samhexum

A bear with a taste for margaritas caused a stir in a Southern California community when it took a dip in a bubbling hot tub. Mark Hough said he was lounging in his Altadena backyard Friday afternoon with his wife and a couple margaritas when he heard rustling, then saw the bear climbing over a fence into his yard. They retreated inside, leaving the margaritas behind. Hough later ventured out to discover the bear lounging in the unheated hot tub. After Hough shot some video, he said the bear emerged from the water, walked over to his margarita, knocked it over and lapped it up. Hough later spotted the bear taking a snooze in an oak tree before it disappeared down the street. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s department said it received six bear-sighting calls that day, but were unable to find it. https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1841849959216151

A topless woman in Montana is accused of taking a front-end loader for a joyride that ended with her crashing into a building across town, according to officials. Great Falls Police said that 34-year-old Heather Houston allegedly drove the vehicle Sunday morning to Fox Hollow Apartments, where she plowed down a fence en route to pick up a shirt from her home. The half-naked woman reportedly used the machinery’s arm and bucket to climb inside her upper-level apartment, according to the Great Falls Tribune. “We can’t make stuff like this up,” Police Lt. Doug Otto told the newspaper. Authorities said Houston stole the front-end loader Sunday morning from a business around 6 miles away from her apartment. Houston’s neighbors took to social media to complain about the early morning disturbance. “Got woken up to our TOPLESS upstairs neighbor driving an excavator into the building!” Molly Broxhold wrote on Facebook. Police arrested Houston on suspicion of criminal mischief and criminal endangerment. Officials said there may be more charges filed against her.

I find some ethnicities (and their stereotypical characteristics when present) more attractive than others as a generality, but there is no group of people I find entirely attractive or unattractive.*** There are always hotties and notties in every group. *** Well, no Evangelicals set my loins aflutter... but they're a cult, not an ethnicity.

If you give me your number, I'll call you. Will you put me in your will? I'll even send you birthday & Christmas cards! :rolleyes: PLEASE, Padrino?

Planet formation isn’t exactly the kind of thing that happens in the blink of an eye. New worlds form over extremely long stretches of time, at least on a human scale. They slowly build up mass from the dust and debris nearest to them, eventually forming the spherical shape we’re all familiar with. Despite the fact that it can take ages for a planet to fully form, actually capturing the process of planet formation has proven to be incredibly difficult. Now, for the first time ever, astronomers have announced the witnessing of a planet in the midst of its own birth, and they’ve got a stunning image to back up the news. The discovery was made using the powerful planet-hunting tool called SPHERE, which is part of the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope. The instrument was able to spot a large mass of material — referred to as an accretion disk — surrounding a nearby star. Within that planet-forming cloud of debris, a planet is being constructed. In the image provided by ESO, the planet is seen as a bright mass to the right of its host star which has been blacked out by a mask that allows the surrounding detail to be seen. The planet, named PDS 70b, is careening through the dust cloud as it orbits its star, gathering material on its surface and slowly but surely maturing into what will one day be a fully-formed world. What makes this discovery so interesting is that it’s the first time that scientists have managed to spot such a young planet with utter certainty. “These discs around young stars are the birthplaces of planets, but so far only a handful of observations have detected hints of baby planets in them,” Miriam Keppler, the lead researcher on the project, explains. “The problem is that until now, most of these planet candidates could just have been features in the disc.” While a newborn planet might sound like an interesting place to visit, you most certainly wouldn’t want to set foot on PDS 70b any time soon. The young planet is absolutely scorching, with a surface temperature topping 1,000 degrees Celsius.

Just one week after a fatal collision in Whitestone that caused the tragic death of a local teenager, Queens residents are demanding a change to the way New York state assesses its senior drivers. More than 7,000 residents have signed onto a petition that calls for “mandatory retesting every two years for all drivers age 80 and over.” New York state currently has an eight-year renewal program that requires a vision exam. It does not have specific provisions for older drivers. The call comes in the wake of the June 25 collision that killed Madeline Sershen, a 17-year-old who attended St. Francis Prep in Fresh Meadows. Sershen was crossing Utopia Parkway with the walk light in her favor when she was struck by a 2005 Toyota Corolla driven by 88-year-old Sheila Kahn Prager, who police said ignored a steady red light. Madeline's mom works in the same school as my best friend. Paramedics rushed Sershen to NewYork-Presbyterian Queens hospital, where the teen was pronounced dead. Prager was issued a desk appearance ticket charging her with three crimes, including disobeying a traffic control device. The Change.org petition, which was published on June 30, suggests that drivers over 80 years of age undergo a driving test every two years to determine whether or not they are still fit to drive, before they are issued a new license. “Simply passing a vision exam is an extremely low standard for a person to maintain their privilege to drive,” the petition reads. “Individuals over 80 must be able to demonstrate that they can continue to remain safe on the road.” Across the country, states have varying rules for issuing licenses to older adults. Many states require seniors drivers to either renew their license in person, complete a written test or provide a doctor’s certificate stating they are fit to drive. The petition, which was already just short of its 7,500-signature goal on July 2, will be delivered to Governor Andrew Cuomo, Mayor Bill de Blasio and the New York State Legislature. Julian Ho, the local who started the petition, said Sershen’s family reached out to him to voice their support for the petition. He also encouraged those who signed to call Cuomo’s office to urge the leader to change the state’s driver’s license renewal procedures. “My beautiful baby sister’s death shall not be in vain,” wrote Olivia Sershen. “Please make the change we need to see in order to prevent future tragedies like Madeline’s — which could have been avoided!!!” The petition is the second community response to last week’s tragic accident. In the hours following the incident, friends of the teenager’s family launched a fundraiser on GoFundMe to help ease the burden of funeral costs. The campaign surpassed its $10,000 goal in less than 24 hours and has raised $37,194 as of July 2.

My preference is gorgeous & wealthy. My reality is breathing and not indigent.

Are you sure? How heavy was your sister? Does she have a big nose & tusks growing out of her face? Elephants have the longest gestation period of all mammals. These gentle giants' pregnancies last for more than a year and a half. Drunk again, huh? Didn't they have a show on TLC?

I suppose 'Auntie' was out of the question...

Ever since I was a young'n, I told my sister I would NOT be Uncle Sam if she ever had kids. It took her a long time to find the right guy... She had her first kid at 37+, & her second 3 1/2 years later... ironically, the exact same timetable as our mother. I was pleasantly surprised when I was with her one day during the first pregnancy... she started talking to her belly, and introduced me to the baby as Tio Sam (we're English-speaking Jews). Both my nephew & niece grew up calling me Tio Sam. They're both in college now, and they still call me Tio Sam. I'm still not sure if they actually realize I'm their uncle. (I didn't say they were in good colleges. :rolleyes:)

And now she gets to co-star with LL Cool J. Hubba Hubba!

And it made the career of that great American beauty, Linda Hunt.

The Year Of Living Dangerously OR The Trumpster Fire (to answer your query, Twenty Eighteen)

Good show; excellent episode tonight.

Thank him for giving you time to figure out your shopping list.

I have 2 questions... 1. Did he buy me dinner? 2. Is he buying (or making) me breakfast?

An orphaned bear cub suffered painful burns to her paws in one of the half-dozen significant wildfires scorching Colorado, but she is being nursed back to health, state officials said Friday. Colorado Parks and Wildlife officers believe the bear will recover well enough to be released this winter. “When the bear was brought in, I wasn’t sure if it was going to make it,” Michael Sirochman said, a Parks and Wildlife veterinary technician. “But she’s responding very well to treatment, and by winter we believe we’ll be able to return her to the wild.” It was an encouraging bit of news amid an extreme drought and an outbreak of disruptive wildfires in Colorado and much of the Southwestern U.S. The injured bear cub is 4 or 5 months and weighed just 10 pounds when she was rescued. Firefighters spotted her wandering alone in a burned-over area north of Durango last week. They notified wildlife officials on June 22 because there was no sign of her mother. It’s not clear how the mother and cub became separated. Wildlife officers found the cub in a tree and immobilized her with a tranquilizer dart and took her to a state facility. Sirochman, the facility’s manager, said the cub’s burns were severe. She’s being treated with salve, bandages, antibiotics and pain medication, and is eating solid food and a liquid milk replacement. She spends most of her time lying on her side to keep her weight off the painful wounds, Sirochman said. Caretakers are minimizing their contact with the cub so she won’t become accustomed to humans, which would make it difficult for her to survive in the wild. After she heals, she will be placed in an enclosure with four other cubs at the wildlife facility. They could be released this winter. “We have good luck returning young bears to the wild,” Sirochman said. “We’re very strict about minimizing human contact.” In California, two adult bears that suffered third-degree burns in a wildfire last year recovered and were released back into the wild.

He writes the songs that make people run. Some Rite Aid stores in California have taken to blasting Barry Manilow tunes as part of a plan to make loiterers scramble. Employees told the Wall Street Journal that the drugstore chain has been testing the tactic of playing songs by the 75-year-old crooner outside their stores — over and over, loudly — to deter panhandlers and vagrants. But the plan has also left neighbors mystified. “I thought some older man had died and left a Barry’s Most Depressing Hits CD on repeat,” said Lisa Masters, a professional drummer in Long Beach who couldn’t open her windows without hearing “Mandy” blaring. “I felt trapped in an episode of ‘The Twilight Zone,’” she said. When she called Rite Aid, she said an employee explained that the Manilow technique had worked at other locations and was now working in Long Beach. “His attitude was, ‘Would we rather have panhandlers or Manilow?’” Masters said. A Rite Aid spokeswoman told the paper that customers were finding it difficult to enter some of their stores because of loiterers, so the chain started employing a couple of deterrents — including Barry Manilow. “We are in the early stages of exploring this approach and have not made any decision about the potential rollout of this to additional stores,” she said. The Manilow technique has also been used at a Rite Aid in San Diego, according to WCPO. Over in Hollywood, neighbors have also been subjected to the Manilow music when strolling outside Rite Aid. John Fields, a record producer for the Jonas Brothers and Miley Cyrus, posted a video on YouTube showing him walking outside the drugstore as “Somewhere Down the Road” plays. “Another night with Barry Manilow,” he says. For some, the music is soothing. “It’s one of those beautiful moments,” LA comedian Debra DiGiovanni said of hearing “I Write the Songs” on repeat. “I know all the words. When I was in my 20s, we might have made fun of him, and now I’m in my 40s and he’s nostalgic. It reminds me of Mom and Dad in a lovely way.” Manilow, a Brooklyn-born star whose career has spanned more than 50 years, hasn’t heard about the tactic, his publicist said. “It’s not very kind that people don’t want to stand around and listen to his music,” she said. “It’s odd. He wouldn’t comment on something like this. I don’t think he knows about it.”

An exec at top Hollywood agency William Morris Endeavor, Skip Chasey, is still employed even though a man died in his basement dungeon after being mummified in plastic wrap and gaffer’s tape,according to a new report by podcaster Mark Ebner. The “sudden death during recreational mummification bondage,” as the Los Angeles coroner described it, happened Nov. 22, but was not reported until muckraking podcaster Ebner broke the story last week. The deceased, Doran George, 47, a British-born UCLA professor with his doctorate and a dancer and avant-garde choreographer, was found in Chasey’s well-equipped dungeon in Los Feliz. According to reports, the LAPD could find no criminal component to George’s death. Chasey, 62, who works in television business affairs at WME, is in the world of bondage and sadomasochism and has given over 250 speeches and workshops. The co-founder of People of Leather Among You (that’s PLAY), his motto is: “Blood may be thicker than water, but leather is thicker than blood.” A spokesman for WME told me: “While we were unaware of the circumstances surrounding this personal matter until now, we understand that the police file is closed and no charges were brought. If other facts develop we will re-evaluate the situation and determine any appropriate action to take.” A source said, “They were consenting adults in a seven-month relationship. They had done this before. This is not an abnormal thing in that community.” Before joining WME in 2013, Chasey had been with Imagine Television for 15 years overseeing negotiations for series like “24,” “Arrested Development” and “Parenthood.” Chasey’s attorney had no comment. This brought to mind another famous S&M death...

Well, if that's all the calories you consumed, it couldn't have been that great a night! :rolleyes: