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  With just four weeks left in office, Mayor Bill de Blasio launched the country’s first legal  shooting galleries  Tuesday morning, calling them safe havens for addicts — shortly before five people overdosed at just one of the clinics on opening day. Oopsie! Goodbye!

The Amazon worker who went  viral in October  after a woman was filmed leaving the back of his truck said the attention the video received got him fired.    The former delivery believes the virality of the video is what got him fired, telling TMZ: "It was just the incident went viral, that's what cost me my job." Excuse me while I find a mirror so I can practice my "shocked" face.  “This why my packages always late.”

  Prices of processed turkeys are up 40.7 percent compared with a year ago, data from the Department of Labor’s Producer Price Index showed Tuesday. That’s even after falling a seasonally adjusted one percent in October. It may be hard to even find turkeys in some parts of the country this year. The  Wall Street Journal   reported  that turkeys were 60 percent out of stock. Cranberries, yams, and sweet potatoes are also low in stock. Grain prices are 40.8 percent higher than a year ago, driving up the prices of our largely grain-fed turkey crop. Beef and veal prices are up 41.5 percent compared with a year ago. Overall, food prices are running 10.5 percent higher than a year ago. Getting to the family Thanksgiving will be costlier with gasoline prices are up close to 90 percent, according to the Producer Price Index. Home heating oil is up 114.8 percent. Residential natural gas prices are up 28.7 percent. Residential electricity prices are up 5.6 percent. Well, it's ...

  FLORENCE, Ore. - A 45-foot, 8-ton whale washed up on the beach near Florence on Nov. 9, 1970. Three days later,  the whale's tale exploded into history  - and became what some people regard as the first-ever viral story. "It had to be said the Oregon State Highway Department not only had a whale of a problem on its hands," Paul Linnman reported for KATU more than a half century ago. "It had a stinking whale of a problem." "So dynamite it was, some 20 cases or a half ton of it," he said. "The hope was that the long-dead pacific gray whale would be almost disintegrated by the blast." "After they blew it up, everyone is watching in awe, and then 30 seconds later - blam blam blam - then everyone's going, 'There's huge chunks of whale blubber getting thrown on us,'" Umenhofer said in 2015. The plan was to obliterate the whale into tiny pieces that seagulls would eat. But as Linnman and former KATU Photojournalist Doug B...

  During the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 28,000 tons (25,000 metric tons) of pandemic-related plastic waste, such as masks and gloves, have ended up in the ocean, according to a new study.  That's more than 2,000 double-decker buses  worth of waste,  The Guardian reported . And within a few years, a portion of those plastic gloves and packaging materials from pandemic purchases could be swirling around the North Pole. The analysis found that 193 countries produced about 9.2 million tons (8.4 million metric tons) of pandemic-associated plastic waste from the start of the pandemic to mid-August 2021, according to The Guardian.  The majority of the plastic — about 87.4% — was used by hospitals, while 7.6% was used by individuals. Packaging and test kits accounted for about 4.7% and 0.3% of the waste, respectively, the authors reported in a recent study, published online on Nov. 8 in the journal  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . Do not hospita...

You've doubtless heard or read about Alec Baldwin and his "accidental" shooting of two production crew members on the set of his film. But what was a live gun doing on the set in the first place? Watch this video to learn about the best use of a prop in film and television and how props are often capable of enhancing a script.  https://artdepartmental.com/blog/props-matter/

  San Luis Obispo County farmer Lisen Bonnier of Vintage Organics has a stretch of her farmland that has never grown crops well. It floods and has always been generally “problematic,” she said. So when an opportunity arose for her to re-think how the area could be used and she was able to obtain 170 native plants attractive to pollinators such as monarch butterflies and bumblebees, Bonnier jumped at it. “This is something I can make a difference with,” she said. “I would like to have good pollinator habitat here, and we need to think more about not just ourselves, but the impact on everyone — my neighbors who grow pumpkins and squash and other crops who also need pollinators.” Bonnier is one of several grantees across San Luis Obispo County and California who have received free native pollinator-friendly plants from the  Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation . “One of the reasons monarchs and other pollinators are declining is a loss of habitat. So anything we can add m...

  The Biden administration is reviewing shutting a  pipeline  in Michigan after anonymously sourced reports said federal officials were quietly studying its potential environmental impact, a  White House  spokeswoman confirmed on Nov. 8. When pressed by a reporter during a news conference, White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre disputed reports saying President Joe Biden was going to terminate Enbridge Inc.’s Line 5 pipeline, which stretches from Canada into Michigan. However, she conceded that the Army Corps of Engineers was reviewing the matter. “Yes, we are. We are,” Jean-Pierre said. “I thought you were saying that we were going to shut it down, but that is not inaccurate. The Army Corps of Engineers is preparing an environmental impact [statement] to look through this. On Nov. 7, Politico reported that the administration was weighing the potential market effects of a shutdown of the pipeline in the face of Republican, Canadian gover...

  Ongoing excavations have revealed a historical latrina – a toilet or an even simpler facility used as a toilet within a sanitation system – at a historical theater in the ancient city of  Smyrna , located within the borders of the western city of  Izmir . The latrina is thought to have been used by the artists in the theater. The theater and the commode date back to around the second century B.C. and were used until the fifth century A.D., said Akın Ersoy, an archaeologist at Izmir's Katip Çelebi University and head of the excavation team. Such a find in theaters in the Mediterranean region is unprecedented, he added. https://www.dailysabah.com/arts/archaeologists-find-theater-toilet-in-western-turkeys-smyrna/news? The commode in the theater, around 40 centimeters (16 inches) high, has a U-shape seating arrangement and could accommodate 12-13 people at a time. Next to it is a U-shaped trough 8-10 cm (3-4 in) deep for clean water. Creature comforts, indeed!  

 

  Man oh man. It's long past time to end the idiocy. .

  EUGENE, Ore. (KABC) -- A violent confrontation over masks is going viral on social media and is now the center of a police investigation in Oregon. It all began when a man and a woman walked into the Crumb Together cookie shop in downtown Eugene without face coverings. However, they were holding a camera that was already recording. The man and woman - who were later identified as Scott Collin and Amy Hall - were allegedly looking for an altercation over mask rules. The owner of the bakery refused to serve them since they weren't wearing face coverings.  In the video, the owner is seen getting shoved by Hall. The owner then grabs a baseball bat from behind the counter and the altercation began, which lasted several minutes. Collin and Hall eventually left the bakery and later spotted police officers a few blocks away. They showed officers their video footage and claimed they had been attacked. Police arrested Collin and Hall for assault and the video is now being...

  A man who walked within feet of a bull elk as the animal stood guard over its harem was toppled by the animal in a scary incident captured on video. The accompanying footage , captured by Eric Burley in the northern Colorado town of  Estes Park, shows the elk flipping the man head over heels after a series of warnings issued by Burley. “The person seemed fine, thankfully, but the message here is to respect the space of wildlife and to use common sense,” said Burley, who also put his video to music on TikTok .  

 My HMO is sending someone to my home in a couple of days to shoot me up with an anti-covid booster - no charge. That's good service! They did that for the original dose as well. 

Food prices around the world continue to climb, hitting a fresh decade high last month, according to the latest report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Over here, "shrinkflation" is back - which means that you pay the same amount as usual, but there's less product in the package. It's been maybe ten years since they last pulled that stunt, but they've started dusting off that old chestnut again. Fortunately, I refilled the freezer over a month ago, and the fridge is pretty well-stocked with veggies and other produce, along with a dozen or so micro-dinners. This ain't my first rodeo. Pretty much the only thing I'll have to find is more milk. I have powdered stuff to fall back on if need be, but I'm not too keen on it, so since there's a dairy a couple of miles from home, I'll scritch some cows and buy some fresh milk in one fell swoop. He doesn't charge as much as the store, anyhow. Global prices for food, energy an...

A man in Looneyville, West Virginia, allegedly killed his father-in-law with a leaf blower during a dispute over a pig last month. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/man-allegedly-killed-father-in-law-with-leaf-blower-during-argument-about-pig/ar-AAQkgpH?li=BBnb7Kz Probably safe to say that he killed his marriage as well.

 The U.S. Navy has fired the commanding officers of a submarine that crashed into an undersea mountain last month. The USS Connecticut, a fast-attack submarine, hit a massive underwater rock formation in the South China Sea Oct. 2, injuring 11 sailors aboard the sub. Commander Cameron Aljilani, Lieutenant Commander Patrick Cashin, and Master Chief Sonar Technician Cory Rodgers were relieved of duty Thursday.  A statement from the Navy’s Seventh Fleet reads, “Sound judgement, prudent decision-making and adherence to required procedures in navigation planning, watch team execution and risk management could have prevented the incident.”  

  Since their introduction in the late 1980s, selective-serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) have become the go-to treatment for major depression. SSRIs, however, have a number of limitations: they take several weeks to start working, can cause a variety of side-effects, and do not help some people with depression. A series of recent clinical investigations suggest that psilocybin, the active compound in magic mushrooms, may be an effective alternative. I've never taken an SSRI. But I used to harvest mushrooms as a kid - yes, those kind. Best place to find them: cow pastures. Cow pastures seem to attract large populations of "magic" mushrooms. https://www.thedailybeast.com/psilocybin-magic-mushrooms-reduce-depression-as-well-as-leading-medication-lexapro-according-to-new-study There's a photo of a group of them in the article.

  Biden Unveils New Plan to Reduce Methane Emissions by 2030 Um...no. He's not going after cow farts and belches (as yet); he's going to go after  oil and gas wells, of course. Apparently they produce a lot of methane as well, though probably not as much as dairy farms.  But hey, if he can stick it to important sources of energy - and you, since prices for those commodities will obviously rise as a result, all the better! Makes me wonder how much more damage he can inflict.  

  A man has reportedly died in Brazil after jumping into a lake to escape bees, only to drown and be eaten by piranhas .    The 30-year-old was fishing with friends when he jumped into a farm lake in the municipality of Brasilandia de Minas on Sunday, according to the local Fire Department.   There are about 30 piranha species in the world; all live in South America's Amazon River basin.     The guy apparently lost a lot of his face and " other parts of his body".    

  Biden's doing nothing, so Gov. Abbott's got his national guard and police putting together a border wall out of shipping crates. Assuming he'll end up with some left over, maybe he can use those to ship illegal aliens back to Mexico. Just a thought....  

  Advisors to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended on Wednesday that all U.S. adults younger than age 60 get vaccinated against hepatitis B. The new recommendation aims to prevent infection among middle-aged adults with hepatitis B increasingly impacting people in their 40s and 50s in recent years. 'We cannot eliminate hepatitis B in the U.S. without a new approach,' said CDC scientist Dr Mark Weng.(Snip)Adults commonly catch the disease through sexual contact and needle sharing.  In other words, if you do stupid stuff you might get sick. Good that the feds are on it, eh? CDC advisory committee recommends all US adults younger than age 60 get vaccinated against hepatitis B  

A man wearing a Fred Flintstone costume was hit and killed while harassing traffic in Texas early in the morning on Tuesday, Nov. 2, police told media outlets. The driver told San Antonio police it was dark and he didn’t see the man dressed as an iconic cartoon caveman until it was too late, KSAT reported.  Police received calls from several motorists concerned about a costumed man in the middle of O’Connor Road, in northeast San Antonio, swinging at passing cars with what appeared to be a “spear,” WOAI reported.  Investigators said he may have been wielding a broomstick or similar object as a weapon, the outlet reported. After hitting the man, the driver stopped and tried to help him, but he died at the scene , KTSA reported. Police said the driver won’t face charges. https://www.star-telegram.com/news/state/texas/article255478706.html?    

An Arizona man who contracted COVID-19 earlier this year is believed to have spread the virus to his two pets in the first-ever documented case of human-to-pet transmission in the U.S. The unnamed man, who is 28 years old and unvaccinated, developed symptoms of Covid on March 6, and tested positive for the virus.  Ten days later, his dog and cat also tested positive for Covid.  It is the first case of pets catching COVID-19 from humans, and gives experts another look at how the virus that has taken over the world may be spreading. Animals can contract Covid, but are very likely to have an asymptomatic case. Cats to suffer a slight increased risk from the virus when compared to dogs, though.  'There's been a lot of evidence over the past 18-plus months that animals are susceptible to getting the virus,' Dr Hayley Yaglom, an epidemiologist at the Translational Genomics Research Institute in Flagstaff, Arizona, and lead researcher of the study, told Daily...

  In 1976, a professor of economic history at the University of California, Berkeley published an essay outlining the fundamental laws of a force he perceived as humanity’s greatest existential threat: Stupidity.  Stupid people, Carlo M. Cipolla explained , share several identifying traits: they are abundant, they are irrational, and they cause problems for others without apparent benefit to themselves, thereby lowering society’s total well-being. There are no defenses against stupidity, argued the Italian-born professor, who died in 2000. https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-five-universal-laws-of-human-stupidity?utm_source=pocket-newtab   PETTING a wild lion is something you'd never expect to see on someone's holiday checklist. And yet, that is exactly what one tourist decided to do while on safari in Tanzania.  A video is doing the rounds on the internet that shows a jeep pull up alongside a lion in the Serengeti National Park. The man then proceeds t...