Earl Bockenfeld: Miscelleous

Friends protest Pluto's demotion

Sat, 02 Sep 2006 20:20:13 GMT

Friends protest Pluto's demotion

Oh great!!! The belligerent and aggressive hallmarks of "short planet syndrome".

Size doesn't matter. That was the message as friends and colleagues of the late Clyde Tombaugh, the astronomer who discovered Pluto, gathered on the New Mexico State University campus to protest the International Astronomical Union's recent decision to strip Pluto of its status as a planet.

Tombaugh's widow, Patricia, and their son, Al Tombaugh, also participated.

NMSU astronomer Bernie McNamara told the crowd that textbooks shouldn't be rewritten.

"Why not? Because the debate is not over," McNamara said.

The IAU determined last week that a planet must orbit the sun and be large enough to assume a nearly round shape, as well as "clear the neighborhood around its orbit." Pluto's oblong orbit overlaps Neptune's, which led the IAU to downsize the solar system to eight planets from the traditional nine.

McNamara argued that only about 400 of the union's thousands of members were present when the Aug. 24 vote was taken.

"This was not a statement by the astronomical community at large," he said, adding that a petition opposing the IAU definition of a planet is circulating among the world's planetary scientists and astronomers.

Tombaugh was 24 when he discovered Pluto while working at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Ariz., in 1930. He came to NMSU in 1955 and founded the school's research astronomy department.

His legacy is visible across the city, where an observatory, a campus street and an elementary school bear his name.

Some say Tombaugh's discovery was significant because it took 60 years for stronger telescopes to locate another object with an unusual orbit like Pluto's, and 73 years before scientists discovered a bigger object in the area.

"Clyde Tombaugh was an American hero," said Herb Beebe, a longtime colleague. "For that reason alone, Pluto's status as a full-fledged planet should be kept."

Don't Leave Home Without Your Condom-On

Fri, 30 Jun 2006 06:59:24 GMT

Don't Leave Home Without Your Condom-On

Completely safe? Lab Tested for Your Safety On Mice!

Condoms aren't that hard to use; any flight attendant would be happy to demonstrate. But for men who just can't seem to learn, here's an infomercial for the Condom-On. "Using technology developed by NASA for the Mars Lander, the Condom-On has been aerodynamically optimized in wind tunnels to prevent air drag and ensure that your condom arrives at its destination ASAP," says the Web site. There. Problem solved.

Via Boing Boing.

But Joshua Davis, who created it, says "I actually think this could be a viable product but I don't have any background in manufacturing so I decided to just shoot the commercial and put the site up."

Let's hope he's less serious about the "i-Cut Home Circumcision device" he's also hawking. That really looks dangerous.

Bonus: we're not naming names, but viewers may recognize a certain golden-voiced jazz moonlighter and Wired Magazine senior editor in the ad.

Link to website, direct link to video.

Arizona Looks To Run Montana-Style Anti-Meth Ads

Wed, 19 Apr 2006 05:24:42 GMT

Arizona Looks To Run Montana-Style Anti-Meth Ads

In Montana, where the campaign is hard to miss, it's been credited with a 30 percent decline in use of the drug among teens. People are often more disturbed by the truth then a lie.

THE MONTANA METH PROJECT

The gritty, in-your-face ads on television, radio, billboards and newspapers have exposed Montana teenagers to the ugly truth about the evil grip of meth addiction.

They're as subtle as a sledgehammer.

A billboard shows a grungy, dirty toilet with the words, "No one thinks they'll lose their virginity here. Meth will change that."

One TV spot shows a young man covered with scabs harassing people in a coin laundry and beating them up for loose change. At the end of the ad, the teen runs up to his pre-meth self and screams, "This wasn't supposed to be your life!"

Fueled by the deep pockets of software billionaire Thomas Siebel, the Montana Meth Project has become a national success story with its often-shocking content. Now, Arizona officials are close to bringing the provocative ad campaign to the state, where meth has taken hold in cities and suburbs, rural areas, affluent houses and lower-income neighborhoods.

On Tuesday, county and state officials, including staff members from the Governor's Office and the Attorney General's Office, will fly to Helena, Mont., to watch the latest round of TV spots and meet with Siebel. The multimillion-dollar ad campaign, "Not Even Once," has saturated the airwaves in Montana, helping reduce meth use among teens by as much as 30 percent.

"I just don't think we have time to waste," Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard said. "I don't think there is hardly a family in Arizona that doesn't have some tragedy associated with meth. It's scary that kids think this is a drug you can experiment with at parties and it won't hurt you."

"We need teenagers talking to teenagers."

The goal is to have an Arizona Meth Project up and running by August, Goddard said. A non-profit organization in Arizona would run the project and continually raise funds. An advisory group, comprised of elected officials, doctors, business owners, educators and tribal officials, would be set up.

Dr. Marc Matthews, director of the trauma unit at Maricopa Medical Center, has seen the physical, emotional and psychological devastation of meth addiction firsthand.

"It's absolutely brutal," Matthews said. "The American people are unwilling to recognize the horror that is happening every day here in Arizona and across the country. The drug is almost maniacal. Once it gets hold of you, that's it."

This campaign takes a lot of hits from ad professionals, which seems strange to me. Toilet sex and flesh slicing are on the minimal end of what meth can inspire.

I am sure that those who have issues with these campaigns have never had a father/son/wife/grandmother who was a junkie... it is a different animal when it is in your backyard and you have to live with it.

I haven't seen these ads but if they are an effective deterrent, then more power to them and the agency that created them. The crack epidemic of the 1980s was very real, and very obvious, to anyone who lived in a city. But that's probably why nobody tried to say its existence was being blown out of proportion. Meth addiction seems to be more of a problem among poor, rural whites who are too often invisible to the media or laughingly dismissed by the general population in "white trash" or "trailer trash" jokes.

14 Things To Do If You Have Missed The Rapture

Mon, 10 Apr 2006 04:38:15 GMT

14 Things To Do If You Have Missed The Rapture

Dude, I can DO this! This is what Grand Theft Auto has been training me for since Vice City.

In pdf or text.

1. DO NOT commit suicide, and stay extremely calm if you have missed the rapture. There will be a period of total chaos, suicides, and heart attacks. People all over the world will be in total chaos. Please understand the fact that you who remain here have missed the rapture, and are living in the tribulation period, and nothing you do can change that fact. Listen! DonÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t look back. Face the fact you've been left, but there still is hope for you!!

2. KEEP A TIME TABLE. Look back and find the date people were reported missing or raptured, mark that date, and put it away. Keep track of the following 7 years. The first three and a half years will not be too bad, but the last three and a half years will be so horrible that human vocabulary is insufficient to describe the events that will take place.

5. BEWARE OF A WORLD CHURCH. This church is not of God. Do not back this church. It is from Satan himself. Do not associate with any kind of world church. Beware of Communist agents who will play the role of pastor. Beware of any big church movement after the rapture. Ask Jesus for a spirit of discernment.

7. DO NOT accept the mark of the beast (666). The Anti-Christ will control the economic system completely, and he will destroy the money system and install a number system either on your hand or your forehead. Do not take this mark. If you do, you will be automatically doomed for eternity. Be prepared if you do not take it. You will be tortured or even put to death, but your soul will be saved in the end. You probably won't be able to buy, sell, or trade anything, but do not take the anti-Christ's number system. Begin now to ask Jesus for strength and boldness. There will be very rough times ahead.

I've Been Tagged - The Meme of Seven

Sun, 08 Jan 2006 20:27:02 GMT

I've Been Tagged - The Meme of Seven

Finally, I'm trying to obey Lance's Meme and responding to his Meme of Seven. Some of my answers are actually serious and truthful.

Thanks Lance, I'll get even with you if I can.

Seven things to do before I die:

1.- Ride on the "Orient Express" train at least from Paris to Venice.
2.- Visit the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland
3.- Ride the "City of New Orleans" train to a rebuilt New Orleans
4.- Ride my mountain bike on the trails around Moab Utah
5.- Revisit battlefield at Gettysburg and monuments in Washington DC
6.- Ride train from Cusco to mountain-top Incas ruins at Machu Picchu
7.- Attend a "Burning Man" happening in the desert

Seven things I cannot do:

1.- Pat my head while rubbing my stomach
2.- Be too good-looking or have too much money
3.- Can't eat and chew food quietly
4.- Can't drive my car without listening to my iPod
5.- Can't organize my work space
6.- Can't find the CD/DVD that I need right now
7.- Can't have enough memory and/or disk space on my computer

Seven things I say most often:

1.- Damn
2.- God damn it
3.- Where's mine
4.- Just a minute Dear, I'm checking my eMail
5.- WTF
6.- Just go ahead and do what you want to, I don't care
7.- This is the worst, at least they can't do anything lower than this

Seven books I love:

1.- HTML for the Web - Elizabeth Castro
2.- The Cuckoo's Egg - Cliff Stall
3.- Best Democracy Money Can Buy - Greg Palast
4.- Rise of the Creative Class - Richard Florida
5.- Secrets & Lies - Bruce Schneier
6.- Body of Secrets - James Bamford
7.- Fast Food Nation - Eric Schlosser

Seven Movies I Watch Over and Over:

1.- High Noon - Gary Cooper
2.- The Gods Must Be Crazy - N! Xau
3.- Tom Jones - Albert Finney
4.- Breaking Away - Dennis Christopher
5.- Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf - Elizabeth Taylor
6.- The Birdcage - Robin Williams
7.- Mister Roberts - Henry Fonda

Seven Songs I Play Over and Over Again:

1.- Who Will Answer - Ed Ames
2.- A Good Hearted Woman in Love with a Good Timin' Man - Waylon Jennings/Willie Nelson
3.- To Beat The Devil - Kris Kristofferson
4.- To All The Girls I've Loved - Willie Nelson/Julio Iglesias
5.- Frankie and Johnnie - Glen Yarbrough
6.- As Long as the Grass Shall Grow and Rivers Flow - Johnny Cash
7.- Suzanne Takes You Down - Judy Collins

Seven celebrity crushes:

1.- Angelina Jolie

2.- David Strathairn
3.- Charlize Theron
4.- Christina Applegate
5.- David Letterman
6.- Jon Stewart
7.- George Clooney

Bin Laden Niece in Glamour Shots

Sat, 24 Dec 2005 02:11:50 GMT

Bin Laden Niece in Glamour Shots

The niece of Osama Bin Laden has posed for provocative photographs for an American magazine.

Wafah Dufour, an aspiring musician and model, is the daughter of the al-Qaeda leader's half-brother Yeslam.

She appears stripped to ostrich feather lingerie, and in a bubble bath, in photos for American GQ magazine.

US-born, she says she is an American, and distances herself from her uncle. "Everyone relates me to that man, and I have nothing to do with him," she says.

Ms Dufour, 26, took her mother's maiden name after the events of 11 September 2001.

She lived in Saudi Arabia, where Bin Laden is from, until she was 10, before moving on to Geneva and back to the US.

'Like any New Yorker'

She says she never sees any of the extended Bin Laden clan, including her father.

"There are 400 other people related to him, but they are all in Saudi Arabia, so nobody's going to get tarred with it. I'm the only one here," she said.

Her father and Osama Bin Laden are among more than 50 children fathered by Mohammed Bin Laden, a Yemeni immigrant to Saudi Arabia, and construction magnate.

Ms Dufour was in Geneva when the 11 September 2001 attacks on the US, masterminded by her uncle, were launched.

She said: "I was freaking out, crying hysterically, watching this in horror. I was like 'Somebody's bombing my city, and I wanna go home!'"

"I was born in the States, and I want people to know I'm American, and I want people to understand that I'm like anyone in New York. For me, it's home," she said.

'Girls Gone Wild' Creator Probed About Police Record

Wed, 21 Dec 2005 05:13:21 GMT

'Girls Gone Wild' Creator Probed About Police Record

The creator of the "Girls Gone Wild" video series was barraged with pointed questions in court this morning designed to counter his claims that he was the victim of robbery, kidnapping and extortion at his Bel-Air mansion last year.

Joe Francis, 32, who made a fortune persuading young women to bare their breasts for the camera, testified that an armed intruder stole cash and possessions and then forced him to make a humiliating, half-naked video.

Francis identified his assailant as Darnell Riley, 28, who is accused of six felony counts of burglary, robbery, carjacking, kidnapping and attempted extortion.

In Los Angeles County Superior Court today, Riley's lawyer fired back at Francis, grilling him on his own police record.

Defense attorney Ronald Richards asked Francis about a theft arrest in North Carolina, and a case pending in Florida alleging that he filmed minors for one of his videotapes and was charged with racketeering, prostitution, obscenity, child pornography and possession of an illegal drug.

"Is it true you have a 47-count indictment against you in Florida?" asked defense attorney Ronald Richards.

"I cannot answer any questions about this case, per advice of counsel," Francis answered.

Francis declined to answer half a dozen times more, citing his right against self-incrimination under the Fifth Amendment.

Under questioning by Richards, Francis acknowledged in the past, he had accused four other people of extortion. But he said those cases, about which no details were available, were separate from today's charges.

"Nobody else broke into my house and put a gun to my head," Francis testified.

Francis testified that after he returned home from a night of partying Jan. 22, 2004, Riley broke in, pulled a gun on him and videotaped him, seminude, making sexually humiliating comments about himself. He then threatened to distribute the video unless Francis paid him $300,000 to $500,000.

Riley has pleaded not guilty to the charges. His preliminary hearing is expected to end today

Police were tipped to the case by tabloid magnate and socialite Paris Hilton, Francis' former girlfriend, who heard discussion of the alleged plot at a party.

Over prosecutor Hoon Chun's objections, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Bernard F. Kemper on Monday allowed the media to film portions of the partially obscured video when it was presented in court, but banned broadcasters from televising Francis' testimony.

Francis said Riley took his watch, $1,100 in cash and his cellphone but demanded more. "He said, 'I need $100,000 in cash right now or you're going to die,'" Francis testified.

Francis was unapologetic this afternoon following his testimony.

"Even if you think I'm a bad guy cause I do 'Girls gone Wild', it didn't give him (Riley) the right too break into my home and rob me and threaten me," Francis told reporters outside the courtroom.

"I don't want attention from this in my life," Francis said. "To relive this is even more painful."

Finally Six Flags' Mr. Six Getting Deep-Sixed

Wed, 30 Nov 2005 19:45:14 GMT

Finally Six Flags' Mr. Six Getting Deep-Sixed

Six Flags... the Wal*Mart of amusement parks

Mr. Six, that freakishly festive old bald guy (actually, probably not old) with the oversized glasses and bad makeup is won't be invading our televisions again with his manic dancing and annoying "We Like to Party" song.

Now new owners will have finally put him to rest. He's not an appealing character, and he would seem to frighten some children. (He frightens some adults.)

Mr. Six memorabilia flies off the shelves. The look-alike contests draw hundreds. He has his own roller coaster, Mr. Six's Pandemonium. All in all, Mr. Six has been a huge, if annoying, success. Despite this, Dan Snyder, who took control of Six Flags amusement parks along with two partners yesterday, plans to force the old spokesgeezer into retirement, the New York Post reports. Apparently, Snyder and his team want to shift the primary marketing focus from thrill-seeking teenagers to mothers with young children.

Mr. Six did like to party, but the party's over.

Happy Thanksgiving

Wed, 23 Nov 2005 22:37:35 GMT

Happy Thanksgiving

For all the readers who will be out of town for the festive feasting, have a wonderful Thanksgiving. For all of the rest of you, hang on -- it's a news-filled festival weekend. More to come...

Over 2,000 American young people are not going to be having Thanksgiving dinner with their families on account of George Bush's incompetence and sociopathology.

I pray for Americans like Congressman Murtha and Patrick Fitzgerald this Thanksgiving. They and millions like them are rays of hope in a desolate landscape.

President Bush has pardoned two Thanksgiving turkeys, and they are headed for Disneyland.

Marshmallow and its backup, Yam, are being shipped to Disneyland in California, where Marshmallow will serve as grand marshall of the annual holiday parade.

Turkeys have been known to look into the sky when it rains and drown themselves, earning it the reputation as the world's dumbest animal. Today at the White House, the turkey met his match.

Meanwhile, the unpardoned Dick Cheney is presiding over the mass torture of the turkeys.

Ha. So ANOTHER turkey figured out how to get a free pass into the White House press corps....

Fan Who Took Favre's Ball Says He's Innocent

Tue, 01 Nov 2005 22:59:23 GMT

Fan Who Took Favre's Ball Says He's Innocent

Don't let the fact that you were filmed stripping the ball out of an NFL quarterback's hands on live television stop you from pleading innocent to the charge

CINCINNATI - The fan who ran out of the stands and snatched a football from Brett Favre's hand pleaded innocent to a variety of charges at his arraignment Monday, while the Bengals promised not to let it happen again.

Gregory Gall, 31, of Cincinnati, is accused of resisting arrest, trespass and disorderly conduct while intoxicated. He was released on his own recognizance following his appearance in Municipal Court.

The Bengals are reviewing their security measures to prevent a repeat of Gall's run on the field, which interrupted the final minute of Cincinnati's 21-14 victory over the Green Bay Packers.

NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said Monday that the league doesn't get involved in team security issues.

"It's a local matter," he said. "If there's any questions, we can assist them. But it appears to be an isolated incident, and the Bengals are reviewing it."

Favre drove the Packers to the Cincinnati 28 in the final minute and took a snap from center when Gall ran onto the field, prompting officials to blow the play dead.

Gall approached Favre from behind, snatched the ball from his throwing hand and ran to the other end of the field with security guards in pursuit. He was finally tackled and taken from the field.

The five-minute delay gave the Bengals time to regroup. They sacked Favre on the next play, and the clock ran out after Favre faked a spike and wound up running downfield. He flipped the ball forward illegally as the game ended.

Several Packers complained about security, noting that the fan could have hurt Favre. Bengals coach Marvin Lewis acknowledged after the game that the delay broke the Packers' momentum, and joked that the team would pay the fan $20.

A day later, Lewis said fans must be kept off the field.

"That's the first fear you have — there's a guy running clean at Brett Favre," Lewis said Monday. "That's why you can't allow that to occur. Our people that handle security feel very badly about it and will take steps (so) that kind of thing never happens here again at Paul Brown Stadium."

Sports leagues have struggled with the question of how to prevent fans from going on the field. In September 2002, a father and his son ran onto the field during a

Chicago White Sox game and attacked Kansas City first base coach Tom Gamboa.

A fan went onto the field at halftime of the Patriots' Super Bowl win over Carolina two years ago, briefly delaying the second-half kickoff.

The NFL required all 32 teams to conduct pat-downs of fans entering their stadiums before games this season. Local government officials initially balked, but the pat-downs were conducted before each of the last two Bengals home games.

Big Easy lets 'The Ghoul Times Roll'

Tue, 01 Nov 2005 22:39:25 GMT

Big Easy lets 'The Ghoul Times Roll'

Ghost town alive. After the real horror of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans revels in 'Mardi Goth'

Revellers get political in the French Quarter Saturday night. The "You're doing a great job, Brownie" sign is an ironic paraphrase of U.S. President George W. Bush, who praised former FEMA director Mike Brown's handling of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina before Brown resigned under a torrent of criticism.

The margarita Diane Spieler sips during her nocturnal masquerade on Bourbon St. perfectly matches the glow-in-the-dark green of her hideous face, airbrushed in dreadful detail with reptilian scales and skeletal hollows. Is she a radioactive ghoul? An alien sea serpent?

"If somebody asks me, I just tell 'em I'm Katrina," the 57-year-old New Orleans accountant says, glaring through ghostly pale contact lenses beneath hair molded into spikes. "Doesn't it look mean and freaky?"

Two months after the monster hurricane's horrifying rampage, Halloween has brought back the French Quarter's thirst for theatric horror and debauchery, its Mardi Goth mojo in the heart of a city long known for its reverence for voodoo and Anne Rice's glamorously gothic vampire novels.

"Halloween is the best kept local secret. It's shoulder-to-shoulder, just like Mardi Gras, but everybody's in costume,"

Spieler said late Saturday, the spooky celebration in full swing two days early. "It's the first big, fun, drinking night since the hurricane."

Much of New Orleans remains a ghost town, but the French Quarter teems with wicked witches and pimps in purple velvet. Elvis struts the sidewalk flanked by Supergirl and Marilyn Monroe. An Amazonian blond's skimpy cop outfit flirts with indecent exposure. Others share the Katrina theme, dressing as discarded refrigerators and the blue tarps that cover broken city roofs.

"Enough cleanup! Time for a drink!" said Bobby Hughes, 23, a Loyola University graduate student sporting a blond pigtailed wig, a plaid skirt that is too short on his 6-foot-6 frame, and a blouse knotted above his waist that bares traces of a red bra.

"Helga's my name tonight," said Hughes, joined by girlfriend Kat McKibben, a "love bug" with floppy antenna, feather boa, butterfly wings and fuzzy slippers. "You're hot!" a passing man tells Hughes.

Spared the brunt of Katrina's wrath and the flooding that followed when levees ruptured, the French Quarter has steadily revived since reopening a month ago. Its bars, restaurants and T-shirt shops have been kept afloat by a transient stream of construction workers, relief volunteers and journalists.

Trash cans overflow with discarded beer cups. Shoes stick to sidewalks lacquered in spilled liquor. Outside the Bourbon Street Blues Company, a woman lifts her shirt in return for a shower of beads tossed from the balcony.

"Different parts of the city, the Garden District and everything, are not the same at all," said Dawn Carroll, 33, dressed as a "Tool Time" character from the sitcom Home Improvement, only with a naughty tool belt. "This makes you think that (New Orleans) is going to come back. It'll be back full force."

Bourbon St. might not be kid-friendly, and many neighbourhoods remain too wrecked for door-to-door trick or treating, but children haven't been neglected.

Outside De La Salle High School in the Garden District, little Batmen and butterfly-winged fairies fill sacks with chocolate bars and lollipops from bowls on tables lining the sidewalks. Indian warriors and cheerleaders dance to zydeco music, oblivious to the downed power lines in the median of St. Charles Ave.

Cherly Oncale worked on her son's costume for two weeks during their hurricane exile in Atlanta. Their flight from Katrina took them to five hotels in five cities. They returned two weeks ago to a friend's house.

"We need a good party right now, to kind of reground us," Oncale said.

Date For Da Vinci Code Trial Set

Mon, 31 Oct 2005 06:07:37 GMT

Date For Da Vinci Code Trial Set

Lawyers acting for Dan Brown, the world's highest-paid author, and the two men who claim he stole their ideas, met at the High Court in London yesterday to agree details of a trial scheduled to begin on February 27.

Two historians, Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, are suing Brown's publishers, Random House, claiming that Brown lifted "the whole architecture" of the research from their 1982 book, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, for The Da Vinci Code, Brown's global hit of a religious thriller.

Baigent and Leigh's non-fiction work presents the theory that Jesus and Mary Magdalene married and had a child, and that their descendants have carried on their bloodline to the present day. This theme forms the basis for the action in Brown's novel, which has sold 29m copies worldwide, earning its author £45m in the last year alone.

The novel's suggestion that the Catholic church has spent the last 2,000 years working tirelessly to cover up the relationship between Jesus and Mary Magdalene has roused the ire of the Vatican, which was driven in March to appoint a cardinal to rebut what it calls the "shameful and unfounded errors" contained in the book.

However, the combination of the central conspiracy theory and the clues, anagrams and puzzles that litter the pages are central to the appeal of the book, which has been translated into over 40 different languages.

Commentators have already pointed out that the name of one of the major characters, Sir Leigh Teabing, is an anagram of the names Leigh and Baigent, although there is no sign of Henry Lincoln, the third author of the 1982 book, who has chosen not to take part in this suit.

This is not the first time that Dan Brown has been called to defend himself over the provenance of his novel. In August, he won a court case brought by another author, Lewis Perdue, who claimed that The Da Vinci Code reproduced elements from two of his novels, Daughter of God and The Da Vinci Legacy. Perdue had sought damages of $150m (£84.2m), and had requested that the court block further distribution of the book and stop work on the movie adaptation currently in production, starring Tom Hanks and the French actor Audrey Tautou in the lead roles.

Following yesterday's discussions between the lawyers, Random House says that a "substantial" part of the claim by Baigent and Leigh has been dropped. The publishing house adds that it is "delighted with this result, which reinforces [its] long-held contention that this is a claim without merit."

Hair Didn't Have Anything To Do With It

Thu, 27 Oct 2005 04:37:57 GMT

Hair Didn't Have Anything To Do With It

To superstitious athletes, hair is a big thing. They'll grow good-luck beards, carve out funny-looking goatees, shave their heads bald. Somehow, this is supposed to improve their chances of winning. So, what are we to make of this year's World Series? The Astros were the ones messing about with their hair, and they're just got swept four games to none. (They grew beards, then shaved them. Who knows what they'll do now that it's over.) The White Sox, meanwhile, have a more unusual superstition -- they think it's a good thing to have Journey's Steve Perry follow them around. Hair is less important. Or is it? Back on Sept. 2, the team did host a Mullet Night promotion at U.S. Cellular Field. It seemed like no big deal. But before Mullet Night, the Sox had lost 15 of 22 games at home, and they had a losing record overall for August. After Mullet Night, they picked things up, steamrolled the Indians, the Red Sox, the Angels and the Astros, and now they just won their first world championship in 88 years. Coincidence?

Viking Love Boat Boys Are Just Boys

Wed, 19 Oct 2005 04:07:42 GMT

Viking Love Boat Boys Are Just Boys

If the allegations are true, it’s awful. We understand that athletes aren’t necessarily role models, but we at least expect them to abide by the basic laws of the state. Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty

How sad is it when the biggest news about the team you grew up dying to beat is about something that didn’t even happen on the football field? Of course, with the Vikings mailing in their first four games this year, a good sex scandal might be just what the team needs to divert the attention of fans and the media from their miserable 1-3 start.

Personally, I don’t much care what adults do in their spare time. It’s a free country, and when you have a collection of large men hopped up on testosterone and possessing more money than sense, what do you think is going to happen? Of course, If laws were broken, then the legal system should be allowed to do what it does. If not, then those folks who in the meantime all falling all over themselves in fits of righteous, moralizing indignation need to just shut the hell up.

Of course, given that the Vikings were a team in disarray before this alleged incident occurred, it’s not as if this is going to make putting Humpty Dumpty back together again any easier.

The names of 17 Minnesota Vikings who were identified as being aboard two charter boats last week where sex parties allegedly took place have been given to Vikings officials in a controversy that has put the team’s bid for a new stadium and its standing among fans and community leaders in jeopardy.

At least six crew members who allege they were confronted with out-of-control Vikings players on the boats met Wednesday with Hennepin County Sheriff’s detectives who are investigating allegations of prostitution and lewd behavior….

The claims involve players aboard two boats on Lake Minnetonka. Because of the ongoing investigation, the repercussions are hard to gauge. But what is known is this: The NFL once again is monitoring a legal issue involving the Vikings, anti-stadium opponents are having a field day, public relations is at its lowest point in memory and the Vikings are the butt of jokes.

At the time of the party, Vikings officials were heavily lobbying state legislators to convene a special session to get public funding for a stadium….

No one has been charged with a crime in connection with the charter boat cruises, which occurred last Thursday night on Lake Minnetonka….

Employees of the boat company and a resident of the lake community of Mound described players having public sex, drinking heavily, urinating on a lawn and aggressively propositioning female crew members.

Yep, just a bunch of rich, randy, spoiled athletes having some good, clean fun during their bye week…or breaking a few laws along the way. Who knows what actually happened? Hey, you must as well get your fun in now. Before too much longer, winter will descend on the Frozen Tundra, and the only things on Lake Minnetonka will be snowmobiles. Kinda tough to have a sex party on one of those, eh??

The Viking's next game may be on CourtTV.

The Burger King King Guy Scares Me Alot

Mon, 17 Oct 2005 17:37:39 GMT

The Burger King King Guy Scares Me Alot
The Spot: It's morning. Birds are chirping. A man wakes up in his bed … and discovers he's not alone! Next to him on the mattress there is some sort of royal personage: a king, clad in burgundy robes and a crown. But the king's head appears to be made of plastic and is perhaps three times too large for his body. He hands the stunned man a breakfast sandwich. They laugh together.

How did the fast-food wars become a frightfest? A while ago, we wrote about Ronald McDonald and coulrophobia—aka, fear of clowns. But in recent months, it's Burger King’s mascot who's been giving people the willies. Check out the fear and loathing that a quick blog search pulls up: "If I were to ever chop down a tree to find the creepy King standing behind it with a nasty sandwich on a silver platter ... well I would all of a sudden have a new use for my saw." • "If I saw the Burger King standing at my bedroom window, behind a tree or at the other end of a log, I think I can safely say I would freak out completely. I would never eat anything he gave me." • "If that sumbitch just appeared out of nowhere, I'd 1) mess myself; 2) kick him in the jimmy; 3) run like hell." • "The reason why I have guns is in case I wake up and some creepy guy in a Burger King mask is looking in my window." • "I had a nightmare last night that he was in league with the gophers in my backyard on a mission to mock me and destroy my lawn. He was standing at the back of my lot line with that disturbing permagrin and sending forth squadrons of the creepy little vermin to dig holes relentlessly." • "If someone stalked me at work, was wearing a costume, wouldn't say a word and then tried to offer me a sandwich, I'd call the police." • "It's just scarey [sic] to look at, especially when he pops up in all the wrong places." • "He's just a creepy S.O.B. I fear him like a clown."

But there's more to it than that. Using a ridiculous plastic head, and an absurd situation, gives this ad an edgier mood—more ironic and wink-wink—than that of your average fast food campaign. And that's the goal. CPB thinks Burger King can differentiate itself with a hipper vibe. Its competitors (namely McDonald's and Wendy's) have more family-friendly images and thus couldn't (or wouldn't) go as far. More Burger King marketing in this edgier mode: the Subservient Chicken Web site. Meanwhile, when McDonald's tries to get hip, they show us kids playing basketball on rollerblades. BK's stuff is just far more subversive. CPB says the core market for fast food is 18- to 35-year-old males, and these are "the most cynical" consumers out there. In setting the mood for the campaign, CPB tries to keep in mind "the cool uncle—the uncle who tells you how things really are, and lets you get away with a little bit more than your mom and dad do."

Your Bike Seat Can Hurt More Than Just Your Butt

Wed, 05 Oct 2005 05:14:29 GMT

Your Bike Seat Can Hurt More Than Just Your Butt

"We make kids wear helmets and knee pads," Dr. Goldstein said. "But no one thinks about protecting the crotch."

A raft of new studies suggest that cyclists, particularly men, should be careful which bicycle seats they choose.

The studies add to earlier evidence that traditional bicycle saddles, the kind with a narrow rear and pointy nose, play a role in sexual impotence.

Some saddle designs are more damaging than others, scientists say. But even so-called ergonomic seats, to protect the sex organs, can be harmful, the research finds. The dozen or so studies, from peer-reviewed journals, are summarized in three articles in September's Journal of Sexual Medicine.

In a bluntly worded editorial with the articles, Dr. Steven Schrader, a reproductive health expert who studies cycling at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, said he believed that it was no longer a question of "whether or not bicycle riding on a saddle causes erectile dysfunction."

Instead, he said in an interview, "The question is, What are we going to do about it?"

The studies, by researchers at Boston University and in Italy, found that the more a person rides, the greater the risk of impotence or loss of libido. And researchers in Austria have found that many mountain bikers experience saddle-related trauma that leads to small calcified masses inside the scrotum.

This does not mean that people should stop cycling, Dr. Schrader said. And those who ride bikes rarely or for short periods need not worry.

But riders who spend many hours on a bike each week should be concerned, he said. And he suggested that the bicycle industry design safer saddles and stop trivializing the risks of the existing seats.

A spokesman for the industry said it was aware of the issue and added that "new designs are coming out."

"Most people are not riding long enough to damage themselves permanently," said the spokesman, Marc Sani, publisher of Bicycle Retailer and Industry News. "But a consumer's first line of defense, for their enthusiasm as well as sexual prowess, is to go to a bicycle retailer and get fitted properly on the bike."

Researchers have estimated that 5 percent of men who ride bikes intensively have developed severe to moderate erectile dysfunction as a result. But some experts believe that the numbers may be much higher because many men are too embarrassed to talk about it or fail to associate cycling with their problems in the bedroom.

The link between bicycle saddles and impotence first received public attention in 1997 when a Boston urologist, Dr. Irwin Goldstein, who had studied the problem, asserted that "there are only two kinds of male cyclists - those who are impotent and those who will be impotent."

Cyclists became angry and defensive, he said, adding: "They said cycling is healthy and could not possibly hurt you. Sure you can get numb. But impotent? No way."

The bicycle industry listened, said Joshua Cohen, a physical therapist in Chapel Hill, N.C., and the author of "Finding the Perfect Bicycle Seat." Manufacturers designed dozens of new saddles with cut outs, splits in the back and thick gel padding to relieve pressure on tender body parts.

Scientists also stepped up their research. Since 2000, a dozen studies have been carried out using sophisticated tools to see exactly what happens when vulnerable human anatomy meets the bicycle saddle.

The area in question is the perineum, between the external genitals and the anus. "When you sit on a chair you never put weight on the perineum," Dr. Schrader said. "But when you sit on a bike, you increase pressure on the perineum" sevenfold.

In men, a sheath in the perineum, called Alcock's canal, contains an artery and a nerve that supply the penis with blood and sensation. The canal runs along the side of a bone, Dr. Goldstein said, and when a cyclist sits hard on a narrow saddle, the artery and the nerve are compressed. Over time, a reduction of blood flow can mean that there is not enough pressure to achieve full erection.

In women, Dr. Goldstein said, the same arteries and nerves engorge the clitoris during sexual intercourse. Women cyclists have not been studied as much, he added, but they probably suffer the same injuries.

Researchers are using a variety of methods to study the compression caused by different saddles. One method involves draping a special pad with 900 pressure sensors over the saddle. The distribution of the rider's weight is then registered on a computer. In another technique, sensors are placed on the rider's penis to measure oxygen flowing through arteries beneath the skin. Blood flow is detected by other sensors that send a "swoosh" sound to a Doppler machine.

The research shows that when riders sit on a classic saddle with a teardrop shape and a long nose, a quarter of their body weight rests on the nose, putting pressure on the perineum. The amount of oxygen reaching the penis typically falls 70 percent to 80 percent in three minutes. "A guy can sit on a saddle and have his penis oxygen levels drop 100 percent but he doesn't know it," Mr. Cohen said. "After half an hour he goes numb."

Dr. Goldstein added, "Numbness is your body telling you something is wrong."

Today's ergonomic saddles have splits in the back or holes in the center to relieve pressure on the perineum. But this may make matters worse: the ergonomic saddles have smaller surface areas, so the rider's weight presses harder on less saddle, Dr. Schrader said. The perineum may not escape injury because its arteries run laterally and they are not directly over the cutouts. The arteries can come under more pressure when they come into contact with the cutouts' edges.

Thick gels on saddles can also increase pressure to the perineum, the studies found, because the material can migrate and form clumps in all the wrong places.

Just as many smokers do not get lung cancer, many cyclists will never develop impotence from bicycle seats, the scientists said. What makes one person more vulnerable than another is not known. Body weight seems to matter: heavier riders exert more pressure on saddles. Variations in anatomy may also make a difference.

Dr. Goldstein said he often saw patients who were stunned to learn that riding a bicycle led to their impotence. One middle-aged man rode in a special cycling event to honor a friend and has been impotent since. A 28-year-old who came in for testing, Dr Goldstein said, showed the penile blood flow of a 60-year-old. A college student who had competed in rough cycling sports was unable to achieve an erection until microvascular surgery restored penile blood flow.

"We make kids wear helmets and knee pads," Dr. Goldstein said. "But no one thinks about protecting the crotch."

Who Would Imagine, Superdome Is Cursed

Mon, 19 Sep 2005 07:51:00 GMT

Who Would Imagine, Superdome Is Cursed

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the Superdome became a symbol of relief efforts gone wrong, a scene of heartbreaking misery for thousands.

There is intense irony in the Superdome becoming the symbol of the horrors of Hurricane Katrina. In New Orleans lore, it's a haunted building - a cursed structure in this city that lives shoulder to shoulder with its Cities of the Dead. Similar to the Boston Red Sox Bambino curse and the Chicago Cubs billy goat curse, the Saints teams, that play in the Superdome, have always been very unlucky. The Saints football team has had to live through 'Black Sunday', 'Big Ben', the Botched Extra-point, Bungled drafts, the Ditka disaster, a total of three decades of futility and heartbreak.

And local lore is that the Superdome was cursed . . . a punishment for desecrating this City of the Dead. Exorcists and voodoo priestesses have been used to dispel the curse. That lore will no doubt expand into an even more gruesome story for buggy drivers in the Quarter to enchant their passengers.

Today's New Orleans visitors can't visit the old Girod Cemetery. Abandoned for years, its iron caskets and bones were tossed up by excavation gear in the early 1970s as the crews moved in to build . . . the Superdome. Beneath the now-shredded roof and the fetid stinking mess of excrement and blood where tens of thousands huddled in storm and flood . .. and some died . . . likely lie even more unexcavated bones.

What to do now with this building? No decision has been made about the future of the iconic city structure, and the manager of the domed stadium expects it will take more than two months to get a damage assessment and determine whether the Superdome should be repaired or razed.

The last storm victims stuck at the Superdome climbed aboard evacuation buses Saturday, leaving millions of dollars of damage behind -- a flooded field, overflowing bathrooms, a sea of garbage up to 5 feet deep and a wretched stench.

Three large holes marred the roof. In all, about 70 percent of the roof failed. Water poured into the building during the storm, along with debris.

Elevators, escalators and ceiling tiles were damaged. Two inches of water were on the field in some places, and the entire surface on which the New Orleans Saints play their football games must be removed. There's damage to seats, bathrooms and other interior areas from the thousands of evacuees who were stranded in the building. The Superdome was used as a shelter of last resort for those who couldn't scramble out of town ahead of Hurricane Katrina, but it wasn't equipped with supplies for those stuck there. Buses took days to arrive and finally move the people out.

The manager estimated repairs to the building would be a minimum $100 million, but demolition and construction of a new stadium could cost between $500 million and $600 million. Finances aren't the only considerations though. There are psychological ones, too, Thornton said.

Many likely will remember the Superdome as a haven for misery and despair, but the building is also a 30-year-old icon to many New Orleanians that could be the symbol of recovery from Katrina, he said.

"There are a lot of good memories in the Dome: Final Fours, papal visits. There was a president nominated there,'' he said."Certainly, there are a lot of good memories, as well as the bad memories.''

The Saints team during it's history has tried to ward off the curse by changing stadiums, playing surfaces, coaches, players, uniforms, training camp sites, all without much success."

Something else the Saints have yet to change: Their name. And retired kicker Tom Dempsey is among the legions familiar with the idea that using Saints as the team's nickname, "pissed off the Almighty. But I'm sure he would do worse than cause us to lose football games if he was mad." Enough said.

Speculators Rushing In as the Water Recedes

Fri, 16 Sep 2005 00:55:43 GMT

Speculators Rushing In as the Water Recedes

Would-be home buyers are betting New Orleans will be a boomtown. And many of the city's poorest residents could end up being forced out.

BATON ROUGE, La. — Brandy Farris is house hunting in New Orleans. The real estate agent has $10 million in the bank, wired by an investor who has instructed her to scoop up houses — any houses. "Flooding no problem," Farris' newspaper ads advise. Her backer is a Miami businessman who specializes in buying storm-ravaged property at a deep discount, something that has paid dividends in hurricane-prone Florida.

But he may have a harder time finding bargains this time around.

In some ways, Hurricane Katrina seems to have taken a vibrant real estate market and made it hotter. Large sections of the city are underwater, but that's only increasing the demand for dry houses. And in flooded areas, speculators are trying to buy properties on the cheap, hoping that the redevelopment of New Orleans will start a boom.

This land rush has long-term implications in a city where many of the poorest residents were flooded out. It raises the question of what sort of housing — if any — will be available to those without a six-figure salary. If New Orleans ends up a high-priced enclave, without a mix of cultures, races and incomes, something vital may be lost. "There's a public interest question here," said Ann Oliveri, a senior vice president with the Urban Land Institute, a Washington think tank. "You don't have to abdicate the city to whoever shows up." For now, though, it's a seller's market, at least for habitable homes.

Two months ago, Steve Young bought a two-bedroom condo in New Orleans' Garden District as an investment for $145,000. Last month, he was transferred by Shell Oil to Houston. Last week, he put the condo on the market. In a posting on Craigslist, an Internet classified advertising site, Young asked $220,000. He got a dozen serious expressions of interest — enough so he's no longer actively pursuing a buyer. "I'm pretty positive the market's going to move up from here," he said.

So, to their surprise, are many others.

"I thought this storm was the end of the city," said Arthur Sterbcow, president of New Orleans-based Latter & Blum, one of the biggest real estate brokerages on the Gulf Coast. "If anyone had told me two weeks ago that I'd be getting the calls and e-mails I'm getting, I would have thought he was ready for the psychiatric ward." Messages from those wanting to buy houses — whether intact or flooded — and commercial properties are outrunning those who want to sell by a factor of 20, said Sterbcow, who has set up temporary quarters in his firm's Baton Rouge office. "We're pressing everyone into service just to answer the phones," he said.

These eager would-be buyers may be drawing their inspiration from Lower Manhattan, which proved a bonanza for those smart enough to buy condos there immediately after the Sept. 11 attack. Of course, in southern Louisiana, everything is hypothetical for the moment. The storm destroyed many property records and displaced buyers, sellers, agents and title firms, so no deals are actually being done. Insurance companies haven't started to settle claims yet, much less determine how, or whether, they will insure New Orleans in the future. The city hasn't even been drained. But people are thinking ahead, influenced by a single factor: the belief that hundreds of billions of dollars in government aid is going to create a boomtown. The people administering that aid will need somewhere to live, as will those doing the rebuilding. So will employees of companies lured back to the area, and the service people that attend to them. All this will lead to what Sterbcow delicately calls a "reorientation" of the city.

"Everyone I talked to has said, 'Let's start with a clean sheet of paper, fix it and get it right,' " he said. "Some of the homes here were only held together by the termites." What the owners of the city's estimated 150,000 flooded houses will get out of "reorientation" is unclear, especially if the houses were in bad shape and uninsured.

Some black New Orleans residents say dourly that they know what's coming. Melvin Gilbert, a maintenance crew chief in his 60s, stood outside an elegant hotel in the French Quarter this week and recalled how the neighborhood had been gentrified. He remembered half a century ago when the French Quarter had a substantial number of black residents. "Then the Caucasians started offering them $10,000 for their homes," he said. "Well, they only bought the places for $2,000, so they took it and ran." The white residents restored the homes, which rose quickly in value. Gilbert said he expected the same dynamic when the floodwaters receded in the heavily black neighborhoods east of downtown.

The question of who should own New Orleans is already sparking tension. The first posting seeking New Orleans property "in any condition or location" was placed on Craigslist on Aug. 29, while the storm still raged. With small variation, it was repeated numerous times over the next week. Some readers were infuriated. "Do you read/watch/understand any of the news broadcasts coming from the city? Or do you just go to 'Cashing in on Desperation, Despondency, and Depression: How to Make a Zillion Dollars investing in Disaster Area Real Estate' seminars. Sheeeeeesh!" wrote one.

The process of tracking down owners of deluged houses is greatly slowed by the absence of records. It's not going to be easy to find these people, said Farris, the Baton Rouge real estate agent. What would she pay for a ruined house? Farris demurred, saying it was too early to tell, but probably only the value of the land, if that. Though the French Quarter may be back to life within months, outlying districts such as North Bywater and the Lower 9th Ward will take years, if they ever do. Investors might hope this is the equivalent of buying land on the outskirts of a boomtown, but it's not a guarantee.

For one thing, there are already proposals to convert certain flooded areas — including some water-logged neighborhoods — into parks. Under the Supreme Court's recent ruling broadening the definition of eminent domain, speculators could be forced to sell their properties to the government. That would be a great outcome for many homeowners in the parishes south and east of New Orleans that bore the brunt of the storm.

Six months ago, Todd La Valla, a Re/Max real estate agent, bought a four-unit apartment building for $59,000 in the community of Buras, an unincorporated hamlet in Plaquemines Parish 55 miles southeast of New Orleans. The tenants evacuated in the storm, or at least La Valla hopes they did. He's sure the building is gone too, like just about everything else in the area. La Valla had no insurance, which means his $10,000 investment is probably a complete loss. Yet where there's disaster, there's opportunity.

"I've had calls from investors in Los Angeles, Las Vegas, New York looking to buy property," La Valla said. "This is going to be hard for the poor, the elderly, those that didn't have insurance. But it's going to be great for some people."

At first, Lucia Blacksher thought she was in the bad news group. In June, she and her boyfriend put their entire savings, about $35,000, into their dream house — a century-old shotgun Victorian in the New Orleans neighborhood of Mid-City. When the storm came, they fled to Blacksher's parents' house in Birmingham, Ala. The house, which cost $225,000, is partially flooded. Her boyfriend, a Virginian who figures he's seen enough of hurricanes to last him the rest of his life, wants to move. The insurance company won't return calls. Last week, Blacksher was worried she would lose her beloved house either to foreclosure or a forced sale. One of those bottom-feeders would get it. She was more optimistic Wednesday. Somehow, she would get through this.

"Because the house survived the storm, it will be even more valuable," she said. "You could offer me $300,000 and I wouldn't take it. No way."

Shaq Helps Cops Nab Suspect

Wed, 14 Sep 2005 04:11:08 GMT

Shaq Helps Cops Nab Suspect

Shaquille O'Neal provided an assist to police over the weekend, trailing a man who allegedly assaulted a gay couple before alerting an arresting officer.

The 7-foot-1 Miami Heat center, who is in the process of becoming a Miami Beach, Fla. reserve officer, was driving on South Beach around 3 a.m. Sunday. He saw a passenger in a car yell anti-gay slurs at the couple, who were walking, said Bobby Hernandez, a spokesman for the Miami Beach Police Department.

The man then got out of the car and threw a bottle, hitting one of the pedestrians, who was not seriously hurt. The man got back in the car, which sped off. O'Neal followed, flagging down an officer who made an arrest, Hernandez said.

An 18-year-old man was arrested on charges of aggravated assault and assault with a deadly weapon. The driver of the car was not charged.

O'Neal, who hopes to be a police chief or county sheriff one day, was already being fitted for his Miami Beach police uniform before he helped the police out.

"For this incident I don't want to be credited as an individual who does police work," O'Neal said in a statement. "I want to be credited as a Miami Beach police officer."

Katrina, Petroleum Reserves and Higher Gas Prices

Mon, 29 Aug 2005 19:18:58 GMT

Katrina, Petroleum Reserves and Higher Gas Prices

I would advise everybody to fill up their vehicles with gas today because if Katrina maintains its course and intensity gasoline could easily be $4/gallon by the end of next week, probably higher because of the damage to the nation's oil infrastructure.

This post is not meant to downplay the likely catastrophic damage to life and property in the region affected by Katrina, just to make everyone aware that the effects of this Hurricane will likely be nationwide. I hope for anyone on the board has friends or relatives in the NO, Biloxi, Mobile area that those friends or relatives are hunkered down somewhere safe out of the path of what looks like being a monster hurricane.

The LOOP is the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port in Port Fourchon, LA. It handles 30% of the oil imported by the US, about 3-4 million barrels per day and is the only facility that can handle VLCC's (Very Large Crude Carriers: Supertankers). On its present course, Hurricane Katrina will pass close to if not directly over Port Fourchon with the result that a significant fraction of US oil supply will be cut off for some indeterminate period of time. There is also a lot of refinery capacity in the neighbourhood of Port Fourchon and New Orleans that will likely be affected by the Hurricane.

If all the refineries within the band of hurricane force winds goes offline, the US loses 1.8 million barrels per day of refining capacity or about 10%. In addition, 3 million barrels per day of imported crude and petroleum products will be lost from the LOOP. Get ready for a huge spike in energy prices and possible gasoline shortages.

VMA131Marine posted the map shown above says: Hurricane Katrina's projected path in relation to the oil supply and refinery facilities in the region. Note in particular the LOOP and Port Fourchon: Louisiana Petroleum Resources

If all the refineries within the band of hurricane force winds goes offline, the US loses 1.8 million barrels per day of refining capacity or about 10%. In addition, 3 million barrels per day of imported crude and petroleum products will be lost from the LOOP. Get ready for a huge spike in energy prices and possible gasoline shortages.

Associated Press reports that President Bush will announce later today whether he will release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to make up for production losses caused by Hurricane Katrina:

It is still a problem that the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is in Louisiana, if there are logistics issues in the coming weeks? Also, the SPR is crude, so you would still have fuel shortages if the refineries are out of commission. The SPR may well require an off-shore rig to get to as it will probably be under water and without power for an extended period. We don't know about the conditions of roads and bridges in the area; we don't know about the condition of the facitities at the port of New Orleans; we don't know enough to make a decisions at this time.

Superdome's Roof Leaking, People safe, So Far

Mon, 29 Aug 2005 16:01:36 GMT

Superdome's Roof Leaking, People safe, So Far

'I could have stayed at home and watched my roof blow off,'' said one of the refugees, Harald Johnson, 43. ''Instead, I came down here and watched the Superdome roof blow off. It's no big deal; getting wet is not like dying.''

This is where about 8,000+ of New Orleans' poorest residents have taken shelter, in the Superdome. The NYTimes reports now even that imposing structure is taking damage from Katrina:
"Strips of metal were peeled away, creating two holes that were visible from the floor of the huge arena. Water dripped in and people were moved away from about five sections of seats directly below.
Others watched as sheets of metal flapped visibly and noisily. From the floor, more than 19 stories below the dome, the openings appeared to be 6 feet long."
Superdome and government emergency officials stressed that they did not expect the huge roof to fail because of the relatively small breaches, each about 15 to 20 feet long and 4 to 5 feet wide.

''We think the wind somehow got into the vents and got between the roof's (waterproof) membrane and the aluminum ceiling tiles,'' said Doug Thornton, regional manager of the company that manages the huge arena.

The dome was filled with the sound of metal rattling, which Thornton said was produced by the metal ceiling tiles.

They're stuck sitting in the stadium seats because the authorities don't want to risk the possibility that the field may flood, which will start to get damned old in about 24 hours.

Aside from the tear in the huge roof, the 77,000-seat steel-framework stadium, home of the NFL's New Orleans Saints, provided few comforts but at least had bathrooms and food donated by charities.

The wind that howled around the dome during the night was not heard in the interior of the building where the refugees were kept.

''Everybody slept last night. They didn't seem to have any problems,'' said Dr. Kevin Stephens Sr., in charge of the medical shelter in the Superdome. ''They slept all over the place.''

Power failed in the Superdome around 5 a.m. Monday, triggering groans from the crowd. Emergency generators kicked in, but the backup power runs only reduced lighting, not the air conditioning.

Residents lined up for blocks, clutching meager belongings and crying children as National Guardsman searched them for guns, knives and drugs.

Then Katrina's rain began, drenching hundreds of people still outside, along with their bags of food and clothing. Eventually, the searches were moved inside to the Superdome floor, where some people wrapped themselves in blankets and tried to sleep.

It was almost 10:30 p.m. before the last person was searched and allowed in. Thornton estimated 8,000 to 9,000 were inside when the doors closed for the 11 p.m. curfew.

More than 600 people with medical needs were inside. ''And we sent another 400 to hospitals,'' said Gen. Ralph Lupin, who commands the 550 National Guard troops in the Dome.

''We've got sick babies, sick old people and everything in between,'' Stephens said. ''We're seen strokes, chest pain, diabetes patients passing out, seizures, people without medicine, people with the wrong medicine. It's been busy.''

Thornton worried about how everyone would fare over the next few days.

''We're expecting to be here for the long haul,'' he said. ''We can make things very nice for 75,000 people for four hours. But we aren't set up to really accommodate 8,000 for four days.'

God help these folks, and all the rest down there.

Stripping Off In The Name Of Art

Mon, 18 Jul 2005 22:19:40 GMT

Stripping Off In The Name Of Art

Makes me think of those dreams I used to have where I'd go to school in my underwear . . . or less.

When Yve Ngoo announced she was going to take part in this culturally historic event, reactions ranged from "are you mad?" to "you pervert". Even her mother feared she could suffer some sort of post traumatic stress disorder - and be blighted by flashbacks for the rest of her life. But all she wanted to do was experience what thousands of people across the world had previously done - take part in a Spencer Tunick installation.

What I had signed myself up for didn't really hit home until I received the lengthy email containing my consent form, which included the demands for sobriety and the banning of socks, hats and sunglasses.

Once undressed you had to leave your clothes, possessions and dignity in an unidentifiable plastic carrier bag in the middle of a car park.

After maybe 30 minutes, Spencer Tunick and his crew welcomed us, addressing the crowds via megaphone, whilst perched precariously on a step-ladder.

Spencer explained the "set ups". These would involve walking three abreast (if you can have three breasts) across the magnificent Millennium Bridge, along the Newcastle Quayside, up historic Dean Street across the Swing Bridge, along the side of the Sage Gateshead to return to the car park.

Getting naked

At advantageous points that would take in the exciting and the fantastic surroundings of regenerated Quays, we would be asked to stop and pose.

You could sense tension, excitement and apprehension in the air. There was also a final rush for the loos.

Finally, Spencer, spoke the words we all waited for: "OK, you can get naked now".

Everyone started stripping, very rapidly, as if it were a race - men were particularly quick at disrobing.

I took off my sweat top and jogging bottoms. I was naked.

Other naked people were appearing everywhere, some balancing on one leg trying to remove socks and shoes without bending over. I didn't look at either of my friends.

In less than two minutes, only naked bodies were visible. People started looking at each other, friends and strangers, seeing their bodies totally uncovered in the diffused early morning light, in a Gateshead car park!

Dunkirk spirit

Then people began to whoop and cheer, laughing and talking like nothing had happened. Tunick had to call for quiet.

To be surrounded by hundreds of naked people is an awesome, overwhelming sight. So many different shapes and sizes, in varying hues, blending into a uniform mass.

Then we all started walking towards the bridge. The only people clothed were Spencer, his crew, security and the police.

When you're surrounded by total nudity in all its diversity, inhibitions gradually become less.

We dutifully fell into rank - full of the Dunkirk Spirit, we marched triumphantly from Gateshead to Newcastle across the magnificent Millennium Bridge to embark on cultural expedition that would affect each and every one of us.

Three hours later, and it was a bit sad to dress again, People dressed slowly - some holding onto their precious naked moment as long as legally possible.

It was just after 7.30 am, and Newcastle Gateshead was beginning to wake up to lazy sunny Sunday morning.

Attention Homeland security and Police Security types. Don't you realize this is a foolproof new method for avoiding suicide bombers. These people could be commuters safe and without fear on their way to work! A second benefit would also be protection against pickpockets and pursesnackers. Wouldn't it also be great for the sales of suntan-in-a-bottle and sunglasses.

Bush hits police officer while on bike ride

Thu, 07 Jul 2005 02:19:17 GMT

Bush hits police officer while on bike ride

GLENEAGLES, Scotland - President Bush collided with a local police officer and fell during a bike ride on the grounds of the Gleneagles golf resort while attending a meeting of world leaders Wednesday.

Bush suffered scrapes on his hands and arms that required bandages by the White House physician, said White House spokesman Scott McClellan.

The police officer was taken to a local hospital as a precaution, McClellan said. The extent of the officer's injuries was not known, but he might have an ankle injury, the spokesman said.

It was raining lightly at the time.

The officer was on a security detail. He is a member of the police department of Strathclyde, a nearby town, McClellan said.

The president was concerned about the officer's condition, and talked with him for some time after the collision, McClellan said. The president also asked White House physician Richard Tubb to monitor the officer's condition at the hospital.

The fall did not affect the president's schedule. Dressed in a tuxedo, he attended a dinner hosted by Queen Elizabeth at the annual Group of Eight economic summit. He showed no signs of distress. (link)

He falls off a couch chokes bruises? and one or two other time bruises, the first thing he hits with a hammer is his finger, he falls off the Segway and once before on a bike and now; KLUTZ stirkes again.

I'm sending him ice skates for xmas - pretty white ones.

Once you learn how to fall off a bike, you never forget.

Freedom is Nothing But a Chance to be Better

Mon, 04 Jul 2005 01:20:10 GMT

Freedom is Nothing But a Chance to be Better

Ron Kovic served two tours of duty during the Vietnam War. He was paralyzed from the chest down in combat in 1968 and has been in a wheelchair ever since. Along with Oliver Stone, Kovic was the co-screenwriter of the 1989 Academy Award-winning film based on his book, Born on the Fourth of July (Akashic Books). The following is the introduction to the new edition of the book.

It was exactly forty years ago this past September that I left my house in Massapequa, New York to join the United States Marine Corps and begin an extraordinary journey that was to lead me into a disastrous war which would change my life, and others of my generation, profoundly and forever. There are times in the lives of both individuals and nations when we cross certain thresholds where there is no going back, no return to the innocence we once knew; the change is utter and irreconcilable. We often sense these moments. I know I did that day.

Happy 4th of July to Ron Kovic and all the other veterans and servicemen and servicewomen today!

You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness. You may think you have overeaten, but it is patriotism. ~Erma Bombeck

The Miracle That Wasn't

Tue, 19 Apr 2005 05:39:31 GMT

The Miracle That Wasn't

Freakonomics (second in popularity on Amazon only to Harry Potter), calls into question the commonly held wisdom from 1990s New York City that you take back the streets from squeegee men and drug dealers, and you curb violent crime:

Professor Levitt considers the New York crime story to be an urban legend. Yes, he acknowledges, there are tipping points when people suddenly start acting differently, but why did crime drop in so many other cities that weren't using New York's policing techniques? His new book, written with Stephen J. Dubner, concludes that one big reason was simply the longer prison sentences that kept criminals off the streets of New York and other cities.
The prison terms don't explain why crime fell sooner and more sharply in New York than elsewhere, but Professor Levitt accounts for that, too. One reason he cites is that the crack epidemic eased earlier in New York than in other cities. Another, more important, reason is that New York added lots of cops in the early 90's.

But the single most important cause, he says, was an event two decades earlier: the legalization of abortion in New York State in 1970, three years before it was legalized nationally by the Supreme Court.

The result, he maintains, was a huge reduction in the number of children who would have been at greater than average risk of becoming criminals during the 1990's. Growing up as an unwanted child is itself a risk factor, he says, and the women who had abortions were disproportionately likely to be unmarried teenagers with low incomes and poor education -- factors that also increase the risk.

Again, if the "pro-life" people were truly pro-life, they'd all be out adopting crack babies. But, it really isn't about life, is it? It's about forcing their ideology on the rest of us. Thanks, but no thanks.

Jenna Writhes Again

Fri, 08 Apr 2005 03:29:34 GMT

Jenna Writhes Again

The New York Post has a little tidbit about Ms. Jenna Bush doing some dirty dancing in the Big Apple:

VIDEOTAPE of Jenna Bush in very high spirits at a bachelorette party is being sold and could end up on national TV by the end of the week. Luckily for Jenna, the cameraman missed "the high point . . . Jenna on all fours doing 'the butt dance' — and doing it very well — as guys were ogling her thong," said our source.

Okay, you ask, why would liberal progressives be at all interested in these kinds of antics by Ms. Bush? To be honest, we're not....EXCEPT there is that whole morals and sex obsession thing coming out of her Daddy's administration and his right wing cronies.

The Bush people spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about the sex lives of other Americans, whether it's their gay-bashing constitutional amendment or their "sexual abstinence for everyone but us" campaign. We just think that if you want the rest of the country to "behave," well, maybe you should tend to your own house first.

Apparently, Jenna's little show will be out on video later this week.

I have no problem encouraging and congratulating Jenna for being an individual. Personally, I have no problem with her actions. They are not abnormal for a 22yr old. What I do have a problem with are all the right wing types, including our president, who repeatedly decry liberal debauchery but have no issues when their friends/kin/etc do the same type of things. It is the feeling that their are two sets of rules and standards in place that ticks me off.

This reminds me of my favorite bumper sticker slogan "Focus On Your Own Damn Family!"

Moving to New Location

Tue, 22 Jun 2004 14:46:42 GMT

Moving To New Location

This move has NOTHING to do with the HOW TO DISAPPEAR previous post. The "Earl Bockenfeld's Radio Weblog" is moving to new headquarters that won't be available for a couple months. The current location is being vacated this weekend, and getting ready for the move is the reason for very erratic posts in recent weeks. During the next two months we will be taking some much needed rest-time and will have limited computer access, so posts will be few, if at all, until the computer is installed at the new location. In the meantime, I advise my readers to visit the "Great Sites" in my link list on the left column.

Have a great summer, and I hope to talk to you all as soon as I'm relocated.

-earl-

C-Word Flak Leads Hoffman To Tears

Thu, 17 Jun 2004 22:34:03 GMT

C-Word Flak Leads Hoffman To Tears

President's distress spills out in interview

University of Colorado President Betsy Hoffman broke down and cried this week while explaining her remark about how a pejorative word referring to the female anatomy could be used as a term of endearment.

Hoffman had been talking Tuesday morning to editors and reporters at the Durango Herald.

An editor asked her about a newspaper story on her use of the C-word while she was giving testimony in a deposition.

Her testimony stemmed from a question asked by one of the lawyers in a federal lawsuit filed by three women who alleged they were sexually assaulted by CU football players and recruits in December 2001.

One of the lawyers was questioning Hoffman about a claim by former CU place- kicker Katie Hnida, who said her football teammates referred to her by the C-word.

Hoffman told the lawyer that the term was a swear word. But when asked if there was any possible polite context for the word, Hoffman testified that the word could be used as a "term of endearment."

The CU president, a medieval scholar, told the Herald that she was thinking back to the 14th century poet Geoffrey Chaucer.

According to the newspaper, Hoffman said, "I was immediately sorry." She said that the lawyer "kept pushing me. He was very nasty."

"I knew as soon as I said it that it would come out in the papers," Hoffman told the Herald. "I should have said, 'Read Chaucer's The Miller's Tale. "

About that time, Hoffman began to cry.

"She just pretty much broke down in tears," said Bryan New-some, the Herald's day city editor. "It was kind of somber. Seeing somebody cry is never pleasant."

Hoffman stepped outside the room for a moment, regained her composure and resumed the interview, which had been intended to be about public financing of higher education in Colorado.

After later reading the depositions, Newsome said he could understand why Hoffman was upset.

"But at the time, I was a little surprised to see a college president break down in tears."

The flap over the deposition drew a full range of reaction from CU regents and one of the commissioners who recently investigated CU's athletic department.

Commissioner Jacqueline St. Joan said she felt Hoffman "put her foot in her mouth," with her remarks on the C-word.

"I see it as a combination of siege mentality and academic myopia about the real world," St. Joan said.

Regent Susan Kirk, however, said she felt it was inappropriate to take out of context Hoffman's brief reply within a deposition.

"I know the president would never disparage women," Kirk said.

Regent Pat Hayes said she thought the controversy over the C-word was "almost a non- story story."

Regent Jim Martin said he understood the context of Hoffman's remarks and the reference to Chaucer but added that he found Hoffman's reply "totally inappropriate."

"That is a vulgar word. She could have just admitted that," Martin said. "To dig in her heels only further tarnishes the reputation of this university."

[Via Rocky Mountain News]

Do-it-yourself checkout digs in

Mon, 07 Jun 2004 23:58:57 GMT

Do-it-yourself checkout digs in

Businesses find that self-checkout lanes distract customers into thinking they spend less time in line while saving the owners money.

A new study of self-checkout lanes offers some advice to shoppers: Get used to them.

"Self-checkout is no longer a test," said Lee Holman, vice president of IHL Consulting Group, a Franklin, Tenn., research firm that tracks retail technology. "It will quickly become as ubiquitous in stores as ATMs at banks and pay-at-the-pump gas stations."

If current trends hold up, IHL estimates that self-checkout sales of $42-billion in 2003 will skyrocket eightfold to $336-billion by 2007.

That's quite a change from a decade ago, when Publix Super Markets Inc. pulled the plug on a highly publicized one-store test of self-checkout in West Palm Beach because it didn't save shoppers any time.

Self-checkout still doesn't save anybody time. But IHL says the illusion of speed, reinforced by not standing in line and keeping busy in a do-it-yourself exercise, has become an appealing alternative for many shoppers at grocery stores such as Winn-Dixie and mass merchants such as Wal-Mart.

Home Depot now offers self-checkout in half of its 1,740 stores nationwide and has been prodding customers to learn how it works by opening fewer cashier lines. While grocers say 15 percent of their shoppers use self-checkout if it is available, 30 percent of all transactions go through self-checkout at Home Depots that have it. In some stores, it is as much as 40 percent, according to IHL.

For retailers the numbers are compelling. A rule of thumb in the grocery business is that it takes a $15 transaction to recoup the cost of having a cashier handle the order. At an installation cost of $23,000 a lane, a self-checkout can pay for itself within a year. If the cashier is moved to another job in the store, retailers can say customer service was enhanced and still pocket a big savings. The theft rate (half of all retail theft is perpetrated by employees) is cut in half with automated systems.

While technology companies are already pushing software and the equipment to do it, no retailer is considering ditching cashiers entirely. That's because the overwhelming majority of shoppers expect a human being to handle checkout for them.

Self-checkout is not for all types of stores, either. To prevent shoplifting, scales under the conveyor and laser scanners compare the weight and shape of a product to what the UPC code alerts the computer to expect. If they don't match, the system shuts down and summons an attendant. So, large apparel stores, for instance, are doubtful prospects for self-checkout because the scanner cannot tell a cheap cotton sweater from a chichi cashmere one.

At convenience stores, the average transaction is too small to make automatic checkout pay because the most likely users already are paying at the pump. At Best Buy, the chain would lose an opportunity to push those highly profitable extended warranties.

The next generation of do-it-yourself checkout is the wireless scanner. Those are the handheld wands Home Depot clerks wave at price tags to help shoppers stumped by the nuances of the self-service lane.

A Massachusetts grocery chain and a German supermarket have built wireless scanners into their shopping carts, which allows customers to ring up their purchases as they shop. At the checkout counter, another computer downloads the list of items from the scanner and a cashier accepts payment.

All 106 Albertsons stores in Dallas and Fort Worth are getting wireless shopping cart scanners. Albertsons also acquired and is installing in other markets the self-checkout equipment that Kmart tried nationally a few years ago before filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

"We're expanding self-checkout in a big way," said Walt Rubel, an Albertsons spokesman.

There's enough of a self-serve movement that Publix has revived its self-checkout test in 13 stores.

"Actually, where they really need a self-service option is the Publix deli," said Holman, the IHL research analyst who lives in Boca Raton. "They've always got a long, slow line there."

In fact, Publix is testing such a system at 13 stores, including two in Tampa. Hurried deli customers punch their custom-sliced meat and cheese orders into a keypad that tells them when to return to pick up their completed order.

[Via St. Petersburg Times]

Phone Becomes Alibi for Liars

Sat, 15 May 2004 02:27:41 GMT

Phone Becomes Alibi for Liars

By Elisa Batista

Cell-phone users who want to get out of work or a dreaded dinner date now have a handy excuse.

A group of 2,000 cell-phone owners have formed an "alibi and excuse club," in which one member lies on behalf of another.

The club's founder, identified only as "Numbrrrs," says the group came in handy for her recently before a blind date. She had another member of the club call up her date to tell him she couldn't make it because she left the country.

"I was just tired," said Numbrrrs, a 28-year-old airline customer service representative from San Diego.

'Numbrrrs' club is modeled after a trend she witnessed during a real trip out of the country, to Europe. In Germany, she learned that cell-phone users often download background noise of traffic jams and then play the sounds when they phone their bosses or spouses to say that they're late. While someone close to the club admitted the ethics surrounding that application is a bit dubious, the software's creators insist that people are only having fun.

"It's a way to make jokes," said Liviu Tofan, the CEO of Simeda, the German company responsible for the SounderCover application.

SounderCover lets mobile-phone users download prerecorded sounds that mimic the noises of a traffic jam, a circus parade, a thunderstorm, a ringing phone -- or even a self-created sound. It's compatible with certain Nokia phones, which mainly run on the cellular-phone networks in Europe.

SMS.ac, an online group of 10 million wireless phone users (including Numbrrrs), plans to partner with another vendor and offer the sound effects to its members by June, said Greg Wilfahrt, the company's executive vice president.

"It's coming as a result of the person-to-person clubs," he said. "I think the whole thing is ridiculously funny, how people are using their phones to communicate now."

SMS.ac's technology lets practically any wireless-device user send a short text message or multimedia message to another subscriber. The service lets members, such as Numbrrrs, start clubs and send each other blast messages that include pictures, music and video clips.

But up to now, if members of Numbrrrs' club wanted to become someone else's alibi, they had to do so manually. This involved picking up the phone to let the boss know of a buddy's tardiness or to make a friend's wife believe her husband has an important meeting when he's really at the bar.

Wilfahrt admits that some people -- especially those who have found out they were conned -- have a problem with mobile alibis "from an integrity standpoint."

But Simeda's Tofan said the application, strangely enough, has made people more polite in their phone conversations. People often play prerecorded music to lighten the mood of a conversation.

"It doesn't encourage people to lie," he said. "It encourages people to find excuses.... Finding an excuse is a better way to get out of a situation than (saying), 'I don't want to talk to you' -- which is rude."

Still, both Numbrrrs and Chris Mowan, a 20-year-old Colorado college student and fellow alibi club member, expressed unease at having a piece of software do their dirty work for them.

"I would rather have a person other than me do it instead of noise in the background, because I don't know how good of a liar I am," Mowan said.

Numbrrrs said she was sure many people, tickled by the novelty of it, would pass around the alibis, rendering them obsolete in time of need.

"I wonder if they already heard that noise from someone else, then they'd think it was a crank call or something," she said.

[Via Wired]

Hold the fries

Wed, 05 May 2004 15:33:06 GMT

Hold the fries
Morgan Spurlock, the man behind the film "Super Size Me," talks about eating nothing but McDonald's for 30 days straight and how he feels about Big Macs now.

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Scott Lamb

May 5, 2004 | As Morgan Spurlock tells it, the idea for the film "Super Size Me" came to him in 2002, during one of those quintessentially American moments: He was sitting on the couch, stuffed with Thanksgiving dinner, watching TV. On the evening news that night was a story about two teenage girls who, the previous August, had sued McDonald's (ultimately unsuccessfully) for making them fat. In its defense, McDonald's claimed its food could be eaten as "part of any balanced diet and lifestyle."

Spurlock was struck with inspiration -- what he calls "a really great bad idea" -- to make a documentary about living off nothing but McDonald's for 30 days, just to see if it could be done.

"Super Size Me," which opens nationwide on Friday, follows Spurlock from his pre-McDiet physical checkups -- he started out in perfect health, and consulted three doctors and a nutritionist throughout the month -- through the weight gain, vomiting, sexual dysfunction and depression brought on by his steady intake of Big Macs and fries. In between bites, the 33-year-old filmmaker traveled across the country, visiting schools and talking to nutrition experts, lawyers, schools, a gastric-bypass patient and Don Gorske -- a man who claims to have eaten over 19,000 Big Macs and have a healthy cholesterol level of 155.

The movie is less of an attack on McDonald's than it may seem; the occasional barrage of statistics is relieved by humor and gross-outs (a rectal exam, the McVomit scene). After all, the profits Spurlock used to finance "Super Size Me" came largely from his short-lived MTV show "I Bet You Will," in which he paid people to perform disgusting feats. But the film takes a darker turn as it becomes clear that Spurlock's "great bad idea" is having a truly bad effect on his health.

[Via Salon]

N.Y. PROM KIDS GO POSH

Wed, 28 Apr 2004 19:04:08 GMT

N.Y. PROM KIDS GO POSH

By DAVID KOEPPEL

It's prom season - and fun-loving teens from the posh private schools of the Upper East Side to the parochial institutes of Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, are shelling out as much as $3,000 each on one night of romance and revelry.

"I want to make this night special," says Flushing HS senior Brian Alvarado. "So why not go all the way?" The must-have prom accessory of 2004 is the sleek, super-sized Hummer 2 SUV - at a cost of around $2,400 for a night of awesome cruising.

For Angelo Casale, 17, a senior from Xaverian HS in Bay Ridge, renting a Hummer - which comes complete with a PlayStation 2, a flat-screen TV and strobe lights - is all about crossing the Brooklyn Bridge in style. The 34-foot limo will transport Angelo, his date and 16 of their closest pals to the venerable Waldorf-Astoria for a prom May 7. After the prom, they'll party at the Roxy and then cruise to the Jersey Shore for two additional days of partying.

"The kids want to be like Britney, Jay-Z or Beyoncé for the night," says Frank DeLuca, the owner of Excalibur Extravaganza limousine in Bay Ridge, who's booked out his Hummer for 21 proms this season.

"This is their last hurrah before going off to school and stepping out into the big world."

For Brian Alvarado, prom night isn't just about fancy cars - it's about true love.

Just a few months ago, the 18-year-old would never have believed that he'd be escorting his "dream date" to her June 11 prom, at SoHo's posh Puck Building.

Alvarado fell for Shana Melendez, 17, "from day one" when they met as freshmen at Martin Luther King HS in Manhattan four years ago. But try as he might, he couldn't spark a romance with her until January of this year, after he transferred to Flushing.

"You grow up and realize that your best friend is the best person for you," says Shana, who lives in Brooklyn and wants to go to Queens College in the fall. "He understands me more than anyone else, he's an awesome boyfriend."

Brian's goal for prom night is to show Shana a spectacular time - and he's prepared to spend $2,500 to please her. Shana will lay out an additional $700 for a Giovanni dress, haircut, shoes, purse, manicure and pedicure.

Instead of crowding into a limo with a rowdy bunch of classmates, the romantic duo will be tooling around Gotham in a Rolls-Royce, priced at $1,200 for the evening.

They'll spend part of the next morning getting shiatsu body massages at a Midtown spa and hotel - total cost about $400.

Prom tickets cost $140 apiece and the dapper dude is shopping for his own swanky tuxedo for around $300.

He's also planning a next-day romantic horse-and-carriage ride around Central Park and a possible rendezvous with friends at Great Adventure in New Jersey.

Staten Island teen Takisha Jones is hoping she'll look at hot as J.Lo at her June prom.

After weeks of poring through magazines and watching DVDs, she's decided to model her dress on the peach-colored strapless silk gown that Jennifer Lopez wore in the flick "Maid in Manhattan."

"I'm perfect for that dress," the Curtis HS senior gushed. "It's really beautiful and fits my own style, my idea of what a princess would look like. Every time J.Lo moved in that dress, it just flowed. I love it."

Takisha is having the stunning gown made for her by a dressmaker in Queens for $400.

She says she plans to spare no expense, budgeting about $1,500 to cover hairstyling, shoes, costume jewelry, makeup, and a "sexy but casual" after-prom dress for the June 4 prom that's being held on a cruise ship in Manhattan Harbor.

"I've been looking forward to this night since freshman year," said Takisha, who will attend the prom with her boyfriend, Carlos. "After four years of hard work, it's just a night to be loose."

When the prom party wraps up around midnight, Takisha said she'll continue partying at the Copacabana and then go back out to sea for an early morning breakfast cruise. The pair will end the date with a romantic rendezvous at a Long Island beach.

Many affluent Manhattan prep-school teens will spend their after-prom weekend at summer homes in the Hamptons.

An 18-year old Spence School student who didn't want her name published will probably spend close to $3,000 for the final blowout at the Waldorf-Astoria in June. She recently bought a Martin Grant couture white strapless dress at Barneys that the sales staff says cost between $850 and $1,300.

"You sort of want to feel pampered because it's the last big bang of your high-school career," she says. "To me it's not about romance or losing your virginity, it's about sharing an evening of fun with my friends."

[Via New York Post]

The Apprentice Finale Scoop!

Sat, 17 Apr 2004 05:30:19 GMT

The Apprentice Finale Scoop!

Friday, April 16, 2004

YOU'RE HIRED!: On Thursday's finale of The Apprentice, Donald Trump dropped the big H-bomb on 32-year-old self-made entrepreneur Bill Rancic before an audience of nearly 28 million viewers. The hunky Chicago native beat out 29-year-old Harvard grad Kwame Jackson, who, in the end, failed to overcome a huge handicap in Oma-rosa. "I think Omarosa set him back," Trump conceded to TV Guide Online just moments after the show ended. "She certainly didn't help. She was caught in a double lie and she was missing in action." Rancic, meanwhile, accepted a $250,000-a-year job heading up a Trump-owned skyscraper in the Windy City. "Today is a great day for entrepreneurs around the country," he said following his big win. "This is something I've wanted since I was 10 years old." That's all well and good, but whom is he romancing? Amy? Bachelor babe Jen Schefft? For answers to that question and more, read this exclusive interview with Bill.

MORE APPRENTICE: As you know, KFC last week announced that it would offer the Apprentice runner-up a crispy $25,000 to spend one week helping the company roll out its new oven-roasted chicken line. So, is Kwame game? "Once we negotiate a higher fee, yes," he laughs. Maybe he'll change his mind once he gets home and reads his mail. TV Guide Online has learned that PETA, prior to the finale, sent letters to both Kwame and Bill urging them to turn down the chicken gig. "If KFC offers you the position of chief sales officer," the letter reads, "and if you accept it, you will be condoning the systematic torture and exploitation of beautiful, intelligent animals in the name of business."

EVEN MORE APPRENTICE: Sam Solovey made Donald Trump an offer he has yet to refuse on last night's Apprentice climax. The goofy Internet entrepreneur said he would give Trump $250,000 to hire him, too. "It was a brilliant move," Trump says. "We'll certainly consider Sam's offer. I like Sam. He's a character." Meanwhile, Trump reveals that another fired Apprentice star is hitting him up for work. "Amy has requested a job," he says. "She wants to move to New York. I would certainly consider Amy."

GUESS WHAT? MORE APPRENTICE...: Two weeks ago on the Oprah Winfrey Show, Donald Trump had a golden opportunity to flat-out call Omarosa a liar for accusing Ereka of dropping the N-bomb on her. Why didn't he? Well, I asked him just that last night. "You know why? Because I wanted to save it for [the finale]," he said. "I didn't want to shoot all my ammunition and not have the ammunition for [the finale]. If you looked at me on Oprah, I was biting my tongue."

Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth: Love Her or Hate Her

[Via TV Guide]

Costco’s Dilemma: Be Kind To Its Workers, or Wall Street?

Wed, 07 Apr 2004 03:32:30 GMT

Costco’s Dilemma: Be Kind To Its Workers, or Wall Street?

Treat your employees well, and they in kind will treat you well. But shareholders think they’re the be-all and end-all of everything and expect held firms to treat their workers like shit, pay them squat, and be as stingy as possible with benefits if indeed any are even offered; at least, that’s what the Pigopolists in the WSJ article are whining about in return for a bigger bonus so they can finally buy that fourth vacation house somewhere fabulous where there isn’t a Mal-Wart and any of those pesky working poor.

The playing field in the world of retailing is increasing sloped over to big box stores, like Circuit City or Best Buy, or the warehouse shopping experience of a Wal-Mart, or a BJ's Wholesale Club. One of the hallmarks of the these super-sized monuments to commercialism is that the consumer gets stuff cheaper. One of the ways these operations manage to offer stuff at lower prices is by compensating the hired help at a lower rate. Wal-Mart is a company that everyone, even presidential candidates, love to criticize for mistreating their workforce by underpaying them or stiffing them out of health insurance or engaging in predatory business practices. There is an an almost diametrically opposed business model being offered by Costco Wholesale Corp. stores. They maintain a philosophy which balances turning a profit with concern for the health and welfare of their workforce. You would think that such an operation would be the darling of Wall Street. You would be mistaken, however.

By any measure, if you were an employee, you would prefer to work for Costco rather than Wal-Mart. A store clerk starting at Costco can expect a starting salary of about (US)$10 an hour and the annual salary can easily climb to about (US)$40K per year within three years of employment. Wal-Mart doesn't disclose its salary arrangements, however it was reported that clerks at the Las Vegas Superstore were starting at (US)$7.65 an hour. There are no statistics on how much that starting clerk would be earning in three years if, in fact, they were still working for Wal-Mart in three years. That's because the annual turnover rate for Wal-Mart workers is 50%, compared to Costco's rate of about 24%. Another area where Costco shows up being a better employer is in providing health insurance coverage for the workforce. According to company records, 82% of the Costco workforce is covered by health insurance compared to 48% of Wal-Mart's. Costco fronts 92% of the costs of the insurance they offer while Wal-Mart only covers two thirds. There are also shorter waiting periods to qualify for insurance coverage at Costco over Wal-Mart. All in all, these factors may explain the disparity in the turnover rate between the companies.
But Costco's benevolence towards its workforce is apparently going unloved by Wall Street. Bill Dreher, an analyst for a Wall Street investment bank was quite up front on how investors feel about things: "From the perspective of investors, Costco's benefits are overly generous. Public companies need to care for shareholders first. Costco runs its business like it is a private company." So, it's the old dilemma again, who's more critical to the success of the operation, the investor who has bought equity in the company in hopes of realizing some return from the profits, or the person in the store, who is the company's "face to the consumer"? In the eyes of Jim Sinegal, Costco's president, the answer is apparent, "I happen to believe that in order to reward the shareholder in the long term, you have to please your customers and workers." But, it's hard to convince investors in Mr. Sinegal's approach. Investor preference for Wal-Mart over Costco is apparent by one measure, the company stock for Wal-Mart currently trades at 24 times the projected per-share earnings while Costco's ratio is around 20 to one. Despite its refusal to publicly state its salary structure (they claim because they operate all over the place and rates fluctuate dependent upon region) Wal-Mart contends that its employee benefit package rivals Costco in just about every category. And Costco points to the reduced amount of employee turnover as being a cost reducer in that it doesn't have to constantly hire and train new employees. But, Wall Street doesn't really buy reduced turnover as that attractive an aspect to Costco. Not when the increased pay rates and better insurance coverage puts a ding in the company's profitability. "Their benefits are amazing, but shareholders get frustrated from a stock perspective," says Emme Kozloff, a retail analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein LLC.

Now, Costco rocks. I shop there at least once a month. I went to a Sam’s club with a co-worker once and it was basically the same as the last Wal-Mart store I was in, only it was dirty, sullen, and full of screaming crotchfruit on a much larger scale. and I really don’t give a shit if the same basic item at Costco is 5% more expensive, if that, than at Sam’s Club. I can afford that for decent service.

This goes for any store, service business, or financial provider. It’s the employees, stupid. They can make or break you at a certain point. If I’m spending money in your business you’d better make sure I’m appreciated and not treated as an annoyance to be dismissed, because my business will be gone so fast if you screw me over (unless you’re Comcast Cable, which treats me like crap but they’ve got the GOP-blessed monopoly here, so I’m screwed).

[Via Online Wall Street Journal]

Robot race ends without a winner

Sun, 14 Mar 2004 00:19:01 GMT

Robot race ends without a winner

$1 million prize goes unclaimed

BARSTOW, California (AP) -- A $1 million race across the Mojave Desert by driverless robots ended Saturday after all 15 entries either broke down or withdrew, a race official said.

Two of the entries covered about seven miles of the roughly 150-mile course while eight failed to make it to the one-mile mark. Others crashed seconds after starting.

The race ended just before 11 a.m. after the final four competitors were disabled, said Col. Jose Negron, race program manager.

Competitors suffered a variety of problems that included stuck brakes, broken axles, rollovers and malfunctioning satellite navigation equipment.

One six-wheeled robot built by a Louisiana team was disqualified after it became entangled in barbed wire.

"It's a tough challenge -- it's a grand challenge -- you can always bet that it's not doable. But if you don't push the limits, you can't learn," said Ensco Inc. engineer Venkatesh Vasudevan, shortly after his company's entry rolled onto its side several hundred yards from the starting gate.

The Pentagon's research and development agency planned to award $1 million to the first team whose microcircuit-and-sensor-studded vehicle could cover the roughly 150-mile course in less than 10 hours.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency was sponsoring the Grand Challenge to foster development of autonomous vehicles that could be used in combat.

[Via CNN]

Woman Uses Sex Act As Manslaughter Defense

Thu, 04 Mar 2004 04:40:51 GMT

Woman Uses Sex Act As Manslaughter Defense

Perhaps if they would just check the look on his face....

A woman charged with causing a fatal car crash in 1999 says that she couldn't have been behind the wheel because she was performing a sex act on the driver at the time.

Heather Specyalski, 33, was charged with second-degree manslaughter in the crash that killed businessman Neil Esposito. Prosecutors allege that she was driving Esposito's Mercedes-Benz convertible when it veered off the road and hit several trees.

But Specyalski claims that Esposito was driving, and she was performing oral sex on him at the time, said her attorney, Jeremiah Donovan. He noted that Esposito's pants were down when he was thrown from the car.

[...]

Assistant State's Attorney Maureen Platt said the defense is flawed.

"His pants could have been down because he was mooning a car he was drag racing," Platt said. "His pants could have been down because he was urinating out of a window. His pants could have been down because he wasn't feeling well."

Flawed or not, I'm gonna to have to go with the blow job, Maureen....

[Via CNN Law Center]

Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth: Love Her, Hate Her

Mon, 01 Mar 2004 21:36:49 GMT

Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth: Love Her, Hate Her

"I'm going to crush my competition and I'm going to enjoy doing it."
--Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth

Turns out that Omarosa Manigault-Stallworth, the controversial star of The Apprentice, honed her annoying ways while on Vice President Al Gore's staff. And the result was a carbon copy of the reaction she's received on the Donald's show: Some love her; some don't. "The traits she displays on the show she displayed to us," says a disgusted former Gore insider of the ex-scheduler-receptionist who likes to drop names and avoid hard work. But others thought she was swell. "I loved her," says a top Gore aide. "I guess the others are just jealous of her."

Omarosa is a former political appointee in the Clinton and Gore White House. She currently works as a political consultant in Washington, DC. Omarosa had a humble youth, growing up in the projects of Youngstown, Ohio, but she eventually graduated from Central State University. She also earned a Master's degree from Howard University and is now working toward her Ph.D, which should be awarded to her in the spring of 2004. Omarosa's hobby is pageantry and she enjoys working as an image consultant who has successfully trained a Miss USA, Miss Taiwan and Miss Guyana.

What is your definition of "success"?
"Recipe for Success: Study while others are sleeping; work while others are loafing; prepare while others are playing; and dream while others are wishing."
(Quote by-William A. Ward)

Amarosa's Website for more...

UPDATE: 03/04/04 Tonight Omarosa is history as far as The Apprentice is concerned. Her devisive nature, poor teamwork and weak work ethnic played a big part in her downfall.

[Via US News]

Queer Eye For Green And Gold Guy

Tue, 13 Jan 2004 23:50:08 GMT

Queer Eye For Green And Gold Guy

Some Pack fans give up game to seek Fab Five wisdom on style, mullets and shaving

By MEGAN TWOHEY

They make up a new demographic that could prove curious to social scientists across the country: Packers fans who love "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy," a popular new show on cable television in which gay men try to transform the fashion, tastes and grooming of style-deficient straight men.

A crowd of about 3,400 predominantly heterosexual men and women from across southeastern Wisconsin took time out of game day Sunday to catch a glimpse of two of the show's stars, Jai Rodriguez and Kyan Douglas, who appeared at the Metropolitan Builders Association's annual Home Builders Expo at the Midwest Airlines Center in downtown Milwaukee.

Couples, families and other viewers of the show arrived with a desire to see if the young men were as cute and charming in person as they are on TV. They bombarded the hosts with questions about style, mullet hairstyles and shaving.

Many said their love of football was matched - in some cases eclipsed - by a love of the show's five hosts, known as the Fab Five, who are appreciated for breaking down barriers between gay and straight cultures while providing tips that prove useful to viewers.

<snip>

Because he attended the first of two question-and-answer sessions with the stars, Kaddatz, whose Packers sweat shirt revealed a love of the team, was not in danger of missing the playoff game against the Philadelphia Eagles. But he set the VCR just to be safe.

The Packers fans who were among the 1,200 people to show up for the afternoon session said there was no doubt about it: Seeing Rodriguez and Douglas promised to be so exciting that they planned to miss part of the game or skip it all together.

"You can always watch the Packers on TV," said Lisa Schneider, 31, of New Berlin, who snapped photographs of the two men as they walked on stage to the sound of enthusiastic applause. "It's not every day that you can see these guys in person."

<snip>

"I like their attitude," he said. "They know how to interact with straight guys."

The enthusiasm of Wisconsin viewers of "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" was not lost on Rodriguez and Douglas.

In an interview backstage after the first session, Rodriguez said he was touched by the warmth of the crowd, which included around 2,200 fans.

"People from the Midwest are so generous and cool," he said. "Growing up gay, you tend to be leery of straight people. It's always a surprise when straight people are so supportive of us."

[Via Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]

Zero Patience for Zero Tolerance

Wed, 26 Nov 2003 04:00:32 GMT

Zero Patience for Zero Tolerance

News shows recently showed video of 14 police officers charging a crowded high-school corridor with guns drawn in a drug sweep. Students at Stratford Creek High School in Goose Creek, S.C., were forced onto their knees or against walls, while dogs sniffed their backpacks for drugs.

None were found. Although the incident was extreme, it was not an aberration but the logical consequences of "zero tolerance" policies, defended by both the school and the police. Zero tolerance must be abandoned, especially in connection with children.

Zero-tolerance policies have resulted in some children being placed in the criminal justice system. Two examples currently in the news: A Missouri judge ruled that a 6-year-old boy suspected of killing his grandfather could be charged as an adult; a New Jersey prosecutor's office has charged a 7-year-old boy with molesting a 5- year-old girl in an incident that the defense attorney describes as "playing doctor."

For most children, zero tolerance is experienced in schools with administrative rules that purportedly enforce safety and discipline. Arguably, the administrative rules are actually a reaction to federal threats to cut funds. For example, in 1994 Congress passed the Gun-Free School Act by which states had to implement zero tolerance on weapons or lose federal money. Many schools rigorously interpreted zero tolerance to include the prohibition of anything even looking like a weapon. They adopted broad definitions of dangerous behavior, which allowed for no exceptions.

Soon the media spilled over with stories of young children being suspended or treated like felons for playing with water pistols, paper guns or even for pointing their fingers at each other and saying "bang."

<snip>

And so, an 11-year-old is taken away in handcuffs for drawing a picture of a gun; an 8-year-old faces expulsion for a keychain that contained a cheap nail clipper; a fifth-grader is suspended for drawing the World Trade Center being hit by an airplane ... The stories go on and on.

<snip>

A backlash is developing among students who are reportedly saying the same thing nationwide. Many schools now resemble prisons with hidden security cameras, metal detectors, guards, random searches, drug-sniffing dogs, and searches without warrants.

<snip>

There is little evidence that zero tolerance produces safety. Instead, it strips away the safeguards of a peaceful society: compassion, due process, good will, presumption of innocence, tolerance, discretion, humor ... It victimizes the most vulnerable citizens: children.

[Via Fox News]

Fit For A Queen, Dicey For W.

Fri, 21 Nov 2003 19:24:21 GMT

Fit For A Queen, Dicey For W.

Too many cooks spoil the President.

George W. Bush has allegedly offended Queen Elizabeth II by bringing no fewer than five of his personal chefs to Buckingham Palace.

"Her Majesty greeted the news that Bush was coming with his own chefs in absolute silence," a snitch tells London's Daily Telegraph.

"That's her general way of expressing disapproval. She's not thought to be [thrilled] about the whole visit anyway, but when you consider that she has excellent cooks herself, you can see why this would be taken as a bit of an insult."

The POTUS with the mostest, who doesn't like to travel abroad, may have been afraid the queen's cooks wouldn't fry pork rinds the way he likes them.

The White House didn't return a call yesterday. But the Telegraph quoted one Bush source saying, "He's the President of the United States - maybe he needs a late-night snack."

Hold the pretzels.

[Via New York Daily News]