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05/23/2007: "All The News That Fits ..."
Some days, I worry that I'll not have anything to say, or that there won't be anything interesting going on in the world, and I'll be at a loss for a blog topic. Then there are days like this when the headlines scream out in competition for who gets to go first ...
- "CSI Too Close to Home"
In this real-life episode of CSI: Nimby — not in my backyard — residents of a rural area near the San Marcos Airport, 30 miles south of Austin, have objected to plans by Texas State University to build a 17-acre body farm nearby. With three acres designated for research and surrounded by a wide fenced boundary, plus cages over the exposed bodies, university officials assured residents there would no problems.
But neighbors complained that the facility would affect property values and attract coyotes and vultures. TSU had to abandon the site, over concerns that gathering vultures would threaten aircraft, and university officials say the body farm will be built elsewhere in the area.
"Nobody likes to talk about it. It's politically uncool — putting a human body out and letting it decompose — but unfortunately it is a necessary artifact of human society," Byrd says. Once the cadaver has been exposed to open air, the bones picked clean by wildlife and insects, the skeletal remains are studied, then measured, catalogued and archived.
More controlled research on human cadavers also would help in the courtroom, Byrd says, since the current method of using hog carcasses to determine key facts like probable time of death is often challenged.
And you thought you had complaints with your neighbors ... 
- "Police: Wife loses lip after calling man short"
Akano Nzerem, 54, of South San Francisco, is charged with felony counts of domestic violence, mayhem, false imprisonment, battery and making criminal threats.
Nzerem told police he was provoked by his wife attacking him first and calling him a short man, according to the district attorney's office.
Police said Nzerem shoved aside his 16-year-old daughter when she tried to intervene in the argument. He then allegedly grabbed his wife in a bear hug and bit off her lip.
Police recovered the lip from the floor but doctors were unable to reattach it. Nzerem's wife said authorities have exaggerated the extent of her injuries
Some guys take no lip off their wife ... not this guy! 
- "Baby 'Bubba' gets a gun permit"
"Bubba" Ludwig can't walk, talk or open the refrigerator door -- but he does have his very own Illinois gun permit.
The 10-month-old, whose given name is Howard David Ludwig, was issued a firearm owner's identification card after his father, Howard Ludwig, paid the $5 fee and filled out the application, not expecting to actually get one.
The card lists the baby's height (2 feet, 3 inches), weight (20 pounds) and has a scribble where the signature should be
The scary part is the reason for the card - Bubba's grandfather had just bought him a 12-gauge Beretta shotgun ... 
- "Cat too scary for Canadian mail carriers"
Canada's postal system has stopped delivering mail to a home in Winnipeg, Manitoba, after a mail carrier was scared away by a "very threatening cat," the Winnipeg Free Press said Friday.
A Canada Post spokeswoman said the agency was concerned about the safety of its carriers, although it hoped for an amicable solution to its dispute with cat-owner John Samborski.
"The letter carrier who delivers mail there ... was brought up on a farm, she is very comfortable with animals," spokeswoman Kathi Neal told the newspaper. "Apparently this is a very threatening cat."
Normally, I'd suggest the letter carrier simply grow a pair, but it sounds like that's physically impossible without surgery ... 
