weekend news roundup

Cricket coach was poisoned and strangled, police believe
*Bob Woolmer knew hotel-room killer
*He was ready to expose corruption
*Fixing enquiry into Ireland game
- The Daily Telegraph

Poison again - well, at least this time it's unlikely to be polonium. But now a possible crime from the past is emerging:

Family to test Houdini’s body for poison “Descendants of Harry Houdini announced plans to exhume his remains following claims he was poisoned.” - The Daily Telegraph

Houdini died suddenly in 1926 – an international conspiracy of spiritualists is suspected. Houdini mocked the spiritualists. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, a keen spiritualist, wrote that Houdini would “get his just desserts very exactly meted out”.

Gay British men pay fertility clinic £33,000 for designer babies - Sunday Times. The Fertitilty Institutes, the clinic in Los Angeles runs the programme. A Gay baby boom!

the tell-tail clue to decoding dog behaviour – it’s how they wag ‘em - Dogs wag their tails to the right when they see something fmiliar, such as their owner, and to the left when confronted with something they want to run away from, it was revealed yesterday. The bias is subtle, requiring video analysis to spot.” - The Daily Telegraph

Will Italy’s laws to cut bad driving get lost in the traffic?
5,000 died, 330,000 injured on Italian roads last year. - The Daily Telegraph

I wonder how the figures compare to the UK's? As a pedestrian, I would like to praise Italian drivers - they are amazingly polite and chivalrous towards idiotic tourist pedestrians. Totally unlike the French or British. A British pedestrian's life is very miserable. Just yesterday I got hooted at by an irate driver while I was crossing the street in front of my own home - miles away from his speeding car.

Lowry's dark imagination comes to light - The Observer. Disturbing and sexually deviant drawings have remained hidden since the iconic British painter's death in 1976.
Hmmm. LS Lowry left his entire estate to a teenage girl fan. I'm actually not a fan of his stuff.

Tate buys women's art for sex equality - The Sunday Times. The Tate does not possess a single Georgia O'Keefe or Frida Kahlo.

"Silicon Valley's dot-com era may be givig way to the watt-com era. Out of the ashes of the Internet bust, many technology veterans have regrouped and found a new mission in alternative energy: developing wind power, solar panels, ethanol plants and hydrogen-powered cars." - The New York Times


Fyffes warns of dearer bananas “Britain’s favourite food – the humble banana – is set to increase in price after Fyffes, one of the world’s largest importers, said it would pass on soaring costs of production to consumers.” - The Daily Telegraph