Pa. boy pulls out teeth after dad puts off dentist (BLOG)

EASTON, Pa. (AP) — A Pennsylvania man has pleaded guilty toreckless endangerment after his teenage son tried to pull out his own teeth because he hadn't been taken to a dentist.

The Express-Times of Easton reports that 40-year-old Francisco Torres told a Northampton County judge Monday that he "procrastinated" in getting the boy dental care.

Police say the boy tried to pull out his teeth after complaining of pain for several months. He broke two teeth and needed emergency surgery to have the fragments removed. He is now 14.

The Express-Times report (http://bit.ly/qb4hpc ) says Torres told the court he had insurance problems that contributed to the delay.

Torres' attorney requested a psychological evaluation be completed before his client's scheduled sentencing in December.

Nestle ad first to pitch to canine customers (BLOG)

ZURICH — Nestle, one of the world's biggest makers of pet food, said on Friday it had launched the first television commercial designed especially for dogs, using a high-frequency tone to grab their attention.

"Dogs' hearing is twice as sharp as humans. They can pick up frequencies which are beyond our range and they are better at differentiating sounds," said Georg Sanders, a nutrition expert at Nestle Purina PetCare in Germany.

Nestle asked experts in pet behavior in the United States to research what would appeal to dogs and used the results to create the 23-second commercial for its Beneful dog food brand.

The ad, to be screened on Austrian television this week, features a tone similar to a dog whistle, which humans can barely hear, as well as an audible "squeak" like the sound dogs' toys make and a high-pitched "ping."

"So delicious, so healthy, so happy," ends the commercial in German, which features a dog pricking up his ears.

"The television commercial aims to reach both the pet and the owner, supporting the special one-to-one relationship between them," said Xavier Perez, Brand Manager of Beneful for Europe.

Nestle said in a statement the commercial follows an award-winning campaign in Germany that featured "sniffable" posters to attract dogs.

Nestle's Petcare division reported first-half sales of 4.8 billion Swiss francs ($5.4 billion), accounting for almost 12 percent of revenue at the world's biggest food group. It competes with Mars, maker of the Pedigree dog food brand.

This sheep thinks he's a dog (BLOG)

The sheep's name is Jack, and it's not his fault he's confused. Alison Sinstadt and her partner Simon Sherwin, who have a farm in Shropshire, England, brought him indoors when he was just a wee lamb because he was quite small. They raised him with their springer spaniel Jessie, and now Jack is so convinced that he's a dog too that he fetches sticks, walks on a leash, and even tries to bark (though it comes out more of a baa-rk).

And putting the 6-month-old ovine in a field with his own flock doesn't help a bit: he just tries to herd them. It's positively unherd-of!

Patient dies outside Calif. hospital after release (BLOG)

SANTA ROSA, Calif. (AP) — A California hospital is investigating the death of a discharged patient whose body was found onhospital grounds.

Officials at Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital said Monday that their investigation into 49-year-old Michael Torres' death is almost complete.

Torres' body was discovered on the hospital campus around 8 a.m. Sept. 20. The Press Democrat of Santa Rosa reports (http://bit.ly/p4Ek7e) that he had been discharged about 12 hours earlier after treatment for an undisclosed condition.

Hospital officials say Torres was asked to move when, after he was discharged, he was found in part of the hospital that is closed to the public at night. But they have released few other details.

According to Torres' family, a preliminary autopsy showed he could have died of pneumonia, or swelling of the arteries and heart.

4 Americans get pot from US government (BLOG)

EUGENE, Ore. (AP) — Sometime after midnight on a moonlit rural Oregon highway, a state trooper checking a car he had just pulled over found less than an ounce of pot on one passenger: A chatty 72-year-old woman blind in one eye.

She insisted the weed was legal and was approved by the U.S.government.

The trooper and his supervisor were doubtful. But after a series of calls to the U.S. Attorney's Office, the Drug Enforcement Agencyand her physician, the troopers handed her back the card — and her pot.

For the past three decades, Uncle Sam has been providing a handful of patients with some of the highest grade marijuana around. The program grew out of a 1976 court settlement that created the country's first legal pot smoker.

Advocates for legalizing marijuana or treating it as a medicine say the program is a glaring contradiction in the nation's 40-year war on drugs — maintaining the federal ban on pot while at the same time supplying it.

Government officials say there is no contradiction. The program is no longer accepting new patients, and public health authorities have concluded that there was no scientific value to it, Steven Gust of the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse told The Associated Press.

At one point, 14 people were getting government pot. Now, there are four left.

The government has only continued to supply the marijuana "for compassionate reasons," Gust said.

One of the recipients is Elvy Musikka, the chatty Oregon woman. A vocal marijuana advocate, Musikka relies on the pot to keep her glaucoma under control. She entered the program in 1988, and said that her experience with marijuana is proof that it works as a medicine.

They "won't acknowledge the fact that I do not have even one aspirin in this house," she said, leaning back on her couch, glass bong cradled in her hand. "I have no pain."

Marijuana is getting a look from states around the country considering calls to repeal decades-old marijuana prohibition laws. There are 16 states that have medical marijuana programs. In the three West Coast states, advocates are readying tax-and-sell or other legalization programs.

Marijuana was legal for much of U.S. history and was recognized as a medicine in 1850. Opposition to it began to gather and, by 1936, 48 states had passed laws regulating pot, fearing it could lead to addiction.

Anti-marijuana literature and films, like the infamous "Reefer Madness," helped fan those fears. Eventually, pot was classified among the most harmful of drugs, meaning it had no usefulness and a high potential for addiction.

In 1976, a federal judge ruled that the Food and Drug Administration must provide Robert Randall of Washington, D.C. with marijuana because of his glaucoma — no other drug could effectively combat his condition. Randall became the nation's first legal pot smoker since the drug's prohibition.

Eventually, the government created its program as part of a compromise over Randall's care in 1978, long before a single state passed a medical marijuana law. What followed were a series of petitions from people like Musikka to join the program.

President George H.W. Bush's administration, getting tough on crime and drugs, stopped accepting new patients in 1992. Many of the patients who had qualified had AIDS, and they were dying.

The AP asked the agency that administers the program, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, for documents showing how much marijuana has been sent to patients since the first patient in 1976.

The agency supplied full data for 2005-2011, which showed that during that period the federal government distributed more than 100 pounds of high-grade marijuana to patients.

Agency officials said records related to the program before 2005 had been destroyed, but were able to provide scattered records for a couple of years in the early 2000s.

The four patients remaining in the program estimate they have received a total of 584 pounds from the federal government over the years. On the street, that would be worth more than $500,000.

All of the marijuana comes from the University of Mississippi, where it is grown, harvested and stored.

Dr. Mahmoud ElSohly, who directs the operation, said the marijuana was a small part of the crop the university has been growing since 1968 for all cannabis research in the U.S. Among the studies are the pharmaceutical uses for synthetic mimics of pot's psychoactive ingredient, THC.

ElSohly said the four patients are getting pot with about 3 percent THC. He said 3 percent is about the range patients have preferred in blind tests.

The marijuana is then sent from Mississippi to a tightly controlled North Carolina lab, where they are rolled into cigarettes. And every month, steel tins with white labels are sent to Florida and Iowa. Packed inside each is a half-pound of marijuana rolled into 300 perfectly-wrapped joints.

With Musikka living in Oregon, she is entitled to more legal pot than anyone in the nation because she's also enrolled in the state's medical marijuana program. Neither Iowa nor Florida has approved marijuana as a medicine, so the federal pot is the only legal access to the drug for the other three patients.

The three other people in the program range in ages and doses of marijuana provided to them, but all consider themselves an endangered species that, once extinct, can be brushed aside by a federal government that pretends they don't exist.

All four have become crusaders for the marijuana-legalization movement. They're rock stars at pro-marijuana conferences, sought-after speakers and recognizable celebrities in the movement.

Irv Rosenfeld, a financial adviser in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., has been in the program since November 1982. His condition produces painful bone tumors, but he said marijuana has replaced prescription painkillers.

Rosenfeld likes to tell this story: In the mid-1980s, the federal government asked his doctor for an update on how Rosenfeld was doing. It was an update the doctor didn't believe the government was truly interested in. He had earlier tried to get a copy of the previous update, and was told the government couldn't find it, Rosenfeld said.

So instead of filling out the form, the doctor responded with a simple sentence written in large, red letters: "It's working."

Man with broken leg survives 4 days in Utah desert (BLOG)

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A North Carolina man crawled four days across the Utah desert after breaking his leg on a solo hike, inspired by a Hollywood movie about a man who cut off his own arm to save himself after being trapped by a boulder in the same canyon.

Amos Wayne Richards, 64, of Concord, North Carolina, is now recovering at home. He said he was inspired to hike Little Blue John Canyon after he saw the Oscar-nominated movie "127 Hours" but fell 10 feet (three meters) during his trek on Sept. 8.

Canyonlands National Park rangers found Richards four days later. Along with the leg injury, he dislocated his shoulder but was able to work it back into place.

"It took me about 3 or 4 minutes to work my shoulder and get it back in place, and once I got it back in place, I stood up and realized my ankle hurt a little bit," Richards told WBTV in Charlotte last week after his story started getting the attention of national TV news networks.

Without cellphone service and only two protein bars to eat, Richards began crawling back to his car across the rocky terrain. He filled his water bottles with rain as he painstakingly retraced his steps, eventually dragging himself almost five miles (eight kilometers).

"I was actually following my GPS, crawling right on top of my feet print that I had hiked in on," Richards said.

Rangers first began looking for Richards Sept. 9 after his campsite was found unattended, said Denny Ziemann, chief ranger for Canyonlands and Arches national parks. They discovered his car two days later at the trailhead for Little Blue John Canyon, which is part of the Canyonlands remote and rugged Maze District but technically outside park boundaries.

"The search was pretty quick and dirty" once they realized where Richards had gone hiking, Ziemann said. Within hours, a helicopter spotted Richards — who used the flash on his camera to catch the pilot's attention — only a couple of miles (kilometers) from his car.

Richards was treated for the shattered leg and dehydration at a hospital in Moab, Utah, before returning to North Carolina to recover.

Ziemann said the result could have been much worse for Richards because he went hiking alone and without telling anybody about his plans. Temperatures in the region were in the 80s Fahrenheit (upper 20s Celsius) during the day and 60s F (upper teens C) at night.

"We make a lot of rescues of people, but we usually know where they are," Ziemann said. "They were either hiking with somebody and got hurt or if they were hiking alone, they told people where they were going."

In 2003, climber Aron Ralston hiked into the same canyon also without telling anyone his plans. He became trapped by a boulder and was forced to cut off his own arm to free himself. Ralston went on to detail his struggles in a book. His story was later adapted into "127 Hours."

Man throws 4,800 bottled notes into the ocean, gets 3,100 replies (BLOG)

It's now been 15 years since Harold Hackett began making friends all over the world. He never meets them in person, and doesn't use the phone or internet for contact, but rather leaves his acquaintances up to the tides. Since 1996, Hackett has thrown over 4,800 bottles into the ocean from Prince Edward Island in Canada, and when the floating time capsules are discovered — along with the note that is placed in each one — a connection is made.

When the wind is right, the Canadian messenger takes to the beach, throwing a handful of Ocean Spray juice bottles each time. To date, over 3,000 people have found the notes and replied to Hackett, who includes his home address on each and every letter he tosses. His responses have come from the Eastern shores of the United States all the way to Ireland, South America, and Africa. Oftentimes it takes a while for the bottles to be found, with some taking well over a decade to be discovered.

The collection of letters, gifts, and postcards that Hackett has received from those who find his bottles is staggering, and he doesn't plan on stopping any time soon. He intends to continue tossing his plastic presents into the ocean for the foreseeable future and hopes to amass a few thousand more responses in the process. You can check out a video interview with Hackett on BBC.

Piranha problem takes bite out of Brazilian beach fun (BLOG)

Authorities in a state in Brazil's northeast are scrambling to take the fright and the bite off the beach after piranhas sunk their teeth into about 100 beachgoers, UOL Noticias reported.

The problem -- rather fearsome given piranhas' horror-movie teeth and ability to sink them into human flesh -- has been the biggest at the main beach area in Piaui state; authorities said they need to act fast to reduce a piranha overpopulation situation.

Last weekend, at least 100 bathers were treated at the hospital in Jose de Freitas not far from Terezina, Piaui's capital, after being bitten on the heels or toes at the local beach.

"Since they have no predators, piranhas have started attacking people on the beach," said Romildo Mafra, a local environment official.

Environmental officials so far have added tilapia to the piranhas' local food chain hoping to quell some of the predators' hunger.

Mayan film documentary claims proof of aliens (BLOG)

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) -A new documentary about Mayan civilization will provide evidence of extraterrestrial contact with the ancient culture, according to a Mexican government official and the film's producer.

"Revelations of the Mayans 2012 and Beyond," currently in production, will claim the Mayans had contact with extraterrestrials, producer Raul Julia-Levy revealed to TheWrap.

"Mexico will release codices, artifacts and significant documents with evidence of Mayan and extraterrestrial contact, and all of their information will be corroborated by archaeologists," said Julia-Levy, son of actor Raul Julia.

In a release to TheWrap, Luis Augusto Garcia Rosado, the minister of tourism for the Mexican state of Campeche, said new evidence has emerged "of contact between the Mayans and extraterrestrials, supported by translations of certain codices, which the government has kept secure in underground vaults for some time."

He also spoke, in a phone conversation, of "landing pads in the jungle that are 3,000 years old."

Raul-Julia claims there is proof that the Mayans had intended to lead the planet for thousands of years, but were forced to escape after an invasion by "men of dark intentions," leaving behind evidence of an advanced race.

"The Mexican government is not making this statement on their own -- everything we say, we're going to back it up," he said.

The film will be directed by Juan Carlos Rulfo, who won the Humanitas Prize for "Those Who Remain" in 2009 and the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for International Documentary for "In the Pit" in 2006. Juan Diego Rodriguez Gonzalez will serve as the Guatemalan executive producer, and Eduardo Vertiz as the Mexican executive producer.

And yes, they expect people to take this seriously, because the messages he plans to impart are crucial to human survival, Julia-Levy insisted.

When Julia-Levy, producer Ed Elbert and co-producer Sheila McCarthy announced the Mexican cooperation with their documentary to TheWrap in August, they were circumspect about claims of alien contact, with Julia-Levy admitting he'd been ordered not to say anything about it.

Also for that article, Rosado brushed off a question about alien contact and said his country was simply offering the filmmakers' access to previously unexplored sections of a Mayan site at Calakmul.

Now, not only has Rosado changed his tune, but the Guatemalan government has joined the project, as well, giving access to artifacts and newly discovered prophecies

While the Guatemalan government is not offering information about aliens, it has joined Mexico in supporting the project. "Guatemala, like Mexico, home to the ancient yet advanced Mayan civilization ... has also kept certain provocative archeological discoveries classified, and now believes that it is time to bring forth this information in the new documentary," Guatemala's minister of tourism, Guillermo Novielli Quezada, said in a statement.

He said the country was working with filmmakers "for the good of mankind."

Raul-Julia claims that the order to cooperate came directly from the country's president, Alvaro Colom Caballero.

Guatemala is the site of a large number of pre-Columbian Mayan settlements in the Mirador Basin, including the extensive and highly organized city of El Mirador

In a curious aspect of the new announcement: Guatemalan minister Quezada is quoted as referring to "'Mirador,' the largest pyramid in the world."

But Mirador is not the name of a pyramid. It's the name of the entire settlement, which includes several pyramids, the largest of which is La Danta -- a fact one would expect the Guatemalan minister to know.

"Revelations of the Mayans 2012 and Beyond" begins shooting on November 15 and is due for a theatrical release in late 2012, before the end of the Mayan calendar.

While doomsday scenarios focus on the calendar ending on December 21, 2012, many scholars point out that it simply resets for another 5,126-year cycle on that date.

Idaho boy, 10, escapes clash with mountain lion (BLOG)

BOISE, Idaho (AP) — A 10-year-old Idaho boy who came face-to-face with a mountain lion in rural Boise County escaped with minor scratches — and concerns that his friends at school wouldn't believe his story, according to state wildlife managers.

The Idaho Department of Fish and Game said Friday the mountain lion was tracked down and killed after the encounter late Thursday. The boy, whose family asked not to be identified, received first aid at home for minor scratches and was expected to get a tetanus shot Friday.

The boy was not traumatized from his encounter, state wildlife officials said.

"His biggest concern was that his schoolmates wouldn't believe him, which is kind of funny," Senior Conservation Officer Matt O'Connell said.

The boy came across the mountain lion while searching for a missing hunting dog with his father near their home in a rural subdivision about 15 to 20 miles northeast of Boise. The boy ran from the predator but stumbled and fell. It was then the mountain lion took a swipe, scratching the boy's arm and hand.

The child then yelled to his father and stood up, pulling out a hunting knife, which made the predator back down and gave the dad enough time to fire off several shots from his 9mm handgun to scare the lion away, O'Connell said.

Conservation officers with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game, along with an off-duty officer from the Meridian Police Department, responded to the reported encounter and a couple hours later, tracked down the big cat.

The mountain lion, which was estimated to be about 18 months old, was found feeding on the carcass of the family's missing hunting dog, O'Connell said.

"When a lion has actually made physical contact with a person and in conjunction with that, has killed a domestic animal and has been close enough to that residence, the animal did need to be euthanized at that time," O'Connell said.

These types of encounters are extremely rare in Idaho, said southwest regional wildlife manager Steve Nadeau. Wildlife managers could recall only one other injury by a cougar. That involved a 12-year-old boy and was reported in the early 1990s on the Salmon River, he said.

"It happens in surrounding states more frequently," Nadeau said.

Bear attacks Idaho bow hunter near Yellowstone park (BLOG)

SALMON, Idaho (Reuters) - A bear, possibly a grizzly, attacked an Idaho elk hunter armed with a bow and arrows who may have startled the animal near Yellowstone National Park on Saturday, wildlife officials said.

The 40-year-old man was airlifted to a hospital suffering from a broken arm and wounds to his hand that required surgery, but his injuries were not life-threatening, said Gregg Losinski, regional conservation educator with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game.

The attack was the latest in an unusual spate of bear attacks in the Yellowstone area this year. Losinski said the man and a hunting partner were seeking elk near Island Park, Idaho, south of the Montana border, when they startled a bear.

The bear charged at the hunter, who was nearer the animal than his partner. The partner used a bear spray canister, which shoots an aerosol mixture of hot pepper, as the animal retreated.

Idaho conservation officers said early indications suggested the bear was a grizzly but they were awaiting confirmation from DNA evidence gathered from the scene.

Wildlife officials decided not to capture the animal, based on the description of the attack provided by the hunters, both from Island Park, and an investigation of the scene.

"It's very clear from the incident that the bear was surprised and ran away. It did not intend to kill or consume the men," said Losinski, who is a member of a federal-state task force on grizzly bears.

Thousands of black bears roam Idaho but their out-sized, hump-shouldered grizzly cousins are fewer in number. There are about 600 grizzlies in the greater Yellowstone area, which spans parts of Wyoming, Idaho and Montana.

Grizzly attacks on humans are rare in the Northern Rockies, where the vast majority of conflicts between people and bears involve damage to property -- from trash cans to livestock -- by the bruins.

Even so, the number of deadly grizzly encounters in the region so far in 2011 is higher than the average of one every two years, government figures show.

In July, a female grizzly in Yellowstone killed a hiker it perceived as a threat to its two cubs in the park's first fatal mauling since 1986.

Then last month, park officials said a grizzly had also killed another hiker whose body was found on one of the park's backcountry trails amid circumstances that remained under investigation.

Earlier this month in Montana, a grizzly attacked a hunter in what has been described as the state's first such incident in a decade to result in a death.

In that case, a Nevada man hunting black bears in the rugged mountains of northwest Montana was assaulted by a wounded grizzly on September 16. He was then inadvertently shot and killed by a friend targeting the attacking bear in an attempt to save him, officials said.

Grizzly bears are protected in the Lower 48 states under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, making it illegal to kill them unless they are threatening human life.

Kindergartener brings crack pipe, meth for show-and-tell (BLOG)

ST. LOUIS (Reuters) - A kindergartener in rural Sweet Springs, Missouri, brought a bag of crystal meth and a crack pipe to school for show-and-tell, but an alert teacher kept the boy from sharing his treasure with others at the school, an official said on Tuesday.

"He was very excited when he got to school," Superintendent Donna Wright said of the September 6 incident. "But I don't think he knew what he had."

A teacher recognized the drugs and pipe and police were called to the elementary school. "It didn't ever get into the classroom," Wright added.

"That was a first for show-and-tell in this town," Police Chief Richard Downing said. He added that the boy's mother, Michelle Cheatham, 32, was arrested later on drug charges and released on bail.

"It was shocking," Wright said. "We're not experienced with dealing with this."

The town, located 66 miles east of Kansas City on the Blackwater River, has 1,500 residents and about 425 students in its school system.

1-in-3,200 chance you'll be hit by fiery satellite chunks on Friday (BLOG)

Small fiery pieces of what was once a climate-monitoring satellite will hurtle towards the Earth's surface this Friday.

Unless you live in Greenland, Siberia or Antarctica, watch out for dazzling lights in the sky as red-hot lumps of NASA-grade aluminium descend upon our planet.

The space agency predicts that the debris from the 20-year-old Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) has a 1-in-3,200 chance of hitting a person, a scenario they consider "extremely remote". It is mostly likely the expensive shards will plummet into the sea, NASA said.

Sadly, if you do manage to catch a chunk of satellite, the US government expressly forbids you from selling it on eBay. The smouldering lump will remain the property of the United States and must be turned over to local police.

Most of the 6.5-tonne craft will burn up in the Earth's atmosphere, but NASA debris experts say that at least 26 large pieces of the satellite will survive the scorching temperatures of atmospheric re-entry.

And they could land anywhere between the latitudes of Northern Canada and southern South America – an area comprising most of the world.

The climate taster has been orbiting the Earth, sampling the ozone layer and chemical compounds in the upper atmosphere. When the $750m UARS satellite was launched in 1991, NASA intended it to last for three years. But it kept going until 2005 when NASA ordered the satellite to burn its remaining fuel and prepare for a suicide dive to Earth.

The last of its fuel is now gone, and the UARS has been gradually pulled closer to Earth. Some recent solar activity has also advanced its descent. This activity can cause the Earth's atmosphere to heat and expand, increasing drag on spacecraft.


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Sperm bank: Redheads need not apply (BLOG)

Stock of red-haired donors 'is about to explode,' says agency director:

If you’ve got red hair, don't bother donating sperm at Cryos International, one of the world’s largest sperm banks.

"We have nothing against red-haired donors," Cryos agency director Ole Schou told msnbc.com Monday. "Our stock is about to explode. We have just too many on stock in relation to the demand for the time being."

Demand for redheads is still high in Ireland, according the clinic, but apparently it’s not enough to persuade officials at Cryos sperm bank to continue accepting them. It has 140,000 doses of sperm from red heads, and that’s enough.

"What we need is brown-eyed Scandinavians/Caucasians and Mediterranean donors and other ethnicities and races," he says. "The problem is that we are located in Scandinavia and 'harvest' donors here but we supply to more than 65 countries all over the whole world. They don’t always want Scandinavian donors out there."

Schou later clarified to msnbc.com that the clinic is not shutting its doors to all red-headed sperm donors -- the specimen cups are still available for those with brown eyes. The issue for Cryos, Schou explains, is too many Scandinavian donors have blond, middle blond, dark blond and red hair, a legacy of their Viking ancestors who also heavily multiplied in Scotland and Ireland.

The sperm bank is also looking for more Black, Asian, Hispanic, Mediterranean and mixed-race donors, Schou says.

"Our function in society is to have all races and all ethnicities. Our problem is that we have too many Scandinavians only," he says.

If you're a blue-eyed redhead looking to donate sperm, you're still welcome at other sperm clinics, although you may be in higher demand if you’re really smart, tall, athletic or musical.

Maryann Brown, chief executive officer of International Cryogenics in Birmingham, Mich., one of the first sperm banks in the U.S., hasn't experienced an anti-red bias. The clinic has "a good call for redheads."

Prospective parents often do have very specific requests when it comes to sperm donors, Brown says.

When parents are seeking sperm, she says, they often prefer donors who are athletically or musically inclined, and they prefer donors who are educated. Sometimes they even want a specific blood type.

"Some people are very interested in their looks and even the shape of their face, and how tall the family members are," she says. "They want all kinds of ethnic backgrounds and eye color including green, hazel, brown and blue."

msnbc

Speaking from his office in Denmark, Schou explains the agency also won’t take any Scandinavian donors for the time being — unless they have brown eyes.

Disabled man forced to stand barefoot in ant hill (BLOG)

PLANT CITY, Fla. (AP) — Authorities say a Florida caretaker forced a mentally disabled man to stand barefoot on fire ant hills as punishment for stealing money.

Hillsborough County Sheriff's deputies have charged 21-year-old Quentin Shunell Amos with abuse of a disabled adult.

Authorities say Amos thought the victim stole money from the staff and forced him to place his hands and feet on several ant beds at the Plant City MENTOR group home Sunday. Police say he was bitten multiple times.

Amos was released on $2,000 bond. A telephone listing for him could not be found. A message left for the group home was not immediately returned Thursday.

The state social services department said the home has been investigated five times this year, but no indications of abuse or neglect were found.

Coked up: Man arrested with 72 cocaine bags in belly (BLOG, PICS)

Brazilian police have released X-ray images of an Irishman they allege swallowed dozens of cocaine capsules in an attempt to smuggle the drug out of Sao Paolo.

The 20-year-old was arrested Monday at Sao Paolo's Congonhas airport as he tried to board a flight to Lisbon, the Irish Independent reported Friday. He was en route to Brussels, the paper said.

The medical images show 72 bags packed with the drug in his gastrointestinal tract.

Police were alerted after authorities noticed his nervous behavior, according to media reports. They said the drugs would have been worth around 150,000 euros ($206,780).

The man, who has only been identified as P.B.B., was reportedly taken to a hospital where the capsules, weighing a total of about two pounds, were removed from his body. It was unclear how this was achieved.

He has been charged with international drug trafficking and could be jailed for up to 15 years, the Independent said.


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2012 Guinness World Record Holders Named (BLOG)

How did it all start?

On May 4, 1951, Sir Hugh Beaver, then the managing director of the Guinness Brewery, went on a shooting party in North Slob in County Wexford, Ireland. He became involved in an argument over which was the fastest game bird in Europe, then later realized it was impossible to confirm in reference books. He then thought that a book supplying answers to such questions could be popular.

From biggest to smallest, wackiest to weirdest, check out some of the world record breakers honored in the latest Guinness book.

Longest ears on a dog

A Black and Tan Coonhound named Harbor has the longest ears of any living dog, with measurements of 12.25 inches for the left ear and 13.5 inches for the right.

Largest violin

The Vogtland masters of violin- and bow-making in Germany created a violin that is 14 feet long and 4 feet 6 inches at its widest. This fantastic fiddle – plus its 17 feet bow – is seven times larger than the real thing. It takes three people to play a tune on it – one to press the strings and two to move the bow.

Longest fingernails on a pair of female hands
The longest fingernails on a pair of female hands belong to Chris "The Dutchess" Walton and measure in at 10 feet 2 inches for her left hand and 9 feet 7 inches for her right hand for a total of 19 feet 9 inches as measured in Las Vegas, Nev., on Feb. 21, 2011.

Most dogs skipping on the same rope

Who knew dogs could skip rope -- much less 13 of them at the same time. The record was achieved by Uchida Geinousha's "Super Wan Wan Circus" in Japan.

Largest collection of penguins

Birgit Berends had amassed a collection of 11,062 different penguin-related items as of March 14, 2011. From Germany, she started her collection at the age of 18 when she was inspired by the animated series Pingu. Her very first penguin dates back to her days in elementary school.

Most piercings on a male

The most pierced man, Rolf Buchholz, has 453 studs and rings all over his body. Buchholz, from Dortmund, Germany, has – among others – 94 piercings in and around his lips, 25 in his eyebrows, eight in his nose and 278 in his genital area.

Youngest person to fly solo around the world

Barrington Irving, a 23-year-old aerospace student at Florida Memorial University, braved snow, storms and monsoon rains to circumnavigate the globe in his single-engine plane Inspiration, becoming the youngest person, and first black pilot, to achieve the feat. When Barrington found that nobody would lend him an aircraft for his journey, he had one built instead. The Columbia 400 he flew was made entirely from donated parts and assembled for free by the Columbia Aircraft Manufacturing Company.

Largest chocolate bar

Workers and guests at the World's Finest Chocolate company in Chicago admire a 12,290 pound chocolate bar they created to set a new Guinness World Record on Sept. 13, 2011. The bar, which stands nearly 3 feet high and measures 21 feet long, beats the previous record chocolate bar by more than a ton.

Longest domestic cat (and longest domestic cat tail)

At 48.5 inches long, Stewie is the world's longest domestic cat. The 5-year-old Maine Coon is owned by Robin Hendrickson and Erik Brandsness and was measured on Aug. 28, 2010. He also has the longest domestic cat tail at 16.34 inches.

Largest afro

The largest afro measures 7.3 inches high, 7.7 inches wide and 4 feet 4 inches in circumference. It was achieved by Aevin Dougas, who lives in New Orleans.

Longest tongue on a female

Chanel Tapper, pictured from California, has a tongue that measured 3.8 inches from tip to top lip, earning her the title of longest tongue on a female. The outright longest tongue record, though, is held by Stephen Taylor from the U.K. His lengthy licker measured 3.86 inches from tip to lip

Largest collection of cows

Denise Tubangui, from the U.S., has a collection of 2,429 cow-related items as of March 2011. Denise started collecting in 1990 when she saw a cow figurine in her mother's kitchen. Her favorite item is the life-sized calf that her neighbors gave her as a present.

Shortest cat

The shortest cat is Fizz Girl, a 2-year-old female munchkin cat, who measured 6 inches from the floor to the shoulder. She's owned by Tiffani Kjeldergaard, who lives in San Diego, Calif.

Longest moustache

The longest moustache measures 14 feet and belongs to Ram Singh Chauhan from India.

Largest crocodile in captivity

Cassius, an Australian saltwater crocodile named after Cassius Clay, has been declared the largest crocodile in captivity by the Guinness Book of Records. Cassius measures an impressive 17 feet 11.75 inches and weighs more than 2,000 pounds.

World's shortest living man

Junrey Balawing smiles as he is presented with a Guinness World Records certificate for being the world's shortest living man following the last of a series of measurement conducted in Southern Philippines, Sunday June 12, 2011, his 18th birthday and coincidentally the Philippines' Independence Day. Balawing was officially measured at at 59.93 centimeters, or 23.5 inches.

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French Woman Sues Husband for Lack of Sex (BLOG)

Husbands and wives, take note: The phrase, "Not tonight, honey," could end up costing quite a bit more than a bruised ego and grumbled acceptance.

A French wife sued her husband and won about $14,000 because he didn't have sex with her enough, according to Time.

The wife sued her husband about two years ago for the waning bedroom activity over 21 years of marriage, and now the Nice, France, judge has ruled that a lack of copulation is indeed a violation of the marital contract.

"A sexual relationship between husband and wife is the expression of affection they have for each other, and in this case it was absent," the judge ruled, according to the Telegraph. "By getting married, couples agree to sharing their life and this clearly implies they will have sex with each other."

Of course, some men also take extreme measures in dissolving relationships.

In 2009, a North Dakota man requested half the value of his wife's breast job when the two split.

Erik Isaacson appealed his judge's decision to exclude the value of the procedure from the divorce case. The judge worried that if breast implants were considered as marital assets, the precedent would extend to other, more necessary medical procedures like root canals or even hip replacements, according to the Bismarck Tribune.

No argument from Isaacson there: He also wanted his wife's Lasik vision surgery counted as an asset.



One Egyptian woman, however, might have the most valid of the three divorce requests.

According to Urban Titan, the woman had to bring her husband to court because he refused to bathe for their entire first month of marriage.

The man claimed an allergy to water prevented him from maintaining proper hygiene -- and a doctor backed up his excuse.

Though the doctor's validation of the water allergy made ending the marriage more difficult, the woman did eventually get to split from her husband. One can only imagine that she would not be complaining about lack of bedroom activity.

'Wi-fi refugees' shelter in West Virginia mountains (BLOG)

Dozens of Americans who claim to have been made ill by wi-fi and mobile phones have flocked to the town of Green Bank, West Virginia:

There are five billion mobile phone subscriptions worldwide and advances in wireless technology make it increasingly difficult to escape the influence of mobile devices. But while most Americans seem to embrace continuous connectivity, some believe it's making them physically ill.

Diane Schou is unable to hold back the tears as she describes how she once lived in a shielded cage to protect her from the electromagnetic radiation caused by waves from wireless communication.

"It's a horrible thing to have to be a prisoner," she says. "You become a technological leper because you can't be around people.

"It's not that you would be contagious to them - it's what they're carrying that is harmful to you."

Ms Schou is one of an estimated 5% of Americans who believe they suffer from Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity (EHS), which they say is caused by exposure to electromagnetic fields typically created by mobile phones, wi-fi and other electronic equipment.Hiding in a cage

Symptoms range from acute headaches, skin burning, muscle twitching and chronic pain.

"My face turns red, I get a headache, my vision changes, and it hurts to think. Last time [I was exposed] I started getting chest pains - and to me that's becoming life-threatening," Ms Schou says.

To alleviate the pain, her husband built an insulated living space known as a Faraday Cage.

He covered a wooden frame with two layers of wire mesh and a door that could be sealed shut to prevent radio waves from entering.

Diane spent much of her time inside it, sleeping on a twin mattress on a plywood base.

"At least I could see my husband on the outside, I could talk to him," she says.

Diane believes her illness was triggered by emissions from a mobile phone mast.

Her symptoms were so severe that she abandoned her family farm in the state of Iowa and moved to Green Bank, West Virginia - a tiny village of 143 residents in the heart of the Allegheny Mountains.Outlawed wireless technology

Green Bank is part of the US Radio Quiet Zone, where wireless is banned across 13,000 sq miles (33,000 sq km) to prevent transmissions interfering with a number of radio telescopes in the area.

The largest is owned by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and enables scientists to listen to low-level signals from different places in the universe.

Others are operated by the US military and are a critical part of the government's spy network.

As a result of the radio blackout, the Quiet Zone has become a haven for people like Diane, desperate to get away from wireless technology.

"Living here allows me to be more of a normal person. I can be outdoors. I don't have to stay hidden in a Faraday Cage," she says.

"I can see the sunrise, I can see the stars at night, and I can be in the rain.

"Here in Green Bank allows me to be with people. People here do not carry cell phones so I can socialise.

"I can go to church, I can attend some celebrations, I can be with people. I couldn't do that when I had to remain in the Faraday Cage."

But EHS is not medically recognised in the US.Debated 'condition'

The wireless association, CTIA, says that scientific evidence overwhelmingly shows that wireless devices, with the limits established by government regulators, do not pose a public health risk or cause any adverse health effects.

And the World Health Organization, while acknowledging that the symptoms are genuine and can be severe, says: "EHS has no clear diagnostic criteria and there is no scientific basis to link EHS symptoms to EMF (electromagnetic field) exposure. Further, EHS is not a medical diagnosis, nor is it clear that it represents a single medical problem."

However, new research by scientists at Louisiana State University and published by the International Journal of Neuroscience, claims to show that EHS can be caused by low frequency electromagnetic fields found in the environment.

"The study provides direct evidence that linking human symptoms with environmental factors, in this case EMF," says Dr Andrew Marino, a neurology professor who led the study.

"It's a watershed in that regard. There have been no previous studies that scientifically assess whether electromagnetic fields in the environment could produce human symptoms.

"And the symptoms matter because they are the first steps that show how EMFs produce human disease."

Scientists conducted a number of tests on a 35-year-old physician who had diagnosed herself with EHS.

She was seated on a wooden chair while voltage was applied to metal plates for pulses of 90 seconds to create a series of magnetic fields. The woman was asked to describe her symptoms after each exposure and after random sham exposures when, unknown to her, there was no voltage.

She reported headaches, pain and muscle twitching during the genuine exposures and no symptoms for the majority of the sham exposures.

The scientists concluded that such consistency could not be attributed to chance.

But other experts still disagree that a link exists.Technological 'ignorance'

Bob Park is a physics professor at the University of Maryland.

He says that the radiation emitted by wi-fi is simply too weak to cause the type of changes in the body's chemistry that could make people sick.

"The bigger problem that we face is that in our society, driven by technological change, people have very little education," he says.

"There are lots of things people need to learn and they're not learning it. The thing that's going to kill them is ignorance."

Seventy-year-old Nichols Fox says she understands such scepticism - it took several years before she became convinced that her debilitating pain and fatigue were caused by electromagnetic radiation emitted by her computer.

"Towards the end of my normal life when I still could watch television I could actually cut my pain off and on with the remote control device," she says. "It was such an enormously clear association there was just no denying it."

Her symptoms are so severe that she has isolated herself almost entirely, living in a remote house surrounded by fields and woods just outside the Quiet Zone. She says even the low-level electromagnetic fields generated there affect her health.

She uses hardly any electricity - her refrigerator operates on gas, light comes from kerosene lamps and a wood-burning stove provides most of her heat.

A thermostat is set to switch on electric heaters if the temperature drops to a level where she is in danger of hypothermia.

"It's so important that people understand that this is a very serious disability, it's a life-changing disability. It leads to an earlier death - I have absolutely no doubt about that and I think it's just unfortunate that this is not recognised," she says.

But even in this secluded part of America, the incursion of wireless technology is relentless. Planning permission has been granted for a cell tower a few miles from her home, and Nichols says she'll have to move.

"I'm getting older and I really don't know where I'm going to go or what I'm going to do," she says. "It's really quite frightening."

bbc

Principal makes cheerleaders don sweats under risque skirts (BLOG)

When San Jose (Calif.) Piedmont principal Traci Williams decided to actually enforce a longstanding ban on miniskirts at the school, her school-wide dress-code sweeps found a very surprised target: The school's cheerleading squad. Now members of the Pirates' spirit team are facing a season wearing sweatpants under their uniforms during school to avoid violating the dress code, a measure that they're none too pleased about.

As first reported by the San Jose Mercury News, the move to make cheerleaders wear sweats under their uniforms was enforced so they could fall in line with a dress code that requires all skirts or shorts to stretch lower than mid-thigh. As you can see in the photo at right, the Piedmont cheerleaders' custom-tailored uniforms come relatively close to achieving that benchmark, but Williams declared that they didn't quite hit it, leading to the necessary adjustments.

Administrators feel that they have a valid reason for stepping up enforcement of the miniskirt ban. While standards in teen clothing in school can vary widely from state to state, Williams described the attire worn by many of the students at Piedmont as ranging from slightly inappropriate to nearly lewd.

"Pockets are hanging out," Williams told the Mercury News of skirts that had been identified in recent clothing sweeps. "Cheeks are hanging out. We don't want them bending over."

While the cheerleaders feel the school administration should ease up on its enforcement of the rule, the Mercury News reported that plenty of other students had been sent into a special building until their parents arrived with a change of clothes, all because their skirts were deemed to be too skimpy.

The difference, of course, is that the Pirates cheerleaders are wearing a custom-tailored, $300 school uniform during classes, all as part of a drive to improve school spirit on game days.

"This is really unfair to us," Piedmont senior cheerleader Antonia Bavilacqua told the Mercury News. The skirts are still OK for games, just not during school. "We're just sad and hurt. It's our school colors and spirit. And they're making us feel like outcasts."

Now Bavilacqua is leading a charge to try and get Williams to ease up on her enforcement of the rule, citing both a prior case in Florida, common sense (another cheerleader cited the weather concerns, saying "It's 95 degrees outside"), and fashion sense as reasons to allow the cheerleaders to wear their uniforms in school one day a week.

After all, as one of the squad's other senior cheerleaders said, wearing sweatpants under a miniskirt is, "dorky."




Yet it doesn't appear that Williams has any plans of budging on her ruling, at least for the moment. If anything, her commitment to enforcing the miniskirt ban for cheerleaders and the rest of the school was only reinforced after attending the Pirates' football game against Evergreen Valley (Calif.) High last week and surveying their cheerleaders' uniforms.

"Their skirts were mid-thigh," Williams said. "If our cheerleader's skirts were that long, this wouldn't be an issue."