Henry M. Willis, of Los Angeles, wrote Mon 8/20/12 to Harper's Weekly:

It's a small point, but "immolation" means sacrifice, not setting
something on fire. So "self-immolate" should not be used sole-
ly for those who set themselves on fire. Why not use plain En-
glish, saying simply that someone set himself or herself on fire?

Bruce Mitchell wrote Sun 8/19/12 @12:45 PDT:

Hey! Thanks for the tip about the Burner app.When I had an active
investigation practice, I had a network of six cell phones with differ-
ent area codes, for a similar purpose . . .

Connie Harbeson wrote Sun 8/19/12 @10:52 EDT
re last week's dumb news from Indiana:

What the hell is that crazy Tea Baggers sign saying?  If  by  "remove"
the billboard means "assassinate" (as with Bin Laden), isn't that a fed-
eral offense?  To threaten the President.

And:  The Indianapolis school bus driver strike is just such a lose-lose-
lose situation.  School  bus  drivers  have the worst jobs in the system
(barely exceeding those of substitute teachers)  and  deserve  so much
more money and on-board adult assistance.  However,  those poor a-
bandoned "chirren" were surely confused and upset, yet probably safe-
ly supervised by their conscientious teachers  and  other  school staff –
who were working overtime for free, on a Friday, instead of dragging
ass into the local Chili's  for their well-earned two-for-one's  at Happy
Hour.  Plus,   the parents,  knowing full well they had some extra time
before their little darlings returned to their doorsteps, could get in a little
more housework,  TV,  home office work,  or net surfing,  or whatever
else they do all day at home.  Lose-lose-lose-win?

No win.  Even the parents lost.  They were notified, and they had to worry, too;
and a bunch of them had to drive to the schools to get their "chirren."

But more than the "lose-lose-lose-lose,"  we found a supreme irony in that news
story:  Hoosier politicians, like the numbnocks of Ohio and Wisconsin, are in the
vanguard of those suppressing public employees' right to strike. But by outsour-
cing the school bus driving contracts,  the  dumb  fucks  undermined their own
policy.   The drivers did not strike against the schools or the school board;  they
walked out on an  Illinois  corporation.  Three political cheers for the school bus
drivers, and three more for labor!
                                                                                                                – Editor

State Excise Police issued 258 citations at Indiana University,
57 at Ball State and 32 at Notre Dame last weekend for pub-
lic intoxication, illegal consumption of alcohol and public nudi-
ty. . . .

A high school freshman was arrested in Greenwood for post-
ing "Fuck the school," "Fuck the teachers," and "Fuck" a par-
ticular teacher on  Clutterbook  Facebook  and, "Something
bad is gonna happen tomarrow [sic]." . . .

Hancock County Coroner Tamara Vangundy,  49,  resigned
after being convicted of driving to  a  suicide  scene  in New
Palestine while drunk  but will continue to seek re-election in
November. . . .

DePauw University, in Greencastle, placed 12th in the Prince-
ton Review's annual list of the 20 top party schools.

                                                 [courtesy Associated Press]

A Louisville anesthesiologist and his wife, running for President and Vice
President, respectively, as write in candidates, filed a suit in the state cir-
cuit court in Frankfort to knock Barack Obama off the ballot  as  not  a
"natural born citizen." . . .


     Zumba, move over!  Zuma Zuma was wowing everyone at this year's
     Kentucky State Fair.
                                                      [courtesy Louisville Courier-Journal]

"Romney's largest problem, obviously, is that he is a phony. His manner, much mocked, is
 that of a stiff '50's high school class president,  who has been forced to take theater class,
 and . . . you can tell he hates it and knows he's no good at it . . . ."
                                                                                                        – Dan Halpern, in Harper's

"If you grow corn or cabbages, the baboons steal them."

                                    – a grandmother identifying herself only as Khathazile, explain-
                                       ing why she and her neighbors in Swaziland had converted
                                       their fields to a strain of marijuana known as Swazi gold

"Legitimate rape."
                                    – Todd Akin

7.  The World as your own personal Wal-Mart.

6.  Clutterbook, Link Din, Spacebook and Twirper show
     that there are more friends on the planet than people.

5.  The working of the Nigerian economy revealed (and it proves Barnum's Theorem).

4.  Everyman a tough guy.

3.  The dissemination of "information" be unlimited, and the truth be damned
     (if you Google long and deep enough, you can prove anything).

2.  Giving keyboards to numbnocks shows us hitherto unknown levels of ignorance.

1.  That it works at all (the accumulated weight of cat and kitten photos on line will
     eventually bring it down).
                                                                    [J. Polacheck, L. Zanger, J. Ewing, H. T. Hebhoe]


And, so: Why does our "spellchecker" not flag the (alleged) names "Caitlin," "Kaitlin" and "Kaitlyn"?

A "personhood" funeral for your miscarriage or late period.

Prince Gabriel of Belgium, 9
Usain Bolt, 26
Macaulay Culkin, 32

A fast food customer somewhere  (location not said)  supposedly got  2 cents' worth of discounts   for   both "best  looking"   and  "best   butt"  (see the Huffington Post). . . . Congressman  Kevin Yoder,   of   Kansas,

went  skinny-dipping  in  the  Sea  of  Galilee. . . . Gay
pride parades were banned in Moscow  for 100 years.
.  .  .  A court-appointed psychiatrist diagnosed  Pussy
Riot leader Nadezhda Tolokonnikova with "mixed-per-
sonality disorder"  involving  inflated self-esteem,  stub-
bornness and a "proactive approach to life." . . . Pussy
Riot supporters were arrested in Marseilles for wearing
balaclavas, under the French law banning face covering
in public  (but it's legal in China). . . . The population of
the United States reached  a  hundred  million  times  pi
(314,159,265). . . . A woman in Wales called 999  (the
British equivalent of 911)  to report a hamster bite. .  .  .
Queen Elizabeth's  corgis  and  dorgis  savaged Princess
Beatrice's Norfolk terriers in a bloody  dog  fight  at Bal-
moral Castle. . . .  Floppy disks,  the Twilight Zone,  and
Vito Corleone are among concepts likely  not  known  to
this year's college freshmen, according to an annual list is-
sued at Beloit University. . . .A 55-year-old Nepali bitten
by a cobra  bit  it  back,  to the death  (the snake's death,
that is). . . . Selena Gomez moved in with Justin Bieber.


 Perp of the week: Prague High School in Oklahoma (the
 name of the town is pronounced,  in  Oklahoma,  like the
 first syllable of "pregnant")  withheld valedictorian Kaitlyn
 Nootbaar's diploma because she said "How the hell do I
 know?" in her speech.

              [courtesy Harper's Weekly, MSNBC.com, AP]

Hillerich & Bradsby (makers of the Louisville Slugger)
and Little League Inc. settled for $14.5 million with the
family of the 12-year-old boy  who suffered a brain in-
jury from a ball hit off an aluminum bat into his chest.

My fiancé and I cut corners for four years so we could have a
nice wedding.  We didn't ask our parents for money, and they
didn't offer.  We're footing the entire bill,  including the formal
wear for the attendants.

The problem is my 34-year-old socially awkward sister, "Al-
lie."  She was hospitalized 20 years ago when she was brutal-
ly beaten by older children. She never received psychological
help.  My mother pays Allie's rent and all her bills. Family va-
cations have been canceled to  keep  Allie  comfortable.  My
parents missed my college graduation because Allie was ner-
vous about fitting into an airline seat.

When I outperformed her academically,  my parents asked me
to downplay it so Allie wouldn't feel bad.  When I got engaged,
my mother asked me to skip engagement party and shower be-
cause those things "make Allie nervous."

I bent over backward to find Allie a flattering plus-size maid-of-
honor dress  and was so thrilled when she finally found one she
liked that I bought it for her.   Now  she's  decided she hates it,
and she told the whole bridal party that I'm a Bridezilla.

Allie has caused two bridesmaids to back out of the wedding.
Last week my mother bawled me out for being "domineering"
and said I should "consider Allie's feelings."

I have been considering Allie's feelings since I was 10.  Can't
I have just one day where people are thinking about me?

                                                                        Normal Sister

[Well,  guess what!  The "bullets" refer  to   two   separate  stories! ] <–––––––––––

Len Zanger wrote Sun 8/12/12 @12:53 EDT,  with his submission of ethnic
identities for last week's Tabloid Headlines poll on U.S. census write-ins by
the enumerated with Middle Eastern origins:

In response to your request for lists of self-declared ethnic identities,
I'm going to begin with the definition of  "ethnic"  from the "Free On-
line Dictionary":   "Of, relating to, or characteristic of a sizable group
of people sharing a common and distinctive racial, national, religious,
linguistic, or cultural heritage."   That's pretty broad,  and allows op-
portunity for days or weeks of Google-ing.

I'm going to leave the "race" category alone for now  except  to  note
that "Muslim" is not a race but "Caucasian" is.  Also,  "Semitic" is not
a race,  but a language group.  On the other hand,  the directive man-
dates "self-declared" ethnic identities; so perhaps we may include the
above while also qualifying them. . . .

Bruce Mitchell wrote Sun 8/12/12 @12:15 PDT:

Is throwing pickled pigs feet the Kentucky equivalent of tossing a shoe
in the Middle East?

There's something to that, but it's more like spitting crickets in Indiana.  – Ed.

(Mr. Mitchell, who said he had a Syrian stepfather and had traveled extensive-
 ly through the Middle East, also submitted a list of 17 Middle Eastern "ethnic
 identities," ten of which were unique – i.e.,  not  submitted  by other entrants.
 Mr. Zanger submitted a list of 16 – nine of them "unique."  Neither of them is
 responsible for the puns or the ethnic slurs in the list below.)

A-rab Afghanistani Al Qaeda Alawi Antesemantic Antesemitic Antisemantic Antisemitic Arabian Armenian Assyrian Azeri Baluchi Bedouin Berber Camel Jockeyan Chadic

Chaldean Coptic Cushtic Desert Rat Druze Egyptian Farsi Fatahnal Gazan Gypsy Hamasian Hebrew Hezbollahan Irani Iraqi Israeli Jewish

Jordanian Khyberian Kurdish Kuwaiti Lebanese Luri Mandean Maronitian Melkitian Moorian Muslim Nubian Nomadic Omani Omotic Palestinian Persian Qatari

Samaritan Sandmani Saudi Semantic Semitic Serial Killerian Sinaian Suezan Syrian Turkish Turkmaniac Turkmenian Turkestanian UAEan Yazidian Yemeni Yemenite Zionist

Drivers working for an Illinois company  to which more than half of
Indianapolis school bus service had been outsourced went on strike
Friday afternoon, leaving 12,000 kids stranded.as the weekend be-
gan.
                                                            [courtesy Indianapolis Star]

A stagecoach overturned at the State Fair horse show,  injuring five
aboard including the State Fair Queen, who was dressed as a cow-
boy and riding shotgun. . . .

Ex-Congressman Lee Hamilton's wife was run over by her own car
and killed in Bloomington.
                                                            [courtesy Associated Press]

                    [courtesy Indiana Tea Party, in Elkhart]

A 36-year-old man set a toilet seat  on  fire  at a convenience store in Louisville and told po- lice it was a religious ritual. . . . Martin County Clerk  Carol Sue Mills, in office 23 years, fired her daughters  after  an audit showed funds missing....

Restroom perp

A federal judge overturned a state law prohibiting
the sale of wine and liquor in  grocery stores  (but
allowing it in drugstores that sell groceries). . . .

A new movie, Compliance, based on a hoax strip
search of a McDonald's employee in Bullitt Coun-
ty 8 years ago, had watchers retching at a preview
in New York. . . .


Perp of the week:  Lacey Gordon, 23, 5'7", 120 lbs.,
was listed as "Lexington's most wanted" on August
15 by both the Fayette County Sheriff  and the Lex-
ington Herald-Leader .  Again,  they didn't say what
she is wanted for;  but – who wouldn't want her?

                                         [courtesy Herald-Leader]

"Leaders are basically saying that they are getting out of piracy and going into other
 business, like kidnapping.  The return on investment is now just too low."

                                                                                    – piracy expert Stig Jarle Hansen

"One day I hope that guns will lose their glamor."
                                                                                – David Berkowitz

"There's just no two ways around that."

                     – Joseph Antos, health care spokesman for the American Enterprise Institute

"It's 10 minutes after 4, Central time."
                                                             – Joe Corcoran, WKYU-FM radio, Bowling Green,
                                                                Ky., at 1:45 a.m. and 2:35 a.m. Friday, August 17

The  "Burner"  will disguise the cell phone number you are
calling from (it helped a man from Portland, Oregon, track
down the thief of his bicycle in Seattle, Washington).

Tim Tebow, 25
Madonna, 54
Kathie Lee Gifford, 59
Gary Larson, 62
John "Boog" Powell, 71
Dave "Baby" Cortez, 74
Edith Garmezano ("Eydie Gormé"), 81 (consensus; or 80, or 84)
Frank Gifford, 82
Ann Blyth, 84
Fidel Castro, 86
Phyllis Schlafly, 88
Maureen O'Hara, 92

The  word  (or  phrase)  "F-bomb"  ( f bomb?  F bomb?
f-Bomb?  fBomb?)  entered Merriam-Webster's Collegi-
ate Dictionary. .  .  . Lindsay Lohan screamed at Frances
Eastwood (Clint's daughter) in a Hollywood nightclub. . . .
Another Israeli woman and three Tibetans self-immolated.
. . .  A man in London set his apartment on fire by micro-
waving his wet socks and underwear. . . . The ultra-Orth-
odox Jewish Modesty Patrol was selling stickers  in Jeru-
salem  that  blur  men's  eyeglasses. . . . A pediatrician in
Delaware waterboarded his 11-year-old daughter. . . . A
gun fell out of a man's pants at the movies in Sparks, Ne-
vada, shooting him in the butt. . . . A driver swerved to a-
void a moose and hit a bear near Hanestad, Norway. . . .
More than 100 Federal Express employees  in  Memphis,
Tennessee, were treated for exposure after a forklift punc-
tured a barrel of chili peppers destined for  pepper  spray.
.  .  .  A  professor  at the Merchant Marine Academy,  in
Kings  Point,  New  York,  was  suspended  for telling the
class, before showing a film, "If someone with orange hair
appears in the corner of the room, run for the exit."

               [courtesy Harper's Weekly, MSNBC.com, AP]

American hurdler Lolo Jones, proclaimed (by herself) to be
yet  a  virgin  at 30 years of age,  said she had not seen any
sexual hookups at the Olympic Village in London.  "I'm in a
suite with seven girls," she said,  "and I guess we don't have
any sluts on the team." . . .

Serena Williams did the Crip Walk to celebrate her victory in
tennis at the Olympics. . . .

A brand of marijuana called "Usain Bolt" was being sold in le-
gal dispensaries in California. . . .

Austin Weirschke, 17, "texted" "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star"
in less than 45 seconds in New York's Times Square  to  win
the American texting championship.

Some men just don't get it.  "Homer" is a wonderful friend, and
I love him dearly.  We are both in our 80's and widowed.  But
Homer's kisses are getting too mushy and lingering.    He often
says,  "I can't wait to make love to you,"  although I reply each
time,  "Not a chance."

We could have so much fun together, but he always has sex on
his mind.  I have  no  interest  in getting in bed with him  or with
any other man. If that's all he wants he's welcome to find some-
one else; but I would miss him. How can I make Homer under-
stand?  His feelings get hurt easily.
                                                            Too Old to Be Frisky

Don't  forget!   Readers  interested  in intellectual dissection of important current events  are invited to attend  the  Weekly World News Round Table at  the  offices of Borf Books outside Brownsville, Ken- tucky,  just  after  church  every  Sunday. Guest  speakers  lined up for meetings in the near future  include  Maria  Alekhina, Ykaterina  Samutsevich,  and  Nadezhda Tolokonnikova,  of Pussy Riot.

LETTERS to the EDITOR:

J. Ewing wrote Sun 8/5/12 @08:08 EDT:

Tim  Tebow  revealed to be dyslexic?  THAT explains it!
It was DOG who told him to spike the ball so they could
play.  Not GOD.

Tony Dean wrote Sun 8/5/12 @23:24 CDT:

As frequently happens, I am mystified by what's weak in
the  "Quotations of the Weak."  Rob Stein's quote pretty
much  nails  it.  The extremely hot and dry weather in the
Chicago area  has effectively limited its mosquito popula-
tion; so yes, I'd have to say the increase in West Nile dis-
ease is complicated and cannot be solely attributed to un-
usual weather.

Stein's weakness, as perceived here,  has nothing to do with sci-
ence or the weather, but everything to do with his diction. It's the
numbers – plural,  not singular:  "There's  "There've  [there have]
already been at least 241 cases of West Nile disease reported in
42 states this summer. . . .  The reason for the increase is compli-
cated;  but the unusually warm winter,  early spring  and hot sum-
mer  is  are playing  a  roles."

NPR's printed version of Stein's report has his grammatical errors
corrected  (and already did the morning the report aired  [erred],
Aug. 2).   That's why we linked only to the spoken version in last
week's issue.  – Editor

A judge ordered a driver's license restored to an Indianapolis wo-
man from whom it was taken because she did not have auto insur-
ance (even though she didn't own a car). . . .

A 17-year-old boy in Anderson hanged himself with a seat belt in
the back of a police car in which he had been left unattended and
handcuffed. . . .

It was cricket spitting contest day at the State Fair.

                                        [courtesy Louisville Courier-Journal]

The Sullivan County town of Dugger decided to  sell  the  property
bearing a 26-foot-tall cross.
                                                            [courtesy Associated Press]

The southeast suburb of Beech Grove welcomed smokers from Indi-
anpolis  as the city council defeated a prohibition that had passed on
first reading.
                                                            [courtesy Indianapolis Star]

The Lawrence County town of  Oolitic  (pronounced
"oh-LIT-ick" – the stone it's named for is pronounced
"OH-oh-LIT-ick")  was platted as "Limestone" in Sep-
tember  of  1888,  and in 1896  the name was sent to
Washington,  D.C.,  to establish a post office;  but the
name was rejected because of a town already named
Limestone in Indiana.    So Dr. R. B. Short suggested
the name  "Oolitic,"  and Oolitic was incorporated on
November 4, 1901.

Or, so says Wikipedia.  But find me a town in Indiana
named  Limestone,  says  the Editor of Tabloid Head-
lines  (there's  a  Limestone  in  Maine,  and  there are
Limestone counties in Alabama and Texas).

And since when is duplication a bar to a town name in
the first place?  There are two towns in Indiana named
Springville,  and  three  named  Needmore.   The three
Needmores  are within 65 miles of one another,  in  the
southwestern part of the state;  and one of them  – yes,
the one in Lawrence County – even  has  a  post office
(it's a branch of Bedford's, zip 47421).

There are four Needmores  in  Texas.  The one in Delta
County, known also as Eureka, Jernigan, Pecan and Pe-
can Branch, once had a post office, established in 1886
(by the name Needmore).

The  most  common  town  name  in the United States is
Springfield. Rand-McNally lists only 17, and none in In-
diana or Texas (but both states have them).

A 26-year-old Louisville man was arrested after he took off his left
sock  and stuffed it in his girl friend's mouth,  she  extracted  it  and
stuffed it in his mouth,  he threw her to the floor  and held her there
with a hammerlock and told her he would not let go until  she  "tap-
ped  out,"  she poked him in the butt causing him to let go,  and  he
drew a handgun out of the sock drawer  and pointed it at her  (but
didn't shoot her).
                                                            [courtesy Courier-Journal]

A woman threw jars of  pickled pig's feet  through the window of a
convenience store in Harlan County after her son was ejected from
the store. . . .

A state legislator from Whitley County,  whose day job was teaching
math,  died  from injuries suffered more than a year earlier  when  he
broke up a fight between two boys in the high school where he work-
ed; the boys, who had already served nearly 90 days in detention for
assault,  were charged with reckless homicide (as juveniles)  after the
man died but not required to serve additional time,  and the teacher's
widow, who won his seat in the legislature as he lay dying, is pissed.

                                                [courtesy Lexington Herald-Leader]

"I am a legend."
                             – Usain Bolt

"I mean, sometimes you just gotta go."
                                                                – Ryan Lochte, on peeing in the pool

"Kiss my ass!"
                            – Mitt Romney aide Rick Gorka, to the press in Poland

"Senate rules sanction reimbursement for any cost relating to a senator's
 use of a bathroom."
                                    – Andrew Herman, attorney for Idaho's Larry Craig

"Unbaby.me" is a browser extension (designed for Google
Chrome) that,  when you click your "Refresh" or "Reload"
button,  will  remove  pictures  of  babies  on your friends'
Clutterbook Facebook pages and replace them with "awe-
some stuff,"  like kittens, puppies, turtles,  ice cream,  your
choice.

Plaxico Burress, 35
B. J. Thomas, 70
Garrison Keillor, 70
Dustin Hoffman, 75
Rhonda Fleming, 89

Nidal  Hasan,  the U.S. Army major accused of killing 13 persons at Fort Hood,  Texas,  was fined $1,000 twice in the last two weeks for appearing at court martial unshaven. . . .A cheetah at the Cincinnati, Ohio, zoo ran the 100-me- ter dash nearly 4 seconds faster than Usain Bolt did.  .  .  . Porn film star Jenna Jameson endorsed Mitt Romney.  . . . Police Tasered a 12-year-old girl in St. Louis, Missouri. ... A Canadian woman who had posted photos of  her  baby on  Clutterbook  Facebook  found the child for sale on an- other web site. . . .  A man telephoned Qantas in Adelaide, Australia,  and was put on hold  for 15  hours,  40 minutes and 1 second by a robot that said an agent would speak to him "as soon as possible." .  .  .  Kanye West admitted that his new rap "Perfect Bitch" is about his ex-wife,  Kim Kar- dashian. . . .  The ACLU asked a federal court to rule that to "like" a Clutterbook Facebook post is free speech,  in a case in which a Virginia sheriff  fired an employee who had "liked" the Sheriff's re-election opponent's page. . . . A 15- year-old boy was hospitalized for dehydration after playing Modern Warfare 3  on the X-box in his bedroom  for  four straight days in Columbus,  Ohio. .  .  . A 17-year-old Chi- nese boy sold his kidney to buy an and I-Phone  and  an I- Pad. . . . Prime Minister Hun Sen of Cambodia delivered a 5 hour, 40 minute speech on national television.. . . . A fed- eral court of appeals OK'd a suit against the police in Ana- heim,  California,  by  a man arrested for beating a possum with a shovel to protect the bulldogs in his back yard.  . . . The U.S. Census Bureau was studying a plan to replace its category of "Negro"  with "black"  and "African-American" ("you people's" choice,  in a check box),  add a "Hispanic" check box, and  give persons with a Middle Eastern origin write-in blanks to identify their ethnicity – which give rise to this new . . . :

Crime scene photo

How many self-declared Middle Eastern ethnic identities can
you come up with?  Multiple entries not only allowed but en-
couraged.

[courtesy Harper's Weekly, Daily Snopes, MSNBC.com, AP]

My mother and I have had a poor relationship for years.  She is
self-absorbed, demanding, and hurtful.   She seems to find great
amusement in upsetting me,  and she takes every opportunity  to
do so.

On one occasion I was talking to my family about an individual
I admired,  and my mother interrupted me to explain that I only
knew  about  him  because "they mentioned him on a television
show."   When I told her  how  embarrassing  that  was for me,
she  retorted,  "It was a joke;  and if you were offended,  that's
your problem."

On another occasion, I had just received my college degree and
was quietly showing my diploma at a family gathering. My moth-
er shouted repeatedly that she needed everyone's attention  and
then said,  "My son just got his degree."  Not only did she again
embarrass me; but her behavior stole my thunder.

She refused to accept that she has done anything wrong.  I final-
ly decided to sever all contact. I have no desire to associate with
someone who tries so hard to hurt me and make me feel small.

The rest of my family berates me for being "mean" to her.  They
expect me to maintain this destructive relationship.   How can I
explain to them how horribly she treats me?

                                        Frustrated and Alone in Indianapolis

FGDean@aol.com wrote Sun 7/29/12 @10:13 PDT:

George W. Bush's  "quotation of the week"  last  Sunday  –
"I crawled out of the swamp,  and I’m not crawling back in"
– is surprisingly eloquent, considering his penchant for clum-
sy speech. Maybe he talks better when he's not under stress.

Bruce Mitchell wrote Sun 7/29/12 @11:37 PDT:

Where's the pic? of the melted weather rock. Or was you
jist exaggeratin'?

How gratifying it is to know that someone is paying attention! – Editor

An extension of I-69 from Indianapolis to Evansville is projected
to go right by  a  nudist  camp  near the Monroe County town of
Kirksville.
                                                        [courtesy Associated Press]

A drug suspect in Princeton used Clutterbook Facebook  to lure
the informant against him to Indianapolis, where four men locked
him in the trunk of a car while they discussed ways to kill him (he
escaped). . . .

Centrifugal force threw a passenger from a car as it made a turn
near the Kosciusko town of Milford  in a police chase at speeds
up to 140 m.p.h. . . .

A 60-year-old woman moved from the northeast side of Indianap-
olis  to Terre Haute,  leaving behind a house occupied by 42 living
dogs and 7 dead ones (neighbors called police over the stink). . . .

Kids went back to school on Tuesday, July 31, in many communi-
ties.
                                                         [courtesy Indianapolis Star]

Kids went back to school on Wednesday, August 1, in many
communities.
                                                [courtesy Edmonson News]

Four million of the $19 million Kentucky is getting from the
deceptive mortgage practices settlement fund  will  go  to a
program tracking prescriptions for pain pills and other con-
trolled substances. . . .

A federal judge in Washington  struck down Environmental
Protection Agency regulations imposed to prevent pollution
of streams in mountaintop removal  by coal mining compan-
ies.
                                [courtesy Lexington Herald-Leader]

"Some Americans shouldn't leave the country."

                                – track star Carl Lewis, speaking of Mitt Romney's remarks in London

"Shove it!"
                    – Rick Gorka, a Mitt Romney aide, to the press

"Did you see the movie?  How does it end?"
                                                                        – James Holmes

"There's already been at least 241 cases of West Nile disease reported in
 42 states this summer. . . .The reason for the increase is complicated; but
 the unusually warm winter, early spring and hot summer is playing a role."

                                                                                          – Rob Stein, National Public Radio

Tim Couch, 35
Roger Clemens, 50
Arnold Schwarzenegger, 65
Kent LaVoie ("Lobo"), 69
Buddy Guy, 76
Edd Byrnes, 79
Peter O'Toole, 80
Elliot Charles Adnopoz ("Ramblin' Jack Elliott"), 91

James Holmes was charged with two counts of murder for
every person who died at the movies in Aurora, Colorado.
. . .  A Baptist church in Crystal Springs, Mississippi,  shut
its doors to a wedding of a black woman who had been at-
tending the church for a year and whose uncle was the jani-
tor there  (the  groom,  also  black,  had been attending the
church for a month). . . . A white buffalo was born in Con-
necticut. . . .  A strip club association, in anticipation of the
Republican National Convention,  revealed a survey  com-
paring Republican and Democratic spending patterns.  . . .
Two thousand farmers in Assam,  India,  were  chosen  for
growing bhut jolokia to satisfy military demand for chili gre-
nades.  .  .  .  Three members of a female rock band called
Pussy Riot were on trial in Moscow for hooliganism. . . . A-
liens cut a Mickey Mouse silhouette into a wheat field  near
Wilbur, Washington.

Are Wheaties (and America)  ready for a new Breakfast of Cham-
pions sweetheart? . . .

Or, did anyone ever notice that corn flakes – Post's Toasties or Kellogg's, either one – are tasti- er, and more nutritious, to begin with?    Here's what we will get from our new Olympic gymnas- tics honey –––––––––––––––> . . .

David Beckham,  not on this year's British soccer team, piloted  a mo-
torboat bearing the Olympic torch up the Thames. . . .

Swiss soccer player Michel Morganella was sent home for tweeting "I
want to beat up all South Koreans, you can all go burn. Bunch of mon-
goloids."  . . .

Greek triple jumper Paraskevi Papachristou was sent home for tweet-
ing "With so many Africans in Greece . . . the  West  Nile  mosquitoes
will at least  eat  homemade food!!!" . . .

Did everyone watch the Olympic bicycle racers in the rain? They look-
ed like a violin section – all their knees were pumping in unison. . . .


     Spain's Olympic beach volley baller Liliana Fernandez shows us where it's at.

I know that this is a bit out of your league, but I don't know who
else to ask.   My son is a university student.   His major requires
that he take several math classes.  In every math class,  the pro-
fessor is his worst teacher of the semester.  They  don't  explain
anything,  and they don't give him feedback  on tests or quizzes.
As a result, he does poorly.

I thought it was just my son or that university, but now he is ta-
king a make-up math class at the community college.  He says
the same thing is happening there.  What is it with math profes-
sors that makes them unfeeling, unhelpful, and uncaring?

                                                Mom in Cape Coral, Florida