The Sunlight is Making Me Paranoid - Near Suicidal

Elefant had this song a few years back. Little did they know, paranoia was the least of their concerns.

Too much sunlight in places like Greenland where long summer days often cause insomnia appears more likely to drive a person to suicide, Swedish researchers said Friday.

Despite a belief that suicides tend to rise in late autumn and early winter months because of darkness, the new findings suggest that places where constant sunlight in summer seasons is a fact of life may be just as dangerous.

The Swedish team studied the seasonal variation of suicides in all of Greenland from 1968 to 2002 and found a cluster of suicides in the summer months.

This seasonal effect was especially pronounced in the north of the country -- an area where the sun doesn't set between the end of April and the end of August.

"We found that suicides were almost exclusively violent and increased during periods of constant day," Bjorksten said in a statement.

"In the north of the country, 82 percent of the suicides occurred during the daylight months."

Most of the suicides involved young men and were violent -- such as shooting, hanging and jumping from high places. These kinds of deaths accounted for nearly all, about 95 percent, of the suicides.

The article goes on to say a lack of seratonin and the combination of no sleep, drives people to kill themselves. Note to self, sleep more and order curtains. And people wonder why I hate the outdoors.

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Snakes...Why Did It Have to be Snakes?

I'm the Asian Indiana Jones. When I was a kid, I made my mom pray at night with me. Amongst a list that included God's prevention of robbers and fires, snakes under my bed were very high on the list. I hate those things.

Well, remind me not to go to TGI Fridays anytime soon. Not only is that spiky blonde haired obnoxious guy from Top Chef their spokesperson, the voice over in the commercial is annoying. And now this:

The US restaurant chain T.G.I. Friday's has asked the New York State Police to open a criminal investigation into suspected product tampering after a severed snake head was found among vegetables.

As part of the investigation, the head was sent to an independent laboratory for testing, and the lab said the snake's head was never cooked.

It has been concluded that the head was placed in the food at some point after the cooking process, the company said.

Best believe I would have freaked out and thrown some type of temper tantrum if this had happened. And I'd probably start calling my mom and asking her to pray that snakes weren't under my bed.

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Say What? (IMMEDIATE UPDATE)

I love 30 Rock. I'm proud to say that I watched the show from the first episode. Although I rarely watch TV anymore because of my life-crushing, socially-demoralizing schedule, I plan to change that in the very near future.

Anyway, I will say that there is a lot of Tina Fey (man, she's SOOOOOOOOO hot; #1 celeb crush right there) speak that may confuse at time. Solution? A lovely translator developed by the good folk at Yahoo!

Menendez
verb: To go crazy and kill one's father.
Usage: "Don't Menendez me." -- Tracy Jordan

Awse
adjective: Shortened form of "Awesome"; a term popular amongst massive jerks.

Usage: "Awse!" – Dennis

an example of the translator in play through a demonstration via gchat.

me: http://tv.yahoo.com/blog/30-rock-a-glossary-of-the-shows-unique-slang--301

Jim: awse

me: I understand what you were trying to say

Today, I feel a little bit more complete.

Immediate update: the fact that Tina Fey is really the only one that showed up in the photo was a mistake. But a very pleasant and awse mistake

Peruse the News

Virtual Fence Virtually a Reality: the Federal Government is ready to install a virtual fence along the border of Mexico in the coming weeks. It has sensors and cameras and is designed to detect illegal drug smugglers and illegal immigrants. Ummm, are they aware about the underground tunnels? This seems extremely primitive and yet it would wholly defeat the concept of installing an above-ground virtual fence. Will it really solve the problem?

Cough Cough, Run Run: naturally, people are getting more deceptive in their ways of cheating the law. Such techniques for entering the country illegally include: faking illness to get to hospital then running, packing ones' self in a suit case, posing as a DHL driver with a fake DHL van, and getting inside a pinata. Apparently just running across isn't a successful strategy. I'd be screwed if I got deported.

Foods to Eat for Your Brain; Foods Not to Eat for Your Brain: who knew, alcohol doesn't sharpen your senses. Salmon is also good for making you think faster. Allegedly.

Somebody's Watching Tom Brady and other celebrities in Massachusetts: Bunch of bored cops with nothing better to do. I will say that if one person deserves to have his right's violated, it's Captain Dreamboat.

Murdoch, Still a Money Grubbing Jackass; Nothings Free in Life: But he's got a point. As Newspapers struggle to survive with the surging internet media, Murdoch says that Newscorp will begin charging for content. Good thing I don't like foxnews. But I do like foxsports.com. I hope he doesn't start charging for that. As newspapers and print journalists struggle to survive, will this really help? Will he create a trend? Or will people just go elsewhere for their news?

Speaking of print journalism.

David Simon on the Accountability Aspect of Print Journalism and the Police: The mastermind behind the Wire, Homicide: Life on the Streets, Generation Kill and a few other "coming soon" shows on HBO still manages to find time to write for the Washington Post, on occassion. A great read about the dynamic between print journalism and the police (and I guess any other government agency that the media covers). When we think of the internet, we can see so many positives. But Simon does a good job of pointing out some of the losses that come with the decline of the newspaper.

Manny Suffers from Erectile Dysfunction: I'm guessing this has something to do with combating the adverse effects of prior steroid use. Although he says he's tested clean in 15 other Performance Enhancing drug tests.

You Can Teach an Old Dog....How to Wear Sunglasses: this dog is 21 years old. In human years. By dog years, I think she's like a million. That's just off the top of my head. I don't have a calculator in front of me. But something tells me, my guess is pretty accurate.

Time to Go Old Man: Alleged Nazi war criminal will not be protected by the Supreme Court of the United States. The Court denied his stay of deportation. Now he has to face the music. 29,000 counts of murder from WWII crimes. His lawyers claimed he was too frail and ill to travel overseas. I could write a lot more on what a douche bag this guy is. But the SC has already thrown him to the wolves. And rightfully so.

Please note, I obviously suck at writing headlines or headline-looking phrases.

Question of the Day

Q: OMG What did I just do?

I don't know where else to turn, help me Yahoo! Users. I think I've done something very wrong. I have been really worried about this swine flu. I live near the Mexican boarder in Cali. I have (or had) a pet pig and I just fed it a whole bottle of pain killers so he would die and I wouldn't get the swine flu from him. :( I think I overreacted. My parents come home in 2 hours. What should I do?! Need help ASAP.

Best Answer: thats just wrong go outside ( or where ever u keep it) and shove ur finger down its throat to make it throw up NOW!!

via thedrunkcanuck

Manny Being Manny - The Drug User

Normally, under any other circumstance, I'd say, "WHAT AN IDIOT" if a player got caught for currently using steroids. Except this time it's Manny Ramirez. And it's not surprising. It's another case of "Manny Being Manny." I just don't get how you could be this oblivious to the modern era's testing programs. Did he think he was going to get a pass? Did he think the drug wasn't going to show up in his tests?

The best part (aside from the fact that he's not with the Sox and we have Jason Bay who has done a good job of replacing him without the antics or the extremely high price tag)?

Citing a source familiar with the matter, The Times reported Ramirez is expected to say the positive test results were a result of medication received from a doctor for a personal medical issue.

I love that they already have the excuse ready to go. Guess we'll have to wait until this develops further, but man, this is awesome. Mostly because this is LA's headache and not Boston's. Now if only Kobe could get a suspension for elbowing Ron Ron, my day would be complete.

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Hebrews 11:1

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do
not see.

Sent via mobile phone.

More Reasons Why ESPN Sucks

Good ol' Hannah Storm did the recap of the Bo Sox Yankees game. In referring to Johnny Damon's homerun off of Josh Beckett, Storm said something to the effect of "Johnny Damon returning the favor against his former teammate." Ummm, Ms. Storm, NOT QUITE.

Damon left to go to the Yankees in 2005. Beckett arrived in 2006. So, they were not teammates. But you knew that Hannah Storm, right? How about you producers?

I have really not been a fan of the live Sportscenter program. While it's great that they can change up the programming, Josh Elliot and Hannah Storm are extremely terrible. Elliot makes little snide remarks and conducts terribly biased and loaded interviews. The show feels more like a TMZ-type show as opposed to sports news coverage. But then again, that's kind of ESPN in general these days.


By the way, Sage Steel is AWESOME and actually does a good job. So I guess all is not lost. oh except I can't find her bio on Sportscenter's web site.

Tuesday's Second-Degree Embarrassment

This guy actually made his own Wolverine claws. Then he proceeded to move like Wolverine. And stab a cardboard box. This is second-hand embarrassment (or embarrassment to the second-degree) at its finest.

Homemade Real Wolverine Like Claws X-Men - The funniest videos clips are here

Hello Today

I've Been Waiting for This for a While

shameful?

Awesomeness! Carl Lewis, oh how you give me second-hand embarrassment.