Thumbprints?

This article is initially funny. As you read it, however, you will become more and more incensed with corporate arrogance and this bank's cavalier attitude towards people:

Bank insisted on thumbprint from armless man

The Americans with Disabilities Act will be 20 years old next year, and Steve Valdez is still wondering when a Bank of America branch near his Tampa, Fla., home is going to hear about it.

The 54-year-old Hillsborough County employee told TODAY’s Lester Holt Monday in New York he is still irked by what happened to him recently when he went into the branch, where his wife has an account, to cash a check made out to her. The teller and branch manager refused to cash the check because he didn’t have an account there and he couldn’t give them a thumbprint to confirm his identity.

The kicker is they wouldn’t accept his reason for not providing the thumbprint: He doesn't have any thumbs, or arms for that matter, because of a birth defect.

Even when he offered two forms of photo identification, the teller wouldn’t budge. He was told company policy required the thumbprint. If he wanted to cash the check, either his wife could come in to cash the check or he could open an account.

... Valdez, who functions with two prosthetic arms, is not the sort to complain about his disability. In his entire life, he said, he’d never found it necessary to speak up about being discriminated against. But this time, the bank went too far, he said.

Read the entire article here.

Deal or No Deal?

From this site:

In one of those inspired bits of research we love so much, a team at Duke University trained a group of rhesus macaques to play a game based on Deal or No Deal.

The researchers gave the macaques a choice of eight white squares to pick up. Underneath each was a colour representing a prize, with green bringing the best reward - a sugary drink. After picking a square, the animals were shown the prizes they had passed up. ...

Brain scans revealed activity in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), a region known to monitor the consequences of actions when the monkeys won a prize. But the same area also lit up when they were shown what they had missed, indicating that they were thinking about what might have been.

"This is the first evidence that monkeys, like people, have 'would-have, could-have, should-have' thoughts," said Ben Hayden, a researcher at the Duke University Medical Center and lead author of the study.

Even the macaques got sucked into that troubling, stressful, "what if" thinking. Wow!

A sign of the times

The box of crackers Debra Rogoff bought from the grocery store had some crackerjack in it — an envelope stuffed with $10,000.

Yet the Irvine woman was more curious than ecstatic about her daughter's find. After all, who would leave money in such a place?

"We just thought, 'This is someone's money,'" she said. "We would never feel good about spending it."

Rather than go on a shopping spree, the family called police and was initially told the money could be part of a drug drop.

Police later heard from store managers at Whole Foods in Tustin that an elderly woman had come in a few days earlier, hysterical because she had mistakenly returned a box of crackers with her life savings inside. In a mix-up the store restocked the box rather than composting it.

The Lake Forest woman, whose identity was not released, had lost faith in her bank and decided the box would be a safer place for the money.

Luckily for her, the box of Annie's Sour Cream and Onion Cheddar Bunny crackers were bought by the Rogoffs, who discovered the crisp $100 bills in an unmarked white envelope on Oct. 10.

The Rogoffs never heard from the woman and didn't receive a reward, but Rogoff did return to Whole Foods a couple weeks later.

"I asked them if I could have another box of crackers," she said with a laugh. The store obliged.

From the Associated Press.

Thank goodness criminals can be so stupid!

From the Associated Press:

Memo to anyone planning a drug store robbery: don't lock your keys in the getaway vehicle.

Police said John Wilkinson, 24, of Big Spring, did just that after he allegedly robbed the Stanton Drug Store of Zanax and hydrocodine.

They said Wilkinson used a caulking gun, wrapped in a dark cloth, to get the drugs Thursday afternoon.

Afterward, he allegedly headed back to his vehicle, which was parked and running in front of the drug store, and discovered he was locked out, the Midland Reporter-Telegram reported in its online edition Thursday.

Stanton Police Chief Mike Adams said Wilkinson then tried to get away on foot. Police, who thought he had a gun, shot him in the top of his shoulder during the short chase.

Just focused on the begonias

What's growing in YOUR garden?

A 73-year-old Dutch man was astonished to learn from police that the begonias he had lovingly tended on his doorstep concealed a secret marijuana plantation.

"Police officers suddenly noticed marijuana plants sprouting from his begonias," a police spokeswoman in The Hague said on Friday.

The Hague pensioner promised to destroy the marijuana plants, which he believes were planted by local youngsters, while preserving his begonias.

Earlier this month the Dutch government set up a task force to crack down on marijuana cultivation in the country.

Growing marijuana is illegal in the Netherlands, but sales of it and other cannabis-related soft drugs in coffee shops have been tolerated for decades.

--from Reuters

Not needles in a haystack ....

... but diamonds in a landfill?

From MSNBC:

A Staten Island jeweler has gotten her 3-carat diamond earrings back after she, her husband and city sanitation employees sorted through a smelly heap of garbage. The studs were in a small jar of cleaning solution, which a worker at the couple's jewelry store had accidentally thrown away ...

Ewww!

Commemorate the mess

From the Associated Press, via Yahoo News:

A measure seeking to commemorate President Bush's years in office by slapping his name on a San Francisco sewage plant has qualified for the November ballot.

The measure certified Thursday would rename the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W. Bush Sewage Plant.

Supporters say the idea is to commemorate the mess they claim Bush has left behind by actions such as the war in Iraq.

Local Republicans say the plan stinks and they will oppose it.

What Bush will be remembered for?

from a Table Talk at Salon:

He got some brush cleared. He lowered the bar for the next president. He almost succeeded in uniting the Democratic Party. No one has ever been able to do that.

How can you call him a failure when he's achieved all that while taking a record number of vacation days?

Call him a failure, indeed!

Tornado Oddities

from the Associated Press and the St. Paul Pioneer Press:


HUGO, Minn. (AP) -- As residents in Hugo begin to move on from last week's tornado, some say they noticed a few bizarre things amid all the damage. Jason Akins said the twister unwound a roll of toilet paper in his bathroom - draped it across the countertop, then rewound it in the sink. The toilet paper didn't even rip.

"All I could say was, 'You have got to be kidding me,'" Akins recalled.

He also said that winds overturned sofas and ripped away his roof, but dishes of cat food and water were untouched. The cat food was actually still in the bowl.

While hurricanes, floods and blizzards create broad swaths of damage, tornados seem to have tiny fingers that can reach in to small areas and cause some weird mischief. Some say tornados have their own personalities.

Terry Clarkin said the Hugo tornado stuck four steak knives in the yard - and they landed in a perfect square, with the blades in the dirt about three inches.

Across the street, a tree had been stripped of leaves, and instead was filled with pink wads of insulation - looking much like a tree from a cartoon.

Some residents made interesting findings amid the wreckage.

Five-year-old Lauren Ford found a red Spider-Man T-shirt in her back yard. One neighbor found a fishing boat against the remains of a front porch. Others found canoes, checkbooks or toys.

Jeff Janus said the tornado protected him.

He was in his front yard when the storm hit, and he ran inside and grabbed his dog and cat.

"I saw people's houses flying by," he said. He didn't make it to the basement, but instead crouched down in the hallway, with one animal in each arm. He said the storm tore off the bedroom doors and placed them almost gently on top of him - shielding him from falling debris.

When the storm passed, he said, he spit shreds of insulation from his mouth, but he felt the doors saved him.

"I find it hard to believe I am actually here," said Janus.

REAL Dragons, ya know?

I found this article at Reuters Oddly Enough page. It's so charming I had to duplicate it here.

My friend Joe Nigg, channeling dragon buyer John Topsell, published a book called How to Raise and Keep a Dragon back in 2006. Joe has written a number of wonderful books about mythological and folkloric creatures, but this one had a particularly interesting story behind it--one that's still unfolding. As Joe explains, "A funny thing happened. The book went from a commissioned adult spoof of animal-raising guides to [being] marketing as an illustrated children's book. The book's surprisingly enthusiastic reception internationally (see matches for John Topsell on Google.com) has shown how fervently many young readers dream of raising their own dragon--and that many adults shared that dream as children, some apparently still believing there are such creatures."

Fueling this impression, Joe says that "Topsell lists fictitious Dragon Suppliers in the back of the book," a resource page that has, in part, led to a lot of correspondence from kids--a veritable outpouring. They run the gamut from literal belief and doubt to imaginary play. Sometimes, Joe says, he responds by writing, "John Topsell's dragons have been in myths and stories worldwide since time immemorial. But there are real animals called 'dragons': the Komodo Dragon of Indonesia (which grows up to 10 scary feet long!), and Chinese Bearded Dragons and Water Dragons, tiny lizards that people raise as pets. What I recommend is that you create your own imaginary Dragon friend. Select its breed, size, and color. Name it, and raise it as you read the book."

Below you'll find some wonderful (uncorrected) excerpts from the many emails and letters received by Joe, which once again show just how imaginative and passionate kids can be about the things they love.

I loved the book "How to Raise and Keep a Dragon." I live in California, but my parents are unwilling to drive to Dragon House, Inc. to get a miniature Standard Western Dragon. First of all, is there any way to get a dragon egg shipped here? And, my parents have no belief in dragons whatsoever. I need to find some way to get a dragon, no matter what the cost. In addition, I need to know how much they cost. Thanks! how long wold it take for a dragon to fly from canada to south america?

***

I am five years old. I want a Standard Western Dragon. I also want the Mushussu Dragon. I want the Piasa Dragon and the Dragon of India. Where can I get them? Can I have a dragon? That is it.

***

dose a baby dragon think your its mom wen it haches?

***

I have your book and I had wanted to purchase a mini western dragon so I looked in the resources and found a place to purchase a dragon from, so I looked on the internet to look up the place I wanted to get my dragon from, and when I searched it said:"Nothing matches your search."I obviously knew the place you mentioned in the resources wasn't real.I asked my dad to help me find a place where someone sold real dragons on the internet but my dad insisted they were not real.I NEED YOU TO GET ME A LINK FOR A FEW WHERE THEY SELL REAL DRAGONS ON THE INTERNET!!!

***

i saw the thing about mouthrot but how do you see it and kier it.

***

I read the book "How to raise and keep a dragon" and I think it's FANTASTIC. But still have questions I would like to ask. Does a dragon exists(I really really really wish it does.)? If so, can you please give me the phone numbers of the dragon suppliers in China (If [you] have them. If not,the addresses will be ok.)and send me a picture of a stanrd western dragon(green,if possible.), too. Thank you!

***

How big should a miniture dragons room be, at the smallest?

***

I am taking care of a standard western dragon and I am wondering where to buy riding equipment for it.

***

Why did you lie to me? I was so upset when I asked my mom where Babyon was, because I wanted to train a Mushussu dragon. She told me about how it was now Iraq and that it no longer exists. I hate you!

***

What if my dragon goes Buzerk and gets really mean? (not that it has)

***

I am an eleven year old fan of dragons, and I am wondering what you think about them. I must ask, do you truly believe dragons are/were real? Please answer truthfully, I do not like being misguided. I would like to discuss this topic more with you, if you don't mind.

***

I would like to know if you really have dragons because I would like to get one and I can't get one if they're not real.

***

I have a full grown European Dragon, a mini- European dragon, and a European Dragon egg, but where can I find a home for them in a mountain? (I am an excellent trainer but people keep spotting them and faint, while some call the police!) Please reply A.S.A.P.!!!!!!!!

***

Sounding silly but deadly serious?

Here's the headline I read in Salon.com:

Giant Sinkhole Opens in Mexico City

July 09,2007 | MEXICO CITY -- A giant sinkhole swallowed a stretch of street on Mexico City's east side, with one man feared dead and 30 families evacuated, authorities said Monday.

Even in a city where historic buildings regularly lean, crack, collapse or sink below sidewalk level due to excessive water extraction and unstable soil, the 45-foot-deep sinkhole -- which measures about 15 yards in diameter -- came as a shock.

It began as a giant crack late Saturday in the eastern Iztapalapa borough and rapidly worsened. The ground collapsed, swallowing a car, the facade of a one-story brick building and pavement.

A young man who was watching the spectacle also fell in, and emergency workers were digging with hand tools to try to recover his body, authorities said. His age was not immediately known.

"It is very highly unlikely" that the victim could still be found alive, said Mexico City Civil Defense Secretary Elias Moreno. "But as long as that possibility exists, we are digging very carefully to avoid hurting him if he is alive."

Fissures from the sinkhole extend outward for about 500 yards, raising the danger of additional collapses. Thirty families that live near those cracks were taken to shelters.

Moreno said are using cement to try to fill about 200 other cracks, fissures and sinkholes in Iztapalapa.

He blamed them on the city's triple problem of earthquakes, which cause cracks; the excessive extraction of ground water, which causes sinking, and heavy torrential rains, which make surface soil more likely to collapse.

Mexico City sinks an average of 3 to 4 inches each year.

Written by MARK STEVENSON, Associated Press Writer

If it weren't so deadly, it'd be tremendously funny, the stuff of Looney Tunes and laughable silliness.

Neither entitled nor qualified

From the inimitable and unrepressable Onion:

CHICAGO—In a surprising refutation of the conventional wisdom on opinion entitlement, a study conducted by the University of Chicago's School for Behavioral Science concluded that more than one-third of the U.S. population is neither entitled nor qualified to have opinions.

"On topics from evolution to the environment to gay marriage to immigration reform, we found that many of the opinions expressed were so off-base and ill-informed that they actually hurt society by being voiced," said chief researcher Professor Mark Fultz, who based the findings on hundreds of telephone, office, and dinner-party conversations compiled over a three-year period. "While people have long asserted that it takes all kinds, our research shows that American society currently has a drastic oversupply of the kinds who don't have any good or worthwhile thoughts whatsoever. We could actually do just fine without them."

In 2002, Fultz's team shook the academic world by conclusively proving the existence of both bad ideas during brainstorming and dumb questions during question-and-answer sessions.

You can say that again! hee-hee-hee.

Can we learn from the ants?

Now that Memorial Day has come and gone, summer is officially here. If you live in Michigan, you know it's also the season of the dreaded ORANGE BARRELS. Time for road construction, lane closures, orange barrels and interminable delays. Read on:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Army ants tired of potholes take one for the team, throwing their bodies into rough spots to make a smoother road for their sisters, British researchers reported on Sunday.

They found that army ants of Central and South America match their own bodies to the size of the hole they want to plug. Several may plunge together to fill in bigger holes, they report in the journal Animal Behaviour.

Scott Powell and Nigel Franks of the University of Bristol studied an army ant species called Eciton burchellii, which march across the forests of Central and South America in swarms of up to 200,000.

These raiders always remain connected to the nest by a trail of other ants. But this highway of living ants can be extremely uneven as it passes over leaves and branches on the forest floor.

So a few of the ants climb into the dips to make a smooth road.

"When it comes to rapid road repairs, the ants have their own do-it-yourself highways agency," Franks said in a statement.

"When the traffic has passed, the down-trodden ants climb out of the potholes and follow their nest mates home," Powell added.

"Broadly, our research demonstrates that a simple but highly specialized behavior performed by a minority of ant workers can improve the performance of the majority, resulting in a clear benefit for the society as a whole."

...

"I think every road user who has ever inwardly cursed as their vehicle bounced across a pothole -- jarring every bone in their body -- will identify with this story," said Franks.

Most ant species are believed to live in large colonies of sisters, all with the same mothers. Males are also sometimes produced, but only under certain circumstances.

From this article.

Bubba, getchur gun

I'm shaking my head over this one:

He can barely walk or talk, but 11-month-old "Bubba" Ludwig is already a fully paid up member of America's firearms fraternity, with a 12-gauge Beretta shotgun and a gun permit to his name.

The shotgun was a gift from his grandfather who bought it as an heirloom for his grandson when the infant was just two-weeks-old.

The gun permit came courtesy of the Illinois state authorities last month.

Who's your daddy?

Here's a story that highlights that even DNA technology has its limits:

Twin brothers Raymon and Richard Miller are the father and uncle to a 3-year-old little girl. The problem is, they don't know which is which. Or who is who.

The identical Missouri twins say they were unknowingly having sex with the same woman. And according to the woman's testimony, she had sex with each man on the same day. Within hours of each other.

When the woman in question, Holly Marie Adams, got pregnant, she named Raymon the father, but he contested and demanded a paternity test, bringing his own brother Richard to court.

But a paternity test in this case could not help. The test showed that both brothers have over a 99.9 percent probability of being the daddy— and neither one wants to pay the child support. The result of the test has not only brought to light the limits of DNA evidence, it has also led to a three-year legal battle, a Miller family feud and a little girl who may never know who her real father is.

"'Did you sleep with him [Richard Miller] while in Sikeston for the rodeo?'," Cameron Parker, Richard's lawyer, said she asked Holly Marie Adams in 2003 court testimony, to which she answered "'Yes ma'am.'" "She then said she went to appellant's [Raymon Miller's]home where they had sex later that night or early the next morning," Parker said.

All I can say is "Wow!"

Playdough recipe

Cleaning out some old .txt files, I found a recipe for homemade Playdough. I had even copied the link to the original webpage, but alas, that appears to be long gone. Here's a more up-to-date (and hopefully) safe recipe for young kids and old kids alike.

Colored Playdough

Materials

• 1 cup water
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup salt
• 1 tablespoon cream of tartar
• Food coloring
• Saucepan
• 1 cup flour

Directions

1. Combine water, oil, salt, cream of tartar, and food coloring in a saucepan and heat until warm.
2. Remove from heat and add flour.
3. Stir, then knead until smooth. The cream of tartar makes this dough last 6 months or longer, so resist the temptation to omit this ingredient if you don't have it on hand.
4. Store this dough in an airtight container or a Ziploc freezer bag.

Time, anyone?

We've added a new world clock to our blog. Check it out ... at the top of this column.

Measuring how long bells will bong ...

I haven't cribbed a story from CNN's Offbeat section in a while. Here's one that is more interesting (to me) than offbeat:

VIENNA, Austria (Reuters) -- With the precision of a surgeon, Andreas Rupp carefully wraps sensor strips around a 21-ton bell in Vienna's famous St Stephen's Cathedral.

Europe's second-largest bell, nicknamed Pummerin, is one of several famous bells across the continent being checked to determine their life spans, and unlock the secret of the optimum chime.

Using acceleration sensors and echo microphones, the sensor strips are like electro-cardiograms that determine the health of human hearts, Rupp said.

"The Pummerin is well," determines Rupp, a project scientist and professor at the Polytechnic College in the German city of Kempten. "We just want to know how long it can be healthy and if there is any risk she could crack like so many others."

Hamburg's Millennium Bell has undergone the examination, and bells in Paris' Notre Dame Cathedral and London's St. Paul's Cathedral -- which British partners in the project favored over Big Ben in the Houses of Parliament -- are lined up as the next patients.

The project was triggered by a debate 10 years ago among bell-makers who wanted to determine if bell clappers were hitting the right spot.

Every time a clapper hits, it causes a slight deformation and strains the metal, mostly bronze or bronze alloys. Experts say the location and force of the clapper's hit -- as well as what it is made of -- will have an effect. The sensors record how hard the hit, how deformed the bell is, and its chime.

Dangers also lurk in modernization, they add.

Churches opting for mechanical, even computerized systems over human ringers might shorten their bells' lifespan, some say. Others think a switch from softer clappers to steel ones about 100 years ago has added to the damage.

"Many fear historic bells could be damaged severely or even destroyed by this new way of ringing," Rupp said.
Human ears needed

"Computers chime the bells as they were programmed to do. Humans can always use their hearing, and go 'oh, that didn't sound so nice,' or 'ouch, that was much too hard'," he said.

In the past it would have taken about 10 people to chime the Pummerin, but now it happens at the flick of a switch. Since the bell has only been in action for around 50 years, it might still have plenty of bongs in it yet.

Its predecessor was cast in 1711 with metal from cannon balls used by the Turks during an unsuccessful siege of the city in 1683, but was destroyed in World War Two.

The current bell was cast from remainders of the old one and new material in 1952.

Even if the Pummerin is a youngster in bell terms, Peter Grassmayr, a 14th-generation bell-founder and the Austrian partner in the project, has no doubt about its destiny.

"One day or another, every bell will crack," said Grassmayr standing next to the bell, which spans more than 3 meters and is nearly the same height. "We simply hope to extend their life span with our project."

Sparing usage can also work in a bell's favor. Many great bells -- like Big Ben in the Houses of Parliament in London -- ring daily or hourly but the Pummerin only chimes on special occasions, like high church days, the death of a pope or at midnight on New Year's Eve.

For Austrians themselves, the Pummerin is not just a bell but a symbol of their identity that marks big events throughout their lives, said the dome's priest Toni Faber.

"It is a voice of freedom, a voice of hardship, a voice of hope and a voice of a new life," he said, proudly glancing at the Pummerin. "I can hear all that when I hear the Pummerin."

Have you heard about B Flat?

I just discovered a most interesting NPR story that first aired on February 16th (my sweetie's birthday!). Here's their blurb on this audio story:

For reasons that remain mostly mysterious, the note we call "B flat" does the oddest things. It aggravates alligators, it lurks in the stairwell of an office building, and it emanates from a supermassive black hole 250 million light years from Earth.

Listen and be delighted: Have You Heard about B Flat?

Drunk gets the munchies!

from MSNBC:

A Russian man stopped by police for allegedly driving drunk tried to swallow his keys and then bit an officer who tried to retrieve them, a Russian news agency reported Tuesday.

Don't mess with a hungry Russian!