Scientists Find Oldest Living Animal, Then Kill It

From www.foxnews.com:

British marine biologists have found what may be the oldest living animal — that is, until they killed it.

The team from Bangor University in Wales was dredging the waters north of Iceland as part of routine research when the unfortunate specimen, belonging to the clam species Arctica islandica, commonly known as the ocean quahog, was hauled up from waters 250 feet deep.

Only after researchers cut through its shell, which made it more of an ex-clam, and counted its growth rings did they realize how old it had been — between 405 and 410 years old.

Another clam of the same species had been verified at 220 years old, and a third may have lived 374 years. But this most recent clam was the oldest yet.

"Its death is an unfortunate aspect of this work, but we hope to derive lots of information from it," postdoctoral scientist Al Wanamaker told London's Guardian newspaper. "For our work, it's a bonus, but it wasn't good for this particular animal."

Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang

Ryugyong Hotel in Pyongyang, originally uploaded by Isaac Mao.

From Isaac Mao's caption:

Under the personality cult of leaders Kim Jong-il and his father Kim Il-sung, North Korea has become fiercely isolationist, nationalistic, and totalitarian. Despite being one of the planet's poorest countries, the communist state looks for any achievement to boost itself in eyes of the world. Its people know little or nothing of other nations except for the fact that Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) is vastly superior.

The DPRK is also one of the world's most secretive nations. For a North Korean, contact with a foreigner can land one in jail… or worse. But there is one embarrassing secret that is hard for the government to hide, literally. It's the Ryugyong Hotel in the Potong District of North Korea's capital city of Pyongyang. It's difficult to hide because it's a massive, 105-story structure which dominates the city's skyline. It's an embarrassment because it's a complete engineering failure… its empty, dilapidated husk lurks over the capital, mocking the citizens of the proud country.

The hotel's story begins in 1987, when the North Korean government began construction at an estimated cost of $750 million, or 2% of the country's gross domestic product (GDP). By comparison, 2% of the United States' GDP would be about $220 billion. Construction of the hotel was a cold war response to other massive skyscrapers in Asia, most notably South Korea's towering Stamford Hotel in Singapore. The North Koreans expected the project to bring in western investors as a first move into their nation. Investors were told to expect little oversight, and assured that casinos, nightclubs and lounges could be added. The North Korean government was so proud of the project that they added it to their official city maps before the project was even started, and they issued postage stamps touting the hotel before it was even half-finished.

The Ryugyong or "Capital of Willows" Hotel stands 1,083 feet tall, and it was planned to have 3,000 rooms and seven revolving restaurants. It has a total of 3.9 million square feet of floor space. The hotel would be the tallest hotel and seventh largest building in the world if it were finished. It would also have been the first building with over one hundred floors outside of New York or Chicago.

The first event scheduled to be held at the hotel was June 1989's World Festival of Youth and Students. The hotel was nowhere near ready for that event. Its construction was plagued with problems, and after five years construction completely ground to a halt due to a shortage of everything… especially funding and electricity. Work on the hotel has never resumed; the project was abandoned, leaving a lonely construction crane perched on its peak.

Pyongyang skyline, showing the Ryugyong Hotel on the top right.The shell of the building is complete but it has not been certified as safe for occupancy. There are no windows, fixtures, or fittings. The extremely poor quality concrete used in its construction has left the building sagging to such a great degree that the structure can never be finished without a massive overhaul.

The North Korean government is still looking for foreign investment, hopefully around $300 million. It's going to be hard to find such an investor considering the DPRK has such a tight stranglehold on visitors coming to their nation. The DPRK only allows about 130,000 tourists in an entire year, and almost none of them come to Pyongyang. To make matters worse, the nation appears to be in a never-ending drought and famine cycle that is not conducive for the operation of a five-star hotel.

Today, few North Koreans are willing to discuss the hotel with outsiders. The hotel, which was once found on city maps before the construction even began, has now been completely stricken from the official maps. Tour guides usually claim not to know where it is. Either a majority of the country is in a state of denial about the whole thing, or they avoid it.

Bizarre news story

From San Diego Union-Tribune. Edited for space.

Couple arrested in rock-throwing siege
By Kristina Davis
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
September 20, 2006

SAN MARCOS – Nearly every night for a month, fist-sized rocks and pieces of brick rained down on three homes along Via Camellia.

The barrage shattered windows, dented family cars and chipped stucco, not to mention scaring residents who were afraid of getting pelted by just stepping outside.
...

A married couple who had repeatedly complained to deputies about damage to their home and who claimed to have been hit by a rock were not victims after all, authorities say.

Jesus Maldonado, 25, and his wife, Krystal Maldonado, 23, were taken into custody after deputies caught a man and woman launching rocks at their neighbors' homes from their backyard, detective Sgt. Tom Bulow said.
...

Neighbors, including the Maldonados, would help walk the streets in the middle of the night looking for the vandals, residents said.

“But then Jesus would say he had to go inside and check on his kids, and it would be when he was gone that they'd get hit again,” George Torres said yesterday.

It wasn't until Deputy Victor David began to notice that the Maldonados didn't seem as concerned as their neighbors about their vehicles being struck that his suspicions were aroused.

On Sunday, during a surveillance of the home, the deputy's hunch was validated, Bulow said.

“We were really shocked,” Heather Groom said about the Maldonados' arrests. “When we'd get hit at night, they'd come running over and ask, 'Did you get hit?' We would've never suspected them.”

The motivation behind the attacks is unclear, and theories abound.

Jesus Maldonado told investigators that a neighbor made an inappropriate sexual comment about his wife, Bulow said.
...

Kristina Davis: (760) 476-8233; kristina.davis@uniontrib.com

Why isn't Get Smart on DVD yet??

Emergency!

I don't remember if I already put Randy Mantooth aka Johnny Gage on here. It doesn't matter because I will probably have to include him more than once.

Bizarre news story

Omeed Aziz Popal's family, worried about his recent mental breakdowns and erratic behavior, tried to keep an eye on him all the time.

But Tuesday morning, relatives and authorities say, the automotive worker from Fremont slipped away -- pulling a trick on his mother and sister that got them out of his sport utility vehicle, then speeding off on a hit-and-run rampage that killed one man in Fremont and injured at least 19 people in San Francisco.

On Wednesday, San Francisco prosecutors charged Popal with 18 counts of attempted murder for crimes that police said he committed because he "just wanted to."

This guy was paranoid schizophrenic and had been hospitalized several times - the family admitted that they never left him alone. However, his mother and sister were easily tricked into leaving the vehicle, so that he was able to bolt back into it and go on a rampage. His family, knowing of his mental illness, also arranged for his marriage to some unsuspecting woman in Afghanistan! What were they thinking?!

He was very angry that the family wasn't allowing him to visit Afghanistan alone to see his bride. Basically, he was a two-year-old in an adult body, who had a deadly tantrum.

See full story at San Francisco Chronicle: www.sfgate.com

A film I won't be seeing

I didn't know a movie had been made of this book. It looks intriguing, but far too disturbing, so I won't see it. From dvdtalk.com: In the late 1890s, a series of strange deaths occurred in the small town of Black River Falls, Wisconsin. Murders were committed for no apparent reason, often by friends and loved ones. Countless infants fell victim to diphtheria, an acute bacterial infection. People were supposedly haunted by ghosts, possessed by spirits, and thrown into a profound state of depression, paranoia, and insanity. One theory is that it was so excruciatingly isolated, cold, and boring in rural Wisconsin that it drove people insane.

Wierd news story

(The Columbus Dispatch, August 24, 2006) Prank gone awry stuns Worthington -- Resident of ‘haunted’ house critically wounds teen. A modern-day Boo Radley/Norman Bates protecting his home and mother from what he thought was a home invasion, shot and seriously wounded a wholesome teenage girl. Girls were daring each other to approach the house, but they were shot while in their car. Norman Bates, I mean Allen S. Davis, didn't call police because his house was already the subject of neighbors' complaints. Read article: http://www.dispatch.com/emailme/emailme.php?
story=dispatch/2006/08/24/20060824-A1-02.html

Cute!!

(Daily Mail, August 24, 2006) What a pair - these funny little creatures are albino Pygmy Marmoset monkeys, born at the Froso Zoo in Ostersund, Sweden this week. The Pygmy Marmoset, the world's smallest monkey which all grown up reaches just 35cm and weighs barely 100 grams, is quite rare, but this albino pair is particularly unusual.