- Latest Popular Stories, Instablogs Community by Benjamin1

11 "Don't-Tell-the-Wife" Secrets All Men Keep

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 20:56:22 +0000

I was in the ninth grade when I learned a vital lesson about love. My girlfriend at the time, Amy, was stunningly cute, frighteningly smart and armed with a seemingly endless supply of form-fitting angora sweaters. And me? Let’s just say I was an adolescent Chris Robinson to her budding Kate Hudson — and well aware of my good fortune.

Company offers Moon as final resting place

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 20:05:17 +0000

The moon could become a final resting place for some of mankind thanks to a commercial service that hopes to send human ashes to the lunar surface on robotic landers, the company said on Thursday.

Celestis, Inc., a company that pioneered the sending of cremated remains into suborbital space on rockets, said it would start a service to the surface of the moon that could begin as early as next year.

God Lets Girl Die in Wisconsin

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 19:32:52 +0000

Police are conducting interviews Thursday in an effort to determine whether charges will be filed against a couple who prayed rather than seeking medical help for their 11-year-old daughter, who died Sunday from a treatable diabetic...

Huge Percentage of Students Fail Math Test

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 19:15:11 +0000

Clark County School District students tested in January on their grasp of first semester material in high school algebra and geometry didn’t just fall short of the mark.

The preliminary report on end of semester exams shows they missed it in a spectacular way.

Across the valley, 90.5 percent of 17,586 students who took the new end of semester exams for Algebra 1 failed, scoring at 59 percent or lower.

Teens as young as 15 are drinking 177 pints of beer a year, report reveals

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 18:06:38 +0000

Youngsters aged 15 and 16 are each drinking the equivalent of 44 bottles of wine or 177 pints of beer a year, research suggests. Up to a third are regular binge drinkers, downing five drinks or more at a time according to the survey. Almost...

Man writes check on 2ply toilet paper

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 17:17:23 +0000

An upstate New York man embroiled in a dispute over his water bill is not being allowed to pay off his debt with a check written on toilet paper. Ron Borgna tried to settle his $2,509.66 bill with a check written on floral print, two-ply toilet...

Million acres of Guyanese rainforest to be saved in groundbreaking deal

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 06:28:52 +0000

A deal has been agreed that will place a financial value on rainforests – paying, for the first time, for their upkeep as “utilities” that provide vital services such as rainfall generation, carbon storage and climate regulation.

The agreement, to be announced tomorrow in New York, will secure the future of one million acres of pristine rainforest in Guyana, the first move of its kind, and will open the way for financial markets to play a key role in safeguarding the fate of the world’s forests.

The initiative follows Guyana’s extraordinary offer, revealed in The Independent in November, to place its entire standing forest under the protection of a British-led international body in return for development aid.

Hylton Murray-Philipson, director of the London-based financiers Canopy Capital, who sealed the deal with the Iwokrama rainforest, said: “How can it be that Google’s services are worth billions but those from all the world’s rainforests amount to nothing?” The past year has been a pivotal one for the fast- disappearing tropical forests that form a cooling band around the equator because the world has recognised deforestation as the second leading cause of CO2 emissions. Leaders at the UN climate summit in Bali in December agreed to include efforts to halt the destruction of forests in a new global deal to save the world from runaway climate change.

Older Americans wealthier, living longer

Benjamin — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 06:05:54 +0000

Older Americans have more money and are expected to live far longer than prior generations, U.S. government researchers said on Thursday.

They said the average net worth of older Americans — those 65 or older — has increased almost 80 percent over the past 20 years.

And those who reach the age of 65 are now expected to live an average of 19 more years, or seven years longer than people who had reached age 65 in the year 1900.

The findings are part a report released on Thursday called Older Americans 2008: Key Indicators of Well-Being, which features data from 15 federal agencies on trends in population, economics and health issues.

Just Released From Lockup, Man Tries Carjacking

Benjamin — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 20:16:03 +0000

The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office called him stupid Tuesday. But Frank Singleton could almost write the book on how to turn a misdemeanor into a felony without ever leaving the jail’s parking lot. “This is one of the stupid...