More random things

Some more stuff that caught my eye over the last few days. There may be a few posts that mention bears as there is a bear in my November project. Sadly they don't behave quite the way I thought they did so I have to reevaluate my plot but it's been interesting reading.

First story is totally not bear related. A plane crashed while trying to deliver a liver and intrepid rescuers were able to get the liver out of the wreckage and hand it off to the transplant team, which successfully installed it. Pretty amazing. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/20/liver-transplant-plane-crash-birmingham

Some quite nice photos of ladies engaging in sport around a hundred years ago. Some are boxing, some are bowling, some are playing baseball and others are doing other things, including flying a plane. http://www.worldinsport.com/2010/11/sportswomen-of-past-homage-with-vintage.html

An Italian police officer discovers stolen art in the window of a New York gallery while on vacation. The statues had been missing for more than twenty years. Well done officer. http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2010/nov/19/policeman-holiday-art-treasure-gallery-window

You may have seen this one already as its quite popular. Grandma is depressed so photographer grandson takes pictures of her as a superhero and voila, she feels better. These photos are lush. http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/grandmas-superhero-therapy-18

This guy complains that there aren't enough conservative novelists. http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/253529/where-are-conservative-novelists-mark-goldblatt He says he's written a novel about "the scalding effect of postmodern cynicism on the human heart." Doesn't that sound like a blast? I can't imagine why it didn't outsell Twilight and Harry Potter. Someone in the comments says they can't get published because they are conservative and says, "Fall ito your respective oceans, ye murders of the human spirit!" With such deathless prose I'm sure they're absolutely correct. The only reason they can't get published is because of their politics. It's got nothing to do with their writing or grammar fail.

From one of my favorite sites, damnyouautocorrect, dude, it's only a tattoo. Totally NOT contagious. http://damnyouautocorrect.com/1203/new-tattoo/

Finally some stuff about bears. This year my state, Maryland, had a five day bear hunting season for the first time. This thing is wildly popular with loads of dudes competing for the licenses. (Suggestion for a reality show - they go out in the woods and fight each other. Survivors get to hunt the bears. Bound to be number one.) What I found interesting about this article is how small the bears are that were killed. http://www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/art_life/display_travelOutdoors.htm?StoryID=112057

More than 3,800 hunters applied for one of the 260 available bear hunting permits. The average estimated live weight of the bears taken this year was 163 pounds.

I don't know what normal people take from this but I keyed in on the weight of these bears. They're tiny. Only about twice as big as my Akita, who has a bear like build. I guess since I'm from California and my kids spend weeks in the summer in Alaska I'm used to brown bears, which are bigger. I'm imagining these 250 pound dudes out there hunting for bears that mass quite a bit less than they do...

The other part of the article that caught my eye was about cheaters.

However, the hunt did not go problem-free. The Maryland Natural Resources Police charged several men with hunting bears with the aid of bait or attractants to lure bears. The use of bait, scent attractants or electronic calls is prohibited for black bear hunting.

Really guys? I'm sure your forefathers are super, super proud of you.