice Department files civil rights lawsuit against Mississippi, alleging abuse of juvenile offenders at facilities. Girls who threw up while running in the heat were forced to eat their vomit [via poe-news.com]
| NORWAY
31-year-old father of three from Trondheim, is so desperate to rid himself of accusations of incest from his daughter that he will ask that charges be pressed against him in order to clear his name in court [Aftenposten] Repeat offender Arild Andersen has swallowed and had operations to remove, over 30 forks in his many terms in jail [Aftenposten] An 81-year-old Oslo man driving an electric wheelchair was stopped by police on Thursday afternoon in heavy traffic on a three-lane highway on route 190. The man explained that he was on his way to get his hair cut [Aftenposten] Norwegian's international erotic success [via fark.com] Ancient Egyptian shabti - funerary figures that represent servants in the afterlife - are causing unease for those working at Bergen Museum. Professor Henrik von Achen says colleagues don't like working there at night, and the figures appear to be moving in their glass cases [Aftenposten] |
A gang of kidnappers has freed their captive, a former Miss Universe runner-up, after getting her to autograph 15 calendars featuring nude pictures of her [AP]
Washington: The U.S. government has filed a complaint against the marketers of "Girls Gone Wild'' videos and DVDs, saying the company shipped unordered products and then charged customers [via newsfilter.org]
Student dresses up as infamous Ku Klux Klan leader for honors class project [via obscurestore.com]
Pix: A family living in a house infested with cockroaches and rats set off 19 "bug bomb" foggers, causing an explosion that blew the building apart [via obscurestore.com]
Engineers used 2,500,000 old Mills and Boon books in the building of the new M6 toll road [telegraph.co.uk]
A traditional doctor in central Nigeria has been shot dead by a patient who was testing the potency of an anti-bullet charm the herbalist had prepared for him [AFP]
The price of 'True Love' has risen this Christmas, according to United States economists who have analysed the cost of five gold rings, four calling birds, three french hens, two turtle doves and a partridge in a pear tree [ABC]
Hamburg: Hard-core pornography will take to the digital airwaves in Germany by the end of the year [DPA]
Schoolies cruise sinks into chaos: It was meant to be the dream end of school holidays, but it ended with a police escort off a passenger ship [Sydney Daily Tele']
Journalist Hunter S Thompson, author of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, is recovering after breaking his leg in a fall on Friday at his Waikiki hotel [BBC]
Ice-cream van enters Plymouth-Dakar rally [Reuters]
What a deal!: Male students at a Canadian university are being offered a free two-week holiday in Australia in return for their sperm [Toronto Star]
Pix: Single people in Germany are snapping up wallpaper with life-size pictures of ordinary looking people so they don't feel lonely at Christmas [Ananova]
Ethiopian royals search for lost Ark in Japan [Paparazzi]
Some 6,000 women in north-western Cameroon have called off a two-month sex strike, a protest against the destruction of crops by cattle [BBC]
Prosecutors in a trial in Miami complain that their seats and evidence boxes are being covered with voodoo powder [Miami Herald]
Britain's fourth largest union is starting a campaign to recruit more lap-dancers, porn industry workers and prostitutes as members [BBC]
A quartet of twenty-something Hooters girls paid a visit to the Veterans Home of California, Barstow, Monday afternoon, distributing candy and Christmas cheer and posing for pictures with home residents [via fark.com]
Christmas is the biggest night of the year for Japan's Love Hotels [Shukan Taishu]
Gourmets in India have feasted on a buffet of rats and mice to celebrate ancient tribal eating habits in Uttar Pradesh [Hindustan Times]
Ugly pix: Man beaten up by White Stripes singer [via obscurestore.com]
Seventeen injured when bus crashes into adult video superstore. click on pic [via obscurestore.com]
| CRIME DOESN'T PAY
Adrian Castillo Ramirez allegedly tried to sexually assault a 24-year-old Bakersfield prostitute who was nearly twice his weight. But she took his knife, stripped him naked and paraded him in front of other prostitutes [AP] A 70-year-old gas station attendant pushed an armed robber out the front door, refusing to give up even $1 of what the foul-mouthed perpetrator was demanding. "It wasn't just the money," Waldo Bainter of Weymouth said. "If he wants money, he should go work for it" [via fark.com] Drunk robber passes out before he can escape [via fark.com] Sometimes criminals can be persistent. Police say that's exactly what happened after they arrested a man, took possession of his trailer, then caught the suspect's brother trying to steal it back [via fark.com] "Before I could even get on the radio the suspects ran toward my vehicle, came up to the vehicle and tried to get into the vehicle," Maxfield said. "They sat in and turned and had a realization they weren't in their pickup vehicle. They were actually in a sheriff's vehicle" [via fark.com] A bank robber in Virginia was forced to flee after a cashier rolled up his demand note and threw it back at him [Virginian Pilot] A Massachusetts contractor wanted for a double shooting, led police in a cat-and-mouse chase before a toll collector spotted a truck with his name on it [via fark.com] A man who allegedly stole £1,100 worth of digital camera equipment from a New York shop left a photograph of himself behind [NY Post] A 41-year-old Canadian man who pretended to be a police officer and inadvertently pulled over a real detective for speeding has been sentenced to six months in jail [Toronto Sun] A man died when he apparently shot himself accidentally after the robbery of a taxi driver [Toronto Star] We now know how detectives cracked what they call a very sophisticated mother/daughter prostitution ring. In court documents, the mother's ex-boyfriend says he ratted the women out because they took his dog and he wants it back [via fark.com] Brussels: Police have described two criminals as "the most stupid thieves in the country" after they stole a woman's purse in Brussels Saturday morning and drove their getaway car through security barriers protecting the European quarter during the weekend's Euro summit [via poe-news.com] |
The Smoking Gun's playing cards, including Frank Sinatra, Michael Jackson, Nick Nolte, Tupac Shakur, Johnny Cash, 50 Cent, Lil' Kim, and Andre the Giant [Smoking Gun]
Review: The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978) [via fark.com]
The truth about Elf Sex [via fark.com]
desember 17, 2003
SADDAM vs THE CROWN
David Penberthy in yesterday's Tele':
We should count ourselves lucky that Saddam Hussein wasn't caught in Sydney......At the committal stage, prosecutors would have sat scratching their wigs as the defence mounted the legally flawed but irresistible argument that Mr Hussein had been drinking when he gassed thousands of Kurds and killed dozens of political opponents...
...However, the judge would note that Mr Hussein "is not in the worst category of despot", noting the greater crimes of Stalin and Hitler, and positing that "the reasonable Ugandan" might also argue that Idi Amin narrowly shaded the Iraqi for depravity...
...Nicholas Cowdery DPP QC LLB etc., would emerge from his own spiderhole to tell the media to butt out and to warn the Attorney-General (not that he's doing anything anyway) against the evil that is extra-judicial interference.
He left out the part about how he'd get time off for changing his plea to guilty, five minutes before the trial ended.
No mucking about in China though. They've just sentenced the organisers of an orgy to life in prison.
EDUCATION COSTS, BUT STUDY PAYS
University graduates are almost guaranteed immediate work, can earn a median starting salary of $37,000, and may find it easier to get a full-time job if they have done a medicine-related course, research suggests.
desember 16, 2003
BIZARRE AND SALACIOUS
| Adriana Sage |  |
It didn't take long for someone to cash in on the capture of Saddam. As journalists posed in the tyrant's "spider hole", a "Captured Saddam" doll hit the shops [SMH]
A 78-year-old mixed race woman in the US is claiming she is the love child of controversial senator Strom Thurmond, who died this year aged 100 [BBC]
Youngsters signal sexual availability with jelly bracelets [snopes.com]
Hollywood star Winona Ryder is now the height of respectability with a judge praising her conduct since being put on probation for shoplifting [AFP]
Nicole Kidman says she would love to have a butt like J-Lo's [PA]
A Melbourne street cleaner has resuscitated a kitten after it was sucked into his street sweeper. They name him Hoover [ABC]
A taxpayer-funded magazine is telling people how to inject drugs, use rock heroin and how to beat a drug test [The Hun]
Two Danish prison bosses have been reprimanded for handing out the Viagra anti-impotence drug to inmates free of charge [AFP]
A new life begins for 104-year-old Russian immigrant Khaimovich Livshits, when he is set to become one of the oldest people to be granted US citizenship [AFP]
An art exhibition in Athens celebrating the Olympics features a photo of a man having sex with a water melon [Ananova]
Billy Bob Thornton offered to wet himself himself for real on camera to make new movie Bad Santa more authentic [Channel 4]
Pix: Former Australian rugby union international David Campese walks down London's Oxford Street on Monday wearing a sandwich board reading "I admit, the best team won" [Reuters]
Scientist creates world's largest book, "Bhutan: A Visual Odyssey Across the Kingdom" [Ananova]
| Karouna Kay Sivilay |  |
A 27-year-old Palestinian called Saddam Hussein is to change his name to 'bring him good luck' [AP]
The U.S. soccer team has finished the year at No. 11, in the FIFA world rankings, ahead of Germany [AP]
Hundreds of doctors in the United States got their degrees from medical schools whose graduates are banned in several states because of questionable educational standards [AP]
Kuwaitis, jubilant at the capture of arch-foe Saddam Hussein, were frantically sending each other mobile text messages of mock denials from former Iraqi information minister Mohammad Said al-Sahhaf [AFP]
A diabled cyclist who fell into an icy river was saved when he used his false leg as a float [The Sun]
Indonesia: An empty train's travelled 45 kilometres with no driver and eight carriages in tow before coming to a halt in the centre of Jakarta [AAP]
With features like "365 Excuses to Get Soused," and "Juicing on the Job," the Denver-based Modern Drunkard magazine ain't exactly Esquire [via obscurestore.com]
When etymology gets down and dirty: In his book The Lover's Tongue, word junky Mark Morton reveals that dirty language has come a long way in the last few hundred years [CanWest]
Van Hoogstraten joins Samaritans: The Samaritans, set up in 1953 as an emergency phone service for suicidal people, says volunteers need a good listening ear and patience - qualities that have rarely been associated with the man reputed to be Britain's most vicious landlord. Ten years ago when a fire broke out at one of his properties in Hove, he described the five people who died in the blaze as "lowlife, drug dealers, drug takers and queers" [The Guardian]
The little green man leaped from behind the ice cream in the freezer and taunted Raymond Rodriguez to chase him. The next thing Rodriguez remembers, after blacking out, was waking up the following morning lying on top of his mother's lover and drinking partner, whom he discovered was dead with a knife in his chest [via fark.com]
In a West Bank university election for the student leadership that focused on which party had killed the most Israelis, the violent Hamas swept to victory Wednesday, defeating Yasser Arafat's Fatah. The campaign for the student government council at Bir Zeit University near Ramallah featured exploding models of Israeli buses and claims of prowess based on Israeli casualties [AP]
Robert A. Heinlein's lost novel imagines a future America patterned on Alberta [via poe-news.com]
A man accused of beating his mother to death with a baseball bat was influenced by a cartoon that made him believe humans were unnecessary beings [Mainichi Shimbun]
| Crystal |  |
PERU
Peruvian President asks Prime Minister to stand down. She had enjoyed high approval ratings, despite a scandal involving allegations of corruption and lesbianism.
WE GOT 'IM
"These people, they have the peace in Australia and they are really peaceful people.
They have a normal life and a beautiful life.
I like it so much.
And they cannot find out or believe, really, Saddam was carrying, for example, a knife and killing a man, humans, or they killed people, thousands of people, in the jail and then they put them in one grave or put them in the acid or torturing them and taking the arms off or the eyes off.
Australian people still don't really believe this because they grow up with the peace."
desember 15, 2003
A LANGUAGE THAT NEEDS BATTERIES
"It is always amusing to tell the more racially-conscious type of nationalistic Chinese that Cantonese DNA is similar to that of Filipinos, and Beijingers’ DNA is similar to a Korean’s. They’ll lie awake for nights worrying. (I haven’t a clue whether it’s true, but that makes it even funnier.)"
SMELLS LIKE MILOSEVIC
The president of the Iraqi Migrants Council says people have been celebrating in the streets of Auburn in Sydney, the home of one of Australia's largest Iraqi populations... ..."I would like to thank God that I lived to see that moment happen."
Meanwhile, Bob Brown thinks that justice is a trial that drags on for decades, costs a billion dollars and gives a monster a platform to continue torturing his victims.
And a nurse in Bethlehem sees the parallel between Saddam's surrender and the leaders of hardline Palestinian groups, who dispatch young men and women to their death in suicide bombing missions, but are not so keen to sacrifice themselves.
LAURYN HILL
US singer Lauryn Hill stunned leading members of the Roman Catholic Church when she accused them of moral corruption, exploitation and abuse from the stage during a Christmas concert at the Vatican. Hill, 28, launched her diatribe in front of an audience of 7,500 guests at a packed Paul VI hall, used by Pope John Paul II for indoor public audiences.
"I'm not here to celebrate, like you, the birth of Christ, but to ask you why you are not in mourning for his death in this place," Hill said, reading from a prepared statement as she came on stage for her performance as part of a all-star gala concert.
desember 14, 2003
SCI-TECH AGOGO
Spain and Morocco have agreed to build a 39-kilometre rail tunnel beneath the Mediterranean sea.
Microsoft says it will offer tools to remove swastikas from a font in the latest version of its Office software. The swastika, which was made infamous by Nazi Germany, was included in Microsoft's "Bookshelf Symbol 7" font.
Three elderly farmers are seeking recognition before they die for their discovery of the famed 2,200-year-old Xi'an terracotta warriors, now one of China's biggest tourist attractions.
As the official 100th anniversary of flight approaches, there are some who dispute the Wright brothers' claim to being first off the ground.
US scientists have decoded and analysed the genome of a bacterium which could help clear up radioactive waste and possibly even generate electricity.
The year of weird medicine.
An exquisitely preserved 125 million-year-old fossil found in China has set a new record for the oldest known marsupial and may rewrite the history of mammal evolution.
US researchers found a gene responsible for drunkenness in worms after plying thousands of the tiny creatures with booze, a discovery that could boost the fight against alcoholism.
Flesh-eating bacteria kills Connecticut official.
There are extremist groups like Greenpeace and unfortunately organic farmers who have taken a role to themselves to try to emotionally damage the cause of the introduction of GM crops.
How did Tolkien come up with the languages for Middle Earth? Listen carefully to the dialogue in the forthcoming movie of Return of the King and you might recognise some old English, a Welsh lilt here and there, and even some Finnish.
Ghostly sand dunes pass right through one another.
Archaeologists in London have found a bundle of 17th century coins from Java buried in mud on the banks of the River Thames.
Scientists create sperm from stem cells.
Astronomers say a volcanic eruption that made the sky turn red was the inspiration for the lurid colours in Edvard Munch's famous painting, The Scream.
Forensic scientists could hold the key to identifying the rugby ball Jonny Wilkinson kicked to win the World Cup for England.
Hair at a crime scene may not be a clue to who committed murder, according to Australian forensics research.
Australia may host clinical trials for a new technology that will allow blind people to read and recognise faces.
A type of beetle that defends itself by spraying high-pressure streams of boiling liquid at predators may help engineers design a better aircraft engine.
The United States, backed by the European Union, Japan and Canada, has turned back a bid by developing nations to place the Internet under the control of the United Nations or its member governments.
Weather reports from Captain Cook's voyages may help scientists involved in climate change refine their predictions.
The grave of a mysterious Viking queen may hold the key to a 1,200 year-old case of suspected ritual killing.
Number four not so deadly for Chinese, "Our study of Hong Kong Chinese people does not support the concept that more cardiac deaths occur in Cantonese people on the 4th, 14th and 24th day of the month."
Austrian farmers use cows milk for under-floor heating.
425-million-year-old penis found.
University of California implant false memories in Alan Alda.
Uniforms that turn into lightweight armor on command.
Solar wind cracks Earth’s magnetic field.
When Good Trees Go Bad: Could a massive marine extinction have been caused by trees?
BIZARRE AND SALACIOUS
Germans should lighten up, according to their president [Reuters]
Russell Crowe makes Adelaide cinema goers sick [ABC]
One of the icons of Japanese adult cinema history, Hitomi Kobayashi, is about to draw the curtains on a career of unprecedented success [Shukan Post]
I've been to strip joints but found them too much like barracking for the Tiges. They're sort of exciting but ultimately frustrating [The Age]
One lousy picture of Leilani [The Sun]
A court in Pakistan has sentenced a man to be blinded by acid after he carried out a similar attack on his fiancée [BBC]
Japan: A bold stalker's legal battle to try and have stalking recognized as a Constitutionally protected right to freedom of expression and pursuit of pleasure has ended after the Supreme Court backed lower court verdicts that ruled he was a predator [Mainichi Daily]
Dog lover Deborah Parkhouse has spent $87,000 building a pooch palace for her adopted afghan hounds, but the cat lover next door threatens to destroy this doggie haven [The Hun]
Erocracy will require wild game to be certified as fit and healthy before being shot [BBC]
Board of Supervisors fights to keep Wiccan priestess from leading prayer at meetings [via fark.com]
Judge buys animal smuggler's defense - he told the court he had been appalled by the thousands of dead animals he had seen on Australia's outback roads and had wanted save some of them [BBC]
Italians boycott 'trash TV' [BBC]
Thai Govt. calls for monastic support against rogue monks who siphon off temple funds or build sub-standard Buddha images [Straits Times]
Wales: A row has broken out after a Thai restaurant owner accused a rival of exploitation by placing a statue of Buddha in a Cardiff street popular with late-night revellers [BBC]
A German has been jailed for declaring his parents dead 40 times in order to get charity hand-outs [Reuters]
Berlusconi joke jars at EU summit [Reuters]
The Sun targets EU summit, "Europe's Secret Plan to Shackle Britain" [Reuters]
'Love dolls' sell out in 10 minutes - scientists take them to Antartica - trade-ins taken to temple where mantras said for them [Asahi Geino]
Two men in a stolen car crashed through the gates of the Florida governor's mansion, cut across the grounds and exited by smashing through another gate [Reuters]
"Bored" teens rack up 80 million Internet bill [Reuters]
Thousands of bills fall in Japan garbage [AP]
Queen bees will have to slum it under new European Union import rules which only allow a retinue of 20 bees to accompany the queen on her voyage [ABC]
South Africa's Advertising Standards Authority has banned an advertisement for the country's Post Office that gave children an address to which to write to Santa Claus with their Christmas wishes [AAP]
A Dutchman spent half an hour behind bars because he refused to carry a shopping basket around his local supermarket [Ananova]
Girl, 10, gets job as football commentator [Ananova]
Texas: A man apparently shot himself to death early Friday on the "X" in Dealey Plaza that marks the spot where President John F. Kennedy was assassinated 40 years ago [AP]
A warrant has been issued for the arrest of former Formula One racing driver Eddie Irvine after he was caught speeding on a scooter in London with no licence or insurance, and who failed to appear for sentencing [ABC]
Cashier asks for ID. Customer says stick lottery ticket. Cashier buys ticket and wins $25,000 [AP]
A man who groped a girl’s boobs as she dozed on a bus was caught when his hand got stuck in a seat near her chest, a court heard. Mohamed Hayath, 31, twice grabbed the 25-year-old pole dancer’s breasts before pulling his hand away each time she woke up, it was claimed [The Sun]
A former Miss Teen Texas whose platform was against underage drinking was convicted Wednesday of public intoxication in Arlington municipal court [via obscurestore.com]
A wild boar's two day odyssey lost at sea has ended after police hauled the creature to shore off the Costa Brava coast of north-eastern Spain [AFP]
Italian opera singer Romano Dragoni has long wanted to meet again the hungry New Zealand soldier who, nearly 60 years ago, sang to his family as payment for taking some eggs during World War II [AFP]
A jealous wife in China threw a chair into the family's TV set when her husband ignored her because he was transfixed by the Miss World contest [DPA]
A court in southern China will open proceedings tomorrow against the organisers of an alleged mass orgy in a five-star hotel involving hundreds of Japanese tourists and Chinese prostitutes [BBC]
Simon Le Bon says he and his mates used to enter Duran Duran lookalike contests [Ananova]
Pop Stars Iraq: Yousef fled the country after Uday had a group of girls beat him up at a concert, Khaled said. Former workers at Shebab recall other incidents, one involving Uday urinating on a singer [Reuters]
A Channel 4 newsreader says her large breasts will probably stop her working for the BBC [Ananova]
Religious solicitors knocking on your door? [fark.com]
Lord of the Rings' twelve endings [AP]
Sick: Peta send tofu and veggie burgers to cannibal [Ananova]
Sheriff's car decal, "We'll Kick Your Ass" [via fark.com]
A Canadian mayor who secretly stripped off in council offices and had her photo taken wearing just her ceremonial chain says she is mortified after the pictures went on public display [globeandmail.com]
Japan: A former university lecturer arrested and charged with drug possession used his twin brother as a stand-in to counsel students, despite the brother having no qualifications [Mainichi Shimbun]
French adopt doggy bags for wine [Reuters]
Study says Germans are fuckrats [Reuters]
As director of such dark films as Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive and the television series Twin Peaks, David Lynch seems an unlikely leader for a world peace campaign based on mass meditation [ABC]
Singer-songwriter Elvis Costello has married jazz artist Diana Krall in a ceremony at Elton John's UK mansion [BBC]
A car painted to look like it is covered with pigeon droppings (pix) could fill the empty fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square [Ananova]
An unwanted dog which was put down with drugs, put in a plastic bag and then through a rubbish compressor has been found alive moments before being buried in a landfill site [www.thnt.com]
A courier has denied nearly destroying £250,000 worth of photographs, by Japanese artist Nobuyoshi Araki, after mistaking them for porn [Ananova]
E-Porn for Dummies [CNN]
E-Porn for Dummies II: San Francisco-based fetish photographer Charles Gatewood claims with a few tips, it's easy for amateur pornographers to get models, strippers and even average ladies to strip for your camera [via newsfilter.org]
Feeding the Duck part 4526: Filipino slices off hubbie's penis, forgets to bring it with her to the hospital, races home to get it, doctors restore manhood, man forgives wife. Radio callers offer helpful hints to wayward husbands such as never sleeping on their backs and always keeping mobile phones tucked under the pillow [Reuters]
University of Birmingham launches own beer [BBC]
Ohio police find home invasion suspect impaled on fence [via newsfilter.org]
One of the darlings of the Internet and a pioneer of electronic exhibitionism, Jenni of JenniCam fame, is turning off the lights after seven years [ABC]
Thai doctor arrested for running fake fertility clinic: Patient Karuna Piswong told the daily that she had paid 110,000 baht to be inseminated but was instead injected 76 times with a substance which made her gain weight, giving her the impression she was pregnant [AFP]
A Tasmanian bank robber, dressed as Santa Claus, in jail after failing to reach his getaway bicycle [Hobart Mercury]
UN-AUSTRALIAN: Plans to build a giant snapper or cuttlefish in Whyalla, 200 kilometres north of Adelaide, have been scrapped [ABC]
German police have charged a man with drugs possession after officers spotted a small quantity of heroin concealed in his ear when he entered a police station to check if he was on their wanted list [Reuters]
NZ: Sex between women and boys under 16 is being outlawed after controversy over an affair between a Wellington swimming coach and teenage boy [NZPA]
Maxim goes to Bollywood [glamsham.com]
When the stroller holding 10-week-old Conor Canty rolled off the platform at Riverwood station last Thursday afternoon and into the path of an oncoming train, his dad Mark had just one thought: saving his son's life... [Daily Tele']
A man walked into an art gallery in this San Francisco suburb and stole a Playboy "Vargas girl" painting worth $US75,000 ($101,300) off its easel [AP]
The man behind a Super Bowl halftime football game between lingerie-clad models (pix) says he has assured executives with sponsor Dodge that the event will be more than a televised "panty party" [AP]
The Postal Service is going ballistic over a Fox television comedy sketch about mail employees going postal [AP]
Free porn a right, not a privilege: Czech porn star Katerina Bochnickova says she's going for bust in next year's elections for the European Parliament, "more eroticism for the people" [via newsfilter.org]
Pennsylvania: Tracey L. Roberts isn't trying to stop her ex-husband from voicing his support of polygamy, a belief that broke up their marriage, but she doesn't want him teaching their 10-year-old daughter [AP]
Reagan and FDR may soon share the 10-cent coin [National Review]
A West Australian farmer has spent almost $320,000 with a dating agency – without meeting one woman [Adelaide Advertiser]
A charge of indecent assault against a woman demonstrator, accused of pinching a British policeman's bottom, has been dropped [PA]
Happy 100th to the ice-cream cone [via fark.com]
...for Harry, England and St George: A British businessman intends leading 5,000 archers to a second battle of Agincourt in an attempt to defeat plans for a wind farm at the historic site in France. Amateur historian Don Baggs, 59, of Monmouth, south Wales, sent out a call to arms after friends in the village, in northern France, asked for his help [Ananova]
A female customer stripped naked in front of staff at a power company in northern China to force them to reconnect her electricity supply... ...Staff called police who persuaded the woman to get dressed. As soon as police left, however, she took her clothes off for a second time and exasperated officials then agreed to reconnect her supply without payment [iol.co.za]
UPDATE: A baby pig which survived being picked up by a hawk in New Zealand has been found dead in a pen at her new home [NZPA]
UPDATE: A woman who breastfed her baby while driving at 65mph on a motorway in the US has been sentenced to three months under house arrest [Ananova]
Mandy Moore now likes clothes that show of her curves [AP]
A young woman's middle finger was jammed in a Madrid telephone booth for two and a half hours when the unit's security system backfired [AFP]
A property owner in northern New South Wales is attempting to secede from his local council and the rest of Australia [ABC]
Two one-legged inmates were among 26 prisoners who scaled walls to break out of an overcrowded jail in the Brazilian city of Niteroi [Reuters]
A teenager dressed as a teenage ninja turtle martial arts warrior to carry out a random killing after having "delusional fantasies" as a heavy smoker of cannabis [London Tele']
Christmas shoppers at the Virgin Megastore in London's Oxford Street have been met by a team of Sexy Santa personal shoppers [Ananova]
US Secretary of State Colin Powell has named James Brown, the so-called "Godfather of Soul," to a new and unusual, but apparently fictitious, senior diplomatic position [AFP]
Mayor files complaint on cop who called him 'dude' [via poe-news.com]
A woman in the Solomon Islands has been refused bail after appearing in court on a lesbian charge [ABC]
What do you get when you combine China's rapid increase in car ownership among a growing middle class and its revolution in sexual attitudes over the last 10 years? The answer, at least in southern China's Guangdong province, seems to be headlines like: Sex in Private Cars Causes Concern [BBC]
A teenager having sex in a car was hit with a driving ban after his girlfriend accidentally set off hazard warning lights with her bottom [The Sun]
A 25-year-old Rhode Island man was slammed into a telephone pole and killed while riding an inner tube towed by a truck accross snowy roads [via newsfilter.org]
New Delhi: An man searching for an ancient treasure was arrested for allegedly performing witchcraft on a naked 16-year-old girl [iol.co.za]
UPDATE: In world of racial diversity, what is 'white'? Caucasian students seek to define their culture, heritage [via newsfilter.org]
An American school with a "zero-tolerance" policy on drugs has suspended a pupil for a year for having headache tablets [PA]
Police skunks [NY Times]
11-foot wooden penis found erected in Oxford garden [via fark.com]
Santa passes out in Guyana - not the Kool-Aid [via fark.com]
Louis XVII to have royal burial, 209 years late [Reuters]
Two girls for every guy [Shukan Jitsuwa]
It features Hindu dancers, drawings of mosques and the word "Goal" but there is no sign of Jesus, Mary or even Santa Claus in this year's Christmas card from the Department of Culture [London Tele']
Thirty years after Afro-Caribbeans in Walsall successfully fought off white skinhead thugs, their children face a fresh wave of attacks - this time from Asians [London Tele']
Hungry elephants have gone on the rampage in eastern Thailand, ransacking villagers' plantations and forcing sugarcane trucks to stop so they can raid their goods [AFP]
Delayed gift delivery saves Bangladeshi woman from snake bite [AFP]
Sierra Leone: Thousands of fans rioted at Sierra Leone's national stadium Saturday when authorities substituted two local dwarf comedians for a widely anticipated out-of-town midget duo [AP]
Officials in Khomeini's birthplace move to quell dwarf rumour [AFP]
Monroe County District Attorney and judge-elect Mark Pazuhanich was charged Friday with groping a 10-year-old girl at a Hilary Duff concert [via fark.com]
South Korean teachers who broke into the house of a student who had missed class for six months found the 15-year-old boy living next to his dead mother's badly decomposed remains [Reuters]
Blanketting winter-worn Sweden with super-sized posters of models in sexy underwear is a dangerous business. This year, security guards have been hired to protect H+M's annual underwear billboards [AFP]
The Thai government has announced plans to charge a British woman for using an image of the Thai flag on her porn website [Ananova]
A ghoulish Internet video game challenging players to shoot down passenger jets before they hit the twin towers is a huge hit - outraging families of Sept. 11 victims [NY Daily News]
Hollywood star Ben Affleck has admitted that he and fiancee Jennifer Lopez have a boring sex life [Sky]
A man suffered facial injuries in southern Vietnam after his mobile phone exploded, in the second such incident involving Nokia handsets to have occurred in the past few months [AFP]
Debunking false photos of nude celebs is a thankless job, but somebody's got to do it [via fark.com]
A Bulgarian woman has launched legal action against a heating company after claiming it was too cold in her flat to have sex [Ananova]
desember 13, 2003
CHINA
A train in China has killed four people as they blocked the track in protest at their houses being demolished. A Hong Kong human rights group said the train, travelling from Beijing to Guangzhou, hit a group gathered on a rail track in the province of Henan.
Shanghai is considering setting up a special taskforce to control its huge numbers of homeless people and beggars.
OP-ED
Modern art has corrupted federal politics for a long time. Sir Robert Menzies, our greatest leader, was a staunch defender of traditionalism, owning several landscapes by Sir Winston Churchill. But his opponent, Labor's H.V. Doc Evatt, actually had a modern artist, Sam Atyeo, as his personal assistant. It was probably the listening to Atyeo's theories about art that drove Evatt mad... [Michael Duffy]
desember 12, 2003
TODAY'S OP-EDs
A senior political figure in the parliamentary Labor Party made a point of approaching me on the opening night and, with heavy irony, congratulating me on the grounds that the museum had adopted the Left's position on every historical issue... ...The museum is a collection, almost in its entirety, of trivia, except for the Aboriginal section where the impression is one of advocacy. This section devoted to individuals is, generally speaking, a section of anti-heroes. [David Barnett]
It would be going too far, I suppose, to draw a parallel with actors, who seem as a rule to have surrendered cognitive areas of their brains in return for their glorious gifts and reveal their Faustian bargain whenever they venture into political activism. However, I think the priest in politics has a good deal in common with the creative writer addressing the issues of the day - as depicted in The Australian last Friday by Frank Moorhouse. "I sometimes wonder," Moorhouse wrote, "whether storytellers of high profile are, if anything, disqualified from public statement because we are often falsely (but seductively) trusted to have special insights which we do not necessarily have." [Frank Devine]
The report into patient deaths at Camden and Campbelltown hospitals is a vindication of the nurses who bravely brought these distressing facts to light. But it stops well short of what it could have achieved. This is because it quarantines the one person who still has the most explaining to do – former Health Minister Craig Knowles. [Sydney Daily Telegraph]
One man has come through the hospital scandal unscathed. But the former minister Craig Knowles still has questions to answer. [Anna Patty]
CRASH BANDICOOTS
The strangest television interview ever?
Maybe.
But Bob Brown did an interview the other day, on Channel Seven, while a couple of protestors dressed as bandicoots wrestled directly behind him.
