Mon, 13/12/2010 - 06:45 by Prince damin
Palm Beach, Fla. -- A camel used in a Nativity scene fell into pews at a rehearsal of the First Baptist Church's Christmas show in Florida, but no one was injured, officials said.
Lula Bell, who weighs about 1,000 pounds, may have had a bum knee, forcing her to stumble, a pastor told The Palm Beach (Fla.) Post.
Neither the camel, nor its rider, Alex James, was injured in the accident, and the West Palm Beach church has decided not to use her in its upcoming Christmas production, said worship Pastor Chuck Lewis.
"Everybody's OK," Lewis said about Thursday's incident. "That's the most important thing."
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Sun, 12/12/2010 - 10:30 by Prince damin
New York -- A New York crime buff has provided a guide to decades of Mafia history in the city with a Mafia Maps phone application.
John Hughes' app includes such classic locations as the barber shop where Albert Anastasia was gunned down in 1957 to Sparks Steak House where "Big Paul" Castellano was killed in 1985, the New York Daily News reported Saturday. For each mob historical site, the app provides photos of how the place looks now, a summary what happened there and GPS guidance for getting there.
While Hughes lives in Manhattan, his app covers all five boroughs. His description of Staten Island is "Gangster Bedroom Communities."
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Sun, 12/12/2010 - 08:14 by harsheeb
Moscow-- About 1,000 people took part in a protest over the death of a Moscow Spartek football fan, police said.
Moscow Police Chief Vladimir Kolokoltsev Saturday urged the protesters to remain patient and peaceful while the death of Yegor Sviridov, 28, is investigated, RIA Novosti reported.
"If we are calling each other to order, including order in the city streets, I ask everyone to treat each other with respect," Kolokoltsev said.
Sviridov was killed this week during a brawl between football fans and internal migrants from the North Caucasus in north Moscow; police have detained three people who participated in the incident.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 07:02 by Prince damin
Las Vegas -- The mayor of Las Vegas said he almost halted the dedication of a solar panel carport when he noticed a sample module was assembled in Mexico.
Mayor Oscar Goodman said the Thursday dedication of the solar carport, the first of a planned trio of ports at the Stupak Community Center, was nearly called off when he discovered the sample was assembled in Mexico, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported Friday.
"When I saw that, I went nuts," he said. "I felt that that was totally unacceptable as far as our sustainability efforts in the United States."
However, Goodman said officials told him the panels themselves were made and assembled domestically.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:58 by harsheeb
University-- Iron furnaces that once covered central Pennsylvania have left a legacy of soils contaminated with manganese, which can be toxic to trees, researchers say.
Researchers at Penn State University quantified the amounts of manganese in soil core samples as part of work funded by the National Science Foundation, PhysOrg.com reported Friday.
The researchers found that "53 percent of manganese in ridge soils can be attributed to atmospheric deposition from anthropogenic (man-made) sources," the researchers reported in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:47 by harsheeb
London -- A woman testified at the U.K. trial of a pair of brothers accused of running a scam holiday theme park that children were waiting up to 3 hours to see Santa.
Angela Barnes, of Southsea, England, said she spent $94 to take her family to the Matchams Leisure Park after seeing advertisements for a "magical tunnel of light" and a "bustling Christmas market," but they arrived to find only a 3-hour line to see Santa Claus, the BBC reported Friday.
"I was sad because I persuaded my husband to go because I got excited by these things, because I felt I had dragged him along to something that was a waste of money," Barnes said.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:45 by harsheeb
AmNN Arbor -- A study of reptile extinctions in ancient Greece may offer clues to how plants and animals will respond to global warming, researchers say.
U.S. scientists say as the climate warmed at the end of the last ice age, sea levels rose and formed scores of Aegean islands that had formerly been part of the Greek mainland. Many reptiles perished on the ever-smaller islands, ScienceDaily.com reported Friday.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:38 by harsheeb
Newcastle -- Frogs in Australia and the United States may be recovering from a fungal disease that has decimated amphibian populations around the world, researchers say.
Between 1990 and 1998 the populations of several frog species in Australia plummeted due to chytridiomycosis infection, but a recent survey suggests the frogs are re-establishing themselves, NewScientist.com reported Friday.
"It's happening across a number of species," Michael Mahony at the University of Newcastle in New South Wales says.
Barred river frogs, the tusked frog and several tree frog species have returned to areas where they had almost disappeared, and some species have even reached pre-infection levels, Australian researchers say.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:24 by Prince damin
Charlotte, N.C. -- Scotland's national delicacy, haggis, will soon be available to American snack hounds in potato chip form, a North Carolina importer said.
Great Scot International announced this week it would have Mackie's Haggis and Cracked Black Pepper chips on display at its booth at the annual Fancy Food Show in New York next month.
"We know that flavors with a Scottish twist are popular because Haggis and Cracked Black Pepper is our best-selling flavor," Kirstin Mackie, managing director of Mackie's, said in a written statement.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:21 by Prince damin
Sarasota, Fla. -- A 27-year-old Florida man has been arrested on accusations he stalked an 89-year-old woman and repeatedly masturbated in her yard, authorities said.
The Sarasota County Sheriff's Office said Alexis Ali Moreland was spotted by the Sarasota woman on at least seven occasions since March and was recorded peering into her window and walking nude through her yard by surveillance cameras placed by investigators, the Bradenton Herald reported Friday.
The woman told investigators Moreland was usually masturbating when she spotted him in her back yard.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:16 by Prince damin
New York -- New York retailers said Friday is the final day they will be receiving shipments of Four Loko and other caffeinated alcoholic beverages.
The New York State Liquor Authority reached an agreement with distributors last month to stop delivering caffeine-laced alcoholic beverages to state retailers and Friday marks the last day for Four Loko fans to stock up, the New York Daily News reported Friday.
Liquor authority spokesman William Crowley said retailers will be given "a reasonable amount of time" to sell off their remaining inventory.
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Sat, 11/12/2010 - 06:14 by Prince damin
Lake Forest, Ill. -- Prosecutors said a former dean of legal studies at a Chicago university e-mailed threats to students after his firing.
Authorities said Bennie Wilcox, of Lake Forest, Ill., hacked into the Kaplan University e-mail system after he was laid off from his $111,000-per-year job in 2007 and sent students a message informing them the school's Web site had been hacked, the Chicago Sun-Times reported Friday.
"Your schools Web site has been Hacked!" the e-mail read. "All of your personal information ... will now be used to ruin your credit, take out credit cards in your name and pay for on-line gambling."
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