Random News - News of the Weird - Potpourri - Page 25 - EvBoard

Cfw828 · 01-13-2006, 03:20 PM

For those of you who like looking at funny videos online, check this video out of former Charlotte weatherman Mark Mathis. This guy wound up, of course, getting fired...but at least he had fun doing it

It got so bad that a local punk band apparently wrote a song about him.

Shape · 01-13-2006, 04:18 PM

Harry Belafonte, best know for the song "Day-O", recently called Bush the "greatest terrorist"

Quote:

"No matter what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world, George W. Bush says, we're here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but millions of the American people ... support your revolution," Belafonte told Chavez during the broadcast

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060109/...uela_belafonte

haha..

Unfortunatley, they're alot of people here in America and around the world, and probly on this board, who actually believe it. :|

Oayis · 01-15-2006, 02:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yahoo! News

Man Solves Rubik's Cube in 11.13 Seconds

SAN FRANCISCO - A 20-year-old California Institute of Technology student set a new world's record Saturday for solving the popular Rubik's Cube puzzle, turning the tiled brain-twister from scrambled to solved in 11.13 seconds.

Leyan Lo is part of Caltech's Rubik's Cube Club, a brainy clutch of students that hosted the competition at the Exploratorium museum in San Francisco. Lo's record-setting time came early in the day, among his first five tries in the preliminary rounds.

The record-setting solve caught competitors and Lo himself by surprise.

"It's kind of scary now that I set it, because I have two more (attempts) to go," Lo said humbly afterward. His time of 11.13 seconds broke the previous record of 11.75 seconds, set by Frenchman Jean Pons at the Dutch Open competition last year.

Still, the world record alone wouldn't gain Lo the overall champion's title at the event, which is determined by averaging three of five solution times in the final round. For that title, Lo went up against the teenager widely considered the fastest Rubik's Cube solver on the planet — Shotaro "Macky" Makisumi, a 15-year-old high school sophomore from Pasadena.

Makisumi prevailed, clocking in with an average time of 14.91 seconds in the final round to take first place.

Besides blindingly fast fingers and a head for memorizing algorithms used by most top competitors to solve the cube, what is Makisumi's secret?

"I don't know. Faster first two layers," he surmised, referring to solving the first two layers of the cube's colored tiles before moving on to the last. For his victory, Makisumi won a Rubik's Snake puzzle, one of several variations on the basic cube model which has sold more than 100 million worldwide, according to the manufacturer.

Contestants brought their own cubes to the competition, and a computer program was used to scramble the cubes in the same fashion for each round to give the contestants equal footing.

One of the crowd favorites was Casey Pernsteiner, 14, who traveled to the event from her hometown of Gonzales, Texas, with her mother. Pernsteiner logged a 21.59 second average in the preliminary round to move on to the finals.

The crowd erupted with applause as she threw the cube down time after time, slapping an electronic timing mat and consistently clocking times well under 30 seconds.

"My previous best time in competition was 25 (seconds) and I beat that, like, all ten solves, so I was really happy with that," Pernsteiner said. She finished among the top 16 finalists.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060115/...s_world_record
Um...wow.

Shape · 01-16-2006, 06:42 PM

Michael Jackson's 'cruel' zoo

Quote:

Michael Jackson has been accused of animal cruelty at his all-but abandoned Neverland ranch.

Animal rights activists have demanded an urgent probe into conditions at the sprawling estate.

They claim giraffes, elephants and other creatures are imprisoned in squalid and cramped surroundings.

Shocking photographs appear to reveal animals surrounded by their own faeces.

A giraffe seems to be standing in a pool of its own blood while a crocodile swims in a pool little wider than itself.

Elephants appear to be walking among their own excrement, with no sign of keepers.

**TheLady** · 01-17-2006, 05:21 PM

Quote:

A 35-year-old tractor operator, Igor Namyatov, has undergone surgery to be relieved of what had initially been diagnosed as a tumor, but turned out to be the embryo of his unborn twin brother, the Komsomolskaya Pravda daily reported Monday.

Doctors said the embryo belonged to Namyatov’s unborn brother who had spent 35 years in the body of the patient.

Namyatov’s fellow villagers doubted the explanation given by the doctors. Some even surmised the object removed from Namyatov’s body was an extraterrestrial organism. “It is a pity they have removed it. They should have waited to see what would become of it later on. That would have been a great scientific find,” one of the villagers said.

The “little brother” first made himself known when Igor was 15. At that time the boy complained about pains in his back, but doctors played down his complaints saying it was only a harmless fatty tumor.

Twenty years later the pains came back. The doctors decided to operate at once. They were genuinely surprised to see that the tumor was in fact an embryo with little legs and hands.

A forensic expert summoned to the village to investigate refused to probe the incident saying it was clear anyway that the object was an underdeveloped embryo.

Igor Namyatov refused to leave the embryo at the hospital for further research.

SOURCE

I like the fact that the locals think it is an alien.

Shape · 01-17-2006, 05:22 PM

that's just fuckin.....ew.

**TheLady** · 01-17-2006, 05:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShapeShifter

that's just fuckin.....ew.

At least it wasn't on his head.

http://www.fraterslibertas.com/Image...ursegollum.jpg

Marika · 01-17-2006, 05:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LadyJo80

At least it wasn't on his head.

I actually saw this video in anatomy class...there was a guy with a parasitic twin that manifested itself sort of as an extra, tiny face on the side of his face, and when he smiled, it smiled.

It was really ew.

Cfw828 · 01-18-2006, 06:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LadyJo80

In other more disturbing news. I was in tears watching the news this morning. What a bunch of sick, heartless people.

Source

Continuing on that story...

http://www.nydailynews.com/ips_rich_...5-nixz0117.jpg (Not safe for the faint of heart)

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/sto...p-325463c.html

From Tuesday:

Quote:

'A little angel'

Hundreds mourn Nixzmary at rest in open coffin

BY KERRY BURKE, JESS WISLOSKI and BILL HUTCHINSON
DAILY NEWS WRITERS

To the hundreds of mourners who came from around the city to pay their respects, Nixzmary Brown looked like a sleeping princess yesterday, dressed in white and nuzzled by a trio of teddy bears sharing her coffin.
"That's a little angel there," said the slain second-grader's tearful aunt Caridad Ramos. "She's in heaven now."

In death, the tragic 7-year-old girl tugged at the hearts of the throngs of strangers who attended her wake yesterday, to mourn her and curse the cruelty that cut her life short.

The line outside the R. G. Ortiz Funeral Home in the East Village stretched around the block as more than 1,000 people came bearing bouquets, stuffed animals and sympathy cards.

"We are here to support her and all abused children," said 13-year-old Shannen Rosado of the East Village. "I think she really didn't need to die. She's so young. It's horrible, nobody deserves to die like this."

Braving the bitter cold, mourners waited up to three hours to get into the funeral chapel. They quietly filed by the white coffin, many breaking into tears as they viewed Nixzmary, whose hands, tucked in satin gloves, were placed over her chest.

A photo of the smiling Brooklyn girl dressed in the Power Rangers costume she wore on Halloween was pinned in her coffin.

Balloons reading "You're Special" floated above her. An ever-growing mound of toys and flowers piled up nearby. A family source said strangers donated $3,381 toward funeral expenses.

Nixzmary's grandmother Maria Gonzalez sat sobbing on a couch at the front of the chapel, where she was comforted by relatives.

Before leaving the funeral home last night, Gonzalez leaned into the coffin and kissed her granddaughter on the cheek. "She looks like an angel," the tearful grandmother said.

During the wake, relatives and friends sang "Amazing Grace" and "His Eye Is on the Sparrow." Nixzmary's cousin Carolina Villanueva, 20, read a poem dedicated to the child.

"God bless that little girl. I hope she rests in peace," said Omar Rivera, 28, of Manhattan, the father of an 11-year-old daughter.

Rivera said he never met Nixzmary or her family, but his heart broke when he heard about her horrible death, allegedly at the hands of her stepfather.

"Tears came to my eyes," said Rivera, clutching a golden teddy bear he brought for Nixzmary. "That day, I knew I was going to come to the funeral and wake wherever it was at."

Others boiled with anger for Nixzmary's stepfather, Cesar Rodriguez, and her mother, Nixzaliz Santiago, who were jailed after the girl's lifeless body was found in the family's Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment early Wednesday.

Authorities say Rodriguez, 27, savagely beat the painfully thin 36-pound girl after accusing her of taking his yogurt. Investigators said the slaying capped a pattern of abuse in which Nixzmary was starved, tied to a chair and tortured - and forced to use a cat .litter box as her bathroom.

Her 27-year-old mother allegedly stayed silent, allowing the abuse to continue. In the hours before Nixzmary took her last breaths, Santiago .ignored her daughter's pleas of, "Mommy, don't leave me!"

The city's Administration for Children's Services also has come under fire for doing little to save Nixzmary from what has become the city's most notorious child abuse murder in a decade.

"It's very painful to me that this young girl went through so much at this very young age," said mourner Deborah Wilson, 44, of Starrett City, Brooklyn.

Nixzmary's wake will continue today from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. at the funeral home at 22 First Ave. A funeral Mass will be said tomorrow at 9 a.m. at St. Mary's Church at 440 Grand St. in Manhattan.

Today's news:

Quote:

Big shakeup at ACS on day of little Nixzmary's funeral
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Hours after teary family, friends and total strangers delivered a final farewell to a 7-year-old Brooklyn girl allegedly killed by her stepfather, city officials announced a massive shake up Wednesday at the agency that missed the obvious warning signs of her brutal death.

A half-dozen employees at the Administration for Children's Services were suspended or otherwise disciplined over allegedly inadequate responses to reports of problems with Nixzmary Brown, who died in a beating allegedly inflicted over a missing container of yogurt.

Earlier, the sounds of weeping and a mournful organ filled St. Mary's Church on Manhattan's Lower East Side as the little girl's body lay inside a white coffin draped with a white and red cloth before an altar still decorated with Christmas poinsettias.

"We have a reminder by the death of this child that the violence continues," said the Rev. Robert O'Neil, the church pastor. "She is a witness for us."

The church once served as a shelter for some of the children abandoned on city streets. It was packed to capacity, with the crowd spilling onto the street outside and police closing down a two-block stretch of Grand Street.

O'Neil told the crowd that the worst was now past for the girl: "Nixzmary is now surrounded by love, beyond the touch of evil."

One of the dead girl's grandmothers was in attendance, along with an assortment of her relatives and classmates. The head of the city's schools, Joel Klein, was in the crowd, as were many people who only learned about the little girl after her death.

Devorah Day, 48, stood with tears streaming down her face on the church steps after the service. "I was an abused child, too," she said in explaining her attendance.

Lucy Rivera, 60, also had never met Nixzmary or her family but felt obliged to attend the service in her Manhattan neighborhood. Rivera blamed the little girl's mother for failing to protect the child.

"The first person who should have defended her was the mother," she said. "She was the first person who failed her."

Nixzmary was at home on Jan. 10 when her stepfather, Cesar Rodriguez, went to the store and bought yogurt. Later, when one of the yogurts was missing, Rodriguez allegedly flew into a rage and blamed the 7-year-old.

According to Brooklyn District Attorney Charles J. Hynes, the stepfather banished the girl to a rodent-infested room with a litter box filled with feces and urine, a wooden chair tied to a radiator and dirty mattresses.

Rodriguez later beat Nixzmary, stripped her naked and dragged her into the bathroom, where he began running cold water in the tub and dunked her head beneath the water, Hynes alleged. The girl was dead the next morning.

Rodriguez and the girl's mother, Nixzaliz Santiago, were indicted Tuesday on charges of second-degree murder, child endangerment and assault. The mother allegedly ignored the loud thumping noises and cries for help that came from the bathroom.

Shortly after the funeral, the head of the city ACS announced a shake up at the department, including the immediate suspension of two supervisors and one child protective worker. Three other employees were disciplined and moved under new supervision, said ACS chief John Mattingly.

"The staff made poor investigative decisions, and gave inadequate attention to clear warning signs," Mattingly told a news conference. The workers were cited for allegedly mishandling a pair of cases involving the little girl: a May 2005 report that she had missed 47 school days, and a December 2005 report of physical abuse.

He raised the possibility of firings or additional suspensions tied to the Brown case.

Mattingly said his agency also invited the city Department of Investigation to conduct an independent probe of the Brown case to determine exactly what had gone wrong. And he announced a reshuffling of some top-level ACS aides.

01-13-2006, 03:20 PM	#241 (permalink)
Cfw828 Mega Post Monkey Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: NYC and occasionally residing in Long Island. Age: 25 Posts: 6,432 Points: 68,408.33 Bank: 0.00 Total Points: 68,408.33 Donate	For those of you who like looking at funny videos online, check this video out of former Charlotte weatherman Mark Mathis. This guy wound up, of course, getting fired...but at least he had fun doing it It got so bad that a local punk band apparently wrote a song about him. Last edited by Cfw828 : 01-13-2006 at 03:23 PM.

01-17-2006, 05:22 PM	#246 (permalink)
Shape ¬¬ Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: San Jose, California Age: 26 Posts: 4,574 Points: 21,402.12 Bank: 435,829.38 Total Points: 457,231.50 Donate	that's just fuckin.....ew.

01-23-2006, 02:23 PM	#250 (permalink)
Phoenix Fires Eight of Cups Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: A little-known country called Wales Age: 22 Posts: 3,490 Points: 39.56 Bank: 2,873,473.04 Total Points: 2,873,512.60 Donate