And Finally...

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16834953

Legendary TV wrestling villain Kendo Nagasaki is planning to sell off his £1.5million, 50-room mansion to fund new LGBTQ+ Zen Buddhism classes - as he also plots a return to the ring aged 82.

The World of Sport superstar - whose real name is Peter Thornley, from Stoke - was famous for his signature 'Kamikaze Crash' slam, and appeared in the ring under the guise of a masked 'Japanese samurai' and mystical sensei.

But decades after his heyday on the nation's screens, he now wants to downsize from his huge Stoke-on-Trent home to Blackpool - where he owns a men-only hotel.

He hopes to teach the Lancashire LGBTQ+ community the art of Zen Buddhism at the seaside town, famed for its illuminations.

And he is even training to return to the sport as a pensioner on the 60th anniversary of his first showing - which would make him the oldest professional wrestler.

Archive (as the original is on the Daily Fail)

I am also legally obliged to include this: "Everything's AOR" by Half Man Half Biscuit.

A Sheffield man has been banned from touching unattended vehicles after he tried to steal a van.

Ricky Roberts, 36, was arrested on July 24 after South Yorkshire Police responded to reports of a man trying to break into a Ford Transit van on Brompton Road, Sheffield. He was discovered in the process of forcing his way into a van and fled after he saw police officers.

He got on a pedal bike but was arrested less than 20 minutes after the initial call reporting the attempted theft. A bag Roberts dropped was found to contain several power tools which had been stolen from vehicles in Sheffield the night before.

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Roberts, of Richmond Hall Road, Sheffield, was handed a two-year Criminal Behaviour Order which bans him from touching or entering any unattended motor vehicle, motorcycle, or pedal cycle without the permission of the owner. He has also been instructed to take part in a drug rehabilitation course.

A team of biomedical and medicinal specialists from the University of Milan, working with a colleague from Foundation IRCCS Ca' Granda Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico di Milano, has found evidence of cocaine use by at least two people as far back as the 17th century in Europe.

In their study, published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, the group analyzed the preserved brains of two people found in a crypt in Milan used as a burial site for people who died in the nearby Ospedale Maggiore—a well-known hospital of the time.

Prior research has found that for thousands of years, people living in western parts of South America chewed on the leaves of the coca plant to experience its chemical effects. After it was found that the leaves could be processed to make cocaine hydrochloride salts in the 19th century, the mind-altering effects of the drug became more widely known and it became a popular recreational drug in many parts of Europe.

In this new study, the research team found evidence that people were chewing the leaves of the plant to get high in at least one part of Europe nearly 200 years earlier.

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The research team also studied the pharmacological records of the Ospedale Maggiore and found no records of cocaine or coca plants being used for medicinal purposes. This suggested that the two people had been chewing the leaves for other reasons. The team noted that the two mummified individuals were buried in a place and in such a way as to suggest that they were poor, further suggesting that the coca leaves were cheap and likely plentiful and that they were chewed recreationally.

Citation: Gaia Giordano et al (2024) Forensic toxicology backdates the use of coca plant (Erythroxylum spp.) in Europe to the early 1600s. Journal of Archaeological Science 170. DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2024.106040

Ssekamwa was arrested on August 2 outside a lodge in Masvingo, a city located 292 kilometres south of Harare, along with Czech tourist Lucas Slavik.

The arrests occurred during a government crackdown on dissent ahead of a regional summit, leading to over 200 opposition and civil society activists being detained.

Ssekamwa faced charges of criminal nuisance and violating the Censorship Act after police found a rubber male organ in his bag. However, magistrate Isaac Chikura acquitted him, ruling that the possession of the sex toy did not compromise public order or cause any nuisance. The magistrate noted that the sex toy was in Ssekamwa’s personal bag and there was no intention to display it in public.

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The Zimbabwean government claimed the detentions were necessary, citing intelligence reports suggesting planned protests to disrupt the summit. Christopher Mutsvangwa, spokesperson for the ruling Zanu PF party, stated that those detained were “deviants” who were dealt with appropriately, expressing satisfaction that no protests took place.

Critics of President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who took power following a military coup in 2017, accuse him of being more authoritarian than his predecessor, Robert Mugabe.

Nudes are a major feature of the newest exhibition at Marseille’s Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations – and not only on the walls.

The museum, Mucem, is allowing visitors to discover their relationship to naturism by viewing the works of art naked, except for their shoes.

Eric Stefanut, of France’s FFN naturist organisation, said there was no objection to bare feet but insisting on footwear was a precaution against the museum’s parquet flooring. “It’s to avoid getting splinters,” he said.

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“France is the world’s leading tourist destination for naturists: its temperate climate and the presence of three seas have facilitated the establishment of communities, which – with the exception of Switzerland – have few real equivalents elsewhere in Europe, where naturism is practised more freely, outside established communities,” the museum said.

“Today, there is a new craze for nudity in nature, a craze that goes hand in hand with the quest for healthy, vegetarian diets and the use of natural therapies, meditation and yoga in the open air. These lifestyles, along with the rejection of the diktats that weigh down our bodies, are all keys to understanding the issues at stake in the naturism of yesterday and today.”

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Kieren Parker-Hall and Alex Parry were among 80 stripped-down visitors to Mucem’s August naturist slot and said seeing the exhibition in the nude was a “once in a lifetime” opportunity.

“There’s not a lot of naturist stuff in England,” Parker-Hall, 28, a web developer from Bath, told AFP. “It’s cold.”

Parry, 30, a stained glass artist from Bristol, agreed. “Being naked in England is seen as something a bit bizarre, shameful,” he said.

Sir Anthony Seldon is set to release his latest political biography, ‘Truss at 10: How Not to be a Prime Minister’ on 29th August, covering the turbulent 49 days that Truss was in the top seat.

The book is expected to contain some bombshell revelations about her time in charge, including insight into how she proposed to deal with the fallout from her disastrous mini-budget, which sent financial markets into a death spiral.

It also claims that Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg tried to persuade Truss to make him chancellor instead of Kwasi Kwarteng, and that he urged her to abolish inheritance tax, replace all tax rates with a 20p flat rate, and organise a stunt to promote nuclear power.

Seldon writes that the then cabinet minister told Truss: “We should get a nuclear submarine to dock at Liverpool and plug it into the grid. That would show it is safe.”

Sir Anthony says cabinet secretary Simon Case dismissed the idea as a “non-starter”, adding that “the subs are needed in operations”.

If you’ve visited Disney California Adventure or, more likely, had your TikTok algorithm churn out some Marvel Cinematic Universe videos, chances are you’ve come across its fourth-wall-breaking attraction, “Story Time With Deadpool.” Now, the attraction is making headlines because its Deadpool & Wolverine-inspired performers joke made a tongue-in-cheek reference to a recent wrongful death lawsuit filed against their parent company while quipping about Disney+’s terms and conditions.

In a TikTok video from user gothgirl_doesdisney, the attraction’s Deadpool actor regaled the audience on the tale of “Cinderpool.” During the dramatic story, Deadpool joked about Cinderpool being late because “he had to read every single page in the terms and conditions when he signed up for Disney+.” Wolverine’s actor chimed in after a mix of nervous laughter from onlookers, saying he didn’t get the reference. Which in turn, laid up Deadpool’s Abbott and Costello-esque response, saying, “They do.”

For those unaware, Disney recently tried to get a “wrongful death” lawsuit filed against it thrown out. According to CNN, the plaintiff, Jeffrey Piccolo, filed the lawsuit after his wife died at Disney Springs; she’d gone into anaphylactic shock after dining at one of the resort’s restaurants in 2019. Deadpool’s quip about reading Disney+’s terms and conditions comes into play when you consider that Disney claimed Piccolo couldn’t sue because he signed up for a free Disney+ trial that same year. Within the Disney+ trial’s terms and conditions was a clause that said all legal action against the company must be forced through arbitration. In layman’s terms, it had fine print that prevents the company from facing litigation.

Context: Disney Seeking Dismissal of Raglan Road Death Lawsuit Because Victim Was Disney+ Subscriber

An Instagram user shared a video of making sourdough bread on her way to Spain. She wanted to surprise her sister with a fresh loaf of bread, so the process was done thousands of feet above the ground.

Her video, viewed over 1.2 million times, did not please many social media users. A couple of them claimed to be flight attendants, who were far from impressed by the passenger’s efforts.

“I’m a flight attendant and I hate people like you," posted one user on Instagram.

“As a flight attendant I’m gonna say: Ewwwww. On the last flight, some unhygienic passenger clipped his toe nails on that table and another one puked on it. Needless to say that the armrest you’re touching, is where some dudes’ unwashed hands from the lavatory were as well. Another woman changed the baby’s diaper, since the bathroom wasn’t “sanitary" enough in her opinion. I’ve seen it all - believe me. Now there’s you, kneading and folding sourdough. Enjoy your germ-bread. That’s an airplane - not a bakery. Learn some manners, people.., Please," wrote another.

“Looks really cute but please don't do it in planes, it's a really closed place and a celiac could suffer an intoxication, the flour can easily "fly" and spread. I know there is HEPA in the plane but is not instantaneous, so please avoid to do it in closed public places if you can not want to ruin some days of someone’s holidays," posted another.

Reflect Orbital, a California startup, has opened applications for anyone who wants to use a satellite with a mirror on it to reflect sunlight to a specific location on Earth after dark. You might be wondering: What?

A few years ago, VICE spoke with Reflect Orbital’s founder and CEO, Ben Nowack, about his plans to generate solar power at night.

“I had an interesting way to solve the real issue with solar power. It’s this unstoppable force,” Nowack said in the interview. “Everybody’s installing so many solar panels everywhere. It’s really a great candidate to power humanity. But sunlight turns off. It’s called nighttime. If you solve that fundamental problem, you fix solar everywhere.”

The company’s orbital mirror is set to launch in 2025, and you can “apply for sunlight” for the next few months. There’s “limited availability,” and already supposedly over 30,000 applications. It really just sounds like a one-time test, though: you only get four minutes for a diameter of 5km. No price is listed.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16691148

Downing Street officials are reportedly planning how to announce the eventual passing of Larry, the No 10 chief mouser.

The 17-year-old tabby, while currently healthy, is in his twilight years.

Larry has become a fixture of Downing Street, known for his patrols of the grounds and occasional confrontations with local wildlife. His encounters with Palmerston, the Foreign Office cat, have often made headlines.

...

He has also outlasted five prime ministers and famously refused Liz Truss the chance to stroke him.

But although Larry can count himself among the more popular residents of the street in recent years his demise will happen at some point and officials are now preparing.

In a similar manner to how insiders had a code for when the Queen passed away, there is set to be an official way that the cat’s death will be broken to the nation.

According to The Times, officials will say “Larry bridges” when the cat passes - a reference to ‘London Bridge is falling down’, the code for when Elizabeth II died.

Following a forestry accident in January, a 33-year-old man was flown by air ambulance to Graz University Hospital, Styria, southeastern Austria, with serious head injuries, according to Kronen Zeitung, an Austrian newspaper.

He needed emergency surgery, but the doctor allegedly let his 13-year-old daughter take part in operating on him.

The newspaper reported that she even drilled a hole in the patient's skull.

While the operation was said to have gone off without issue, the patient is still unable to work and investigations by the Graz public prosecutor's officer against the entire surgical team are continuing.

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The alleged victim initially learned about the case in the media before later being told by authorities he was a witness in an investigation.

A Florida school board paused a plan for a chaplain program after receiving First Amendment concerns — and interest from The Satanic Temple.

In a move that school officials present said was rare, the Osceola County School Board pulled the plan from consideration during its Tuesday meeting. It highlights the complexities and complications school districts face in implementing a new law signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis this year that allows volunteer chaplains to provide support services for public K-12 students.

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Fast-forward nearly four months, and the school board voted 3-2 to take the policy out of a bundle it was voting on for the new academic year. The school board members in the majority said concerns brought to them shortly before the meeting warranted more discussion.

"I need more time to make a decision," said Heather Kahoun, the board chair. "I haven't had an opportunity to think about these things, to think about the implications regarding the First Amendment, regarding federal litigation that we could receive if we were to approve this as it is today."

The Satanic Temple, for example, sent the board an email on Tuesday saying they were "enthusiastic about the opportunity this policy presents for our Ministers of Satan."

I guess Bixby really isn’t dead after all.

A woman who "married" the River Avon said the event had changed her life.

Megan Ruth-Trump and her friends gathered for the ceremony in Bristol in 2023.

Her aim was to raise awareness about untreated sewage being pumped into the waterways, but she said the event had now grown into something "bigger".

"We put together a wedding event that would celebrate love for the river. It would bring people together - it started as a joke but quickly got attention," she said.

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Speaking about the wedding, she said: "It felt bigger than the event itself. It felt a bit sacrificial - people's reaction was strong, they thought it was weird and funny and powerful.

"Marriage is a human tradition meaning union, promising care. It was very moving. People were moved to act."

She added that the event "changed her life", saying: "I was brought together with a lot of strong women in film, science, and journalism.

"I was now connected to other river campaigns - all the rivers are connected.

"It's a huge inspiration for my poetry. I'll attempt to be a river bride poet in Bristol."

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Artist Kim Kaos has also been backing the campaign. He created a puppet representing a river goddess to draw attention to the issue and help people relate to the river as "a being".

Mr Kaos describes himself as an arts activist - he uses his art to "amplify campaigns".

"The river is a big thing for people to conceive - the puppet can embody the spiritual side of the river," he said.

The world's oldest living man has celebrated his 112th birthday at a care home in Southport today. John Tinniswood was born in Liverpool on August 26, 1912, the same year the Titanic sank.

He became the oldest man in the world in April this year and has said his long life is down to "luck". When John was asked how it felt to be turning the ripe old age of 112, he said: "In all honesty, no different.

"I don’t feel that age, I don’t get excited over it. That’s probably why I’ve reached it.

"I just take it in my stride like anything else, why I’ve lived that long I have no idea at all.

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John was questioned as to what he thought the biggest difference in the world was from when he was born to now, more than a century apart. He said: “It’s no better in my opinion, or hardly any better, than it was then. Probably in some places it is, but in other places it’s worse.”

On the secret of his longevity, he told Guinness World Records it’s “just luck.” He added: "You either live long or you live short, and you can’t do much about it."

According to the Times Reporter, the documentary “Vampires in Gem City” was set to expose Dayton as having the second largest vampire coven in the United States and featured the missing person’s case of 26-year-old George Phillip Gall.

It is reported that Gall went missing on October 13, 1994 after getting off a bus near the goth-themed Asylum nightclub.

The bus driver told investigators that Gall walked toward the Asylum nightclub and was never seen again. He was declared dead by the state of Ohio in 2002.

According to Times Reporter, it wasn’t until 2008 that rumors of vampires started after a retired Dayton police officer told The Dayton Daily News that a bartender at the nightclub told him Gall was killed and beheaded for an occult ritual.

It is reported that after Gall’s disappearance in 1994, Williams went to the nightclub undercover and noticed it attracted a large “gothic, vampire-like” crowd. It was while he was undercover that a bartender confided in Williams that Gall’s head was sold inside the club.

Williams told the Dayton Daily News that the bartender gave enough intricate details to make the story believable. Williams also says that Gall’s body was placed in a storm sewer tunnel accessible inside the nightclub. Officers searched for the body but did not find any evidence of the crime, but they did find “occult markings.”

According to Times Reporter, the mystery behind Gall’s disappearance has led to the birth of an urban legend, with many Dayton residents claiming to have seen a headless man approaching them in tunnels to ask where his head was.

If they want to stop people parking in the gap, it should probably be a hatched area, with the double yellows just on the road?

People are theorizing why a utility box in San Francisco fell over. Some said it was due in part to dog urine.

Ken Khoury, the owner of Castro Coffee Company, said the AT&T-owned telephone junction box has been a popular destination for dogs to urinate on. The box's base is now corroded.

"Now, over time, it's deteriorated as you can see, probably dog pee most of the time, the elements," Khoury said.

Khoury, whose business is in front of the box, said he's noticed pets taking a potty break at the box for 15 years. Now, it has corroded enough that it has separated from the concrete foundation.

It wasn't until last week that a wood and rope structure resembling a gallows was erected to help keep the utility box upright.

A sight on Auburn Ravine Road might cause you to slam on the brakes if you’re not expecting it. About a half mile off Interstate 80, around a seemingly ordinary bend, appears a group of 40-foot-tall figures, mostly nude, in dramatic poses: a man ripping chains off his enormous frame, an Amazon woman bent back with a bow, another with a spear.

As astonishing as these statues are, the story behind them — involving a dentist, a controversial school bus route and a battle with the county — is even stranger.

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He did incur the wrath of at least one more person, though. In a 2004 oral history recorded with Fox and kept by the Placer County Historical Society, he was asked if anyone “commented on the fact that your giant Amazons are nude.” Fox recalled that after he erected the statues outside his office, some school district workers “got upset.” To keep the human form away from young eyes, they began rerouting the school buses.

“Someone wrote a letter to the editor saying whoever changed the route should be thrown out of the school system,” Fox said. “The next week, the school buses were back.”

A Lenovo computer salesman has found himself in a swirl of trouble, fired from his job after he says a bladder condition forced him to relieve himself in a lobby of his Times Square hotel.

Richard Becker, 66, is seeking at least US$1.5 million from the American subsidiary of the Chinese computer giant after being dismissed for the wrongful wee, according to a lawsuit filed on Friday in New York State Supreme Court.

He accused the company of “discrimination on the basis of disability in violation of New York State and New York City human rights laws”.

According to the suit, Becker was returning to his hotel near New York’s Times Square after a work dinner in February when he found himself “overwhelmed” and forced to answer nature’s call in a vestibule located on a separate floor from the main lobby.

“A coworker noticed Becker urinating, and – out of apparent spite and malice – promptly reported him to HR, even though Becker’s conduct caused no harm to anyone whatsoever,” the lawsuit said.

Becker said he has been dealing with a chronic bladder condition since 2016 and is under the treatment of a urologist. The court filing said Lenovo colleagues and managers were aware of his condition.

A would-be burglar in Rome was caught after stopping to read a book on Greek mythology in the middle of a robbery, Italian media report.

The 38-year-old reportedly gained access to a flat in the Italian capital's Prati district via the balcony but became distracted after picking up a book about Homer's Iliad on a bedside table.

The 71-year-old homeowner is said to have awoken and confronted the alleged thief, who was engrossed in the book.

News of the failed robbery attracted the attention of the book's author, who told local media he wanted to send the man a copy so he could "finish" his read.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16582730

A World War Two wreck in the Thames estuary is a ticking time bomb, an expert has warned, as it has not been dealt with 80 years after the vessel first sunk.

The SS Richard Montgomery was carrying 7,000 tonnes of explosives and weapons when it grounded on the sandbank close to the Isle of Grain in August 1944.

A rescue effort took place to try and unload the ship’s cargo but a crack appeared in its hull and only half of the explosives were salvaged.

Professor David Alexander of University College London told the Standard the ship remains a “serious threat” and in a worse case scenario it could explode creating a five-metre tsunami up the Thames.

An Alaska Airlines pilot who attempted to shut off the engines of a passenger plane mid-flight after ingesting magic mushrooms said his actions were “unfathomable”, in some of his first public remarks after he was indicted on 83 counts of reckless endangerment.

In an interview with ABC’s Good Morning America, Joseph Emerson described the events of 22 October as “30 seconds of my life that I wish I could change, and I can’t”.

Emerson, who as an off-duty pilot was authorized to ride in the cockpit’s jump seat, tried to disable the plane’s engines by deploying the fire-suppression system, according to the federal complaint.

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After his arrest in Oregon on state counts of attempted murder, Emerson told police he believed he was having a nervous breakdown, thought he was dreaming when he pulled fire handles in the cockpit, and said he had experimented with psychedelic mushrooms recently as his mental health had worsened.

Emerson said he had taken psychedelic mushrooms two days earlier while commemorating the death of his best friend, thinking they might help with his depression.

He said he believes he was still hallucinating and that “nothing felt real” as he was sitting on the plane. “There was a feeling of being trapped, like: ‘Am I trapped in this airplane?’” he said. “This is not real, I need to wake up.”

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The crew was able to able to subdue Emerson and remove him from the flight deck, but even as the plane descended he said he tried to grab another lever operating the cabin door. According to an affidavit, Emerson warned a flight attendant: “You need to cuff me right now, or it’s going to be bad.”