Subject: Daily Dose - 070410 - Jennifer Lopez's double, THIS is TRUE,
ransom, DDL, Rotten News
"That was nice of you to set up
a blind date for your ex-boyfriend."
"I know, but I don't hold any
grudges."
"I'm surprised he trusted you
enough to agree to go out with her."
"Well, I had to swear to him
she's Jennifer Lopez's double."
"Wow! Is that true?"
"I wouldn't lie. She's twice
her weight and twice her age."
______________________________
THIS is TRUE...
COLLECTION PLATE: The Rev. Randall
Radic of the First Congregational Church in Ripon, Calif., sold the church for
$460,000, then bought himself a BMW and pocketed the rest of the cash. "He
apparently saw [the church] as a source of money for himself," said San
Joaquin County Deputy District Attorney Phil Urie. But Radic laid a Get Out of
Jail Free card on prosecutors: he has information on a local murder, and cut a
deal where he will testify in the murder trial if he gets no jail time for his
embezzlement and nine other felony counts. Prosecutors accepted the deal,
leaving the congregation sputtering. "My undoing is truth," Radic
says on his web site. "I decided to say the truth and that has led me down
some very interesting paths and complicated my life." Radic, 54, had to
pay restitution as part of his plea bargain, and has signed a book deal to tell
his story. "Not to read him is a crime," Radic says on his web site,
which shows him holding a glass of wine, smoking a cigar, and looking toward a
woman dressed in high heels, angel's wings ....and nothing else. "Not to
publish him is a sin." (Modesto Bee)
...One thing for sure: he does know plenty about sin.
***
ANOTHER DAY AT THE SALT MINE:
Emmalee Bauer, 25, was told by her boss at a Sheraton hotel in Des Moines,
Iowa, to stop spending work time writing in her personal diary. Sure enough,
they never saw her with her pen and pad again. But when they checked her
computer, they found this: "I am going to be typing all my thoughts instead
of writing all day," she had written. "That way, there isn't any way
to tell for sure if I am working really hard or I am just goofing off." In
total, Bauer used 300 single-spaced pages to describe her efforts to avoid
work. She was fired, but Bauer applied for unemployment benefits. Sheraton
appealed that, which is how the diary ended up in the public record. Other
entries include "I have managed to waste half of the day doing nothing
constructive. That isn't exactly an easy task, either." and "It's
noon already and I don't feel like I have accomplished a damn thing.
Accomplishment is overrated, anyway." Her request for unemployment
benefits was denied. (Des Moines Register)
...So now the only thing she has left is to go into politics.
***
HONEY, I'M HOME! Post-war
baby-boomers are starting to retire in Japan, too, and they're finding it hard
to cope. "For about a year now, I've been starting to help out with the
housework," says Mitsutoshi Fukatsu, who has been married to his wife for
30 years. He even took part in "Beloved Wives Day", which was set up
in 2006 by the Japan Adoring Husbands Association. The goal is to come home
from work exceptionally early each January 31 -- by 8:00 p.m. -- to tell their
wives "Thank you." Fukatsu is also taking another step: he has
started to call his wife by her first name. (AP)
...The hard part, of course, will be remembering what her name is.
***
FINDERS KEEPERS: Emmanuel Sanchez,
30, of Alton, Texas, was stopped by police in Georgia for a "routine"
traffic violation. They asked if they could search his pickup truck, and he
said yes -- and officers found $950,435 in cash hidden in the truck. He found
the money, he said, in a dumpster outside a Hooter's restaurant, and said he
hid it because he knew if the police found it they'd take it away. Indeed the
money was confiscated. Sanchez was not arrested since there is no evidence of
any crime, but he can only get the cash back if he proves he had it legally.
(San Antonio News-Express)
...Otherwise known as "Guilty until proven innocent."
***
HIGH COURT: "Judge Rules
Government Supply of Marijuana Is Inadequate"
--San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News headline
______________________________
Marvin found the following ransom
note slipped under his front door. "Bring $50,000 to the 17th hole of your
country club tomorrow at 10:00 AM if you ever want to see your wife alive
again."
But it was well after 1:00 PM by the
time he arrived at the designated meeting spot. A masked man stepped from
behind a bush and demanded, "You're three hours late. What took you so
long?"
"Give me a break!" said
Marvin, pointing to his scorecard. "I'm a 27 handicap."
______________________________
DDL
A lady from York, Pennsylvania,
Was treated for mild dipsomania.
She screwed her physicians
In eight new positions,
Prognosis is now nymphomania.
______________________________
"Wal-Mart says it classifies
its customers into three groups: brand aspirationals, price sensitive
affluents, and value-price shoppers. Wal-Mart says the new categories will
replace the old customer classifications: teeth or no teeth."
--Conan O'Brien
***
"The music industry is stumped
by the huge drop in sales of rap music. Sales of rap music down 21 percent this
past year. A lot of rappers have had to cut back on their lifestyle. A lot of
rappers getting rid of the gold teeth. They're going with aluminum
siding...it's cheaper."
-Jay Leno
***
"The movie '300' comes out
Friday. The ancient Greek stories are strange. The story of Odysseus is
basically the story of a long, hellish commute; and along the way, a sorceress
turns Odysseus' friends into pigs... which is not really magic if you've ever
been to a high school reunion."
-Craig Ferguson
***
"Civilization exists by
geological consent, subject to change without notice."
--Will Durant (1885 - 1981)
***
In 1815 French chemist Michael
Eugene Chevreul realized the first link between diabetes and sugar metabolism
when he discovered that the urine of a diabetic was identical to grape sugar...
...It also was the first step in
realizing he had WAY too much time on his hands.
***
The people who vote decide nothing.
The people who count the votes decide everything.
--Josef Stalin.
***
Rabble, n. In a republic, those who
exercise a supreme authority tempered by fraudulent elections...
--Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
______________________________
Rotten News.... (true)
Wednesday, 22 November 2006, 01:09
GMT
Rare zoo lion cubs poisoned
By Amber Henshaw
BBC News, Addis Ababa
Rare Abyssinian lion cubs are being
poisoned at a zoo in Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa, and their bodies are then
sold on to be stuffed.
The zoo, founded by Ethiopia's former
Emperor Haile Selassie, says it poisons a number of cubs each year because it
does not have the space or money to look after them.
"We can send them to the forest
and to some governmental palaces but most of the time we send them to the
taxidermists," said the Lion Zoo administrator Muhedin Abdulaziz.
He said the taxidermists paid about
$175 (£90) for each cub and they were then sold for $400 (£210).
Between 1,000 and 1,200 people visit
the zoo each day. Meat to feed the lions costs about $4,000 (£2,100) a month.
**********
Rape Case Roils Saudi Legal System
By DONNA ABU-NASR, Associated Press
Writer
1:49 PM PST, November 21, 2006
AL-AWWAMIYA, Saudi Arabia -- When
the teenager went to the police a few months ago to report she was gang-raped
by seven men, she never imagined the judge would punish her -- and that she
would be sentenced to more lashes than one of her alleged rapists received.
The story of the Girl of Qatif, as
the alleged rape victim has been called by the media here, has triggered a rare
debate about Saudi Arabia's legal system, in which judges have wide discretion
in punishing a criminal, rules of evidence are shaky and sometimes no defense
lawyers are present.
The result, critics say, are sentences
left to the whim of judges. These include one in which a group of men got
heavier sentences for harassing women than the men in the Girl of Qatif rape
case or three men who were convicted of raping a boy. In another, a woman was
ordered to divorce her husband against her will based on a demand by her
relatives.
In the case of the Girl of Qatif,
she was sentenced to 90 lashes for being alone in a car with a man to whom she
was not married -- a crime in this strictly segregated country -- at the time
that she was allegedly attacked and raped by a group of other men.
In a trial that ended in November --
in which the prosecutor asked for the death penalty for the seven men -- four
of the men received between one and five years in prison plus 80 to 1,000 lashes,
said the woman. Three others are awaiting sentencing. Neither the defendants
nor the plaintiffs retained lawyers, as is common here.
"The big shock came when the
judge sentenced me and the man to 90 lashes each," said the woman. The
sentence was handed down as part of the rape trial. Lashes are usually spread
over several days, dealt around 50 at a time.
The sentences have yet to be carried
out, but the punishments ordered have caused an uproar.
Justice in Saudi Arabia is
administered by a system of religious courts according to the kingdom's strict
interpretation of Islamic Sharia law. Judges -- appointed by the king on the
recommendation of the Supreme Judicial Council -- have complete discretion to
set sentences, except in cases where Sharia outlines a punishment, such as
capital crimes.
That means no two judges would
likely hand down the same verdict for similar crimes. A rapist, for instance,
could receive anywhere from a light or no sentence to death, depending on the
judge.
Judges in the case referred The
Associated Press to the Justice Ministry when asked about the sentencing. The
ministry, in a statement Tuesday, said rape could not be proved. There were no
witnesses and the men had recanted confessions they made during interrogation,
the statement said. It said the verdict cannot be appealed.
**********
Iranians Say '300' Insults Their
Ancient Culture
Leader's Aide Says U.S. Trying To
Humiliate Iran With Film
POSTED: 11:38 am EDT March 14, 2007
TEHRAN, Iran -- The hit American
movie "300" has angered Iranians who say the Greeks-vs-Persians
action flick insults their ancient culture and provokes animosity against Iran.
"Hollywood declares war on
Iranians," blared a headline in Tuesday's edition of the independent Ayende-No
newspaper.
Iran Calls '300' War Propaganda
The movie, which raked in $70
million in its opening weekend, is based on a comic-book fantasy version of the
battle of Thermopylae in 480 B.C., in which a force of 300 Spartans held off a
massive Persian army at a mountain pass in Greece for three days.
Even some American reviewers noted
the political overtones of the West-against-Iran story line - and the way
Persians are depicted as decadent, sexually flamboyant and evil in contrast to
the noble Greeks.
In Iran, the movie hasn't opened and
probably never will, given the government's restrictions on Western films,
though one paper said bootleg DVDs were already available.
Still, it touched a sensitive nerve.
Javad Shamghadri, cultural adviser to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,
said the United States tries to "humiliate" Iran in order to reverse
historical reality and "compensate for its wrongdoings in order to provoke
American soldiers and warmongers" against Iran.
"The film depicts Iranians as
demons, without culture, feeling or humanity, who think of nothing except
attacking other nations and killing people," Ayende-No said in its article
Tuesday. "It is a new effort to slander the Iranian people and
civilization before world public opinion at a time of increasing American
threats against Iran," it said.
**********
Tycoon Puts Elbow Through Picasso
A US tycoon has been forced to pull
out of a deal to sell his Picasso painting for a record £74m after he put his
elbow through it.
Steve Wynn was showing Le Reve (The
Dream) to guests at his office in Las Vegas when the accident happened.
Director and screenwriter Nora
Ephron who was at the office at the time of the accident wrote about it on her
blog site, reports the BBC.
She said Mr Wynn raised his hand
then "at that moment, his elbow crashed backward right through the canvas.
There was a terrible noise".
"Smack in the middle... was a
black hole the size of a silver dollar. 'Look what I've done,' he said. 'Thank
goodness it was me'."
Mr Wynn, who has retinitis
pigmentosa, an eye disease affecting peripheral vision, plans to repair the
coin-sized hole.