Recommended Reading
from Bruce
xoJANE: Working In Porn Is Awesome, Until You Want To Find Another Job (Huffington Post)
Before I even got my driver's license, I was an intern at a heavy metal magazine, and had the pleasure to write feature stories, critique album reviews, go to shows three times a week, and hang out with my favorite bands. Nothing surprised or shocked me (I was interviewing Marilyn Manson in his dressing room for a feature story, enough said) and I liked it that way.
Mark Morford: "Extremism wins, ideas lose: The irony of the spineless Democrats" (SF Gate)
It appears we have consensus!
Mark Morford: Here's how you know Obama's net neutrality proposal MUST be great (SF Gate)
Because corporations hate it.
Mark Morford: Bro! Want to TRIPLE your odds of getting her number? Get a dog (SF Gate)
Because it means you can take care of something. Because it means you're not completely selfish. Because it means you might love something other than yourself.
Gavin Jamieson, A.C. Grimes: 5 Important Skills That Are Horrifyingly Easy to Fake (Cracked)
Everybody cheats. No, we're not talking about in a sexual way -- this ain't Cosmo.
Steve Cole, Joshiey: Steve Cole: nothing is quite like Bond, so this was a great excuse to re-read my Ian Fleming 007 collection" (Guardian)
Steve Cole's new book takes on the Young Bond mantle from Charlie Higson. Site member Joshiey talks to him about what it's like to write about Bond, moving on from Doctor Who and Astrosaurs, and flying zeppelins.
Mr. Furious: Employing the Usefulness of the Useless, or: Examining the Relevance of a Philosophical Life (Disinformation)
One of my favorite memories of college is not very interesting. I'm going to tell it anyway, because I'm the one writing the essay, and I get to choose to take a risk and tell a not very interesting story so as to help me make some kind of (possibly not very interesting) point.
Ten Hours of Princess Leia Walking in NYC (YouTube)
Princess Leia is propositioned numerous times as she walks down the streets of New York City.
David Bruce's Amazon Author Page
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David Bruce has approximately 50 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
wrote:
took the day off.
is back to semi-retired.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
from Marc Perkel
BartCop
Hello Bartcop fans,
As you all know the untimely passing of Terry was unexpected, even by
him. We all knew he had cancer but we all thought he had some years
left. So some of us who have worked closely with him over the years are
scrambling around trying to figure out what to do. My job, among other
things, is to establish communications with the Bartcop community and
provide email lists and groups for those who might put something
together. Those who want to play an active roll in something coming from
this, or if you are one of Bart's pillars, should send an email to
active@bartcop.com.
Bart's final wish was to pay off the house mortgage for Mrs. Bart who is
overwhelmed and so very grateful for the support she has received.
Anyone wanting to make a donation can click on this the yellow donate
button on bartcop.com
But - I need you all to help keep this going. This note
isn't going to directly reach all of Bart's fans. So if you can repost
it on blogs and discussion boards so people can sign up then when we
figure out what's next we can let more people know. This list is just
over 600 but like to get it up to at least 10,000 pretty quick. So
here's the signup link for this email list.
( mailman.bartcop.com/listinfo/bartnews )
Marc Perkel
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Overcast and cool again.
Nation's Last Big Icebreaker
Polar Star
The last U.S. icebreaker capable of crushing through the thickest ice of the Antarctic and Arctic resumed its mission after the latest repairs to postpone its already past-due retirement.
Climate change makes the 38-year-old Polar Star Icebreaker's science and security missions ever more vital, according to scientists and other backers of rebuilding the country's dwindling ice fleet.
Earlier Tuesday, crew members of the U.S. Coast Guard's Polar Star Icebreaker drilled before leaving the former naval shipyard at Mare Island, across the bay from San Francisco. Shipyard workers replaced worn, 18-foot-high propellers for refitting and carried out other work on the country's sole remaining heavy icebreaker, now eight years beyond its scheduled decommissioning date. The icebreaker is expected to head for Antarctica shortly after Thanksgiving.
The U.S. Coast Guard has one other icebreaker, a medium-size one, which mainly works in the Arctic. The National Science Foundation has a still-lighter icebreaker for research. The Russian government, by contrast, has 18 icebreakers, including four, nuclear-powered and operational heavy icebreakers. Russia on Monday announced the planned start of work on a new icebreaker to supply that country's growing military presence in the Arctic and tug Russian combat ships through Arctic ice.
Polar Star
'Sons of Anarchy'
Conan
The cast and creator of "Sons of Anarchy" will appear on TBS' "Conan" Tuesday night in their first group talk show appearance and, to commemorate, Conan O'Brien decided to try out the biker lifestyle.
In the cold open for the episode, O'Brien dons a SAMCRO leather vest and hits the road on a motorcycle. Though he looks cool enough, it doesn't end up too well - the host is thrown out a window, and eventually resorts to riding on a children's bicycle.
The video also parodies the show's iconic opening credits, though it seems a lot less tough with Conan and co. involved.
Series creator Kurt Sutter and stars Charlie Hunnam, Tommy Flanagan, Jimmy Smits, Drea de Matteo, Mark Boone Junior and more joined the show to talk about the current seventh and final season.
Conan
Makes Case for Obamacare
Ed Schultz
MSNBC's Ed Schultz addressed Glenn Beck's health issues Tuesday, wishing his competitor well before contrasting the world-class health care Beck received to everyday Americans.
"Glenn Beck found help because he can afford it," Schultz said with a screen behind featuring Beck's face and "Best Wishes." "Someone without insurance would not have the resources to see any doctors at all; now listening to Beck, can you imagine what that would be like?"
"I don't know Beck, I have no desire to know him, Schultz added. "I've had my battles with him over the years-no big deal, it's media mudslinging."
"I hope that his story motivates those that think Obamacare is bad," he said.
Ed Schultz
Ice Age Infants Uncovered
Alaska
Researchers have uncovered the remains of two Ice Age infants in Alaska's interior, a discovery archaeologists call the youngest human remains from that era found in northern North America.
The remains dating back about 11,500 years offer a new glimpse into ancient burial practices, the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reported Tuesday.
Researchers have explored a large sand dune for nearly a decade at a dig site known as the Upward Sun River southeast of Fairbanks. In 2010, archaeologists found the partly cremated remains of a 3-year-old child.
The babies' remains were discovered last year about 15 inches below in the same area. The bones are well preserved and appear to belong to one child who was stillborn and another who died soon after birth. The three children appear to have died during the same summer, according to researchers.
The infants are clearly Native American, according to Liverpool John Moores University researcher Joel Irish, who participated in the project. Researchers hope to follow up with DNA analysis to determine the gender and whether the babies were related, Irish said.
Alaska
Cyber Attacks
NOAA
The U.S. agency that operates the National Weather Service said on Wednesday four of its websites were hacked in recent weeks, becoming the latest federal agency to fall victim to a cyber attack.
"In recent weeks, four NOAA websites were compromised by an Internet-sourced attack," said Scott Smullen, a spokesman for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
He did not identify the websites that were compromised or elaborate on the attacks but said they did not prevent the agency from delivering forecasts to the public.
NOAA had a data breach last month when an agency employee in Ohio was charged with stealing sensitive information from a federal database for the nation's dams and lying about the breach to federal agents.
Xiafen "Sherry" Chen, 59, was arrested on Oct. 20 at the NOAA office in Wilmington, Ohio, about 50 miles (80 km) northeast of Cincinnati, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Ohio said.
NOAA
Poachers Face Trial
Nevada
Three men convicted of state hunting violations in Nevada now face trial on federal charges stemming from a poaching ring that saw untold numbers of deer, antelope, birds and other wildlife killed illegally across Nevada, game officials said on Monday.
Authorities uncovered the poaching ring after one of the defendants posted a photograph on Facebook of two deer he shot and killed out of season last June, said Cameron Waithman, who led the Nevada Wildlife Department investigation of the case.
The ensuing probe found that Adrian Acevedo-Hernandez, 36, Jose Luis Montufar-Canales, 31, and J. Nemias Reyes Marin, 31, had been illegally killing and butchering animals across the state and bragging about the kills online since early 2013, Waithman said.
The men, described by Waithman as "serial wildlife killers," were convicted in a state court of misdemeanor hunting violations earlier this year. In July they were indicted by a federal grand jury in Las Vegas on felony firearms offenses and criminal charges under the U.S. Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
Their quarry included upland game birds, protected migratory songbirds and deer and antelope whose carcasses were left to rot.
Nevada
Germans Convicted
Great Pyramid
An Egyptian court sentenced three Germans and six Egyptians to five years jail on Tuesday for stealing fragments of a pharaonic artifact from Cairo's Great Pyramid, a judicial source said.
A court in Giza, south of the capital, sentenced in absentia three Germans -- who had claimed they were researchers -- for stealing pieces of an ancient scroll bearing the name of the Pharaoh Khufu, as well as rock samples, the source said.
Six Egyptians, including three employees of the antiquities ministry, two pyramid guards and the director of a travel agency, were also jailed for five years for aiding the robbery, the source said.
The judicial source said that the German researchers took the scroll pieces in order to determine their age and bolster an unorthodox theory that the pyramids may be several millenia older than the construction period accepted by most Egyptologists.
Great Pyramid
Sudden Bid Surprised Government Officials
North Pole
New documents suggest that Canada's last-minute decision to stretch its claim to the Arctic seabed all the way to the North Pole took federal bureaucrats just as off-guard as it did the rest of the world.
Hundreds of pages of records released under Access to Information legislation seem to show bureaucrats were as surprised as Canada's allies when the Harper government announced it would delay its full submission under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea to give it a chance to try and claim exclusive rights to the sea floor under the Pole.
Days before the Dec. 6, 2013, submission was due, records show Foreign Affairs lawyers were still sorting out the difference between the geographic, magnetic and geomagnetic poles.
By that time, Canadian scientists had been working for years to prepare their country's bid for rights to the Arctic seafloor. They had sailed on icebreakers, camped on sea ice and spent about $117 million painstakingly mapping which parts of that area could be shown to be connected to Canada's continental shelf.
Actual mapping was said to be complete in 2011. The submission had been widely expected to stop just short of the North Pole.
North Pole
Skeleton Found
Greece
Archaeologists are holding their breath that a skeleton found in a mysterious, richly-decorated tomb from the time of Alexander the Great will solve the riddle of who ancient Greece's biggest burial mound was built for.
Having dug their way past huge decapitated sphinxes, broken through a wall guarded by two caryatids and emptied out an antechamber decorated with stunning mosaics, experts have finally found the body it was all built for, the Greek culture ministry said Wednesday.
The bones were found scattered around a wooden coffin in the third room of the vast mound near Amphipolis in northern Greece.
The ministry said the remains were clearly those of "a powerful personality, which can be seen from this unique tomb", with speculation rife that it could be that of Roxana, Alexander's Persian wife, his mother Olympias, or one of his generals.
The tomb's near-intact sculptures and staggering mosaics have been a cheering reminder to Greeks of past glories with the country today mired in economic woes.
Greece
In Memory
Warren Clarke
Actor Warren Clarke, who starred in the British television series "Dalziel and Pascoe" and had a role in the film "A Clockwork Orange," died on Wednesday at the age of 67, his agency said.
Clarke, who was born in Oldham, England, began his long career in television in the 1960s and starred in the soap opera "Coronation Street."
Before turning to acting he worked as a copy boy for the Manchester Evening News.
Clarke played opposite actor Malcolm McDowell in Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange" in 1971 and most recently was best known for his television role as Detective Superintendent Andy Dalziel in "Dalziel and Pascoe," which ran from 1996 to 2007.
Clarke was filming a new BBC adaptation of TV series "Poldark" before he died.
Warren Clarke
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