Don't Panic! Lighten Up!S

UFO

Line up for an alien abduction

ROSWELL, New Mexico - Businesses here have been cashing in on the UFO craze for years -- paintings and replicas of unidentified flying objects and space aliens adorn downtown buildings, and even the McDonald's and Wal-Mart are UFO- and space-themed.

Bizarro Earth

Oh My What a World! - At last, invisible knickers make appearance, fashion police on alert

Having a Visible Panty Line, or VPL, is widely regarded as one of the most serious crimes a woman can commit against fashion.

The mere suggestion that someone might be able to see the shape of your knickers through tight clothing is enough to get you arrested by the style police.

Rocket

Second astronaut fired in NASA love triangle fallout

The U.S. space agency has dismissed the male astronaut involved in a love triangle that led to a bizarre confrontation between a female astronaut and another woman in a Florida airport, a spokesman said on Friday.

USA

Boy, 11, kills Hog Bigger Than 'Hogzilla'

Alabama - Hogzilla is being made into a horror movie. But the sequel may be even bigger: Meet Monster Pig. An 11-year-old boy used a pistol to kill a wild hog his father says weighed a staggering 1,051 pounds and measured 9 feet 4, from the tip of its snout to the base of its tail. Think hams as big as car tires.

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Question

Flashback 'Where have all the bloody teaspoons gone?' The case of the disappearing teaspoons

In January 2004 the authors of the research found their tearoom bereft of teaspoons. Although a flunky (MSCL) was rapidly dispatched to purchase a new batch, these replacements in turn disappeared within a few months. Exasperated by our consequent inability to stir in our sugar and to accurately dispense instant coffee, we decided to respond in time honoured epidemiologists' fashion and measure the phenomenon.

A search of the medical and other scientific literature through Google, Google Scholar, and Medline using the keywords "teaspoon", "spoon", "workplace", "loss" and "attrition" revealed nothing about the phenomenon of teaspoon loss. Lacking any guidance from previous researchers, we set out to answer the age old question "Where have all the bloody teaspoons gone?" We aimed to determine the overall rate of loss of teaspoons and the half life of teaspoons in our institute, whether teaspoons placed in communal tearooms were lost at a different rate from teaspoons placed in individual tearooms, and whether better quality teaspoons would be more attractive to spoon shifters or be more highly valued and respected and therefore move and disappear more slowly.

Coffee

Wolf-beast pacified!

Like most three-week-old babies, Hugo has a dummy to suckle - the only difference is his is a solution to a dog of a problem.

Staff at Wellington SPCA gave the little labrador-cross pooch and his sister, Lottie, baby pacifiers because they were becoming ill from sucking on each other.

©ANDREW GORRIE/Dominion Post
Hugo the three-week-old Labrador Cross puppy gets his teeth into a baby pacifier at Wellington SPCA.

Arrow Down

Bush In Line of Fire

ABC's Ann Compton reports: An outdoor news conference in perfect spring weather, with birds chirping loudly in the magnolia trees, is not without its hazards.

As President Bush took a question Thursday in the White House Rose Garden about scandals involving his Attorney General, he remarked, "I've got confidence in Al Gonzales doin' the job."

Simultaneously, a sparrow flew overhead and left a splash on the President's sleeve, which Bush tried several times to wipe off.

X

Burger bosses want ban 'McJob' from UK dictionary

Bosses at fast food giant McDonald's chose Canterbury to launch a nationwide bid to get rid of the term 'McJob', which they say insults thousands of honest workers across Britain.

The company has organised a national petition calling for UK dictionaries to drop the existing definition of the word "an unstimulating low-paid job with few prospects, esp. one created by the expansion of the service sector".

The term "McJob" was invented by Canadian author Douglas Copeland in his 1991 novel "Generation X: Tales Of An Accelerated Culture".

Coffee

Cairo customs prevents snakes on a plane

Customs officers at Cairo's airport on Thursday detained a man bound for Saudi Arabia who was trying to smuggle 700 live snakes on a plane, airport authorities said.

Magic Wand

Man claims new sleepless record

A Cornish man says he has broken the world record for sleep deprivation by staying awake for 11 days and nights.

Tony Wright, 42, from Penzance, was trying to beat the Guinness world record of 264 sleepless hours set by Randy Gardner in the US in 1964.

He fought off tiredness by drinking tea, playing pool and keeping a diary.

The Guinness Book of Records has since withdrawn its backing of a sleep deprivation class because of the associated health risks.