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As many of you know we have a little fan club in India. More of a loose association of like minded people than anything formal, but it’s still fun. It does have its perks though. I have, over these last few weeks once it was proved I was a real person, been introduced to many wonderful things. I now have a layman’s understanding of cricket, for example. I have been sent a wide array of beautiful images showing what a wonderful country India is. I also got a complimentary subscription to the Times of India. Additionally, while they do love their Bollywood, few understand the American obsession with celebrities. They are much more interested in science. In fact, it was on a NASA blog where I met the people who were responsible for introducing my writing and podcasts to India. All of them were, and are, rocket scientists. When I’m not at a bar watching baseball those tend to be the kind of people I hang with. Anyway, while Caitlyn Jenner was breaking the Internet in ways her daughter Kim could only dream of, other stuff happened too. In fact a lot of sciencey stuff happened. So let’s catch up.

First off, a couple of things that got talked about on my weekly radio show that didn’t get written about.

Scientists created an artificial pancreas.

The advent of continuous glucose monitoring systems has revealed just how often pregnant diabetic women’s blood glucose levels fluctuate dangerously. This is the case even with careful management using insulin pumps, which create a more even administration than injections. Plus the personal discomfort, sleep interruption and false alarms that can come from using continuous glucose monitors make it harder to ensure patients use them to manage the condition correctly.

The actual birth is even more of a challenge because of the greater chance for disaster. Withstanding and maintaining effective contractions in order to give birth requires large amounts of energy. That creates greater pressure for adequate blood glucose and insulin levels.

Artificial pancreas technology builds on and improves continuous glucose monitoring systems. University of Cambridge

Glucose levels are typically maintained during the birth through an intravenous glucose infusion and a manually adjustable dose of insulin. The insulin makes sure that the mother’s cells can absorb enough glucose, which in turn prevents the baby’s blood sugar levels from dropping to potentially fatal levels (neonatal hypoglycaemia).

After delivery, the insulin requirement drops sharply and clinical staff must be careful not to give the mother too much and reduce her blood sugar to a dangerous level (maternal hypoglycaemia). This risk develops soon after contractions have ended, especially if the mother quickly begins breastfeeding and if medication given to her for labour prevents her from recognising the symptoms of hypoglycaemia.

With all these complications, it is small wonder that diabetic women are often advised to opt for caesarean sections, although these carry their own post-operative risks as nutrition and mobility are again impaired.

The artificial pancreas eliminates all those problems and has been successfully used in one natural birth already. Click the link to meet the lucky lady.

Dementor Wasps Turn Cockroaches into Zombies.

Add this to my nightmare list: A creature that turns prey into a zombie, then eats it alive.

That’s pretty much the M.O. of Ampulex dementor, a wasp named after the mythical “Harry Potter” creatures that suck souls with abandon. Dementor wasps inject venom into cockroach prey, right in the belly, rendering it a “passive zombie,” according to a new report from the World Wildlife Fund. The report details 139 new species discovered in the Greater Mekong region during 2014.

“Cockroach wasp venom blocks receptors of the neurotransmitter octopamine, which is involved in the initiation of spontaneous movement,” according to the report. “With this blocked, the cockroach is still capable of movement, but is unable to direct its own body. Once the cockroach has lost control, the wasp drags its stupefied prey by the antennae to a safe shelter to devour it.”

Considering that there are billions of square miles that have never been studied I would imagine that these kind of discoveries will keep happening. Believe it or not, science doesn’t find this stuff just to creep you out.

In other stuff science created I need to make mention of the new super spiders.

Because regular spiders don’t bother enough people.

Spiders sprayed with a thin layer of graphene and carbon nanotubes have produced super-strong webs with record-beating properties.

Combining one of the strongest natural materials with one of the strongest artificial materials, researchers at the University of Trento in Italy created what they describe as “super silk”.

“The protein matrix and hard tissues of insects, worms, ants and spiders naturally incorporates metals, such as zinc, manganese and copper,” the study states. “This leads to mechanical hardening of teeth, jaws, mandibles, ovipositors and to an enhancement of silk toughness.

It has been touted as a “wonder material” by scientists for its remarkable properties and vast range of uses, which include everything from flexible smartphone screens to artificial retinas.

“Thus, the artificial incorporation of metals, or even insulating or semiconducting materials, into these protein structures could be exploited to obtain a reinforced matrix.”

The silk created by the graphene-coated spiders is 3.5 times tougher than that of the giant riverine orb spider – the strongest silk known to nature.

The process that leads to the graphene and carbon nanotubes being infused in the silk is still not clear to the researchers, though the principle theory is that spiders make use of materials found within their immediate environments when spinning silk.

Nicola Pugno, the lead researcher in the study, believes that the strength of the material produced is the highest reported to date, even when compared to high performance fibres like kevlar or the current toughest knotted fibres.

Graphene is a one-atom thick sheet of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal lattice. UC Riverside physicists have found a way to induce magnetism in graphene while also preserving its electronic properties

If you made a web large enough with this stuff you could stop a jet from running off a runway with a net weighing under a pound. But if you’re still freaked out by spiders, here’s a happy little video that will help you get over it.

I aim to please.

Now here’s some completely new stuff.

Bone Tissue Regrown Using Proteins from Stem Cells

Using proteins secreted by stem cells, researchers may have found a new, less risky way to regenerate bone tissue for people who have suffered major trauma to their limbs. According to findings published in Scientific Reports this week, the technique could one day provide a sustainable source of fresh tissue.

Right now, to stimulate the growth of new bone tissue, scientists have to grind up old bones to extract growth factors and various proteins known as “demineralized bone matrix” (DMB). This requires taking bones of varying quality from donated cadavers, and there’s no guarantee that enough of the necessary protein signals can be produced. “These limitations motivate the need for more consistent and reproducible source material for tissue regeneration,” Todd McDevitt of Gladstone Institutes says in a news release. “As a renewable resource that is both scalable and consistent in manufacturing, pluripotent stem cells are an ideal solution.” These have the potential to give rise to almost all cells and tissue types found in mammals.

All you need to do is think about people who’ve suffered bone or muscle loss from cancer or any other disease. This new treatment will help them heal quicker and more safely.

That’s a good thing.

Just in case you’ve got a little vampire in you, make sure to suck the blood of a younger person.

Science has shown that young blood heals old bones.

Hailed as the long sought-after elixir of youth ever since scientists demonstrated that it could reverse signs of aging in old mice, there has been a lot of interest in young blood as a potential rejuvenation factor. While scientists thought they may have pinpointed the responsible molecule, describing its impressive effects in several high-profile publications, its age-defying abilities have this week been called into question by a new study. But it seems scientists shouldn’t fall at the first hurdle as, interestingly, a new investigation has come out that showed that young blood can help old broken bones heal faster.

As described in Nature Communications, circulating the blood of young mice in older mice with fractures sped up the healing process, an effect that they could replicate by also giving the elderly mice a bone marrow transplant from youthful individuals. Furthermore, they were also able to pinpoint a signaling pathway that is at least partly responsible, although what causes it to go wrong in the elderly remains unknown.

Speaking of cancer related issues;

Cuba’s Had A Lung Cancer Vaccine For Years, And Now It’s Coming To The U.S.

When New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) headed to Havana on a historic trade mission in April, he returned with the promise of an important commodity: a Cuban-developed lung cancer vaccine.

The vaccine, called CimaVax, has been researched in Cuba for 25 years and became available for free to the Cuban public in 2011. The country’s Center for Molecular Immunology signed an agreement last month with Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, New York to import CimaVax and begin clinical trials in the United States.

“We’re still at the very early stages of assessing the promise of this vaccine, but the evidence so far from clinical trials in Cuba and Europe has been striking,” Dr. Kelvin Lee, Jacobs Family Chair in Immunology and co-leader of the Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy Program at Roswell Park, told The Huffington Post.

When President Obama loosened the United State’s 55-year long trade embargo against the island nation in December, he allowed for such joint research deals to be finalized. Similar programs might have been impossible just a few years ago.

Cuba has long been known for its high-quality cigars, and lung cancer is a major public health problem and the fourth-leading cause of death in the country. A 2007 study of patients with stages IIIB and IV lung cancer, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, confirmed the safety of the CimaVax and showed an increase in tumor-reducing antibody production in more than half of cases. It proved particularly effective for increased survival if the study participant was younger than 60.

I first heard about this a few years ago and would have bet good money that it was a hoax. I am very pleased that no one took that bet and that I was wrong.

As long as we’re talking about hoaxes do you remember that snarky phrase “Physician heal thyself”? Some scientists got to thinking along those lines and wondered if the human body could heal itself from cancer.

The answer is maybe trending towards yes.

Researchers meeting in Chicago are hailing what they believe may be a potent new weapon in the fight against cancer: the body’s own immune system.

An international study found that a combination of two drugs that helped allow the immune system to fight the cancer — ipilimumab and nivolumab — stopped the deadly skin cancer melanoma from advancing for nearly a year in 58% of the cases.

Melanoma, though a skin cancer, can spread to the lungs, liver, bone, lymph nodes and brain.

Other studies have shown promise in treating lung cancer. The research is being presented in Chicago at the annual conference of the American Society of Clinical Oncology and published in The New England Journal of Medicine.

Those involved in the fight against cancer are divided as to just how excited to get over the promise of immunotherapy in battling cancer.

“Immunotherapy drugs have already revolutionized melanoma treatment, and now we’re seeing how they might be even more powerful when they’re combined,” said Dr. Steven O’Day, an expert with the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

“But the results also warrant caution — the nivolumab and ipilimumab combination used in this study came with greater side effects, which might offset its benefits for some patients. Physicians and patients will need to weigh these considerations carefully,” O’Day said.

The beauty of treatment like this is that it’s completely noninvasive. As of right now it needs to be used in conjunction with surgery and radiation therapy but the goal is to make it a stand alone treatment. At least as much as is possible.

Of course it may be a combination of the above possible cures that will do the trick. Either way science has made huge strides in keeping your happy ass alive a little longer.

Speaking of asses, have you ever wanted to get a good look at one without earning a restraining order or jail time? Science has you covered there too.

Science Just Invented a Simple, Painless Way to Get Superhuman Vision.

Good news for everyone with blurry vision or a strong desire to become Superman. The Ocumetics Bionic Lens may give you 60/20 eyesight — three times better than 20/20. It’s a major leap in eye prosthetics, and apparently, it’s pretty painless too.

Garth Webb, a British Columbia optometrist, founder of Ocumetics and the creator of the Bionic Lens, told CBC his product would allow someone who can’t make out an object at 10 feet to see it clearly from 30 feet. He also claims his surgically implanted lenses can prevent cataracts from forming because they replace the rotted human lens.

“At age 45 I had to struggle with reading glasses, which like most people, I found was a great insult,” Webb told CBC. “To this day I curse my progressive glasses. I also wear contact lenses, which I also curse just about every day.”

Webb says the surgery is identical to cataract surgery. The original lens you’re born with is removed, and then instead of replacing it with the usual artificial lens, the surgeon folds up Ocumetics’ Bionic Lens in a syringe and injects it into place. According to Webb, it’s an eight-minute surgery that leaves the patient with unprecedented eyesight — and could once and for all do away with contact lenses and glasses.

Science has also been experimenting with solar-powered sight and Wi-Fi-connected eyeballs. While all of this research is aimed at helping people with limited or nonexistent sight, the obvious recreational usages will probably fund them all for eternity.

Speaking of funding, when was the last time you thought about the rapper Akon? Yeah, me too. But there’s a good reason for that. It turns out he’s been in Africa using science that was barely nascent a year ago to bring electricity to almost a billion people.

Although he’s been absent on the music scene recently, Akon has been working to bring electricity to 600 million Africans with his initiative Lighting Africa.

At the United Nations Sustainable Energy for All Forum, Akon announced his plan to launch a new solar academy for the continent.

Reports say that the academy would help with developing the skills and training of future entrepreneurs, engineers and technicians in Bamako, the capital of Mali.

The website for Akon’s Lighting Africa program released a press release stating:

“This professional training center of excellence is a first on the continent and targets future African entrepreneurs, engineers and technicians. It aims to reinforce expertise in every aspect of installing and maintaining solar-powered electric systems and micro-grids in particular, which are really taking off in rural Africa.”

Lighting Africa has already installed street lights and small household solar systems in 14 countries. With 320 days of sunshine per year, Africa is ideal for developing solar power.

While large parts of Africa are industrialized there are also large swaths that are not. With this technology, and the newly trained experts to install and oversee it, pretty much everything else becomes available. Electric powered water pumps instead of local wells is one good example. The ability to connect to the world at large is another.

And it’s not just important to Africa. Here in America this technology could eliminate, or greatly reduce, the need for power companies. Rural America would no longer require risky power lines. I could go on but you get the picture.

This is all very interesting, I hear you mumbling, but what about all the scientific advances you promised using poop.

Don’t worry,science didn’t forget you. They just created the fastest poop powered bus in the world and you can ride on it.

The Bus and Coach Buyer, however, specifies that the record attempt was meant to reflect speeds for “a service bus.” The article also notes that the record was simply a “lighthearted event” meant to help spread the word about biomethane gas as fuel.

Even if it doesn’t hold a Guinness World Record, though, we think the Bus Hound and its snazzy cow print paint job are pretty cool.

Reading Buses operates a total 34 buses powered by the cow manure fuel, according to Bus and Coach Buyer. The cow droppings are converted into fuel through anaerobic digestion, which involves microorganisms breaking down the feces in an oxygen-free environment. This process creates biogas, which can then be processed to produce biomethane that can be used as fuel, the Alternative Fuels Data Center explains.

The Bus Hound, by the way, is not to be confused with another U.K. “poo bus” that debuted recently: the Bio-Bus, which serves the city of Bristol and runs on human waste.

Considering that poop is a naturally occurring, and completely renewable, resource this is good news. While not as efficient as fossil fuels now continued research should clear that hurdle sooner rather than later.

So eat some chili and save the world.

Or you could just play the ukulele and ride a bike.

My Bicycle (Music Video) NSFW NUDE from two& Las Olas on Vimeo.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
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You are what you eat is one of the most overused cliches of all time. In this case, it also happens to be true. Because people know that and not much else it also tends to be the basis for a wide variety of specious, and occasionally harmful, diet fads. The Paleo diet is a great example. First off it has nothing to do with how Paleolithic people ate. Their diet included cannibalism. Not exactly a “go to” food choice for most folks. Secondly, it is not a well balanced diet and can cause numerous health issues if actually adhered to. As some of you know I recently lost a little over 200 lbs. I did it by going to a dietitian and getting a diet designed to help me. It would not be a good diet for many others. Before I went to see her my old boss kept trying to get me to go on the Atkin’s diet. While I would have lost weight if I had done so I would also have died. It seems my body was no longer processing proteins properly. It would have, literally, clogged my heart. Because of that knowledge I tend to strongly advise people to see a medical professional before embarking on any diet. You have no way of knowing what is or is not wrong with you just by looking in a mirror.

One thing you can, and should, do is follow the government guidelines. Despite what you may have heard they don’t ban meat. They just strongly advise that you eat less of it and avoid the processed stuff as much as possible.

Sam P.K. Collins takes a look at how people who know nothing about health tend to shape guidelines.

Or, at least, they used to.

In 2012, meat industry leaders also derailed President Barack Obama’s attempt to weaken Tyson Foods’ stranglehold on rural farmers. Under the status quo, chicken farmers didn’t own the beef, pork, and chicken they raised, instead working for Tyson for a small percentage. If the Obama administration’s plans would have come to fruition, then farmers could sue meatpackers more easily and worked autonomously under what Vilsack called the “new rural economy.” However, the meat lobby killed those plans, creating what veteran agribusiness journalist Christopher Leonard described as a “spectacular failure.”

Whether the meat industry’s most recent organization strategy will be successful has yet to be seen. But if it does fail, a potential move toward a more plant-based diet could serve as a challenge to a lobbying powerhouse and possibly the final blow to a food culture that has waned in popularity in recent years.

Meat serves as the primary part of the diet in many industrialized countries, with the United States counting as the second-largest consumer per capita. Even with a 12 percent decline in meat consumption within the last decade, the average American still eats more than 200 pounds annually.

While experts contend that eating beef moderately has health benefits, attention has turned to the consequences of excess production, especially since prices have declined. For many, the risk of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and the greater likelihood of early mortality have become too much to ignore. Additionally, a growing body of research has tied meat production to a larger carbon and water footprint, another point that has galvanized support among environmentalists, especially as California reels from a drought.

That’s why one in 10 millennials has adopted a vegan diet and one third of Americans say they’re cutting back on their meat intake. Those changes have, in part, played a role in the introduction of more vegetarian food choices in fast food restaurants.

Dietician Julieanna Hever raised these points in her op-ed that appeared in The Hill last month, speculating that there’s not much standing in the way of HHS and the USDA finalizing the dietary recommendations later this year as they appeared in February, even with the meat industry’s political connections.

“It is telling that nearly every spokesperson not representing the meat, dairy, egg, and junk food industries who provided oral comments on the committee’s report wholeheartedly embraced this recommendation,” Hever wrote. “The fact is that Americans get it. We’re already eating less meat, and many of us are trying to cut back even further. A diet richer in vegetables, fruits, beans, and grains — and lower in animal products — is what our country needs and wants. And it’s not so controversial after all.”

A quick note here to help you avoid confusion. Any moron with a tinfoil hat can claim to be a “nutritionist.” That lovely industry is entirely unregulated. A dietitian, however, has a medical degree and knows what those things inside your body are supposed to do and how to help them do it. Put simply, just because Bob down the block once fixed a lawnmower doesn’t mean you should trust him with your car.

Granted, even if you know what’s good for you it’s sometimes a pain to take the time to make it. Well, I have some good news for you. A group of scientists, inspired by Star Trek’s replicator, have built a device that can make a 100% healthy meal in thirty seconds.

And the latest example of Star Trek tech becoming reality is the Genie, a device that echoes Trek’s food replicators. Created by a pair of Israeli entrepreneurs, Ayelet Carasso and Doron Marco, it relies on pods—akin to the inner workings of espresso machines—to turn natural baking ingredients and freeze-dried fruits and vegetables into personalize meals… in just 30 seconds.

Eventually, Marco told the news service Reuters, Genie will know a person’s microbiome and will prepare the pod specifically for that person. “You will eat better, even tastier and healthier,” he said. Marco also shared his desire for the Genie to be put to use in countries without enough food to feed their populations.

“In our world, we are getting fat and we are throwing away a lot of food, (and) in their world, they don’t have any food,” he said. “So if you use Genie, you can distribute the food better, you can have the shelf life much longer without the preservatives, give the people better food for them. We can even the food distribution in the world. That’s a very, very important goal for us.”

If you CLICK HERE you can see a video of the Genie in action. It will be available in the US next year.

If you want some diversity in the fruits you eat we’ve got you covered there too. Science Alert tells the tale of a tree that produces forty different types of fruit.

An art professor from Syracuse University in the US, Van Aken grew up on a family farm before pursuing a career as an artist, and has combined his knowledge of the two to develop his incredible Tree of 40 Fruit.

In 2008, Van Aken learned that an orchard at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station was about to be shut down due to a lack of funding. This single orchard grew a great number of heirloom, antique, and native varieties of stone fruit, and some of these were 150 to 200 years old. To lose this orchard would render many of these rare and old varieties of fruit extinct, so to preserve them, Van Aken bought the orchard, and spent the following years figuring out how to graft parts of the trees onto a single fruit tree.

Working with a pool of over 250 varieties of stone fruit, Van Aken developed a timeline of when each of them blossom in relationship to each other and started grafting a few onto a working tree’s root structure. Once the working tree was about two years old, Van Aken used a technique called chip grafting to add more varieties on as separate branches. This technique involves taking a sliver off a fruit tree that includes the bud, and inserting that into an incision in the working tree. It’s then taped into place, and left to sit and heal over winter. If all goes well, the branch will be pruned back to encourage it to grow as a normal branch on the working tree.

After about five years and several grafted branches, Van Aken’s first Tree of 40 Fruit was complete.

Aken’s Tree of 40 Fruit looks like a normal tree for most of the year, but in spring it reveals a stunning patchwork of pink, white, red and purple blossoms, which turn into an array of plums, peaches, apricots, nectarines, cherries and almonds during the summer months, all of which are rare and unique varieties.

Not only is it a beautiful specimen, but it’s also helping to preserve the diversity of the world’s stone fruit. Stone fruits are selected for commercial growing based first and foremost on how long they keep, then how large they grow, then how they look, and lastly how they taste. This means that there are thousands of stone fruit varieties in the world, but only a very select few are considered commercially viable, even if they aren’t the best tasting, or most nutritious ones.

Van Aken has grown 16 Trees of 40 Fruit so far, and they’ve been planted in museums, community centres, and private art collections around the US. He now plans to grow a small orchard of these trees in a city setting.

Of course, the obvious question that remains is what happens to all the fruit that gets harvested from these trees? Van Aken told Lauren Salkeld at Epicurious:

“I’ve been told by people that have [a tree] at their home that it provides the perfect amount and perfect variety of fruit. So rather than having one variety that produces more than you know what to do with, it provides good amounts of each of the 40 varieties. Since all of these fruit ripen at different times, from July through October, you also aren’t inundated.”

This is the tree.

I THINK that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth’s flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day, 5
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

– Joyce Kilmer

While true in the sense that Van Aken didn’t make the tree it’s still pretty cool to see it in action. Hopefully they’ll be able to streamline the process and make it more readily available to the masses. Until then it’s heartening to know it exists.

One thing I discovered on my diet is that you can eat a lot of different things. You’d actually be amazed at the number of healthy choices you can make without going hungry. In fact I’d have to say that my diet now is far more diverse than the one that almost killed me.

Oh, side note, had I not gone on the prescribed diet I would have died within a couple of months. No way I knew that looking in a mirror.

Actual Food Porn from Jessica Saia on Vimeo.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
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I get it. Sometimes you’ve got some “me time” and you want to make it worth your while. So, a little soft music, a nice dinner for one, maybe a rose (For me? You shouldn’t have!), a couple of adult libations, some jiffy lube and off you go for an evening of one handed romance. You let your imagination run wild. Your brain, the most erotic organ you have in any case, starts firing. Finally, after however long it takes you, your synapses collapse into a heap of protoplasmic ecstasy. Later, after you’ve toweled yourself off, you bask in the glow of self love. That’s all well and good. In fact it’s pretty damn healthy actually. Science has proven that masturbation has many health benefits too. Masturbation helps you sleep, relieves cramps, helps prevent prostate cancer, alleviates urinary tract infections, can help relieve Restless Leg Syndrome symptoms, helps boost your immunity and it just, plain old, makes sex better. If that last one seems counterintuitive just think about it. You’ve made sure all your parts work. You’ve proved to yourself that you have an imagination. Those two things that make you happy also happen to be the exact same things that will make your partner happy. So have at it and enjoy.

Just not in public.

I was talking to a friend of mine and I mentioned that there seemed to be a growing trend of American’s rocking the one eyed wonder weasel, or feeding the bearded clam as the case may be, in places that aren’t usually on anyone’s go to list when it comes to personal pleasuring. He told me to quit exaggerating. Look, if I’ve told him once I’ve told him a billion time, I don’t exaggerate.

But, after being called out like that I feel it’s my duty to prove me right.

Let’s start in Florida because ….. well, Florida.

Meet Amie Carter. This lovely young lady was walking around the outskirts of Orlando, Florida (the greatest place on Earth!). So far so normal. Then she started walking in the middle of the street. Not smart but .. oh, wait. Yes, buck naked in the middle of the road she started commando diddling in front of police. When they tried to arrest her she resisted, did over a grand’s worth of damage to a Nissan (I’d kill to hear that call to an insurance agency) and kicked her legs in the air at the cops. While her path to stardom as a Rockette may be closed the nice police were kind enough to offer a new path to jail. Drugs may have been involved.

Meet Frederick Tennyson Davis. No, you really, really want to. Freddy boy showed up at a library in Toronto not once, but twice, with a cucumber in one hand and his love muscle in another. How he managed to elude police the first time has got to be the saddest tale one cop can tell another. Still, the terror of the tomes has been incarcerated so it’s safe to read again.

Or not.

Meet Tyree Carter. The 20 year old Racine, Wisconsin resident has been banned for being a bibliophile of epic, and disturbing, proportions. He would go into an aisle, pick out a book he loved and then share his love of literature by flogging his frog in front of anyone who happened by. He’s been banned from any library in the world for life.

So what do you do if the cops bust for you a little self loving?

Not this.

Meet Mike Eiskant. Mike was a cop in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He was videotaped sitting in his car, demanding that someone on his cell phone show him her tits while he was rubbing one off. And that was the least of his problems. Check this out.

… he entered a plea of no contest before Bernalillo County District Court Judge Reed Sheppard to two counts of attempt to commit a felony (false imprisonment), one count of stalking, two counts of harassment and other charges including larceny and possession of marijuana, according to the Santa Fe New Mexican.

Seven of the charges occurred in 2011 and the counts of false imprisonment, stalking and harassment relate to traffic stops involving female drivers, according to the criminal complaint.

In return for pleading no contest, Eiskant agreed he “will never again become a law enforcement officer anywhere in the United States,” according to a statement from Attorney General Gary King’s office.

On the other hand, meet this guy. Again, we’re back in Florida. A woman had called the cops because she saw someone masturbating in the CVS parking lot (oh, you know you want to do it too). When the cops tracked him down inside the store he claimed it was because he had a rash and not because he liked himself. And, again this is Florida, to prove it he whipped out his balls and showed them to the cop. And they were horrid. No charges were filed.

In Omaha, Nebraska, Darryl Moore, not to be confused with Dennis Moore, tried a similar tactic. He told the cops he’d witnessed a murder. When they asked for details he dropped trough and started flogging his frog. Fortunately for the citizens of Omaha the police didn’t have to take him very far. The good news for Darryl, and the bad news for the janitor, is that he completed the process before they could stop him.

Speaking of people janitor’s hate, meet Anthony Bruce Berry. The Lantana Florida native, I’m seeing a theme developing here, was having trouble using a door knob, yes, you read that right, so he fucked it. He has also faced charges of indecent exposure two times before, and has had 32 other arrests for charges such as robbery, sexual assault and cocaine possession since 1979.

Really? A door knob?

Let’s try and wrap this up, as it were.

Scott Smith, from Penn Township, Pennsylvania, claimed his pants were too big and that’s why his penis kept popping out. No, the cops didn’t believe him either.

William Blakely, the vice-mayor (man is that post aptly named) of Mt. Carmel Tennessee, was arrested for masturbating out of the window of his car while he drove. I don’t even want to know how or why he developed that skill.

Not enough?

Meet Nick Gonzales (in a firehouse?), Gregory Matthew Bruni (pooped & masturbated in Tony Lands’ Florida Home), Steven Young (at a parade no less), Elijah Slocumb (incorrectly named according to witnesses), Jared Weston (the master of hair don’ts), and the man, the myth, the legend, Edwin Tobregta.

Here’s a little sumptin sumptin about Eddie.

Edwin Tobergta, 35, was arrested in Hamilton, Ohio on Wednesday for allegedly having sex with an inflatable pool raft by the side of the road, Fox 19 reports. This is the fourth time Tobergta has been arrested for this kind of offense.

In 2011, Tobergta was caught with his pants down in an alley with his neighbor’s pink, inflatable raft.

He went to jail, but was arrested again in 2013 for having sex with the EXACT SAME RAFT, which had inexplicably not been thrown out. The 2013 offense occurred at Tobergta’s own home, but he was charged with — and pleaded guilty to — public indecency because it happened within the view of children during the day.

It is unclear if Tobergta’s most recent alleged offense took place with the same pool raft.

In 2002, Tobergta was arrested for publicly pleasuring himself with an inflatable pumpkin. That object wasn’t a pool toy, though, because come on, a man needs a little variety.

In his newest mugshot, Tobergta is wearing a T-shirt that reads, “I’m out of my mind. Please leave a message.”

POOL PARTY!

Or not.

I limited my research to the last two years and to those that were actually charged. Well, except for rash-man. That was just too fun not to share.

Had I not done so you would have thought that War and Peace was a pocket book.

So what have we learned today boys and girls? You only share with CONSENTING partners. Got it?

Good.

Now have fun out there.

tsurufoto presents… Give Me A Reason To Love You starring Sheila Savage (NSFW) from tsurufoto. on Vimeo.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
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Stupid is as stupid does, goes the modern aphorism. Or, as Ron White famously put it, you can’t fix stupid. But, God help me, I am going to try. Let’s get some of the obvious ones out of the way. There are no Nigerian princes, or princesses, hanging on to a couple of mil that they just need to deposit in your bank account. Quit encouraging them. Also, bonus, if you do fall for that scam you can go to jail for money laundering, among other crimes. So, yes, it is now a crime to be stupid. Let’s see, what else? Oh yeah, you need money. We all do. That said, going to an online loan site and turning over your banking info and social security number makes you an idiot. The same crimes apply as for the Nigerian money scam so you and your loved ones may not see each other for a while. Additionally, if you get an email from a bank you don’t use or have never heard of, just delete it. Save yourself years of hassle. Russian brides? I actually know a guy who went for that one. $100,000 and three years of court filings later he was allowed to give her half of his money and property. On the one hand that may have been a cheap price to pay to get rid of the bitch but, on the other, this was pretty avoidable. Kind of like, if the gates are down or the lights are flashing, don’t go on the train tracks. This stuff is easy if you take a minute to think first.

On that note, let’s take a look at you. Yes, you. You have a computer. You use it to catalog grandma’s recipes and search for porn. To protect all that valuable stuff from falling into the hands of the terrorists of the week you need a password. Olivia B. Waxman, from Time Magazine, has some advice for you.

Make sure your password isn’t on this list

SplashData, which makes password management applications, has released its annual list of the 25 worst passwords based on files containing over 3.3. million passwords leaked in 2014.

“123456” and “password” hold the top two spots, as they have every year since the company started producing this round-up in 2011. New passwords appearing on this year’s edition include “696969” and “batman.”

Here is the full list:

1. 123456
2. password
3. 12345
4. 12345678
5. qwerty
6. 123456789
7. 1234
8. baseball
9. dragon
10. football
11. 1234567
12. monkey
13. letmein
14. abc123
15. 111111
16. mustang
17. access
18. shadow
19. master
20. michael
21. superman
22. 696969
23. 123123
24. batman
25. trustno1

Cyber-security experts often say that the harder the password is for you to remember, the more secure it is. If your password is on this list, consider this smart and easy tip TIME recently received from security expert Bruce Schneier:

Come up with an entire phrase that’s easy for you to remember, and then use the first instance of each letter, number and symbol from each word in the phrase, keeping punctuation intact as well.

By the way, #19 is most popular with women who like 50 Shades of Grey. You might want to talk to your mom about safe cyber practices. That will be a fun conversation, I can promise you that.

“Mom, we need to talk. I know you’ve been having unprotected encounters.”
“Oh, honey, dad and I stopped doing that stuff years ago.”
“Mom, no, ewwww…..”

See? I promised you fun.

In other news, quit being an asshole and vaccinate your kids. Even Fox News, which has a habit of finding experts who actually don’t have a freaking clue what they’re talking about, actually broke down and asked real doctors about the risks involved with vaccination. The unanimous result was that parents should vaccinate their kids. And, if they won’t, then the government should do it for them.

Yes, I’m still talking about Fox News here.

Measles and whooping cough, two diseases that were almost completely eradicated 20 years ago, are now infecting people and claiming lives at an astonishing rate. In 2012 over 48,000 kids, in California alone, came down with whooping cough and some of them are died.

Needlessly.

The reason that Fox’ guest doctors advocated government intervention is that none of these kids needed to get sick; and wouldn’t have if they were properly vaccinated.

I’ll make it simple for you.

THERE IS NO FUCKING LINK BETWEEN VACCINES AND AUTISM!!!!

Simple enough?

Justine Alford, over at I Fucking Love Science, says that the Gates Foundation is using art to hammer home the concept.

photo credit: Alexia Sinclair, via The Art of Saving a Life

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On May 14, 1796, Edward Jenner performed a now famous medical experiment on an 8-year-old boy named James Phipps. He was testing out his theory that people who had been infected with the mild disease cowpox could not contract smallpox, one of the deadliest diseases in human history. To do this, he cut the boy’s skin and inserted the pus from a cowpox sore. A few days later, he challenged Phipps with smallpox, but he never succumbed. Phipps had become immune to the disease.

This experiment marked the first important step towards the global eradication of smallpox, which was officially achieved almost 200 years later, and is represented in the image above. (If you’re wondering where the beautiful woman fits in, she is highlighting the fact that the disease does not discriminate between the rich and the poor).

The thought-provoking piece, which was shot by Australian photographer Alexia Sinclair, is part of a wider collection of art by more than 30 world-renowned photographers, painters, sculptors, writers, filmmakers and musicians. The idea behind it is to share with us the stories behind the success of vaccination, which are stories of “risk and bravery, the passion and dedication of scientists, the love of parents, and the determination of health workers.”  Of course, there is a wider message that the artists hope to convey: vaccinations save lives, and they’ve helped change the world for good.

The compilation is called The Art of Saving a Life, and it will be unveiled throughout January in order to promote the importance of vaccination during the run up to a huge fundraising meeting at the end of the month. The event, which will be held on January 27^th, is organized by Gavi, a global vaccine alliance, who are seeking $7.5 billion over the next five years to deliver vaccines to 300 million children. If they are successful, they believe 6 million lives could be saved.

Here is a sample of the evocative work, which we can thank the Gates Foundation for as this philanthropic organization commissioned the work:

Flowers—The Beauty of Vaccines, by Vik Muniz

While this may look a bit like wallpaper, the image was actually created using cells. As Muniz explains: “The artwork is a microscopic pattern of liver cells infected with a smallpox vaccine virus. After infection, the virus turns the cells a reddish color which allows scientists to visualize infection.”

Vaccines as Love Serum—Mauro Perucchetti

Using pigmented resin, Perucchetti has combined two of his most famous sculptres: Jelly Baby Family and Love Serum, which could “inoculate the whole world.” The idea is to bring a smile to children and remove both the fear of needles and parents’ skepticism of their effectiveness.

The Girl Who Kicked the Ball—Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra

This digital animation is “a metaphorical portrayal of the poliovirus as aliens and the human spirit that defeated it by creating the anti-virus in a ‘vaccine.’” Mehra hopes that the film portrays the power of immunization and shows us a brighter future if we take a stand against disease.

By the way, Edward Jenner, mentioned above, got the idea by watching milk maids. They would get the mild disease of cow pox and never suffer any further ills. So, basically, some dirty old man ogling women is responsible for saving billions of lives.

In other words, if anyone asks, you’re searching porn to try and cure cancer.

Girlicious – Stupid Shit from Daneille on Vimeo.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
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