ABBOTSFORD, British Columbia - A Romanian immigrant has given birth to her 18th child in British Columbia, making her the province’s most prolific mother in 20 years.

Proud dad Alexandru Ionce said Saturday that his 44-year-old wife, Livia, gave birth on Tuesday. Their daughter Abigail weighed in at seven pounds, 12 ounces.

“We never planned how many children to have. We just let God guide our lives, you know, because we strongly believe life comes from God and that’s the reason we did not stop the life,” said Alexandru Ionce.

The couple immigrated to Canada from Romania in 1990 and now live in Abbotsford, British Columbia. Their 17 other children range in age from 20 months to 23 years old. (more…)

TOKYO - It’s the hottest season of the year in Japan, and that means it’s eel season. So, bottom’s up!

A canned drink called “Unagi Nobori,” or “Surging Eel,” made by Japan Tobacco Inc., hit the nation’s stores this month just ahead of Japan’s annual eel-eating season, company spokesman Kazunori Hayashi said Monday.

“It’s mainly for men who are exhausted by the summer’s heat,” Hayashi said of the beverage, believed to be the first mass-produced eel drink in Japan. (more…)

WASHINGTON - The businessman arrived at the Treasury Department carrying a suitcase stuffed with about $5.2 million. The bills were decomposing, nearly unrecognizable, and he asked to swap them for a cashier’s check. He said the money came from Mexico.

Money like this normally arrives in an armored truck or insured shipping container after a bank burns or a vault floods. It doesn’t just show up at the visitor’s entrance on a Tuesday morning. But the banking habits of Franz Felhaber had stopped making sense to the government long ago. (more…)

If you thought the Apple iPhone was amazing, then feast your eyes — and fingers — on this phone from Samsung. Dubbed the Anycall Haptic, the phone features a large touch-screen display just like the iPhone. But it does Apple’s revolutionary gadget one better, at least for now: It enables users to feel clicks, vibrations and other tactile input. In all, it provides the user with 22 kinds of touch sensations.
The Samsung Anycall Haptic
Courtesy Samsung
The Samsung Anycall Haptic (more…)

CRYSTAL LAKE, Ill. - Jeff Hornagold loved being a UPS driver.

So when the suburban Chicago man died this week of lung cancer, longtime co-worker Michael McGowan agreed to take him on one last delivery.

McGowan transported Hornagold’s body from Davenport Family Funeral Home to Saturday’s funeral services in his UPS truck.

McGowan says he plans to keep a picture of Hornagold in his truck until he retires so that they can keep riding together.

Hornagold was a UPS driver for 20 years, and his wife Judy Hornagold described him as “just the happiest UPS man alive.”

She says the special delivery was the perfect tribute.

___

Information from: The Northwest Herald, http://www.nwherald.com

If James L. Harris really did what police say he did, then I would like to award him a Happy Mutant Criminal Award certificate.
The 18-year-old is accused of stealing at least three Miami-Dade Transist buses, and driving them on their routes.Poilice say Harris wore a Miami-Dade Transit employee uniform, did not steal the fares, and returned the buses to the depot each night.

He’s been charged with three counts each of third-degree grand theft and burglary of an occupied conveyance.

Man Stole Miami-Dade Buses, Drove Them On Routes (News4jax.com) (via Arbroath)

MILWAUKEE - A Milwaukee man was accused of shooting his lawn mower because it wouldn’t start. Keith Walendowski, 56, was charged with felony possession of a short-barreled shotgun or rifle and misdemeanor disorderly conduct while armed.

According to the criminal complaint, Walendowski said he was angry because his Lawn Boy wouldn’t start Wednesday morning. He told police quote, “I can do that, it’s my lawn mower and my yard so I can shoot it if I want.”

A woman who lives at Walendowski’s house reported the incident. She said he was intoxicated.

Walendowski could face up to an $11,000 fine and six years and three months in prison if convicted.

A call to Walendowski’s home went unanswered Friday morning.

NEW YORK - Want to look down on the rich and famous? Go eye to eagle-eye with a winged predator? See the sun rise over Queens? How better to do this than from a balloon 30 stories above Central Park?

The opportunity arises, so to speak, on Friday when a private company begins offering rides over the 843-acre park for $25 per adult and $17.50 for kids.

Other than the wicker basket accommodating a pilot and four passengers, there’s not much to suggest the Jules Verne classic, “Around the World in 80 Days.” No roaring flame providing hot air; instead the balloon is filled with helium, an inert, nonflammable gas. And no soaring for miles; the 45-foot-diameter envelope is tethered to the ground and raised and lowered by a winch for a 10-minute hover above the park. (more…)

Yeah, you really can find EVERYTHING on Ebay — even public toilets! LOL! According to reports, Seattle’s five expensive and much-maligned automatic public toilets will show up on eBay as soon as next week. The city’s officials recently decided to pull the plug on the multimillion-dollar self-cleaning toilet stalls as the unisex facilities attracted drug users and prostitutes, and were less cost-effective than regular public restrooms. The toilets can be found at Victor Steinbrueck Park near Pike Place Market, on Pier 58 at Waterfront Park, in Occidental Park in Pioneer Square, in Hing Hay Park in the International District and at 1801 Broadway on Capitol Hill. (more…)

AGHDAD (AP)—Just two weeks before the start of the Olympics, Iraq was told Thursday it’s not welcome in Beijing because of a political feud in Baghdad that angered the games’ guardians and exiled a country that arrived to a roaring ovation at the opening ceremony four years ago.

The International Olympic Committee told Iraqi sports officials in a letter that it would uphold its ban imposed in June after the government in Baghdad replaced its national Olympic panel with members not recognized by the IOC.
(more…)

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Rapper and hip-hop mogul 50 Cent sued Taco Bell on Wednesday, saying the restaurant chain made him the star of its hip-hop themed ad campaign without his permission and without paying him a fee.

50 Cent, whose real name is Curtis Jackson, accused the Mexican-style fast food chain of “diluting the value of his good name” and employing a guerrilla advertising campaign to fool consumers into thinking he had endorsed the chain, said the lawsuit, filed in Manhattan federal court.

“Without seeking or obtaining Jackson’s authorization, defendant Taco Bell made him the star and focus of its nationwide advertising campaign by using his name, persona and trademark to promote Taco Bell’s business and products,” court papers said.

The lawsuit accuses the chain of disseminating a letter, addressed to 50 Cent, that encourages the rapper to change his name to “79 Cent,” “89 Cent” or “99 Cent.”

The letter was designed to promote the company’s “79-89-99 Cent Why Pay More” campaign, while avoiding the multimillion-dollar fee the rapper might have charged to use his name, the lawsuit said.

Rob Poetsch, a spokesman for Taco Bell Corp, said, “We made a good faith, charitable offer to 50 Cent to change his name to either 79, 89, or 99 Cent for one day by rapping his order at a Taco Bell, and we would have been very pleased to make the $10,000 donation to the charity of his choice.” Taco Bell is operated by Yum! Brands.

The lawsuit said the Taco Bell letter was eventually sent to the rapper, but only after it had been circulated to reporters.

“As Taco Bell intended, many customers believed that 50 Cent had agreed to endorse Taco Bell’s products. Indeed, postings on numerous Internet ‘blogs’ castigated 50 Cent for ’selling out’ by his apparent endorsement of Taco Bell,” the lawsuit said.

Since his debut album in 2003, 50 Cent has built a business with a record label, a clothing and footwear line, ringtones and video games. He has also starred in a movie based on his life, “Get Rich or Die Tryin’.”

5 quick baseball links to start your day …1. If you’re allergic to peanuts — and my sympathies for that tragic misfortune, if you are — Seattle’s Safeco Field will be the place to be on Aug. 5 and Sept. 9. The stadium staff there is planning to make two sections “peanut-controlled” zones, cleaning each before the game and banning the sale of peanuts at nearby concession stands so those afflicted by the food allergy can watch the game without worry. (more…)

Why are these news anchors smiling? Because they’ve been given cups filled with a solid plastic material that resembles coffee.

Two cups of McDonald’s iced coffee (BUY!) sit on the Fox 5 TV news desk, a punch-you-in-the-face product placement (BUY!) to chase down your morning news.They’ve been on the Las Vegas station set for about two weeks, following the lead of a few TV stations across the country, and they’re still looking every bit as frosty and tantalizing (BUY!) as they were the first day you laid your eyes on them.

But wait, here’s the best part: They’re not real. Fake coffee on the real news, two plastic cups permanently filled with some kind of bogus drink. The anchors aren’t even supposed to acknowledge them, McDonald’s reps explain.

(I want this fake cup of espresso.)
Plastic coffee on Fox News (Las Vegas Sun, via Museum of Hoaxes)

It’s been three weeks since his blue-eyed baby debuted in this world, but Thomas Beatie – better known around the world as the Pregnant Man – can already say this about his daughter’s personality: “She’s easygoing and mellow and intelligent.”

On June 29 at 8:55 p.m., Beatie, 34, a former female beauty pageant contestant, made cultural history as perhaps the first legally transgender male to give birth, bringing into the world a 9 lbs., 5 oz. baby girl named Susan Juliette. (more…)

The “spam king” was sentenced on Tuesday to 47 months in prison, with a ruling that the court hopes sends a message to other online criminals.

Robert Soloway, the man known as the spam king for the massive volume of spam he sent out, pleaded guilty to fraud, spamming and tax evasion after being indicted in May 2007. After an unusually long sentencing hearing lasting two-and-a-half days, Judge Marsha Pechman handed down her sentence in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington in Seattle. (more…)