Bird watchers walking along the beach on the Baltic island of Öland off Sweden’s southeastern coast were puzzled by an unusual natural phenomenon recently when they stumbled across dozens of football-sized balls of ice lying on the shore.
Mysterious giant ice balls discovered on Swedish coastline - The Local

A man in Florida who called 911 police emergency claiming he had been beaten and shot at was actually hoping for a free ride to a bar, US officials say.

But now Gregory Jerome Oras, 37, is facing charges of misusing the 911 system and battery of an official.
BBC News - Drunk US man dials 911 to get free bar ride

A US company is offering free holidays in Mexico and Guatemala for volunteers on a diarrhoea drug programme.

Vaccine manufacturer Intercell is offering up to $1,500 (£938) to cover flights and accommodation.

In return, the volunteers - being recruited in the UK and Germany - will wear vaccine patches, and give blood and faeces samples.

The trial is in a part of the world where travellers' diarrhoea is rife. A total of 1,800 volunteers are needed.

Intercell's clinical director, Nigel Thomas, told the UK's Independent newspaper: "We are looking for people who have already planned to go to Mexico or Guatemala and think this would add another interesting aspect.

"It is almost like going on a package holiday. They will be met by a concierge who will take them to their hotel and arrange for them to give their first blood sample within 48 hours."

'Diarrhoea diary'

According to the recruitment website, to be eligible for the programme, known as Trek Study, volunteers must be:

* between 18-64
* in general good health
* travelling to Mexico or Guatemala for at least seven days before May 2010
* willing to maintain a study diary for 17 days

Volunteers will be discounted if they have already received a cholera or diarrhoea vaccine, or if they have already developed diarrhoea travelling in a developing country in the past year.

Intercell's vaccine has already been tested on a smaller group of American volunteers.

According to results published in medical journal The Lancet last year, it reduced the incidence of diarrhoea by some 75%.
BBC News - Diarrhoea vaccine guinea pigs wanted for free holidays

All men watch porn, scientists find
Scientists at the University of Montreal launched a search for men who had never looked at pornography - but couldn't find any.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/relationships/6709646/All-men-watch-porn-scientists-find.html

More Gaga symbolism.

This guy appears to be a flush-spotter

http://www.youtube.com/user/ramdomness453

The amendment, approved by the Legislature and overwhelmingly ratified by voters, declares that "marriage in this state shall consist only of the union of one man and one woman." But the troublemaking phrase, as Radnofsky sees it, is Subsection B, which declares:
"This state or a political subdivision of this state may not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to marriage."

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics/AP/story/1340136.html

Welcome to Ground Hero.

As the Freedom Tower makes its ascent into the city skyline, rising alongside it atop a crane will be a Subway sandwich shop that will turn out subs for hungry hardhats who can't spare the time to head back down to the street.

The shop, expected to be in place by the end of the month, will be fitted into a shipping container-like structure fixed to one of the tower cranes, alongside a bathroom and construction offices for the project managers.

The concession stand will rise with the tower, eventually stopping near the 105th floor -- at roughly the height of the old Twin Towers, or about as high as the former Windows on the World restaurant was, Port Authority officials said.
Freedom Tower construction site to get Subway sandwich store on crane

Is this taking the whole Star Trek thing a teensie weensie bit too far? d'Armond Speers spoke only Klingon to his child for the first three years of its life.

Klingon? Not Spanish, French, Mandarin? Not some gutteral genuflecting concoction from the deepest recesses of Borneo? Klingon? You heard it right. (And if you don't know about the Klingon Empire, look it up.)

"I was interested in the question of whether my son, going through his first language acquisition process, would acquire it like any human language," Speers told the Minnesota Daily. "He was definitely starting to learn it."

Local dad spoke only Klingon to child for three years - Minneapolis / St. Paul News - City Pages - The Blotter

For 99 euros (£88) a night, visitors to the hotel in Nantes can feast on hamster grain, get a workout by running in a giant wheel and sleep in hay stacks in the suite called the "Hamster Villa".

It is the latest venture from owners Frederic Tabary and Yann Falquerho, who run a company which rents out unusual venues to adventure-seekers. Both architects, the men designed the room in an 18th century building to resemble the inside of a hamster's cage.
French hamster hotel lets guests live like rodents - Telegraph

Florida police say a man arrested for repeatedly calling 911 looking for sex claimed it was the only number he could dial after running out of cell phone minutes.
Florida man Joshua Basso arrested for calling 911 asking for sex

In 2005, the FBI sent homicide detectives to investigate a series of unsolved disappearances and deaths in Nome, Alaska. Most of the victims were Native villagers. Between the 1960s and 2004, over 20 people mysteriously died, or vanished. In 2006, the FBI concluded that "excessive alcohol consumption and a harsh winter climate" were to blame for the disappearances.
The real story behind The Fourth Kind

Normally you expect to find sex chat numbers in the back of adult magazines or the LA Weekly. But at Linda Vista Elementary, it was printed on the kids t-shirts.
For a Good Time, Call Linda Vista Elementary School - KNBC-TV- msnbc.com

If the Happiness Hat, created by interactive artist and designer Lauren McCarthy, senses that you aren't smiling, it shoves a metal spike into your head until you do.


The happiness hat forces you to smile - Core77

Dan Halloran is the leader of a neo-pagan religion who calls this community his Reich, who routinely practices animal blood sacrifice, and who has support from some of the worst hate groups in our country today,” said activist Michael Sais as to why he was protesting the candidate.

Video news story

NY1 | 24 Hour Local News | Top Stories | Whitestone Residents Question Council Candidate's Religious Rituals

Body by Calvin Klein Jeans—retail price, $79.50—with their “body-defining fit for an enhanced profile.” With some padded-fly trickery, Body Jeans presumably gives guys the optical illusion of more horsepower underneath their hood.
Something Is Getting Between Him and His Calvins | The New York Observer