“Buy A Ticket. Don’t Lock Yourself In The Bathroom.” Negotiators called in to talk man out of SeaTac airport restroom.

Puppy Mills: Illegal in Washington State starting Friday.

Awwwwww: Father and daughter in Walla Walla reunited after 50 years.

Oh No! US and UK shut down embassies in Yemen after Al Qaeda threats.

Tough Times: About 1 in 50 Americans lives in a household that reports only food stamps as income.

But Somehow: Rick Warren raises $2.4 million after announcing the Saddleback Church’s $900,000 deficit.

Today In The Rapture: Biblical scholar Harold Camping uses math to predict coming of Christ in 2011, acknowledges error in 1994 prediction.

Happy New Year: US banks are rolling out more fees.

Of Course It Is: World’s tallest building is opening in Dubai.

In Brazil: Over 60 dead from mudslides.

Ultimatum: Iran sets a one-month deadline for the West to accept a UN counterproposal before going forward with nuclear fuel production.

Today In Little Things Attacking Big Things: Seagulls attacking whales in Argentina.

Pinball Cat! CHASE THAT BALL!

More in NEWS

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Suite Deal

The longest hotel strike in Washington state history is over now that workers at the downtown Embassy Suites have a contract.

41 replies on “The Morning News: Puppies, Yemen, Money, Seagulls”

  1. I for one, am just sick of waiting for the rapture. I say let’s get this over with and move on with our lives. Are we just supposed to sit around and wait for eternity to get to our eternal damnation? I for one am ALWAYS in favor of just making the commitment, rip the band aid off, and have done with it.

    Maybe this “recession” is really just a warm up for eternal damnation. Well, I’m ready, let’s get it on!

  2. Anyone else have a sick feeling that we are going to start a full blown war against Yemen? (well more of a war than we have already been waging up to now)

  4. Well, he came in some way shape or form. Maybe we’ll get some other well intentioned and totally irrelevant book that is open for very lose interpretation to get crammed down our throats.

    I’ll just throw this out there … maybe the bible will be fused with the King James translation of Harry Potter. I mean, he was nailed to the cross by his peers (metaphorically) … and he even rose from the dead! Like twice!

    Add a few hundred years, and people will really believe, that at least for a time, there was an underground world of wizards at the start of this millennium.

  5. Well, he came in some way shape or form. Maybe we’ll get some other well intentioned and totally irrelevant book that is open for very lose interpretation to get crammed down our throats.

    I’ll just throw this out there … maybe the bible will be fused with the King James translation of Harry Potter. I mean, he was nailed to the cross by his peers (metaphorically) … and he even rose from the dead! Like twice!

    Add a few hundred years, and people will really believe, that at least for a time, there was an underground world of wizards at the start of this millennium.

  6. if 2012 rolls by and the world hasn’t ended can we stop with all the end times/rapture nonsense? i mean, how many times does a single school of thought get to be totally and embarrassingly wrong before they’re formally asked to shut the fuck up?

  8. Are we just supposed to sit around and wait for eternity to get to our eternal damnation?

    You may want to read a book. Sitting by the heat lamp last night, no internet link, the back of my paper back – WHY – (year 1909) “at age 31 in the front ranks of important people on abstract mathematical theory”….

    WASTE – “….duality… trinity….has 5 centers…emotion, transport, instinct sex, thought…the…5 centers within…(locks a pentagram)…” MY – ” …the 6 pointed star….becoming… a circle of life…isolated from foreign….or accidental shocks….the Seal of Solomon LIFE – “seven fundamental tones of the octave…that is to say, the 8th step…with (intervals) and (additional shocks)… give nine…incorporating the do -of do re mi – we…ten steps”

    the weary woman scrawls cursively random words (read:masturbating) into a byte ridden machine, meanwhile getting shot by 10, 20, 4 pirated nomads…fortunately, a reformed health care buffalo bill has ridden into the outback, and randomly inserted an IV, killing her quicklesslier than u can say …re-in car nation

  9. I read somewhere that the first ten years or so of a new century always stirs up the rapture types. Now, with the internet, it will probably go on longer.

    Personally, it would seem to me that the idea that some higher power has to end the world on our schedule would be rather insulting to that deity. But that’s humanity for you: We tend to create God in our image, which means that he/she/it tends to be something of a jerk.

  10. you mean he/she it tends to be something of a party animal, lusty, funny, angry, sad, jerky, generous, loving, spiteful, benevolent, and scornful?

  15. Hey, maybe now that Rick Warren raised a bunch of money, he can delegate some resources to condemning the gay-killers in Uganda! Or, you know, taking any sort of action anywhere that would behoove a man of God. Charity, forgiveness, love, tikkun olam… something like that. No?

  16. My prediction: On January 2, 2012 Mr. Camping will note yet another “error” in his mathematical formula, and will announce the Rapture will really, really, really, thistimeforsure happen on April 24, 2015.

    On April 25, 2015 Mr. Camping will not make any announcement, having died of a brain embolism on February 17, 2014. Meanwhile, everyone else will have completely forgotten about his end-of-times prediction and go on with their lives.

  18. @9: It’s true.

    In the past, “animals doing funny stuff” were at first ignored, and then came the newsreels and cats were boxing to the delight of everyone who quickly forgot them. Later, you had the TV news which latched onto them like crazy with “and in lighter news, here’s a dog with its head stuck in a cereal box”, but people still forgot about it.

    Now I can’t go a week without seeing that damn image macro I made of the cat wearing goggles advocating the use of cocaine.

    The internet, indeed!

  20. “Today In The Rapture: Biblical scholar Harold Camping uses math to predict coming of Christ in 2011,”

    And in related news…Biblical scholar Harold Math uses coming to predict the camping of Christ in 2011.

  21. Urgutha @19: Yes, and for every chuckle we get from something like that, there are literally hundreds of comments from unregistered, piece-of-shit, asshole trolls we have to deal with.

  22. The Dubai-tallest-building story is on Huffington, which whenever I go to it is so slow and jerky and generally unnavigable as to be totally worthless. Very frustrating, as it seems like they have some good shit on there, from seeing it on my RSS feeds, but I usually ignore it. Anyone else have the same problem? Happy New Year to all, in case I forgot to say it!

  24. 21

    no- thousands

    I mean it-
    4 digit quantities of comments from unregistered, piece-of-shit, asshole trolls.

    Literally.

    THOUSANDS!!!

  25. As is to be expected Slog missed the real news-

    Yesterday’s Cotton Bowl where Mississippi upset #21 Oklahoma State.

    Everyone agrees on a few things about college football;
    the SEC* is the best,
    the Big12 are second best,
    the rest all wallow in the rear except the PAC which has it’s own special spot at the bottom of the suckpit.

    There were three head to head match-ups between SEC and Big12 schools this bowl season and it provides a good chance to see how the two top dogs are doing relative to each other.

    Of course the main attention is on the National Championship Game between Alabama and Texas.
    Look for Alabama to win and Florida (fresh off a 51-24 whupping of #4 Cincinnati that wasn’t that close) to come in at #2, giving the SEC the National Champ for about the 5th year in a row and the #1 and #2 for almost as many.

    But the runts in the SEC are doing their part-
    we already mentioned the Rebels’ upset win over the Cowboys; the third head to head pitted pitiful #8 in the conference Georgia against Texas A&M.
    The Dawgs (please note that the term is only appropriately used for the University of Georgia- check your AP Stylebook) salvaged a little pride by whalloping the Texans 44-20.

    In the interest of honesty let us note that it was a disappointing bowl season for the SEC, with an Alabama win probably going to end up 6-4 bowl record and a far cry from last year’s 8-1 record which is more what the Conference expects from itself. (still, sending 10 of your 12 teams to bowls isn’t too bad overall…)

    Bottom Line: SEC rules.

    (We knew you’d want to know…)

    .

    *South Eastern Conference, for you hipsters

    An Ode to the soon-to-be National Champions:
    (Turn It Up Loud-)

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWB_d1tWL…

  26. I suppose the SEC needs something for their illegitamite mutant children to aspire to …

    And more stadiums with bleachers that can withstand 3 ton capacity for their obese spectators.

    I mean, I love football as much as the next red blooded American. But how much respect can I give to state where it’s main economic stimulus, is COLLEGE FOOTBALL! like Alabama.

    And places like Texas, where you couldn’t get the grades from primary and secondary ed in their public school system to get into a texas state college, UNLESS YOU PLAY FOOTBALL.

    I worship football on weekends, and in the meantime, I have a job (or should have a job) in a research lab.

  27. 26
    who do you pull for?
    the prospect of a Washington State hipster who “worships” football fills me with unspeakable sadness.
    Being a football fan in Washington must be like the, what, 12th circle of Hell?…

  28. 26
    Football is good for the economy, true.
    But building Mercedes-Benz and BMW and Toyota vehicles trucks helps, as well.
    And building Boeing 787s pays a few of the bills.

  29. @27

    your notion is correct, here we think all football fans are deranged morons.

    And we be right in that, too.

    “Have a nice day!”

  30. I’m from the northeast, I root for the Giants. Point a gun to my head, and I probably would STILL not move back to Oregon. But I root for the Ducks. I was very appreciative and respectful of the condolence and RESPECT given to Oregon by the OSU coach, as to the deranged psycho babble one expect from say University of Florida, but whatever.

    In hindsight, I should have played pro-football, I certainly have the build and athleticism. I would have had more a chance of employment, less isolation, than science … go figure.

    Not really hipster, sorry …

    A fun organic chemistry fact?

    http://www.und.com/trads/rockne.html

    Apparently he was a great organic chemist, but I can’t figure out what the hell he did (he was mentioned in my organic chemistry textbook.)

    Apparently his legacy as a football player and coach trumps his legacy as a chemist. I just like Seattle, because I can work the stupid hours as scientist, but I don’t have to befriend the insufferable bastards that lurk in organic chemistry labs without soap, sleep, or sanity.

  31. They SAY the recovery might happen here in Seattle, but I’ll be honest. I don’t no where this “stimulus” money is being spent for sciences, I know virtually no one, on any coast that has been hired for a research job, teaching job, or fellowship, whatever job since last September that didn’t have their Ph. D. for at least 10 years or was from China.

    Hell, I can move concrete forms with the best of them, I’m no fucking pansy, but they aren’t hiring either …

  32. @21,
    True, but it’s easy to ignore the boring trolls after reading a few words and the chuckles are a good enough trade off (for me, at least).

  33. 30
    sorry, the hipster crack was low.
    anyone who deals with organic (as opposed to barely surviving it) has my respect.

  34. @31

    that’s weird, South Lake Union Biomedicine is supposedly booming. All those guinea pigs and hamsters waiting to be gutted for the benefit of the benevolent Pharmaceutical companies. They’re all over the nightly news telling us about arthritis and cholesterol and how we should consult with our doctors about how many milligrams we should injest. Those hundreds of poor cute little scalpel-slayed and splayed hamsters. Maybe you can move to Concrete, WA and get some work. There, they slaughter dozens of elk every year.

  37. Interesting that the ‘researchers’ are favoring the whales over the gulls.

    Guess they are a bit like Obama and Benanke — protecting the big guy from the little guy…

  38. biotech is not the same as organic chem …

    The techniques are actually quite easier, all the organic chemistry comes in prepackaged kits. I used to be a biochemist, but I was annoyed that all my chemistry was done for me already. Instead I learned to make many of the specialty dyes that are put into their kits (among other things). That’s a pretty wild industry, several grams can account for millions of dollars worth of inventory!

    Although biotech is booming, it hasn’t translated into hiring (just like everything else in this country.) ESPECIALLY at the Ph. D. level.

  41. @ #36. Yoyr friend should be safe in his sauna as long as there are no ersatz gurus around like James Arthur Ray. I wonder how he will do as a spiritual advisor to his fellow inmates.

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