It's News to Me

Mama mia, those nutty Italians are making headlines for all kinds of reasons nowadays. Take your pick: bootlegged Ferrari's, newly minted political logos, saint exhumation, whatever.
I'm particularly enthused by the first one, though. Imagine: Where you could once hit the streets of Rome and pick up fake Prada and Gucci bags (or PruCci bags, in New York City), you can now scrounge about your couch cushions for 20,000 euros and pick yourself up a faux Ferrari. And your friends will have no idea that you're not a drug dealer who just hit a big score.
Then again, you might be too late. Police are working to shut down the whole operation and have already confiscated 21 cars.
But maybe hope's not lost. There's probably some bootleg-sympathetic political party that's thrown its fedora into Italy's April general election. So far, 180 symbols of political groups have been submitted to the Interior Ministry. Among them are representative images of the "No Garbage Party," and, my favorite, "Dr. Cirillo's party of existentialist impotents." I think I'd lend my support to the "party for fewer political parties in Italy." If I have any influence, this party will double as a political subversive unit and thereby, somehow, compete directly with both the "Italian Communist Marxist Leninist Party" and the "I Don't Vote" party.
If materialism and politics aren't your cup of espresso, you're in luck. If you have any interest in Catholic mysticism, embalming fluid/morgue culture/undertaking or manicures and the other forms of hand-maintenance, then perhaps you might make a trip to see the body of exhumed saint Padre Pio.
Forty years into his eternity in paradise, Pio's been called back down to the minors to go on display to his devoted fans. And while his face is reportedly just recognizable and his body is in fair condition, Pio fans can gawk at his nearly remarkably preserved stigmata-bearing hands that one archbishop described as appearing to just have been manicured. (Off the record, I'd have to doubt that last part; while I've never had a manicure, I would hope that if I did, my hands would come out looking better than ones that bear the nail wounds of Christ's crucifixion.)
Anyway, it looks like the boot of the Mediterranean has got a little something for everyone, but if it doesn't, you can just go ahead and create a political party or advocacy group that will accommodate your wildest fantasy.

Currently, the dismal state of the economy is on everyone's mind. Today, CNN released a poll stating that three-fourths of the U.S. think we're in a recession. The recent sale of Bear Stearns to JPMorgan Chase for a mere $2 a share has done little to curb these economic worries.

Anyone who's done any traveling in the past year or intends to relatively soon knows the worth of the dollar is practically zilch. Signs of an impending recession? Are we already in one? As tuition-paying college students, the economy affects us a great deal.

According to the CNN story about the poll, "Seventy-four percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey say the economy has entered a recession. That figure is up from 66 percent who felt that way in a similar survey last month. The number stood at 61 percent in January and 46 percent in October."

It's no surprise then that the economy remains the key issue in the public's mind.

By a 2-1 margin, it tops the Iraq war as the No. 1 issue for Americans in their choice for president, the CNN story said.

Considering the economy has now eclipsed the Iraq war as the issue of most importance to the public, I'd say things are looking pretty dire.

According to a recent Associated Press story, both Democratic presidential candidates are sounding off on the state of things as well.

"Our economy is in a shambles," Obama said at a town hall meeting at a community college near Pittsburgh, according to the story. "This economy is contracting, it is heading toward recession. We probably already are in one."

Also according to the story, he later said the economic stimulus package signed by Bush needs to be supplemented by enacting this year the tax cuts for middle-income Americans that he had earlier proposed for the first year of the next administration. And he hinted that, if market conditions continue to deteriorate, he might even reconsider his call to roll back Bush tax cuts on capital gains and dividends.

Clinton, meanwhile, told reporters in Washington it was a time of economic "stress and uncertainty" and said there was "urgency to continue the action that was started yesterday."

But I think there's still reasons to be optimistic. Apocalyptic proclamations of another Great Depression may be running rampant right now, but I like to think that at least I can look forward to moving into a nice, cozy tent when the job market plummets and I can't afford that penthouse pad. A tent pitched on my parent's property, that is.

There are a lot of strange events that happen every day, but this one takes a place near the top of our list.

According to a story from The Associated Press, police said a woman from western Kansas became stuck on her boyfriend's toilet after sitting on it for two years.

They said it appeared the 35-year-old woman's skin had grown around the seat. She initially refused emergency medical services but was finally convinced by responders and her boyfriend that she needed to be checked out at a hospital.

Police said they pried the toilet seat off with a pry bar and the seat went with her to the hospital, where hospital staff removed it.

The story said investigators planned to present their report tomorrow to the county attorney, who will determine whether any charges should be filed against the woman's 36-year-old boyfriend.

The sheriff of the town where this occurred, Bryan Whipple, said of the woman, "She was not glued. She was not tied. She was just physically stuck by her body. It is hard to imagine. ... I still have a hard time imagining it myself."

The woman's boyfriend told investigators he brought his girlfriend food and water, and asked her every day to come out of the bathroom.

"And her reply would be, `Maybe tomorrow,'" Whipple said. "According to him, she did not want to leave the bathroom."

The boyfriend called police on Feb. 27 to report that "there was something wrong with his girlfriend," Whipple said, adding that he never explained why it took him two years to call.

Police found the clothed woman sitting on the toilet, her sweat pants down to her mid-thigh. She was "somewhat disoriented," and her legs looked like they had atrophied, Whipple said.

"She said that she didn't need any help, that she was OK and did not want to leave," he said.

She was taken to a hospital in Wichita, about 150 miles southeast of Ness City. Whipple said she has since refused to cooperate with medical providers or law enforcement investigators.

Authorities said they did not know if she was mentally or physically disabled.

Police have declined to release the couple's names, but the house where authorities say the incident happened is listed in public records as the residence of Kory McFarren. No one answered his home phone number.

The case has been the buzz Ness City, said James Ellis, a neighbor.

"I don't think anybody can make any sense out of it," he said.

Ellis said he had known the woman since she was a child but that he had not seen her for at least six years.

He said she had a tough childhood after her mother died at a young age and apparently was usually kept inside the house as she grew up. At one time the woman worked for a long-term care facility, he said, but he did not know what kind of work she did there.

"It really doesn't surprise me," Ellis said of the bathroom incident. "What surprises me is somebody wasn't called in a bit earlier."

This story shocks and appalls, and we have to wonder why the woman's boyfriend didn't feel the need to notify anyone any earlier into the ordeal. After two years, you have to wonder why he finally thought it had become a problem.

There is also still no reason yet as to why she sat there for two years. Bad bowel problems? Fear of the outside world? Most likely we'll never know.

It's not every day that you see a headline with the words "exploding python." However, the BBC recently ran a story about just this.

According to the story, "An unusual clash between a 6-foot (1.8m) alligator and a 13-foot (3.9m) python has left two of the deadliest predators dead in Florida's swamps.

The Burmese python tried to swallow its fearsome rival whole but then exploded.

The remains of the two giant reptiles were found by astonished rangers in the Everglades National Park.

The rangers say the find suggests that non-native Burmese pythons might even challenge alligators' leading position in the food chain in the swamps.

The python's remains were found with the victim's tail protruding from its burst midsection. The head of the python was missing.

"Encounters like that are almost never seen in the wild ... And here we are," Frank Mazzotti, a University of Florida wildlife professor, was quoted as saying by The Associated Press news agency.

"They were probably evenly matched in size. If the python got a good grip on the alligator before the alligator got a good grip on him, he could win," Professor Mazzotti said.

He said the alligator may have clawed at the python's stomach, leading it to burst.

"Clearly, if they can kill an alligator they can kill other species," Prof Mazzotti said.

He said that there had been four known encounters between the two species in the past. In the other cases, the alligator won or the battle was an apparent draw.

Burmese pythons - many of whom have been dumped by their owners - have thrived in the wet and hot climate of Florida's swamps over the past 20 years."

Across the pond in Switzerland, The New York Times ran an interesting story about the cat fur trade.

In the story, Isabelle Nydegger describes how she began noticing that her cats were disappearing.

She became convinced, the story says, that her cats were shot by hunters and sold to tanners for their fur, which was used in garments and blankets. The cat fur trade is still legal in Switzerland.

According to the story, "while it is legal in Switzerland to shoot feral cats as well as domestic ones that stray more than 200 yards from their homes, it is not clear how many cats are hunted every year here and across the border in France, where residents have also complained about disappearing felines. One government official put the number at a couple of dozen. Luc Barthassat, a legislator with the Christian Democratic People's Party, said about 2,000, but members of S O S Chats, an advocacy group, say tens of thousands are killed.

Estimates of the value of each pelt vary wildly. Mr. Barthassat said tanners had told him that they pay only about $5. But animal rights advocates say that hunters make much more than that, noting that some blankets made from 10 pelts sell at retail for more than $1,700.

But the numbers almost seemed beside the fact this fall, after a series of TV reports created a public furor. Three TV news crews from Switzerland and France conducted hidden-camera investigations that caught tanners who had officially denied trading in cat fur actively doing so and, in at least one case, explaining that cat meat was also available."

These two stories may be quite different, but they share one thing: it's not always humans that make for the craziest headlines.