Clown Doing Space Flips

Canadian billionaire Gy Laliberte, the founder of Cirque du Soleil, rocketed into space aboard a Russian spacecraft for a few days of space tourism during which time he expects to do a few clown back flips. Back on Earth, his employees do the back flips.

Wave

There’s Twitter and Flutter (fewer characters) and now Google is taking Wave to public trial. Wave combines email, instant messaging and wiki-style editing, which means your friends can watch as you write your messages in real time. Imagine the anticipation.


Witchcraft Fears Cost Rowling Honour

Some US politicians believe Harry Potter author JK Rowling “encouraged witchcraft” and that’s why she never earned the President’s Medal of Freedom during the Bush years. Bush thought her chances would have been better if she had given him some of Harry’s pottery and Cheney thought she was writing about him.

Death to Fakers

A leading Egyptian scholar, who is probably crap in bed, is demanding the death penalty for people caught importing a female virginity-faking device. The $15 device releases liquid imitating blood, allowing a female to feign virginity on her wedding night. The other options are hymen repair and/or lying.

No Divorce During Celebration

Marriage will be allowed but no divorce during an eight-day celebration of 60 years of communist rule in China. Because of the number of marriages, officials say they just wouldn’t be able to cope with divorces during the festival, which begins Thursday. People who can’t wait for their divorce should just fly to Vegas.

Negative Messages Get Through

Negative subliminal messages work according to new research being done at University College, London. However, if your negative subliminal messages aren’t getting through, there is always the old standby, “Piss off!”

Iran’s On The Doo-Doo Track

Iran is building a new nuclear plant, they’re firing missiles to show they are “prepared to crush any military threat from any other country.” How much showing off do you have to do before you get bombed? I guess we’ll find out.

Pot to be Legal in California, Maybe

California, which legalized medical marijuana in 1996, may now become the first state to fully legalize marijuana. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said the state is broke, so they could use the tax revenue, and parts of it are on fire. “We need a pick-me-up.”


Swiss No Longer Neutral

The Swiss have been giving things up lately. They gave up their once-secret bank records to foreign governments so they could tax sheltered money. They gave up Oscar winning film director Roman Polanski up so he can face charges in the US. And now it is remoured they are giving up chocolate. It was either that or watches.

Saudi University Unveiled

A new university opening in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, will allow male and female students to mix freely, except in female-only residences. The females don’t have to wear veils in mixed classes and they will be allowed to drive on campus, all because the university is outside the jurisdiction of the religious police. The religious police will be waiting at the university gates, however, ready to pounce on any female student who shows her face.

Gel With a Twist

The Brits like their alcohol. One hospital had to remove antibacterial gel dispensers because visitors were using the stuff to get drunk. Now, a prisoner has done the same thing causing officials to remove all the gel dispensers in the prison system. Both inmates and guards are upset. As one guard put it, “The gel was tasty.”

Anglo Saxon Men’s Gold

A British guy with a metal detector has found hundreds of gold and silver pieces from the 7th Century. The find, worth millions, is mostly weapon fittings. Curiously, there are no feminine objects among the 1,500 Anglo Saxon pieces found which has archaeologists wondering . . . well they’re just wondering, that’s all.

Nudists Just Want to Ramble

German nudists want the right go rambling along their own footpath in a secluded area in what was formerly East Germany. However, there is opposition from the locals who say there are some people who just shouldn’t be seen naked.

Trump's Tent

Officials in Bedford, N.Y., have order workers to stop building a tent for Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi citing local bylaws. The colonel wanted the tent so he could entertain during the UN General Assembly in New York. The Bedford property, it turns out, is owned by Donald Trump who has a tent too, but he wears it on his head.

Fat People Can’t See It

Only seven per cent of obese people questioned in a UK poll realized they were obese. More than half the people deemed morbidly obese said they ate a healthy diet and more than one-third of the morbidly obese said they had never tried dieting. The two-thirds who did try dieting didn’t like it, although they said the diet meals were tasty when eaten with a large side of chips and gravy.

Electric Car Noises Being Considered

Electric car makers are experimenting with sounds to make the silent cars more audible to pedestrians. Nissan has tried chimes, melodies and whirring aircraft sounds from the film The Blade Runner. That one sort of worked but pedestrians kept looking up.

Ausie Cops Caught Nude

Two Australian policemen, part of an elite emergency response squad, were caught frolicking naked outside an unmarked police van following a stag party. Both officers are embarrassed, of course, but at least they’re out of the closet.

Alcohol Improves Brain Trauma Outcomes

Alcohol may become part of the treatment for brain trauma in the future because emergency doctors have found that people who have alcohol in their bloodstream are less likely to die of brain trauma. They have also noticed that people with alcohol in their bloodstream are more like to suffer brain trauma.


Smoking Bans Lower Heart Attack Rate

I used to suffer secondhand smoke in the cab but this has been a smoke-free zone for years, a very good thing and here’s proof. Studies show that smoking bans in public places in Europe and North America, which went into effect in 2007, have cut heart attacks by a third, probably saving hundreds of thousands of lives. Pity we can’t get everyone to quit.

Afghan Failure a Familiar Prediction

Generals, admirals. I’ve had em all in my cab and when they talk, people listen. The top US and Nato commander says the mission in Afghanistan will fail unless more troops are brought in. I hate to remind him but similar predictions were made by Russian generals who actually did bring in more troops.

Ramp Up Now, Stiff Us Later

Prices aren’t high enough for the oil companies. The head of the oil giant Total puts it in perspective though when he says the world could face a shortage of oil because of under investment. In spite of the worldwide recession and lack of demand, he wants oil companies and oil-producing countries like Saudi Arabia, Brazil and Canada to spend money now so they will be ready to open the taps when demand picks up. In other worlds, if you want to screw the consumer properly, you must prepare. Words to live by.


Blockhead Move

There are so many blockhead politicians, I often wonder where they come from. Here’s a source. Dr. Phil recently had a couple on his TV show who confessed to a shoplifting spree across the US and then reselling the loot on e-Bay. Now, they have been indicted on several crimes which could get them a big fine and years in jail. Joe Wilson is not alone.

Dog, Man on Run

An Australian man is on the run after springing his dog from death row. Ron Gilbertson’s dog, Max, was to be put down for mauling sheep before Ron busted him out of the pound. Gilbertson has been found and he’s going to turn himself in. It’s doubtful that Max will do the same.

Unhealthy Men Die Sooner, Love Less

Scientists say unhealthy men who smoke and have high cholesterol die 10 years before their healthier counterparts. That’s 10 years of good sex you’re missing boys along with the other 40 years of good sex you missed because of your smoker’s breath.

Ramadan Threats

A Moroccan man who led a group that wanted to lift a ban on public eating during Ramadan was threatened with death 100 times, maybe 101. He was so stressed he lost count.

Iran’s President Big on Tooth Ferry

Iranian President Mohamoud Ahmadinejad has again denied the Holocaust saying it was based on a “mythical claim,” unlike the tooth ferry which he said is based on sound Iranian science.

No Missiles Now But Wait Until 2012

Plans for missile bases in Poland and the Czech Republic have been scrapped by US President Barack Obama. The Russians are happy, the Democrats say the move is sensible and will save money and the Republicans say just wait 'til Sarah Palin is president.

Tallest Man Has Downside

The world’s tallest man, Sultan Kosen from Turkey, is in the market for a wife. On the bright side, the eight-foot-one-inch Kosen can change light bulbs and hang curtains without a ladder. The downside? He’s not really a sultan.

FedEx Charging More

FedEx has found a way to rescue sagging sales or at least raise more money from the sales they get in the future. They plan to increase prices. If this actually works . . . well, it won’t.

EU Wants to Reign in Bonuses

The European Union wants bonuses for bank executives to be tied to long-term performance. Bankers are opposed saying they prefer the current rock-n-roll system: Money for nothing, cheques for free.

Magazine Video Screen Gets Mixed Reviews

They’ve inserted video screens in the US magazine Entertainment Weekly. Some readers like the novelty but others say the video insert is too bulky, while Kanye West complains the videos aren’t about Beyonce or him.

Promiscuous Ad Pulled

Denmark is pulling a ‘promiscuous’ video that critics say sends the message that Denmark is a place to go to have unprotected sex with strangers. On the bright side, many people who saw the video before it was pulled have booked trips to Denmark hoping to have unprotected sex with strangers.

Colour Blindness Cured

Scientists believe they have found a genetic cure for colour blindness. Adult monkeys without the ability to distinguish between the colours red and green have had full colour vision restored. Now the monkeys can see what we see, that everything is pointless.

98-Year-Old Troublemaker Evicted

A 98-year-old British woman has been evicted from her Southampton flat for harassing neighbors, caregivers and police. She banged on neighbors’ windows, used her panic alarm 563 times in a month and called police 264 times over the past two years. This is a woman who probably needs a cat.

Graft, Corruption Supported by Parliament, Police

Indonesia’s corruption commission has been investigating the police and now the police have implicated the commissioners in crimes of bribery and murder. Parliament is on side with the police and they plan to pass a bill later this month to ensure that both graft and corruption continue to flourish as long as politicians and the police get their fair share.

Kidnapping Faked, Whuppin For Real

An 11-year-old Alabama boy didn’t want to bring a poor report card home so he faked his own kidnapping. He told police he escaped with his band instrument, a tuba, but left behind his school bag containing the report card. Police said they aren’t planning to lay any charges but the boy is expected to get a double whuppin.

Computer Filter Worked Too Well

Schools in Beijing are removing the Green Dam filter that was supposed to filter out ‘unhealthy’ sites such as porn. School officials said it actually prevented them from doing anything with their computers so you can’t say, technically, that it didn’t work.

Twittered Goats Flee Nepal

Sacrificial goats are in short supply in Nepal ahead of the Dashain festival which begins September 19. Goats are traditionally slaughtered during the 15-day event to appease Durga, an important Hindu goddess. Officials are trying to round up 6,000 goats but so far they have only found 240 amid fears that the country’s techie goats were warned about the festival on Twitter and fled the country.

Husband Number 23 Please

A 107-year-old Malaysian woman may be in the market for husband number 23. It all hinges on whether husband number 22, who is just 37 and in a drug rehab program, is still hot for her once his head clears. If he’s not, she’s putting out her well-worn welcome mat.

Rapper Needed Attention

Rap star Kanye West is sorry for interrupting the acceptance speech of country singer Taylor Swift at the MTV VIdeo Music Awards. West said he would never have done it if anybody had been paying any attention to him.

Williams Aced the Fine

Tennis star Serena Williams has apologized for her outburst at the US Open where she swore at the lines-woman for calling a foot fault. In spite of her apology, Williams was fined $10,000 for the outburst, an amount she happened to have in her change purse.

Lambs to the Slaughter

A hand-fed school lamb, part of a British primary school program designed to teach children about the food chain, has been slaughtered upsetting some pupils so much that trauma counsellors had to be called in. The counsellors expect to be even busier after phase-two of the program. Really cute, smart, sensitive hand-fed pigs will be butchered so the kids can learn about sausage making.

Groping Big in Tokyo

Tokyo police are cracking down on gropers who use the daily commute to take advantage of fellow passengers who are jammed together for rush-hour rides. Last year, more than 6,000 people were arrested on suspicion of groping but most got off arguing they were just reaching for their change, waving to friends or winding their Seiko watches.

Dead Ducks Didn’t Read Warning Signs

Syncrude Canada Ltd. says the company is not guilty of environmental charges stemming from the deaths of 1,603 ducks last year in one of the company’s toxic oil sands tailings ponds in Northern Alberta. A company lawyer said they have already expressed “deep regret” to the ducks and they hope, in the future, ducks will heed larger warning signs and land somewhere else.

Cha Ching

A young Chinese woman paid $600,000 for a Tibetan Mastiff, although the large, fierce dogs typically sell for about $2,000 outside of China. Asked to comment on the sale, the ethnic Tibetan who sold the dog said, “Cha Ching!”

Elton Wants to be Daddy

Sir Elton John and his partner David Furnish want to adopt an orphan they met in Ukraine. John said the 14-month-old toddler named Lev had “stolen my heart.” London’s children’s wear shops are gearing up to steal his money.

No Thanks Kraft

Cadbury has said no to a $17 billion offer from Kraft saying, essentially, that the Kraft offer was cheesy.

Chicken Parts

China and the US are stepping up their trade war. The US slapped tariffs on car and light truck tires from China and China fought back saying the US is dumping auto and chicken parts on them. It’s true about the chicken parts. Colonel Sanders gets the wings and legs, Swiss Chalet gets the breasts and thighs and China gets the feet.

Reality Show Bites Contestants

I can’t count the number of people I’ve driven to reality show auditions but none of them turned out this badly. Nine female “contestants” in Turkey were held for two months in a villa in Istanbul. After they were freed by military police, the nine said they were not sexually abused but they were required to fight each other and dance in bikinis while being filmed for the internet. There were arrests made but the ringleader got away. Meanwhile, the women are demanding to know which contestant won.

Pigeon Outruns High Speed

Pigeons are useful birds when they’re not raining down on the old windshield. Take Winston, a South African pigeon. He is faster than the country’s internet broad band. He carried a a 4GB memory stick 60 miles in two hours. In the same time, the country’s ADSL broadband system sent just a fraction of one GB. Microsoft would like to use the pigeon in its advertising but sources close to the bird say Winston is a Mac.

Japanese Space Freighter Set to Park

Japan has sent a space freighter into orbit. The 16.5-tonne unmanned H-II Transfer Vehicle is on a mission to resupply the space station if it can safely dock with the station. Designers say that won’t be a problem, adding that the parking system was taken from a Lexus.

Bused Into Traffic

I drive on the wrong side of the road occasionally but imagine being forced to switch sides forever. Samoans used to drive on the right, like Americans, but this week they switched to driving on the left, like Brits. The only problem is with buses which now discharge their passengers out into traffic. Until the buses can come up with the money to have their buses converted, the government is considering a number of short-term solutions: Make passengers walk; give passengers a helmet and orange vest and hope for the best; or, way down the list of possibilities, pay to have the buses converted immediately.

Cuddle and Move On

Share my cab, but not my bed. That’s the kind of advice Dr. Neil Stanley is giving. He’s a British sleep specialist and he says couples would be healthier if they had separate beds, like Ozzy and Harriet. People didn’t sleep together until the industrial revolution when they moved to town and found they needed to share. He recommends having a cuddle and then moving on down the hall for a good night’s sleep. Or call me and I’ll take you across town.

Long-Lasting Marriages One Day Only

Thousands of couples in China got married yesterday because 9-9-9 in Chinese sounds like ‘long lasting’ and that will make their marriage last. Couples getting married today don’t really care how long it lasts. They just want the presents.


Tall People Get Everything

Have you noticed that tall people have better lives? US researchers found that tall people are happier, probably because they have better jobs and better educations. And how did they get those jobs and that education? They’re tall, they could see over the heads of the kids in front and they got basketball scholarships and they dated the cheerleaders who were also tall and now they have tall children who will also have happier lives. There’s no way around this is there?

Bad Cop Bad Cop

One of the best ways for a cop to go under cover is to drive a cab. It’s true. I’m not under cover though so I can talk about a country with one of the world’s worst police forces, Kenya. The government is doing something about it, though. They have replaced almost all of the country’s senior police officers, including Major General Hussein Ali, the ex-police commissioner. He has been moved to the post office. Kenyans will feel safer now, unless they are expecting a cheque in the mail.

Teachers Expect Bad Things from Crystal

When I was in school, the nuns spotted trouble in a name, but it was the last name; the family name. Now, according to a UK poll, teachers look to first names to predict trouble. Kids named Connor, Brandon, Chelsea, Casey or Crystal get the bad brand. Good names are Adam, Edward, Christopher, Benjamin, Charlotte, Emma, Hannah and Rebecca. I know it’s not scientific, just an observation, but I went to school with Rebecca. She was not that good.


She Must be a She

South African runner Caster Semenya has taken part in a makeover in South Africa’s You magazine, partly to counter claims she is really a man. The 800-metre world champion wore a number of dresses for the photo shoot including a cocktail dress worn with stilettos. No guy could walk in those!

Short People

French President Nicolas Sarkozy is short. He’s just 5 feet five inches tall and he is touchy about it and often wears high heels in public, especially with his taller wife, former model Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. So, aides recently set up a photo after a factory tour in which only short employees were allowed on stage with him. Now, taller employees are saying they were discriminated against while shorter employees are complaining that now everyone will know they are short.


I Know, Your Feet Hurt

Why do you think I take passengers one block, two blocks a half a block? Sore feet! People, including men, buy uncomfortable shoes that don’t even fit because they want to look fashionable. Because of that, they have painful corns and ingrown nails and they take cabs. I’m not complaining, I’m just saying.

Eat More, Lose Weight

Lots of my customers are carrying a coffee when they get into the cab. No worries. But, if you’re trying to lose weight, eat a big breakfast. Researchers found that people who eat a full, balanced breakfast, don’t get hungry later in the day and turn to junk food. People who eat little or nothing for breakfast and don’t turn to junk food later in the day are just weird.

Kraft (Dairy Milk) Dinner

Kraft Foods is trying to buy Cadbury, maker of Dairy Milk, Green & Black's chocolate brand and Halls lozenges, Trident and Dentyne gum brands, and liquorice allsorts maker Bassett's. Kraft kitchens is already working on a chocolate-coated, cheese-dipped pasta.

Giant Rat Big As Cat

A giant rat found in the lost volcano in the jungle of Papua New Guinea is about the size of a cat, which should even the odds when the rat inevitably ends up in Bombay, New York and Singapore . . . for starters.

Banking on Death

Careful there older person with a life insurance policy, Wall Street has a plan to cash in our your death. Bankers are buying life insurance policies from the very old and the very ill for a percentage of the policy’s worth. If your policy is worth $500,000 when you die, they might give you $250,000 now and wait for the payoff. In the meantime, they’ll bundle thousands of policies into bond offerings and sell them to pension funds and brokers. Everybody waits for everybody to die and they snag the profits from your demise, which they hope will come sooner rather than later for obvious reasons. Talk about your Sarah Palin death panels. There are $26 trillion in life insurance policies in force in the US alone so if bankers can get a few trillion into this game of chicken, it could be another winner/loser. Just after they buy up all the policies of the walking dead, someone finds a cure for everything along with the fountain of youth and we’ve got the subprime dying time disaster. Sweet, and you’ve got some of their money. Now, watch for the puddle.


Satin Smooth Brand Won’t Save You

Misleading packaging can lead some smokers to believe there are brands that are safer according to a University of Nottingham study. Researchers recommend plain packaging as a way not to mislead smokers. Manufacturers argue that plain packaging would deprive customers of the right to differentiate between brands that will kill you today or brands that will kill you tomorrow or the next day.

Stone Age Cat People

Cat people have been around a long time. Archaeologists have just found a grave dating back 9,500 years containing the remains of a cat and a spinster.

North Korea Doubles Bomb Potential

I’m driving toward the east thinking about the cartoon mushroom cloud that hangs over Cloud Cuckoo Land also known as North Korean. They’ve told the world they are in the "final stage" of enriching uranium, a process that, if completed, would give it a second means of making a nuclear bomb. How impressive is that? Two ways to create nuclear bombs but not one way to feed their people.

Just Add Salt

A Denmark-based think tank says the world needs to spend money on marine cloud whitening rather than protecting forests and regulating carbon emissions. Just send clouds of salty sea water into the atmosphere and it reflects sunlight away from Earth before the salt falls (harmlessly) to Earth and kills all the crops.


Moon Landing Faked

Two Bangladesh newspapers have published an article taken from The Onion, a satirical US web site, which claimed the Moon landings were faked. The editors apologized and said they didn’t check with Neil Armstrong who is quoted in The Onion as saying the Moon landing really took place on a New Mexico sound stage. Not to be outdone, the Russians are working on a fake Mars landing which will take place in Siberia. It was originally planned for Afghanistan, but that didn’t work out.

Don’t Sweat the Bombs Washington

If I was driving cab in Washington this week, I’d have to watch for Taliban-type explosions and then be amazed when Canadian soldiers and medics deal with it. The Secret Service is working with the Canadian forces on this. It’s a way to show Americans what Canada is doing in Afghanistan or it’s a way to scare the hell out of people who live in Washington.

Pot That’s Not

Did you know they can make car panels out of hemp? It’s true. This very cab could be made of weed. Hemp is in the news in Europe because the Dutch police destroyed 47,000 plants they thought were cannabis. It was a field of hemp being grown for Wageningen University where they are studying hemp as a potential sustainable source for textiles. So, if you bought any of this stuff before the cops torched it, you’ll get higher making a rug than smoking it.

Madonna Adds to Purse

Madonna never rode in my cab, but if she did I bet she’d leave a bit tip cause if there’s one thing she’s got, it’s cash. Her Sticky and Sweet world tour made $408 million, the highest ever for a solo performer. The highest grossing tour ever was the Rolling Stones’ Bigger Bang tour which grossed $558 million. They had to split it four ways though.

Hard-Liner Gets Iranian Nod

Iranian MPs have approved the first woman minister in the 30-year history of the Islamic republic. Marzieh Vahid Dastjerdi, the female health minister-designate, is a hard-line conservative who has in the past proposed introducing segregated health care in Iran, with women treating women and men treating men. Two other women were nominated to become ministers but they were turned down because they aren’t hard-line conservatives.

YouTube to Rent Movies

YouTube is in talks with major studios about renting movies by streaming them online. The good news is that the Blockbuster stock you’ve always wanted to buy is going to be cheaper.

Older Americans Can’t Retire

American companies aren’t hiring, in part, because older workers are afraid to retire or they are financially unable to retire because they bought Chrysler at $100.

Oldest Dog a Chocoholic

The world’s oldest dog is dead. Chanel, a wire-haired dachshund was 21 or 147 in dog years. A New Yorker, Chanel enjoyed butter sticks, chocolate, barking at people and giving them the paw.

Japan Takes a Deep Bow

Japan has elected a new coalition government led by the Democrats who defeated the former government led by the Liberal Democrats. The new government, which campaigned on promises to increase social welfare and do away with American-style, pro-market reforms, is expected to bow deeply and do nothing.

UK Teens Big Drinkers

British teenagers - girls in particular - are more likely to get drunk than anyone else in the industrial world according to a new report. Not surprisingly, the report also found that this has led to unusually high rates of teen pregnancy.

Engineering Climate Change

A UK Royal Society study has concluded that many engineering proposals to reduce the impact of climate change are "technically possible" although the society also agrees some of them might be really harmful. One bad idea, they say, is tossing iron filings into the oceans to create CO2-absorbing algae because the filings (and maybe the algae) might kill other things. Another bad idea is having a royal society decide anything.