The Daily Drift

Ursus arctos

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Today in History

1154		Henry II is crowned king of England.
1562		The French Wars of Religion between the Huguenots and the Catholics begins with the Battle of Dreux.
1793		French troops recapture Toulon from the British.
1862		Confederate General Nathan B. Forrest begins tearing up the railroads in Union generals Grant and Rosecrans rear, causing considerable delays in the movement of Union supplies.
1900		The French Parliament votes amnesty for everyone involved in the Dreyfus Affair.
1909		American socialist women denounce suffrage as a movement of the middle class.
1941		Japanese land on Hong Kong and clash with British troops.
1941		Adolf Hitler assumes the position of commander in chief of the German army.
1942		The British advance 40 miles into Burma in a drive to oust the Japanese from the colony.
1944		During the Battle of the Bulge, American troops begin pulling back from the twin Belgian cities of Krinkelt and Rocherath in front of the advancing German Army.
1945		Congress confirms Eleanor Roosevelt as U.S. delegate to the United Nations.
1950		The North Atlantic Council names General Dwight D. Eisenhower as supreme commander of Western European defense forces.
1959		Reputed to be the last civil war veteran, Walter Williams, dies at 117 in Houston.
1974		Nelson Rockefeller is sworn in as vice president of the United states after a House of Representatives vote.
1982		Four bombs explode at South Africa's only nuclear power station in Johannesburg.
1984		British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang sign an agreement that committed Britain to return Hong Kong to China in 1997 in return for terms guaranteeing a 50-year extension of its capitalist system. Hong Kong was leased by China to Great Britain in 1898 for 99 years.
1998		President Bill Clinton is impeached. The House of Representatives approved two articles of impeachment against President Clinton, charging him with lying under oath to a federal grand jury and obstructing justice. Clinton was the second president in American history to be impeached.

Non Sequitur

Wassail

Wassail the beverage is a hot, mulled punch often associated with Yuletide. Historically, the drink was a mulled cider made with sugar, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg and topped with slices of toast. Modern recipes begin with a base of wine, fruit juice, or mulled ale, sometimes with brandy or sherry added. Apples or oranges are often added to the mix. While the beverage typically served as "wassail" at modern holiday feasts with a medieval theme most closely resembles mulled cider, historical wassail drinks were completely different, more likely to be mulled beer or mead. Sugar, ale, ginger, nutmeg, and cinnamon would be placed in a bowl, heated, and topped with slices of toast as sops.

 




Recipe for the traditional, classic Yuletide hot mulled cider drink.

4 liters apple cider or juice (fresh milled organic is excellent!)
1 orange, chopped
1 lime, chopped
1 lemon, chopped
4 cinnamon sticks or 1 t. ground cinnamon
1 inch-square piece of fresh ginger or 1/4 t. ground ginger
1 t. cloves, allspice and/or star anise

Heat all and simmer in an enamel pot (aluminum can impart a metallic flavor) on low for an hour, then serve to cold.

Ten Foods that Will Boost Your Metabolism

 

Eat this to get your insides going."Having a fast metabolism is everything," says Lisa Lynn, a metabolic weight loss specialist (and former Martha Stewart trainer!) behind the LynFit diet program. "You can win the health war with foods that are metabolism boosters." Lisa schools us on what to eat to speed up our metabolism and burn, baby, burn calories.

By Michelle Ruiz

1. Green Apple
"The biggest thing to keep your metabolism going: Eat! Look at metabolism like a fire: You have to keep feeding it in order for it to burn. So have a green apple around 3 p.m. each day; that's when metabolism starts to decline. An apple a day keeps the fat away."

2. Protein Shake
"Protein is the best way to boost that fire of your metabolism. Nothing is better than a whey protein shake-it's full of the amino acids that you need to burn calories."

3. White Fish
"The lighter and whiter the fish, the better it is for your metabolism. You know when fish is so light and flaky, you can just break it with a fork? That's how easy it is to digest."

4. Chicken
"Consider chicken a solid back-up for fish. It doesn't pack as much protein by mass as fish, but it's still a good option when you want to boost metabolism."

5. Leafy Greens
"Kale, romaine lettuce, and spinach are the biggies-they burn even better than broccoli."

6. Black Coffee
"Coffee is a great metabolizer. Caffeine is one of the oldest tricks in the book to put your body into fat loss. But it has to be black-no dairy creamers, no skim milk-they have sugar that stops fat from burning."

7. Egg Whites
"There's no fat in egg whites, and they're all protein-prime for your metabolism."

8. Grapefruit
"Grapefruit helps cleanse the liver, which makes it a great snack."

9. Green Tea
"Green tea won't elevate your metabolism on its own, but it will help keep you in fat-burning mode. It gives you something to sip on in between meals. It's important to be eating and drinking to keep the fire burning."

10. Spicy Spices
"Chili peppers and red pepper flakes lower blood sugar and start to starve fat. Spices like these push the metabolic process along a little bit faster."

The truth hurts

The sad truth is ...

A good progressive counter-offer to Boehner: Lower the Medicare age

UPDATE: With all the Chained CPI news yesterday — Obama has offered it to Boehner as a “fix” for Social Security and Pelosi is signaling Yes — I want to add one item to the “ask” list is this post.Remove the salary cap on Social Security and take cat food off the table. There, Social Security “fixed.” (Senator Sanders, you can start this tomorrow — just get your 29 letter-writers to co-sponsor the Begich bill.)
________
Earlier I asked why “our” side always asks for not much in these supposed cage matches with Republicans. As I wrote then:

They request a pony; we ask for a bitter pill.

Well, here’s a great strong counter-offer to Boehner’s last offer, from Cliff Schecter writing in Politico:

[N]ot only should there be very little compromise here, but here is what smart, progressive governance would actually look like in the current situation, if you consider [w]here the leverage is:

1) Lower the Medicare age to 40
2) Bulk negotiation and reimportation of prescription drugs for Medicare
3) Double Social Security benefits (per the New America Foundation)
3) Add an additional tax rate for over $1 million per year of 50%, let’s call it the “First Term Reagan” tax rate, end the ridiculous Romney-ish “carried interest loophole” (per Warren Buffett)
4) Decriminalization of recreational drugs–you know, to save the billions wasted in criminal justice costs, if not for moral reasons (per Richard Branson)
5) Cut defense spending by at least $110 billion as Rep. Jan Schakowsky has called for (explained best by Red Dawn…sort of)
6) Get out of Afghanistan–yesterday (explained best by common sense, experiences of the last century and War Of The Worlds)

That, of course, is just a start. But it looks to me to be about equal to the victory that was won by progressives in 2012. It’s a helluva lot closer to the Democrats’ mandate from this election than the repugican one–which is to go slink into a corner somewhere with your self-proclaimed witches and theological-rape specialists and listen to actual adults discuss policy that works in the real world. I love this list. Heck, give me that list and Obama’s aces — he’s holding two, you know — and even I could come out with a win. Sigh.

Abandoned Ohio Poorhouse

The public poorhouses that you read about in Dickens novels are gone, having been replaced with welfare hotels, housing projects, and homeless shelters. The Knox County Poorhouse in Ohio was once such an institution.

Constructed in 1875, Knox County Poorhouse sheltered the poor, homeless and orphaned. During a time when mental illness was still considered innately wrong, parents would often abandon children whose behaviour deviated from what was considered “normal”. Many of the rooms were occupied by the elderly who simply didn’t have the means to support themselves. Rooms were overrun with occupants, leaving staff unable to provide an acceptable standard of living.

Reused as a Bible college since then, the structure has been empty for decades. The delapidated building is rumored to be haunted by the tortured souls who lived and died there. And thanks to urban explorers, you can take a look inside in a series of photographs at Urban Ghosts .

Did you know ...

5 facts about America's pathological wealth distribution

About how the war on drugs became a real war

That right to work leads to poverty

Did the wingnut film Obama's America miss out on an Oscar nomination because of liberal bias or because it was a really bad flick?

That Faux News viewers have lower IQ's

That 80% of antibiotics in this country are given to meat animals

That worried repugicans are stocking up on gold coins

The Classics

1929 Pierce-Arrow Model 125 Roadster

The Inuit Sport of Ear Pulling

Occasionally there are interpersonal disputes here at the Neatorama office. This is how we resolve them. It's also the Inuit sport of ear pulling:

Ear pulling is a traditional Inuit game in which competitors sit with their legs in front of their bodies and intertwined, facing each other. Competitor's left and right ears, respectively, are linked to their rival's via a two-foot-long loop of waxed string. From there, the game is more or less self explanatory: the two competitors pull. The idea is to endure as much pain as possible. The winner is the first man or woman to dislodge the string from the ear of their competition, withstanding the pain a little longer.

I want to see what the winner's trophy looks like.

More

Woman gets stem-cell "wrinkle treatment," grows extra bones in her eye-socket

A woman who had a $20,000 stem-cell "enhanced" facelift at a posh Beverley Hills clinic experienced a bony clicking sound and excruciating pain every time she opened or shut her right eye. The bony clicking sounds turned out to be bones.

About three months earlier the woman had opted for a relatively new kind of cosmetic procedure at a different clinic in Beverly Hills—a face-lift that made use of her own adult stem cells. First, cosmetic surgeons had removed some the woman's abdominal fat with liposuction and isolated the adult stem cells within—a family of cells that can make many copies of themselves in an immature state and can develop into several different kinds of mature tissue. In this case the doctors extracted mesenchymal stem cells—which can turn into bone, cartilage or fat, among other tissues—and injected those cells back into her face, especially around her eyes. The procedure cost her more than $20,000, Wu recollects. Such face-lifts supposedly rejuvenate the skin because stem cells turn into brand-new tissue and release chemicals that help heal aging cells and stimulate nearby cells to proliferate.
During the face-lift her clinicians had also injected some dermal filler, which plastic surgeons have safely used for more than 20 years to reduce the appearance of wrinkles. The principal component of such fillers is calcium hydroxylapatite, a mineral with which cell biologists encourage mesenchymal stem cells to turn into bone—a fact that escaped the woman's clinicians. Wu thinks this unanticipated interaction explains her predicament. He successfully removed the pieces of bone from her eyelid in 2009 and says she is doing well today, but some living stem cells may linger in her face. These cells could turn into bone or other out-of-place tissues once again.

In the Flesh: The Embedded Dangers of Untested Stem Cell Cosmetics

Will cigarette makers jump into pot market?

Will the Marlboro Man light up a joint soon?

The states of Washington and Colorado legalized possession of small amounts of marijuana in the November elections, but it is unclear if any cigarette makers plan to supply either market.

Marijuana remains illegal under federal law. President Barack Obama indicated last week that going after individual users won't be a priority, but there's no firm indication yet what action the Justice Department might take against states or businesses that participate in the nascent pot market, which has the potential to be large. For example analysts have estimated that a legal pot market could bring Washington state hundreds of millions of dollars a year in new tax revenue for schools, health care and basic government functions.

Bill Phelps, a spokesman for Philip Morris USA, maker of Marlboro, based in Richmond, Va., was vague when asked about the future intentions of the nation's largest tobacco company.

"We have a practice of not commenting or speculating on future business," Phelps said, adding "tobacco companies are in the business of manufacturing and marketing tobacco products."

Less mysterious was Bryan Hatchell, a spokesman for the second-largest cigarette maker, Reynolds American Inc., maker of Camel and Pall Mall, among many others.

"Reynolds American has no plans to produce or market marijuana products in either of those states," Hatchell said. "It's not part of our strategy."
But if major tobacco companies are not going to supply the new markets, it appears there are some ready to step in.

The Washington State Liquor Control Board is in the process of collecting applications from people who want to be certified to be able to grow pot legally. Agency spokesman Brian Smith said Tuesday that some applications so far have come from people who have long been growing marijuana when it was against state law.

"We're getting a lot of interest from people that want to be producers," Smith said. "Some say they have been growing it illegally until now."

Indoor growing operations appear to be the most productive and secure for marijuana, Smith said.

"But we could have outdoor grows in eastern Washington," he said.

Since no state had previously legalized marijuana possession, Washington must invent a production system from the ground up, Smith said. Colorado did have a licensed system for growing medical marijuana, but that was very tightly regulated and probably more stringent than Washington needs, Smith said.

"We don't need to get to the level of oversight Colorado has in medical marijuana," he said.

Washington's new law decriminalizes possession of up to an ounce of pot for people over 21. But selling marijuana remains illegal for now. The initiative gave the state a year to come up with a system of state-licensed growers, processors and retail stores, with the marijuana taxed 25 percent at each stage.

In Colorado, a 24-member task force began work on pot regulations this week. The state's Department of Revenue must adopt the regulations by July, with sales possible by year's end.

Florida man plotted New York terrorist attack

A Pakistani-born man plotted to detonate a bomb in New York City to avenge the deaths of people killed by drone attacks in Afghanistan but failed to raise enough money to carry out the scheme, a federal prosecutor said on Tuesday.

Raees Alam Qazi, 20, was arrested along with his brother, Sheheryar Alam Qazi, 30, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on November 29. The brothers, both naturalized U.S. citizens, are charged with providing support to terrorists and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction.

Both have pleaded not guilty.

On Tuesday, prosecutors offered the first details about the alleged plot during a bail hearing in federal court.

Raees Alam Qazi traveled to New York from his home in Florida on November 23 with the hope of finding a job to make enough money to build an explosive, according to testimony from FBI Special Agent Kristine Holden.

The younger Qazi told investigators after his arrest that he rode around New York on a bike looking for targets but never chose one and returned home four days later after running out of money, prosecutor Karen Gilbert said.

Qazi, who spent his time in New York sleeping in a restaurant, a mosque and on public transportation, was arrested two days after he traveled home on a Greyhound bus.

His brother, a taxi cab driver, was described by prosecutors and investigators as aware of the possible attack, but they said Raees Alam Qazi intended to carry it out.

"The brother was supporting him, paying bills, providing a computer and a cellphone," Gilbert said.

The case against the brothers is based in part on evidence gathered during surveillance of their cellular telephones, according to court documents.

During recorded calls, Raees Alam Qazi asked about the size of crowds at Times Square, Wall Street and at some New York City theaters, Holden said.

In another conversation, Sheheryar Qazi described his brother as a "lone wolf, like the Times Square bomber," referring to Faisal Shahzad, who pleaded guilty two years ago to trying to set off a car bomb in Times Square.

The elder Qazi was also recorded saying that his brother "wasn't going to be in this world long."

In a search of a house where Raees Alam Qazi was living, authorities say they recovered a laptop computer that showed he had researched ingredients to make a shoe bomb. They also found disassembled remote-control car parts, which Gilbert said were possibly intended to make a remote-control detonator.

Daniel Ecarius, an attorney for Raees Alam Qazi, sought to have him released on bail on Tuesday, saying his client had no criminal history. He took issue with some of the translation of the taped telephone calls, which were recorded in Pashto, a language spoken in Pakistan, as well as Afghanistan.

However, a federal judge ordered Raees Alam Qazi held without bail, saying he was a flight risk.

If convicted, both of the men could face a sentence of 15 years in prison on the charge of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists.

The charge of conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction carries a potential maximum life sentence.

Woman said to be Mexico drug kingpin's daughter deported from U.S.

 

A woman said to be the daughter of a notorious Mexican drug lord arrested at the U.S. border in October has pleaded guilty in California to using a false passport and has been deported, court records show.

A pregnant Alejandrina Gisselle Guzman-Salazar, 31, was detained after she tried to cross on foot from Tijuana into the United States using a false visa and name, telling customs agents that she wanted to give birth to her child in Los Angeles, according to court documents in the case.

During a search of her purse, the agents found a Mexican driver's license and a voter card, also in the false name, according to a motion filed by federal prosecutors.

The Los Angeles Times has reported, citing an unnamed high-ranking U.S. law enforcement official, that Guzman-Salazar told agents at the border that she was the daughter of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel.

A federal official who asked not to be identified has also told Reuters that she was the drug kingpin's daughter.
But prosecutors and her defense attorneys have declined to confirm that Guzman-Salazar is related to El Chapo.

Guzman-Salazar pleaded guilty on Monday to a single count of fraud and misuse of visas and documents, according to court documents. U.S. District Judge Cathy Bencivengo sentenced Guzman Salazar to the time she'd already spent in detention.

Prosecutors dismissed five other counts and she was deported before she could give birth to her child.

"The government treated her just like anyone else caught trying to enter the U.S. illegally for the first time," Guzman-Salazar's attorney, Guadalupe Valencia, said. "They treated her fairly regardless of who she is or who she says she is."

El Chapo, whose nickname means "Shorty" in English, escaped a Mexican prison in a laundry basket in 2001 to become the country's highest-profile trafficker, hauling tons of marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin to U.S. markets in trucks, ultralight aircraft and through clandestine tunnels.

Included on Forbes list of billionaires since 2009, Guzman has been indicted in the United States on dozens of charges of racketeering and conspiracy to import narcotics. Washington has a $5 million reward for the capture of El Chapo.

In recent months, U.S. and Mexican agents have arrested traffickers close to him and seized his assets on both sides of the border. Among those targeted by the U.S. Treasury Department was Maria Alejandrina Hernandez Salazar, reported to be Guzman-Salazar's mother.

Guzman's third or fourth wife, Emma Coronel, made headlines last year when she traveled to Los Angeles to give birth to twins.

FBI offers $50k reward in Chicago jail escape

A manhunt for two bank robbers who used a makeshift rope to pull off a daring escape from a high-rise Chicago lockup pushed into a second day Wednesday, with authorities offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the men's apprehension.

The former cellmates apparently broke a cell window, pulled out the bars then descended almost 20 stories to escape the downtown Metropolitan Correctional Center early Tuesday.

Joseph "Jose" Banks, 37, and Kenneth Conley, 38, were unaccounted for during a 5 a.m. headcount, according to the U.S. Marshals Service. An FBI affidavit says the men were in their assigned areas for a head count around 10 p.m. Monday and that jail employees noticed the makeshift rope around 7 a.m. Nearby business owners said helicopters and canine units did not swarm the area until almost 8:30 a.m.

Inside the cell Tuesday morning, investigators found a broken window and bars inside a mattress, according to an FBI affidavit. Stuffed under blankets on two beds were clothing and sheets, shaped to resemble a body, the affidavit said.
Hours after the escape, the rope of bed sheets could be seen dangling down the side of the building, at least 200 feet long and knotted about every 6 feet.

The FBI has declined to provide details of the escape, but a close-up photograph clearly shows damage to the concrete along the lower edge of the window, which is 6 feet tall but only 6 inches wide. Damage broadened the hole through which the men must have had to climb.

Banks and Conley were the first inmates to escape from the federal facility in nearly two decades. It was still unclear how they were able to accumulate enough bed sheets and other items to pull off the escape or how jail guards failed to detect the scheme or notice that the men were gone until several hours later.
The FBI reissued a plea to the public to be on the lookout for the men, whom they believe are traveling together, and warned that they should be considered armed and dangerous. On Wednesday, Thomas Trautmann, the acting special agent-in-charge of the FBI's Chicago office, announced a $50,000 reward leading to their arrests.

The apparently meticulously planned escape from the 27-story facility came just a week after Banks made a courtroom vow of retribution. The men, who have yet to be sentenced, are facing hefty prison terms.

The facility, which can house up to 700 inmates, is one of the only skyscraper lockups in the world, and experts say its triangular shape was meant to make it easier to guard, theoretically reducing blind spots for guards. The only other escape from the nearly 40-year-old facility occurred in the mid-1980s, U.S. Marshal's Service spokeswoman Belkis Cantor said.

Banks and Conley both were wearing orange jumpsuits, but police believe they quickly changed into white T-shirts, gray sweatpants and white gym shoes. The FBI believes both men were in Tinley Park, a heavily wooded area about 25 miles south of Chicago. Authorities were scouring a local forest preserve in the afternoon.

SWAT teams stormed at least one home in Tinley Park on Tuesday. Although neither man was found, evidence suggested that both had been at the home just hours earlier, according to the FBI. On Wednesday, police in neighboring Orland Park said a search had been conducted Tuesday of a home where an associate of Conley lived or once lived, but that search came up empty as well.

Some schools went on lockdown after being inundated with calls from nervous parents. Mike Byrne, a superintendent in Tinley Park, said "our parents are so emotionally charged right now" because of the school shootings in Connecticut.

Banks, known as the Second-Hand Bandit because he wore used clothes during his heists, was convicted last week of robbing two banks and attempting to rob two others. Authorities say he stole almost $600,000, and most of that still is missing.

During trial, he had to be restrained because he threatened to walk out of the courtroom. He acted as his own attorney and verbally sparred with the prosecutor, at times arguing that U.S. law didn't apply to him because he was a sovereign citizen of a group that was above state and federal law.

After he was convicted by U.S. District Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer, he said he would "be seeking retribution as well as damages," the Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago Tribune reported.

When the judge asked how long he needed to submit a filing, Banks replied: "No motion will be filed, but you'll hear from me."

Pallmeyer, a prominent federal judge who oversaw the corruption trial of now imprisoned former Illinois Gov. George Ryan, appeared to stick to her regular schedule Tuesday and there were no signs of extra security. Her office declined comment.

Conley pleaded guilty last October to robbing a Homewood Bank last year of nearly $4,000. Conley, who worked at the time at a suburban strip club, wore a coat and tie when he robbed the bank and had a gun stuffed in his waistband.

The brother of Hollywood director Christopher Nolan also tried to escape in 2010. Matthew Nolan, who was being held pending an extradition request, was sentenced to 14 months in jail for plotting to escape the high-rise jail by hiding a rope made out of bed sheets in his cell.

China Jails Doomsday Believers

Spreading rumors about doomsday is not cool in parts of China. Read more

How the Mayan Calendar Works

The Mayan hieroglyph-heavy calendar is based on counting days. Read more

Ancient Pharaoh's Throat Was Slashed

Egypt's last great pharaoh was killed by conspirators -- and his son may have led the charge. Read more

Ancient Cranial Deformations Fuel Alien Theories

Strangely-shaped skulls found in Mexico suggest to some that aliens have visited -- and mated with -- humans. Others aren't so sure. Read more

Random Photo

Science News

How Arctic Hurricanes Help Warm Europe

Arctic storms intensify the circulation of the ocean and are partly responsible for keeping Europe warm. Read more

Humans Changing Saltiness of the Seas

Human-driven climate change is now showing itself in a strong signal of salinity changes in the world's oceans. Read more

Knight in Baked Armor Found at 'Pompeii of Japan'

The remains of a high-caste man wearing armor, who was buried by hot ash while facing Mount Haruna, have been found in an area known as the "Pompeii of Japan." Read more

Earthquake That Killed A King Ruptured Ground

A major earthquake in 1255 ruptured the ground in the Himalayas, killing the king of Nepal. Read more

America's Most Extreme Rocks Found

For the first time, ultrahigh temperature metamorphic rocks have been discovered in the United States. Read more

 

Don't Kiss Mistletoe Goodbye

It may be a parasite, but the holiday plant actually plays a key role in keeping forests healthy, research shows. Read more

 

Bugged by the Facts? Don't Be.

Be one of the brave who embraces their bug overlords. Read more

Plants Smell Fruit Flies' Funk

The flowers we smell may be getting a whiff of us at the same time. Read more

Dinosaurs Had Christmas Trees

Conifers haven’t spruced up their DNA nearly as much as flowering plants since the two lines diverged from each other approximately 300 million years ago. Read more

New Dinosaur Had Unforgettable Smile

A herbivore found in Wyoming had so many large teeth, its mouth was set in a perpetual grin. Read more

A Whale of a Tale

Found: Whale Thought Extinct for 2 Million Years

Pygmy whales are the last known members of a group thought to have gone extinct long ago. Read more

People Seen Trying to Ride Sick Sperm Whale

An eyewitness says that two people paddled out to a sickly sperm whale off the coast of Florida and one got on top of the animal. Read more

Saber-tooth Cat Lived in Vegas

Remains of a saber-tooth cat that lived 15,590 years ago are found in hills just north of the bustling Nevada city. Read more

 

Animal News

Extinct elephant 'survived late'

The extinct elephant Palaeoloxodon was still living in North China 3,000 years ago, scientists say. BBC Nature

• Prehistoric rhino reveals secrets
• Giant bird was 'gentle herbivore'

New Poisonous Spider in the US

A spider bite ... And you thought the brown recluse was bad!

Three women in North Florida, turned up at hospitals over a 5-day period, all with the same symptoms. Fever, chills, and vomiting, followed by muscular collapse, paralysis, and finally, death. There were no outward signs of trauma.

Autopsy results showed toxicity in the blood. These women did not know each other, and seemed to have nothing in common. It was discovered, however, that they had all visited the same Restaurant (Olive Garden) within days of their deaths.
The health department descended on the restaurant, shutting it down. The food, water, and air conditioning were all inspected and tested, to no avail.

The big break came when a waitress at the restaurant was rushed to the hospital with similar symptoms. She told doctors that she had been on vacation, and had only went to the restaurant to pick up her check. She did not eat or drink while she was there, but had used the restroom.

That is when one toxicologist, remembering an article he had read, drove out to the restaurant, went into the restroom, and lifted the toilet seat.
Under the seat, out of normal view, was a small spider.

The spider was captured and brought back to the lab, where it was determined to be the Two-Striped Telamonia (Telamonia dimidiata), so named because of its reddened flesh color. This spider's venom is extremely toxic, but can take several days to take effect. They live in cold, dark, damp climates, and toilet rims provide just the right atmosphere.
Several days later a lawyer from Jacksonville showed up at a hospital emergency room. Before his death, he told the doctor, that he had been away on business, had taken a flight from Indonesia, changing planes in Singapore, before returning home.
He did not visit (Olive Garden), while there. He did, as did all of the other victims, have what was determined to be a puncture wound, on his right buttock.
Investigators discovered that the flight he was on had originated in India.
The Civilian Aeronautics Board (CAB) ordered an immediate inspection of the toilets of all flights from India, and discovered the Two-Striped Telamonia (Telamonia dimidiata) spider's nests on 4 different planes!
It is now believed that these spiders can be anywhere in the country. So please, before you use a public toilet, lift the seat to check for spiders. It can save your life!
And please pass this on to everyone you care about.

The Scientific Reason Why Reindeer Have Red Noses

We've all heard the story of Rudolph, the reindeer that saved Christmas because of his bright red nose. But while a nose that shines like a beacon through the fog may be the stuff of fantasy, Rudolph is far from the only reindeer with a red nose.

Of course, the story was rooted in myth. But there’s actually more truth to it than most of us realize. A fraction of reindeer—the species of deer scientifically known as Rangifer tarandus, native to Arctic regions in Alaska, Canada, Greenland, Russia and Scandinavia—actually do have noses colored with a distinctive red hue.

Now, just in time for Christmas, a group of researchers from the Netherlands and Norway have systematically looked into the reason for this unusual coloration for the first time. Their study, published yesterday in the online medical journal BMJ, indicates that the color is due to an extremely dense array of blood vessels, packed into the nose in order to supply blood and regulate body temperature in extreme environments.

How did they determine this? The study involved infrared imaging, comparing reindeer and human noses, and putting reindeer on a treadmill! Who says science isn't fun? Read all about the study at Surprising Science.

Animal Pictures