Category: Defies a category!

Who’s Townshend Released on Bail in Porn Probe
LONDON (Reuters) – British rock star Pete Townshend was released on police bail after being questioned by detectives on suspicion of possessing indecent images of children but has not been charged, his lawyer said Tuesday.
Police said the 57-year-old guitarist with legendary band The Who had been bailed to reappear at a police station in late January after being quizzed by officers for more than an hour on Monday night.
“Mr. Townshend has been at the station this evening answering questions from police. He has not been charged,” the musician’s lawyer John Cohen told reporters. “He’s been bailed to come back perhaps at a future occasion if they want him to answer more questions.”
Townshend was arrested Monday after police involved in Britain’s largest-ever operation against pedophilia descended on the rock star’s mansion in Richmond, southwest London. They took away boxes full of computers and other equipment.
Later Townshend looked stony-faced as he was driven away by detectives after being held on suspicion of possessing indecent images of children, suspicion of making indecent images of children and on suspicion of incitement to distribute indecent images of children.
Townshend, who has said he believes he was abused as a child, acknowledged Saturday he had downloaded child pornography from the Internet but insisted he had done it for research purposes.
“I am not a pedophile. I think pedophilia is appalling,” the guitarist, who is married with three children, said in a statement.
Hours before he was arrested he told the Sun newspaper he had worked “tirelessly” to help the abused but had been foolish to wage a one-man battle against child pornography.
He said he was outraged when he first came across child pornography Web sites six years ago when surfing the Internet with his son Joseph, now 16.
Townshend is the most prominent figure to have been questioned as part of the Operation Ore police inquiry which has resulted in more than 1,300 arrests so far in Britain.
The probe, which began 10 months ago, was launched after U.S. law enforcement agencies identified about 7,000 British suspects as users of child pornography Web sites.
CELEBRITIES UNDER SUSPICION
The British media hinted that other British celebrities and some politicians may also be under suspicion.
The Who shot to fame in the late 1960s with its zeitgeist anthem “My Generation” and cemented its reputation with such albums as “Tommy,” “Who’s Next” and “Quadrophenia.”
Townshend, who wrote most of the band’s songs, was renowned for smashing his guitars during live stage performances.
Despite its many musical highs, the band has also been dogged by tragedy. Townshend and lead singer Roger Daltrey are the only two surviving original members of the band.
Bass player John Entwistle died in a Las Vegas hotel room last year from a heart attack triggered by cocaine use while the band’s original drummer Keith Moon died of an accidental pill overdose in 1978.

Sarcasm Not Funny to Kids?
CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) – When parents use sarcasm to playfully tease their young children, do the kids see the humor?
Not likely, according to a Canadian researcher who has completed a study showing that children need to be 10 or older before fully grasping the concept that sarcasm can be funny or even insulting.
The results have implications for everything from the content of children’s television programming to interpreting bullying behavior, University of Calgary psychologist Penny Pexman said on Thursday.
“Our study suggests that the 5-year-olds are beginning to understand the simplest form of sarcasm and are getting better at it, but still by the age of eight they really don’t find it funny, so there’s still a dissociation there,” said Pexman, who has been studying sarcasm for the past six years.
“They can appreciate that the person means the opposite of what they’re saying, but they don’t find it humorous.”
She and a colleague tested 64 children, presenting them with various scenarios played out with puppets using “counter-factual communication.”
One featured a bumbling gardener who pulls all the flowers out of a garden and leaves only the “yucky” weeds, prompting a miffed homeowner to remark: “You’re a great gardener.”
“Half the younger kids say, ‘No, he means he’s a good gardener,’ so they really take it literally. Even though the intonation is there and the gardener totally messed up, they really do think it’s a positive remark,” Pexman said.
In addition, children under the age of about 10 almost always interpreted a sarcastic remark as serious, even when it was intended to be humorous, she said.
The findings should help researchers understand reactions to teasing and bullying, especially since the young subjects often identified with the character who was the target of the sarcastic jibe, Pexman said.
It is still not completely clear what determines how children comprehend sarcasm, but Pexman said factors could include the amount used at home, their social milieu and the types of television shows they watch.
In fact, since adults write kids’ television programs, much of the humor may be lost on the intended audience, she said.

Britney Spears as Sherlock Holmes?!?
Britney Spears is in talks to play a modern-day Sherlock Holmes in a new movie. The movie, cringingly called 221bCAUSE, is about a disgraced cop who turns detective and saves the US President’s kidnapped son. According to a movie mole, ‘Britney is a New Yorker working there and she notices letters arriving for Sherlock Holmes. She starts to answer them as the detective and it leads her back to New York trying to trace the President’s son.’ Britters has also signed up to play the daughter of the boss of a team in the US Nascar motor racing series in an as yet untitled movie. Filming for the project is due to start this year.

Inept Car Thieves Couldn’t Drive
EDMONTON, Alberta (Reuters) – Two would-be Canadian thieves learned the hard way on New Year’s Day that knowing how to drive a car is a prerequisite for stealing one.
Police said the two males accosted a pizza delivery man in northeast Edmonton, Alberta, early Wednesday and demanded the four pizzas he was carrying as well as cash.
The bandits, aged 17 and 18, apparently changed their minds at one point and jumped into the man’s car.
But their getaway was foiled because the 17-year-old behind the wheel did not know how to drive a stick shift.
Flummoxed by the manual transmission and clutch, the duo then went back to their original plan to commandeer the pizzas, Edmonton Police spokesman Wes Bellmore said.
“It was a toss-up between pizzas and the car, and they knew how to operate pizzas,” Bellmore said.
When officers soon arrived on the scene, they spotted one of the suspects entering the home where the pizzas were to be delivered.
Both were arrested and have been charged with robbery and theft under $3,000.
Police also recovered the pizzas.

An Awesome Game To Start The New Year With
Save Michael Jackson’s kids!

Bushisms Added to List of Banned Words
SAULT STE. MARIE, Mich. (Reuters) – Overused cliches, wordy redundancies and hyperbolic phrases — including the Bushism “make no mistake about it” — were declared banished on Wednesday by the university overseers of an annual list of banned words.
Other favored utterances of President Bush such as “material breach,” “weapons of mass destruction,” and “homeland security,” were the tired targets of the New Year’s Day list compiled by the public relations staff at Lake Superior State University.
This year’s list of 23 worn-out words and phrases was whittled down from 3,000 entries submitted to the school from around the world to its Web site.
“Make no mistake about it” was nominated by several contributors, one of whom commented, “Who’s mistaken, anyway?”
As usual, the media and advertising worlds came in for ridicule.
In response to the catch-phrase “must-see TV,” contributor Nan Heflin of Colorado wrote: “Must find remote. Must change channel.” The list-writers added: “Television once pitched entertainment. Apparently now it’s taken on a greater imperative. (It) assumes herd mentality over program taste.”
Another linguistic target was “now, more than ever,” which contributor Matthew Lowe of New Jersey said “has become overused since the (Sept. 11) terrorist attacks … from warnings to be safe, to stores having sales … It has to go.”
Advertisers would be better off finding another superlative other than “extreme,” which contributors complained had evolved from an adjective denoting dangerous sports into a promotional tag for products from cars to deodorant.
“Branding” too has morphed from something burned into a cow’s rump into “any activity that supports a company’s desire to clearly define its products,” said Nancy Hicks of Virginia.
Irritating to many contributors were the overused “having said that” and “that said,” to which David Patrick of Indiana said: “I heard you the first time.”
To those who trumpet facing one “challenge” after another in their lives, Ray Lucas of Michigan suggested keeping quiet and locating a solution.
Sports cliches such as “got game” — referring to a player with skills — and “mental mistake” — is there any other kind? — also came in for criticism. And “There is no score,” is merely a misnomer for a score of 0-0, a contributor opined.
Tautologies such as “frozen tundra,” which by definition is frozen, and “an undisclosed, secret location,” as in references to Vice President Dick Cheney (news – web sites)’s position, repeat themselves.
Finally, the list gave the heave-ho to the self-important obituary writer’s phrase, “untimely death,” which seems to suggest some deaths are more tragic than others. “Has anyone yet died a timely death?” asked Donald Burgess of California.

Click!
This guy took a picture of himself every day this year and posted them online. Come on, what would it take to get him to smile?

Wife of Survivor finalist Heidik charged with spousal battery
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The wife of Survivor: Thailand finalist Brian Heidik faces trial Monday for allegedly attacking her husband, officials said.
Charmaine Heidik, 30, was arrested Nov. 17 at the couple’s suburban Los Angeles home in Quartz Hill, according to the district attorney’s office. She faces a misdemeanour count of spousal battery.
Released without bail, she was ordered by the court to stay at least 90 metres away from her husband and his residence and not own or use any deadly weapons, according to Court TV’s The Smoking Gun Web site.
Heidik allegedly punched her husband in the nose, the Web site said.
She has pleaded not guilty. If convicted, she faces a maximum sentence of one year in jail and a $1,000 US fine, the district attorney’s office said Friday. Superior Court Judge Randolph Rogers was scheduled to hear the case.
The CBS reality series Survivor: Thailand will conclude with a two-hour episode airing Thursday in which the $1 million winner will be decided. Brian Heidik is one of four finalists.

Texan Killed Friend Who Drank Last Cold Beer
BANDERA, Texas (Reuters) – A jury on Thursday handed a life prison sentence to a Texas man who shot and killed a longtime friend he accused of drinking the last beer in his refrigerator.
Jurors deliberated for less than two hours before passing the sentence on Steven Brasher, 42, for the murder of Willie Lawson, 39, on Nov. 5 last year.
“There was only two beers left, so I took one, and I told Willie not to take my last beer,” Brasher said in a taped statement that was played during the trial.
Testimony showed Brasher shot Lawson in the head with a pistol after the two began arguing over the missing beer. Brasher maintained the shooting was an accident.

…here comes the Women In Waders calendar.

(I’m almost ashamed to admit JUST how turned on I am).