Tuesday, November 4, 2008
The world is having a party
Senior scores two points
"I found myself on the free-throw line 52 years after my last college game," Mink said. "I said, 'Just relax and shoot it like you know how to all day long.' I just floated the shots in there. I'm in the books now. I can relax a little bit."
Mink, of Knoxville, last played college basketball 52 years ago at Lees College in Jackson, Ky. After someone soaped the basketball coach's office, he lost his spot on the team and was expelled. Mink still says he didn't do it.
Last year, after shooting baskets at a neighbor's house, he wrote to several area colleges, and Roane State coach Randy Nesbit agreed to give him a chance. Mink has practiced regularly with the team since school began in August.
Trailing the bacon
A police statement Tuesday said officers followed the blood for 12 miles to the town of Kuettigen only to find that a butcher's supply van had spilled its cargo.
A barrel of pork blood had overturned inside. The van had been headed for a local sausage factory.
Determined Texas woman, 92, votes in ambulance
"And you have voted," precinct judge Sam Green said after Owen pushed the red button finalizing her choices. "You know, you look so pretty in that red dress."
Owen grinned, the San Antonio Express-News reported in Tuesday's online edition.
Her daughter arranged for the ambulance ride at the last minute after Owen failed to get an absentee ballot.
Owen, a Marine Corps veteran who served in World War II, cast her first ballot for Wendell Willkie, a Republican running against Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1940.
She became a Democrat after voting for John Kennedy in 1960. She cast a straight Democratic ballot Tuesday.
This Lady is but one of the reasons the repugicans lost today
Working replica Nautilus sub
Pat Regan built a 1/10 scale working replica of the Nautilus from the film 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.Kissell is our new Congressman
North Carolina Governor
She is our first female governor.
Dole Lost!
Endangered turtle eggs seized
Muhammad Sallam Spawi, an officer in Sabah state on Borneo island, says police surprised four smugglers as they were unloading bags of eggs Sunday.
But he says the men managed to flee in their boat.
Still, he said Tuesday the seizure was "the biggest ever" in Sabah.
He said the men were speaking Tagalog, which is spoken in the Philippines.
Abdul Karim Dakog, an officer with the state wildlife department, says the department hopes the eggs, from the endangered green and Hawksbill turtles, may still hatch in a conservation area.
Trade in turtle eggs is illegal in Malaysia but the eggs remain popular in local food markets.
They cost about 80 cents each.
Recipes for the Holidays
So to bring a bit of culinary sophistication to your palette this year I present recipes from my cookbooks for your pleasure.
To start off on a great footing I give you an old southern staple: Baked Country Ham
12- to 14-pound country ham or country-style ham
2 teaspoons whole cloves
8 cups apple cider or apple juice
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
2 teaspoons ground cloves
Red wine vinegar
Pears (optional)
Lemon leaves (optional)
HOW TO:
1. Place ham in a large container; cover with cold water. Soak for 16 hours in the refrigerator; change water once. Pour off water. Scrub ham in warm water with a stiff brush; rinse well. Cut skin from ham; trim off fat. Insert cloves in ham.
2. Preheat oven to 325 degree F. Place ham, fat-trimmed side up, in a large roasting pan. Insert a meat thermometer into the thickest portion of the ham, making sure it doesn't touch fat or bone. Pour apple cider or apple juice over ham.
3. Bake ham, covered, in the preheated oven for 4 to 4-1/2 hours or until the meat thermometer registers 160 degree F. Drain off the pan juices.
4. For glaze, combine brown sugar and ground cloves. Add just enough wine vinegar to make a paste. Spread glaze over fat side of ham.
5. Bake ham, uncovered, about 30 minutes more or until the meat thermometer registers 170 degree F. Let stand for 15 to 20 minutes before slicing. Transfer to a large platter and, if desired, garnish with pears and lemon leaves. Makes 25 to 30 servings.
The tale of the long line
Lines that normally grow to encircle the polling stations by mid-day were already double that before the doors to the polls were open this morning around here - a scene that was repeated over and over again at polling stations throughout the eastern states.
Now, it is mid-day and the lines have not abated ... in fact they have grown!
The misty drizzle around the area has not deterred any as far as anyone observing the the numbers of people going to the polls can tell.
I don't think even a full-blown category 6 hurricane would keep people from voting this time and you know what there is no such animal as a category 6 hurricane - they just don't make'em that strong ... that is the mood of the people of this country.
When you couple today's extremely heavy voter turnout with the historic numbers who voted early where it was allowed ... well, let's just say it's not gonna be the repugicans best day.
The First Votes Are In!
Barack Obama came up a big winner in the presidential race in Dixville Notch and Hart's Location, N.H., where tradition of having the first Election Day ballots tallied lives on.
Democrat Obama defeated Republican John McCain by a count of 15 to 6 in Dixville Notch, where a loud whoop accompanied the announcement in Tuesday's first minutes. The town of Hart's Location reported 17 votes for Obama, 10 for McCain and two for write-in Ron Paul. Independent Ralph Nader was on both towns' ballots but got no votes.
"I'm not going to say I wasn't surprised," said Obama supporter Tanner Nelson Tillotson, whose name was drawn from a bowl to make him Dixville Notch's first voter.
With 115 residents between them, Dixville Notch and Hart's Location get every eligible voter to the polls beginning at midnight on Election Day. Between them, the towns have been enjoying their first-vote status since 1948.
Read the rest here.
The World hopes for a 'less arrogant America'
A world weary of eight years of the shrub is riveted by the drama unfolding in the United States. Many are inspired by Barack Obama's focus on hope, or simply relieved that - whoever wins - the current administration is coming to an end.
From Berlin's Brandenburg Gate to the small town of Obama, Japan, the world gears up to celebrate a fresh start for America.
In Germany, where more than 200,000 flocked to see Obama this summer as he moved to burnish his foreign policy credentials during a trip to the Middle East and Europe, the election dominated television ticker crawls, newspaper headlines and Web sites.
Among the more irreverent festivities planned in Paris: a "Goodbye George" party to bid farewell to the shrub.
"Like many French people, I would like Obama to win because it would really be a sign of change," said Vanessa Doubine, shopping Tuesday on the Champs-Elysees. "I deeply hope for America's image that it will be Obama."
The shrub's administration alienated Muslims by mistreating prisoners at its detention center for terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and inmates at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison - human rights violations also condemned worldwide.
"I hope Obama wins (because) of the need of the world to see the U.S. represent a more cosmopolitan or universal political attitude," said Rais Yatim, the foreign minister of mostly Muslim Malaysia.
"The new president will have an impact on the economic and political situation in my country," said Muhammad al-Thaheri, 48, a civil servant in Saudi Arabia.
Like so many around the world, he was rooting for Obama "because he will change the path the U.S. is on under Bush."
Nizar al-Kortas, a columnist for Kuwait's Al-Anbaa newspaper, saw an Obama victory as "a historic step to change the image of the arrogant American administration to one that is more acceptable in the world."
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown clung to convention by refusing to say which candidate he wants to see win. Regardless of the outcome, he told Al-Arabiya television while on a tour of the Gulf, "history has been made in this campaign."
In Baghdad, a jaded Mohammed al-Tamimi said he didn't think U.S. policy on Iraq would change. Even so, "we hope that the new American president will open a new page with our country."
Kenyans made their allegiance clear: Scores packed churches on Tuesday to pray for Obama, whose late father was born in the East African nation, and hailed the candidate - himself born in Hawaii - as a "son of the soil."
"Tonight we are not going to sleep," said Valentine Wambi, 23, a student at the University of Nairobi. "It will be celebrations throughout."
Kenyans believe an Obama victory would not change their lives much but that hasn't stopped them from splashing his picture on minibuses and selling T-shirts with his name and likeness. Kenyans were planning to gather around radios and TV sets starting Tuesday night as the results come in.
"We will feast if Obama wins," said Robert Rutaro, a university president in neighboring Uganda. "We will celebrate by marching on the streets of Kampala and hold a big party later on."
In the sleepy Japanese coastal town of Obama - which translates as "little beach" - images of him adorned banners along a main shopping street, and preparations for an Election day victory party were in full swing.
A son of bin Laden is seeking asylum
A ministry official says Omar Osama bin Laden requested asylum immediately after arriving at Madrid airport Monday on a flight from Cairo, Egypt, that had been going on to Casablanca, Morocco.
The official says Omar Osama bin Laden was traveling on a passport from Saudi Arabia.
The official says he cannot say on what grounds bin Laden is requesting asylum.
The 27-year-old remains at the airport while the ministry considers his petition.
The ministry has 72 hours to make a decision, and the petitioner has a right of appeal.
Daily Horoscope
Damn, they're good!
