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Fish Story - Are marketing people weird? You decide: Pepperidge Farm, which makes the fish-shaped snack cracker called Goldfish, took umbrage when competitor Nabisco said it would market a cracker based on the cartoon show Catdog. The cracker, shaped like a fish, was said to represent Catdog's "favorite snack." Pepperidge Farm threatened to sue but Nabisco got in first, filing suit to get the court to rule that a fish shape is generic and can't be trademarked. Two fish in court, duking it out with legal sharks behind them. [Wired News]
Fleeing Floyd - Residents along 400 miles of coastline -- from Miami to New Brunswick, Georgia -- are bracing for the onslaught of Hurricane Floyd, which is moving westward across the Atlantic and expected to make landfall sometime Wednesday. Floyd, currently packing winds of up to 155 mph, is on the verge of being declared a Category 5 hurricane, meaning that it is capable of inflicting catastrophic damage. Tens of thousands of people are being evacuated inland from the Florida coast and NASA is considering shutting down the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral. Forecasters expect Floyd to pack a bigger wallop than Hurricane Andrew did in 1992, when scores of people were killed, 160,000 were left homeless, and the damage was estimated at US$25 billion. [Wired News]
Flight of Fancy - Whether the guy was a terrorist, a prankster, or just some twit late for his flight, he certainly managed to do a number on United Airlines at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport Thursday. By suddenly bolting past a security checkpoint and vanishing into a crowd, he eluded the cops, who eventually gave up and shut down United's terminal as a precaution, canceling 131 flights and stranding more than 6,000 passengers. Things had still not returned to normal Friday morning, and airline officials said they expect confusion to reign until at least the afternoon. Meanwhile, the mystery streaker remains at large, leaving us with the disturbing image of a dozen donut-gorged cops sweating profusely as they try to catch the guy. The halt in pursuit of the lame, if you will. [Wired News]
Flight of Fancy? - Thanks to Europeans who liked to stick its tail feathers in their hats, the Huia bird of New Zealand has been extinct since the 1920s. Now, there's talk of reviving the species by cloning DNA taken from preserved specimens, just like scientists did with dinosaurs in Michael Crichton's science-fiction thriller, Jurassic Park. If the Huia ever reappears -- and there's a passionate ethical debate raging over the possibility -- scientists say that it won't be anytime soon. So all you milliners along the Rue St. Honore can just cool your jets. [Wired News]
Flipper Exposed - From the time of Aristotle, humans have looked to the dolphin as a peaceful and benevolent guardian of the sea. But that perpetual grin of the beloved marine mammal belies a seamy underbelly of disturbing behavior. Scientists have followed a bloody trail of clues to find that dolphins are cold-blooded killers, stabbing porpoises to death by the hundreds and smashing the skulls of their own offspring. What's worse, the killings aren't motivated by a need for food (most animal killers eat their prey) but by apparently murderous urges. Looks like they're more human than we ever imagined. [Wired News]
For the Record - With President Clinton's acquittal a foregone conclusion, you'd think the Senate would have the decency to keep it brief. But oh, no.... There will be no final impeachment vote on Thursday, as many had hoped, because the windbags in the Senate are dragging things out. Senators, it seems, have their eyes firmly fixed on their place in the history books: One freshman senator, a former congressman, called the session "one of the finer debates I have heard in 18 years in the House." Another described it as a "rewarding" experience. With everyone seemingly intent on coming off sounding like Daniel Webster, the vote is not expected until Friday. Time will tell. [Wired News]
Foul Ball - That ridiculous disruption in the baseball season known as interleague play begins this weekend, a marketing gimmick that brings National and American League teams together during the regular season under the pretext of encouraging geographical rivalries. This is Year Three of interleague play, but the players are beginning to grumble. "It's kind of weird," says Toronto Blue Jays outfielder Shawn Green. "We play Montreal six times and some American League teams only seven or eight games." If you're in third place, it's hard to pass the two teams ahead of you when you only see them seven or eight times all year. And with so few games, it's hard to foster rivalries of any kind. Heck of a way to run the national pastime, Bud. [Wired News]
French Avalanche - Two avalanches hit the town of Le Tour in the French Alps Tuesday, burying 11 chalets and raising fears that scores of people may have been trapped inside. Residents of Le Tour, near the popular ski resort of Chamonix, helped police and sensor-equipped rescue workers search for survivors. According to an Associated Press report, the avalanches occurred in mid-afternoon, only minutes apart. Heavy snows have caused problems in Europe since Friday: Tourists are reported snowbound in the Tirol region and emergency supplies have had to be flown into areas cut off in parts of Austria. [Wired News]
French Minister Dies - A week after suffering a heart attack during a live television broadcast of a French National Assembly debate, veteran MP Michel Crepeau died Tuesday in a Paris hospital. The assembly observed a minute of silence for Crepeau, 68, the head of the center-left Radical Left Party. President Jacques Chirac hailed him as a figure of French public life and Prime Minister Lionel Jospin said, "I have lost a friend." [Wired News]
From East to West - Three former stalwarts of the once formidable Warsaw Pact -- Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic -- joined NATO Friday, extending democratic hegemony in Europe up to the borders of Russia itself. Besides swelling the ranks of NATO to 19 member states, Friday's ceremony marks the first time that former Soviet bloc nations have joined the organization, founded in 1949 as a bulwark against communism. (Well, East Germany went in, too, but as part of a unified Germany.) While champagne glasses are clinking in the West, the Russians are not pleased. "The enlargement of the North Atlantic alliance will not promote a strengthening of trust and stability in international relations," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement. "On the contrary, it could lead to the appearance of new dividing lines. We do not want this to happen because it is not in the interests of the peoples of our continent." [Wired News]
Frozen in Time - Discusses three, well-preserved, 500-year-old mummies discovered by archeologists in the high Andes Mountains.
Funny Money - To the battleship, cannon, dog, horse and rider, iron, shoe, thimble, top hat, wheelbarrow, and race car, you can add a sack of money. Monopoly -- the venerable board game born during the Depression that teaches Americans to suckle at the breast of capitalism -- added its 11th game piece, and first in 47 years this week. "It was the release of the sack of money that sent the Dow over 10,000," joked Glenn Kilbride, Hasbro Games vice president, at a news conference Tuesday at the Museum of American Financial History near Wall Street. "We like to think we played a small part." Whether they did or not, the sack of money seems an apt metaphor for America's current financial climate. It was chosen in a public vote, beating out a biplane and a piggybank. [Wired News]
Geezer Squeezer - The 82-year-old actor who made a career out of warning supermarket shoppers "Please don't squeeze the Charmin" is making a comeback as Mr. Whipple. In 1978, television viewers ranked bathroom-tissue pitchman Dick Wilson as the third best-known American, behind former President Nixon and the Reverend Billy Graham. And why not? Mr. Whipple appeared for over 20 years in more than 500 commercials. [Wired News]
Go, Canada - Canadians have it better than people anywhere else in the world. That's according to a new United Nations survey of the best places to live on earth based on the quality of health care, life expectancy, education, income, and gender equality. Norway ranked second, followed by the United States, Japan, and Belgium. The five worst nations of the 174 countries surveyed? Sierra Leone ranked last, followed by Niger, Ethiopia, Burkina Faso, and Burundi. [Wired News]
Good Fella - There is still the formality of a runoff election, but Oscar Goodman isn't terribly concerned. He's going to be the next mayor of Las Vegas, and that's all there is to it. Goodman, who narrowly missed winning the job outright from a field of nine candidates, told supporters Tuesday night that "the result of this election is a foregone conclusion. I will be your next mayor." If that sounds a little brash, consider that Goodman, an attorney, made his reputation defending mob figures like Meyer Lansky and Tony "The Ant" Spilotro. Martin Scorsese liked Goodman enough to cast him as himself in the movie Casino. Brash? Certainly, but in a city like Vegas, brash just might fit the bill. [Wired News]
Gore Tosses Hat in Ring - Saying that he will deal with policy, not platitudes, in his campaign, Vice President Al Gore formally announced his candidacy for the top job Wednesday at a press conference in Carthage, Tennessee. Gore, saying he's been anxious to get the ball rolling for some time now, denied that the fast start by Republican contender George W. Bush had anything to do with the timing of his announcement. While only Bill Bradley stands between Gore and the Democratic nomination, Bush -- expected to easily win the GOP bid -- presents a formidable challenge. Some polls give Bush a 16 percentage-point lead over Gore in their projected head-to-head match-up. On the other hand, there are also 17 months until the presidential election. [Wired News]
Government Seeks Strippers - Stuart, a town on the Florida coast, faces such a critical exotic dancer shortage that it wants to import overseas talent. But as the high-tech industry found out when it tried to hire engineers from abroad, there are laws about things like that, namely the US Alien Labor Certification Program. Designed to protect American workers from losing jobs to foreigners, the law requires employers to search locally for help before looking abroad. So the state of Florida finds itself in a rather compromised position -- the state government is having to post a help-wanted ad on Stuart's behalf: "Exotic dancer 40 hrs per week, 7pm-3am. Four years experience in the job offered. Perform modern and acrobatic dances, coordinating body movements to musical accompaniment. Choreographs own dance movements." Interested? Just contact the Florida Department of Labor. [Wired News]
Graf Retires - Saying that she's done everything she wants to do in tennis and that the game isn't fun anymore, Steffi Graf made it official Friday: She's retiring. Graf, 30, who bridged the era between Martina Navratilova and Martina Hingis, was 13 when she turned pro in 1982. Her punishing stroke earned her the nickname "Fraulein Forehand" and carried her to 22 grand slam titles: seven Wimbledons, six French Opens, five US Opens, and four Australian Opens. Graf spent a record 377 weeks as the top-ranked woman player in the world. More coverage from Lycos. [Wired News]
Grass Takes Nobel - Guenter Grass, the 71-year-old German author famous for his candid writings about postwar Germany and the shame of Nazism with books like The Tin Drum, was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. [Wired News]
Green Acres - If you're a parent, a prospective parent, or even thinking about becoming a parent, then New England is the place for you. The Children's Rights Council released its latest list of the best places to raise kids and New England -- led by Maine -- swept the top five; Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, and New Hampshire followed in that order. Louisiana, along with the District of Columbia, finished dead last. The New Englanders were cited for their superior schools and relatively low poverty levels and teen birth rates, among other factors. Of course, your kids will grow up rooting for the Red Sox, which means enduring a lifetime of crushed hopes and unfulfilled dreams. [Wired News]
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