Evilution

I have a theory that evolution isn't hip in the U.S. just because it sounds a bit too much like the "R" word. At any rate, America now has the honor of placing just below Latvia and Cyprus in terms of the percentage of adults who don't agree that humans evolved from animals (WaPo, 1/16/2007). At least we edged out Turkey--a country that still hunts down journalist who refuse to deny the Armenian genecide (the model for the Holocaust). Back in the U. S. of A., 40% of adults agree that humans developed from animals, 39% disagree, and 21% couldn't figure out which way to hold the pencil. In Iceland, on the other hand, 85% agreed and only 7% disagreed. All that bathing in hot springs evidently stimulates higher brain functions.

The troop recall that simply went too far

The Shrub mis-Administration must be getting very hard-up for troops. It recently sent a massive mailing to the injured and killed-in-action asking them to return to active service. I wonder if they'll have to refit the Humvees for amputees.

Teaching your pet to "just say no"

They're must be a large segment of our society with far too much money to spend. There is now a diet drug for dogs! Instead of drugging poor Fido, wouldn't it be easier to simpy put less dog-food in his bowl? People could then send the extra money to feed the hungry or cure blindness in some less frivilous corner of the planet.

Starting the year on a good note

...and now for a heart-warming story:

New York 'heroes' save falling toddler by Richard Holt and agencies

Two men in New York men are being hailed as heroes after catching a three-year-old boy as he fell four storeys from a fire escape. Julio Gonzalez and Pedro Navarez saw toddler Timothy Addo hanging screaming from a railing and ran to position themselves underneath him. As the child fell to the ground he first hit some tree branches, bounced off the chest of 40-year-old Mr Navarez and straight into Mr Gonzalez's arms.

"I just knew that baby was not going to hit the ground," the 43-year-old mechanic told the New York Post. The dramatic rescue in the Bronx came just days after another New Yorker made the headlines by throwing himself onto a Manhattan subway track in front of a train to save a man who had fallen after a seizure.

"This is the week of heroes in New York," Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said. Timothy, who police said had crawled out of a fifth-floor window when his babysitter briefly took her eyes off of him, was treated for a cut on his forehead. He apparently fell through a gap to the fourth-floor fire escape, where he clung on desperately 40 feet above the street, screaming: "Somebody get me! Somebody get me!" "He was hanging on for dear life," Mr Gonzalez said. "We ran over and stood underneath so we could catch him."

"He's fine. He's happy. He's smiling," his mother Katrina Cosme said. A detective said police had talked to the babysitter and an investigation was continuing.

2007

Happy New Year everyone! Have you made (and broken?) any new year resolutions yet?