Top stories from your local newspaper

Recreation Fun & Games
1

I’ve always been a big fan of my mum and dad’s local paper The Crewe Chronicle. As some of you will remember, some of us tried to help solve the riddle of who stole the wheel trims from the Holmes Chapel car park a few months ago.

Here’s another bit of essential news from last week

[quote]CHURCHGOERS in Warmingham have raised more than £600 towards the upkeep of St Leonard’s with a charity bag appeal.

Villagers donated their unwanted used clothes and shoes to then be sold on at a charity sale.

Appeal organiser Myra Cope of Moss End said: “So far over the last five years, £2,393 has been raised and all given to the upkeep of the church.

“Our village is very small so a big thank you is extended to everyone who keeps supporting this very worthwhile cause.

“Well before the deadline for collection we had tonnes of full bags piled up.

“It was a fantastic response from the community.”[/quote]
600 quid!

So what’s going on in your original neck of the woods?

2

[quote]PORRIDGE hit the top of the menu this week when Scotland’s First Minister, Alex Salmond, hosted a special breakfast in the countdown to the Golden Spurtle World Porridge-Making Championship, which is due to take place in Carrbridge on Sunday (October 10).

The porridge breakfast, held at the First Minister’s official residence at Bute House in Edinburgh, is intended to help stir up support for a charity fund- raising celebration of Scotland’s traditional national dish.

It is among a series of events being held to mark World Porridge Day, which was officially launched last year to tie in with the annual Golden Spurtle World Porridge-Making Championship.

Scott Bruce, chairman of Carrbridge Community Council, explained that the aim was to establish World Porridge Day on the international calendar, with an invitation to porridge ambassadors around the world to host their own porridge/oatmeal-related fund-raising events for Mary’s Meals.

Welcoming the First Minister’s backing, Mr Bruce said: “Mary’s Meals does tremendous work, and we hope that everyone will follow the First Minister’s lead and join in the spirit of the World Porridge Day fund-raising efforts to support this worthwhile cause.”[/quote]
Sorry, the Strathspey and Badenoch Herald doesn’t update as often as it might, given the huge amount of news up there.

3

Translated from Spanish:

War! The gringos are invading! Their ships are off the coast! Rise and defend the motherland! And the neighbors to the north are stealing our land/cattle/wimmin/allied to the gringos! So the ones down south! War!!!

In other news:
Using calculators reduces students fear of Math.

Mrs.Lopez denounces that her cellphone has been at the repair shop one month and still no sign of any recovery.

Bus driver accussed of driving while “all stressed out”.

4

Sorry, only Sports, since the Tofield Mercury only publishes on Tuesdays.

Sedgewick, you BASTARDS!!!

5

We’re still abuzz about our local sports team beating the Irish National football squad last weekend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ho-LzW3ocuA

They had the ball, behind by one point, less than a minute to go, in field goal range, with a kicker who has never missed, and they throw the ball into the endzone to be intercepted. It’s kind of funny if you think about it.

6

Broken Britain!

[quote]POLICE are appealing for witnesses after two bikes were stolen in the Dalneigh area of Inverness on Sunday.

The first theft of a grey BMX took place between midnight and 8.30am from an address on Caledonian Road.

The second theft of a silver Apollo child’s bicycle was taken from an address on Lilac Grove between 11:45am-6pm.

Police are not linking the thefts.

Last week an appeal went out after another two bikes were stolen, including one from outside the James Cameron Centre in Dalneigh.

Police are encouraging anyone who has any information to contact 0845 600 5703 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.[/quote]

7

Obama, Barack, Obama, Barack, Obama, Michelle, Barack…if anyone doesn’t know, he is coming to India, and if anyone doesn’t know, his party will lose the mid- terms :unamused: And I just spared all of you from reading in depth detailed reports of the said forthcoming events.

8

“3rd Marine Expeditionary Brigade provides assistance to Philippines after Typhoon Megi”

“Combat canine handlers and their partners undergo helicopter familiarization training”

9

The O C Register (Orange County) is the paper of record from my former “home.” Todays its all election news and the usual crime stories.
But I found a column from a guy that some may know of…Corky Carroll. He’s a semi-buddy, I took surfin lessons from him for a while - we both decided it was a waste of his time and my money - and he also plays music around Huntington Beach when he needs either the money or the drinks…usually the latter.
Here 'tis:

[quote][url=http://www.ocregister.com/news/water-273987-beach-little.html]Carroll: Terror in the shallows[/url]
Published: Nov. 2, 2010 11:28 a.m.

I would really like to get my wife to learn to surf one of these days. When we first got together she was so afraid of the ocean she would not even stick her little toe in it. Honestly. We would walk on the beach and if a wave came up close to her she would squeal and run away from it, not letting even a drop of salt water touch her. After about a year she finally waded into the water about knee deep, freaked out and ran out in horror.

But finally after maybe another six months of coaxing her into the water on small days she got a little braver and decided that she would learn to boogie board. This she has taken to on small days and seems happy to leave it at that. She said she feels safe doing that and doesn’t want to try surfing, at least not yet.

This leads me up to yesterday afternoon. It was a beautiful day and there was a nice little shorebreak just down the beach a little bit from our house. Raquel said she was going to go for a boogie and asked me if I wanted to come with her. It seemed like a fun thing to do at the time so I happily went along. As we were walking into the water I was thinking to myself to remember to shuffle my feet. It is a sandy bottom and everywhere that is a sandy bottom has stingrays. A few minutes later I forgot about that and was walking out for a wave right next to my beautiful Raquel when WHAM, one got me. It got me big time too, right on the bottom of my left big toe near the joint.

Oh my God. I hate stingrays with a passion. This one must have hated me too because it absolutely nailed me. Poor Raquel was yelling, “What happened? What happened?” I was squealing like a little girl and writhing in agony all the while hopping to the beach on one foot. It must have looked pretty funny but it hurt like heck.

The only thing that you can really do for a stingray hit is to soak your foot in the hottest water you can take: the hotter the better. It’s common for people to burn themselves trying to take the pain away from one of these stings, it hurts that bad. Hey, I was thinking if only I had a shotgun I could just blow the toe right off and get some relief that way. Some people think that you’re supposed to pee on a stingray hit, but that is totally wrong. That is for sea urchins, or in some cases just plain recreation. But not for a stingray.

So I get up on my deck and Raquel gets me a bucket of boiling water. I call my neighbor, the infamous Iguana and legendary former chief of lifeguards in Seal Beach. Seal Beach is the stingray capital of the world, so I figure he might be of some help.

“Get over here quick, I have been hit by the Godzilla of all stingrays and am sinking fast,” I plead. Geez, first the crocodile dude and now me. He lives right next door and rushed over, arriving an hour and a half later. By that time the horrible screaming and speaking in tongues, none of which are human, part was over. Not my favorite way to spend an afternoon.

The moral of the story: shuffle your feet on sandy bottoms.

Corky Carroll is a three-time international and five-time U.S. surfing champion.[/quote]

10

[quote]Halloween poetry reading held at Page 233 Book Store
AMHERSTBURG — Local writers Mary Ann Mulhern and Penny-Anne Beaudoin joined fans at a Halloween poetry reading hosted by Amherstburg’s Page 233 Book Store last Saturday.

This reading came after a reading from the pair at From The Heart Gift Shop on Ottawa St. in Windsor earlier in the day. Both readings were very well-attended with about 25 people at each.[/quote]
Wow, 25 people! Stop the Presses! Poetry reading sells out local broom closet!
Even beat hockey off its’ customary front page pedestal.

11

Since I am in Kaohsiung for a couple of weeks, this is Taiwan newspaper news, but still worthwhile food for thought. I’ll summarize:

A 30-year old engineer working in an industrial park was recently fleeced of NT$200,000+ by a transsexual woman who had previously cheated a handful of other men as well over a 10 year period (and escaping to Mainland China in between slaps on the wrist from the judicial system).

The woman met him at a KTV, gave him (and only him) her number, which really made him feel special as she was reportedly quite a hot number, then called him a few days later to go out in the evening. The next thing he knew, she was suggesting he move in for a “test marriage”. She also took him to a temple somewhere and had him there throwing the blocks for four hours until they finally came up “marriage”.

She refused to sleep with him, however, saying that she wanted that to be for their actual wedding night. She did charge up a storm on his credit cards and so forth. Since she had had a sex change in Thailand some years back, I suppose there wouldn’t have been an actual, er, impossibility involved on the sex front, though.

The only things that tipped him off was the fact that she never closed the door to the bathroom, and that she made an inordinate amount of noise when eating noodles. She countered that she hung out with lots of other models and all of them had the same habits. She also sent him a threatening text after being discovered, saying that he should go ahead and sue her for the money; if he did, she would just tell all of Taiwan that he had been romantically involved with a transsexual.

[Sooooo many wrong things going on here. I was struck by how Apple-daily-ish the presentation of the story was, although it was in a mainstream newspaper, and how at least in this case the transsexual was viewed as not a real woman. I suppose the transsexualism was fair game as she was the one who brought it into the game with the threatening text message, but still…]

12

I think the biotech terms are “wild type” or “native” woman, vs. “bioengineered woman”.

For fairness, for a transsexual man, the biotech terms are “wild type” or “native” man, vs. “bioengineered man”.

13

a look at the local wildlife

nydailynews.com/ny_local/201 … groun.html