Royal New Zealand Navy finds huge floating pumice field in Pacific; Monowai Seamount volcano thought to have erupted

This news item is certainly fascinating, and there’s another fascinating observation in the stories that follow the leading one by CNN.

I think they’re quite noticeable.

See if you notice them.

Observations follow at the conclusion.

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‘Weirdest thing’ floats in South Pacific

By Todd Sperry, CNN
updated 10:36 PM EDT, Fri August 10, 2012

Officials reported the floating rock shelf to be 250 nautical miles long by 30 nautical miles wide.

(CNN) — Pumice, the lightweight stone used to smooth skin, is usually found in beauty salons, but on Thursday sailors from New Zealand‘s Royal Navy found nearly 10,000 square miles of the lava rock bobbing on the surface of the South Pacific Ocean.

By comparison, the state of Rhode Island comprises approximately 1,200 square miles.

Described by one sailor who witnessed it as

Louisiana Monks challenge state law making their work a crime… making & selling caskets

It’d be funny if it weren’t sad.

Or, would it be sad if it weren’t funny?

Either way, it’s sad and funny.

Or, should that be ironic?

Whatever it is, it’s weird… and unjust.

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It’s Illegal for Monks to Sell Caskets In Louisiana

By Claire Suddath on June 01, 2012

The monks just want to sell caskets. That’s the simple plea of a relatively simple case, in which a Louisiana monastery—St. Joseph Abbey, about an hour outside New Orleans—is suing the Louisiana State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors for the right to sell their handmade wooden caskets. Only licensed funeral establishments can sell caskets in Louisiana, which means that St. Joseph’s monks would have to hire a funeral director, install embalming equipment, and construct a funeral parlor even though they have no plans to embalm the deceased or perform actual funerals. “They would have to take an exam about the whole panoply of funeral directing,” says Scott Bullock, an attorney with Institute for Justice, which is representing the monks. “It’s like telling someone who sells shoes that they have to first become a podiatrist.”

Photograph by David Moore/Gallery Stock

St. Joseph Abbey, founded in 1889 as part of the Order of Saint Benedict, has been producing caskets for as long as its monks can remember, but until recently, they were only used for the private burials of their own members. In the 1990s they built a few coffins for the funerals of local bishops and the Catholic community began to take notice. “People would come to our funerals and see them and ask

Dumbell drops dumbell on bullet, gets shot

From our “News of the ‘Damn! That’s weird!’” files.

He should be thankful it didn’t strike him in the head.

But then again, perhaps he’d already been touched in the head.

Who knows?

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Weightlifter says dumbbell fell on bullet that shot him in shoulder

April 13, 2012 |  8:21 am

A 56-year-old weightlifter in Modesto reportedly shot himself after dropping a dumbbell on a bullet.

Modesto police officers responded to the call Wednesday night and found the man wounded in the shoulder.

He told police he was

Human Breast Milk Ice Cream… now on sale in the UK

Those crazy Brits…

Oh well.

I’m surprised also that medical and other ethicists have not jumped on this issue – even that the government has allowed this, which is the sale of human tissue. Hair, however, is sold – but body parts, such as cornea, heart and/or valves, etc., are not. That, of course, is also entirely discounting that many medications are excreted in breast milk. For example also, what happens when the supply is gone?

Reckon what the LaLeche League thinks of this?

And then, there’s the inevitable humor that will result.

24 February 2011 Last updated at 13:40 ET

Breast milk ice cream goes on sale in Covent Garden

A restaurant in London’s Covent Garden is serving a new range of ice cream, made with breast milk.

The dessert, called Baby Gaga, is churned with donations from London mother

Are Frankenfoods in your future?

South Carolina Doctor’s laboratory grows test tube “meat.”

South Carolina scientist works to grow meat in lab

By Harriet McLeod – Sun Jan 30, 10:00 am ET

CHARLESTON, South Carolina (Reuters) – In a small laboratory on an upper floor of the

Hot Damn! UAHBomber Amy Bishop’s husband, James Anderson, is a freak, too!

Okay, let’s get this straight. If you’re “emo” or “goth,” you’re a damn freak. You’re mentally unstable. You need psychiatric help. Period. Let somebody help you… PLEASE!!

Now, onto the news.

Guess what?! Amy Bishop’s husband, James Anderson, has publicly said he met Amy at a Dungeons and Dragons meeting. Yeah, great. What’s that like? Saying, ‘I met my wife – who used to be a man – at a bisexual swinger’s sex-swap party’? It’s just plain messed up. Period.

True, Amy Bishop, PhD, aka “the UAHBomber,” was busted for going postal at the

“I am Dr. Amy Bishop!”

“I am Dr. Amy Bishop!”

The IHOP iBitch!

“Biitch! Gimme that last highchair!”

Yet more weirdness from the UAHbomber!

Biology department-member-on-her-way-out, Dr. Amy Bishop, PhD, whom shot and killed three colleagues, wounding thee others during a faculty meeting, was charged with assault, battery and disorderly conduct in 2003.

The episode at a Peabody, MA

Parker Griffith-ing

Liar… thief…

Those terms just seem to gravitate toward AL 5th Congressional District Rep. Parker Griffith, MD (R) who recently, halfway through his first two-year term,  jumped Democratic ship for the Republican party.

Perhaps it’s not as much his secretive “I’m going to switch parties half-way in my first two-year term,” attitude that bothers people as much as it is his now-broken promises – essentially lies – such as the one to return campaign contributions to disgruntled donors.

I suppose a good analogy would be his sex change. Griffith married a woman, representing himself to be a man. After the birth and rearing of their children (halfway through his life), he announces to his wife and family he’s a woman and will be having a sex change – which in turn, of course, would make her a lesbian – which she is not – and consequently call into question the validity of their marriage.

In that light, two other words seem apropos for Griffith – mentally defective.

Family’s more strident words might include traitor… asshole.

Of course, ultimately, the one to be pitied is Griffith, and secondarily the people he injured (his family representing his constituency) along his selfish and misguided way. And in this case, divorce would only add insult to injury. What is genuinely needed is intensive psychotherapy for Griffith.

“I want your questions in the box.”

Hey… I thought “thinking outside the box” was the desirable outcome!

Now, we’re told we should get back in it.

The quote in the subject line is from Richard Heene, the Ft. Collins, CO man whom authorities are investigating for intentional fraud – suspecting the scare his little boy might have been aloft in a helium balloon and the resulting scramble of rescue resources, federal, state and local was deliberate.

In context, that’s what Mr. Heene told reporters camped outside his house.

And, I think the sheriff’s cooking legal spaghetti.

Why spaghetti?

Just like spaghetti, he’s gonna’ cook it just long enough, and then throw the charges… to see if it sticks to the wall, or in this case, Mr. Heene.

Of course, Mr. Heene will come out smelling like a Ponderosa Pine (not many roses grow in Colorado) because he’ll get a book deal, and a made-for-teevee-movie, will appear on numerous talk shows, and otherwise make the media rounds.

As I understand, Mr. Heene’s ideas for a “reality teevee show” have been rejected on more than one occasion. And, as is the “American way,” Mr. Heene is making his own “reality teevee show”… er, making his own “opportunity.”

And what a name for a balloon boy, eh?

Falcon.