Naked Man Shot and Killed and was threatening three unclothed children? WTF news story of the day. (Anonymous login does exist for this story!)

Olympic Slash Fanfiction Has anyone noticed that in the past 5 to 10 years fans of movies, events, and other things have gotten weirder and weirder? Olympic Slash represents something that is actually tame, but represents a growing trend of the internet bringing together the best or worst of fans. I'm not sure this is worth reading, so much as being amused at the concept. Anyone notice this increase in fan-wackiness?

Gawker: Ashley Simpson, Glutton for Punishment Apparently she was booed after her performance at the Orange Bowl. The funny thing is, is that this time it's all because wasn't lipsyncing. You guys must have all been boozed up on Jan. 1st to have missed this. Now, admittedly, I'm not much of a sports guy, but after all the buzz on the other filter about her first mess up, well. This would have been interesting to see. Miss it? Here's a video clip.

Soothly we live in mighty years! A recent post in Language Hat links to an online version of Poul Anderson's "Atomic Theory", but it leaves out all non-germanic loan words that English has imported since (I think) pre-Anglo-Saxon days. Uncleftish Beholding "shows what English would look like if it were purged of its non-Germanic words, and used German-style compounds instead of borrowings to express new concepts." more inside

Monkeys of the past I'm working on a project which involves some sort of shocked, (actually, shock over the stress and rhythm of english) but I'd like to use some 50s-era accents to spice it up. I figure the emotion of shock is best expressed by a 50s housewife who has just discovered a new brand of detergent, or something along those lines. So, does anyone know where there'd be a nice treasure trove of various 50s stock photographs, or advertisements or something like that?

The NOAA POES Satellite has it on good authority that, living in the right areas (at this moment, North America), you might see the northern lights if you go outside and look up tonight. City lights might be an issue, but I managed to see a few faint streaks twitching in the sky, through Minneapolis/St. Paul's city lights. But hey, even people as far south as Utah can see them, as reported on Spaceweather.com .

Kofi Annan says the war in Iraq is Illegal. Translation: "Shove it, Bush". Annan also said that, "I hope we do not see another Iraq-type operation for a long time - without UN approval and much broader support from the international community." The article also talks about the upcoming Iraq election, but what does this say for the U.S. Elections in November?