Saturday Snippets

Toxic locks, Electrified underwear, Pigs with swine flu, a missing beach and Mr Clucky




It is not raining yet, and not very warm, still if it does rain I take responsibility because I mowed the lawn yesterday, but it does give me the time to catch up on the cleaning, the washing, the ironing and my most favourite domestic chore-changing the duvet cover, which is about as much fun as poking needles in your eyes and about as easy as knitting fog.

And yes I do know the various methods of "inserting" the duvet into the cover, such as having the cover inside out, grasping the corners of the duvet while standing on the bed and shaking said duvet so that it slips glently into the cover, sounds good until you take the Rat faced bat cat into the equasion, Trfbc likes to sit on the duvet while I am perched on the bed and when I finally get the damned thing on she likes to dash into the space between the duvet and cover and lay down, sometimes changing the duvet cover can take hours, until trfbc decided to come out and scream at me for food.

Aint life grand?

First up:

The barber of Bury

Lee Haynes is up before the beak, he has committed the gravest of sins; leaving two bags of hair clippings and sundry sandwich wrappers outside his salon.

He told the court that he had been invited by a council refuse worker to cut his hair in return for disposal of the two sacks a week.

"I was approached by a council worker who offered to get rid of the waste and I wanted to ensure that it wasn't fly-tipped - he said he would put it in the skip used by the council on market days." he said. "It is not a huge factory and I am not sure it counts as controlled waste - it's just hair but the council insist it may have traces of bleach or dye in it."


He has been accused of breaching the law by failing to ensure the transfer of waste was to an authorised person and not giving an accurate description of the waste and could face a £15,000 fine.

Caroline Watling, a solicitor for Babergh District Council who brought the case, said that Mr Haynes had been reported because the waste was defined as "toxic or dangerous." and he had "benefitted financially by not employing a registered waste contractor."

OOOH Scary!

Does that mean that anyone who has bleach or dye in their hair is hazardous to the rest of us?

Thongs aint what they used to be

Down in the Lincolnshire village of Leadenham strange thongs are happening, in fact a flying thong has plunged the sleepy little hamlet into darkness.

The power cut happened on Wednesday afternoon after the thong was found wrapped in power lines above a croquet lawn. The underwear was apparently attached to a helium balloon which had gone astray.

Heavy rain had caused the thong to short circuit the cables, cutting power to 17 homes and businesses in the village.

Andrew Barrow, a spokesman for electricity distribution company Central Networks, said: "Our engineers are used to dealing with the unexpected but I think this might be a first for us."

"What we think happened in this case was the offending article was on the line for some time but it was the heavy rain yesterday – wet things conduct electricity – which led to the short circuit.

"The main thing to say here is that if people do see something on the lines don't try and get them down yourselves that is when it becomes dangerous."

Engineers have now restored power to the homes.

You don’t really think of croquet players wearing thongs do you? Apart from Prezza of course (allow that picture to sink in).

What a swine

You just can't win

Tests have confirmed that swine flu has broken out at a piggery in the central west of New South Wales.

It is the first case of the virus among pigs in Australia and the State Government believes the animals probably caught the disease from workers at the piggery.

A total of 280 pigs have been placed in quarantine and strict bio security measures are in place to try to contain the spread of the virus.

NSW Primary Industries Minister Macdonald says the piggery's owner and staff have previously suffered flu-like symptoms and are being tested for swine flu by the health department.

Mr Macdonald says the outbreak poses no threat to humans.

Yeah right, that wouldn’t be Ronald Macdonald would it?

Ill gotten grains

Life's a beach

MEXICO CITY (AP) - Surprised tourists found their little piece of Cancun beach paradise ringed by crime-scene tape and gun-toting sailors on Thursday.

Environmental enforcement officers backed by Mexican navy personnel closed off hundreds of feet (dozens of meters) of powder-white coastline in front of a hotel accused of illegally accumulating sand on its beach.

Mexico spent $19 million to replace Cancun beaches washed away by Hurricane Wilma in 2005. But much of the sand pumped from the sea floor has since washed away, leading some property owners to build breakwaters in a bid to retain sand. The practice often merely shifts sand loss to beaches below the breakwaters.

"Today we made the decision to close this stretch of ill-gotten, illegally accumulated sand," said Patricio Patron, Mexico's attorney general for environmental protection. "This hotel was telling its tourists: 'Come here, I have sand ... the other hotels don't, because I stole it.'"

Patron said five people were detained in a raid for allegedly using pumps to move sand from the sea floor onto the beach in front of the Gran Caribe Real Hotel.

The hotel is also suspected of illegally building a breakwater that impeded the natural flow of sand onto other hotels' beaches, he said.

An employee of the hotel's marketing office said nobody was available to comment on the allegations. Authorities said the hotel owner ignored previous orders to remove the breakwater.

A knot of angry tourists gathered around the closed beach.

Some were irked by the sight of police tape and "Closed" signs.

Maria Bachino, a travel agent from Rocha, Uruguay, said by telephone that she had booked a beachfront room in Cancun, only to find herself cut off from the clear, bathtub-temperature waters that lure millions to Cancun each year.

"They promised us a beach," said Bachino. "This is very unpleasant, we feel bad. This is intimidating," she said of the armed navy personnel who participated in the raid.

Oh do stop beaching on woman!

Chicken Feed

A celebrity rooster and Miami Beach tourist favourite named Mr. Clucky could soon be evicted from the condo he shares with his owner.

The Miami Herald reports that a dramatic city hall plea from Mark Buckley wasn't enough to stop officials from giving city code officers authority to remove Mr. Clucky and his hen girlfriend, Wallflower.

Buckley also was ordered to pay a $50 fine for the rooster, known for perching on the handlebars of Buckley's bicycle.

Miami Beach code prohibits keeping poultry and other livestock in residential areas.

But there might still be hope for Mr. Clucky: Buckley can ask city commissioners for an exception or appeal to the courts.

Mr. Clucky has become a favourite subject of tourist photos and was even grand marshal of a parade.


Paxo anyone?


Angus

Angus Dei politico

Angus Dei-NHS-THE OTHER SIDE