MONDAY, JANUARY 8 This week of flaming ladies, fatal games, and galling presidential hubris kicks off today with a biblical vision of the apocalypse from Austin, Texas, where the fallen carcasses of over 60 dead birds led to the closure of several downtown streets this morning. Details come from the Associated Press, which identified the dead birds as grackles, sparrows, and pigeons and reported that bird flu was quickly ruled out as a potential cause of death. "It sounds most like a poisoning, if I had to guess," said veterinarian Jacob Mireles, whose guess seems like a good one. Preliminary tests found no dangerous chemicals in the area, and the AP reports that many downtown Austin business owners considered the birds "a nuisance." R.I.P., annoying birds of Austin.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 9 The week continues with the harrowing mystery of the woman, the elevator, and the fire, courtesy the Seattle Times. The saga began not long after midnight, when firefighters responded to a fire alarm at downtown Seattle's Marriott-Waterfront hotel, where fire investigators found a severely burned woman inside an elevator and not a lot of answers as to how she came to be there. The most significant clues come from a hotel guest booked on the same floor as the unnamed woman. The guest reported smelling smoke, hearing a fire alarm, then evacuating his room—at which point he found a pile of burning clothes on the hall floor, and investigators found the horribly burned and presumably naked woman in the fifth-floor elevator. With burns to 60 percent of her body, the woman was rushed to Harborview, where she was listed in satisfactory condition. Investigators believe the aborted self-immolation may have been a suicide attempt. (You know what's worse than burning yourself to death? Surviving an attempt to burn yourself to death. Best wishes to the mystery woman and her skin grafts.)

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 10 Speaking of stories that make your butthole clench: Today President George W. Bush took to the airwaves to outline his new plan for the ongoing nightmare in Iraq. Dubya's remedy for the almost-four-years-and-counting military action that's brought the deaths of more than 3,000 U.S. soldiers: More troops—over 21,000 more—to be deployed at a cost of $5.6 billion. "[T]o step back now would force a collapse of the Iraqi government, tear the country apart, and result in mass killings on an unimaginable scale," said Bush through his patented monkey-in-trouble serious face. "Such a scenario would result in our troops being forced to stay in Iraq even longer and confront an enemy that is even more lethal. If we increase our support at this crucial moment, and help the Iraqis break the current cycle of violence, we can hasten the day our troops begin coming home." Never mind that "the current cycle of violence" is largely the result of the U.S.'s falsely premised invasion of Iraq; Bush is too busy spinning the biggest con in contemporary military history to fuss with intricacies. As for the wealth of existing and forthcoming casualties: "We mourn the loss of every fallen American," said the commander in chief. "And we owe it to them to build a future worthy of their sacrifice." (Which means we'll keep sending troops to be killed so that the families of already-dead soldiers don't feel worse—clearly a winning strategy.) Lucky for Last Days, the task of calling bullshit on Bush was taken up by far-more-qualified subjects than us. "I think this speech given last night by this president represents the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam," said Republican senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, whose misgivings were echoed by Democratic senator Bill Nelson of Florida: "I have not been told the truth over and over again by administration witnesses, and the American people have not been told the truth."

THURSDAY, JANUARY 11 Speaking of international embarrassments: The week continues with the Zeitgeist-defining hubbub out of Federal Way, Washington, where a complaint from an evangelical parent led to a ban on all school-related screenings of Al Gore's global-warming documentary An Inconvenient Truth. "Condoms don't belong in school, and neither does Al Gore," said Frosty Hardison, a parent of seven who told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer that he believes the Earth is 14,000 years old. "The Bible says that in the end times everything will burn up, but that perspective isn't in the DVD." Bolstering Hardison's lunacy is the Federal Way School District policy "Controversial Issues, Teaching of," which says in part, "It is the teacher's responsibility to present controversial issues that are free from prejudice and encourage students to form, hold, and express their own opinions without personal prejudice or discrimination." To honor the policy, the school board will now require teachers who want to show An Inconvenient Truth to present a "credible, legitimate opposing view" to the film's backed-by-the-vast-majority-of-reputable-scientists findings. (What on earth would qualify as a "credible, legitimate opposing view" to the science of global warming? Creationist cartoons? Pixar's Cars?) Whatever the case, congratulations to the Federal Way School Board for making the Pacific Northwest the laughingstock of the enlightened world, and for bending over backward to appease parents who are clearly worth the trouble: "From what I've seen [of the movie] and what my husband has expressed to me, if [the movie] is going to take the approach of 'bad America, bad America,' I don't think it should be shown at all," said mother Gayle Hardison to the P-I. "If you're going to come in and just say America is creating the rotten ruin of the world, I don't think the video should be shown."

FRIDAY, JANUARY 12 Following Tuesday's tale of the woman whose life was imperiled by too much fire, today brings another element-specific horror story, starring the woman who died after drinking too much water. Details come from the Associated Press, which reports that 28-year-old Jennifer Strange was set on her path to fatal waterlogging by a contest sponsored this morning by a California radio station. Entitled "Hold Your Wee for a Wii," the contest rewarded the competitor who could drink the most water without urinating with a Nintendo Wii video-game system. "They told us if you don't feel like you can do this, don't put your health at risk," said one of Strange's fellow contestants to the AP. Clearly, Strange "felt like she could do it," and paid the big price for her presumption. This afternoon, Strange's body was found by her mother at her Sacramento home, and a preliminary investigation uncovered evidence "consistent with a water intoxication death." The moral: No matter the liquid, competitive drinking is always a bad idea.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 13 Nothing happened today.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 14 The week ends with noble defeat, as the Seattle Seagulls lost in overtime to the lucky-field-goal-kicking Chicago Bears. R.I.P., dreams of Super Bowl 2007, and thanks to the mighty Seagulls for an intoxicating week of sports-related civic pride, which helped take the sting off the bullshit that went down in Federal Way. recommended

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