This Week's News

I've been a little bit out of it this week, so I've caught up on the news and thought I'd share a few highlights.

The big two items are the rate cut and Microsoft bidding on Yahoo!. See links regarding how this is even remotely relevant to our own life. But there's other news that happened this week that didn't fit the place where all the news fits. If you know what I mean...

Some workers at a slaughterhouse had a Raskolnikov moment and kicked, beat, shocked, dragged, and otherwise tortured "downed" cows. The slaughterhouse is part of Hallmark Meat Packing Co. and Westland Meat Co.. The USDA is investigating, this was all caught on video mind you, and large fast food joints have pulled all beef from them. NYC's school district has pulled burgers alltogether. One video? Wasn't Schlosser's Fast Food Nation enough, we need YouTube? Not that it's on YouTube, I don't know, it's just the idea of, oh look what a cool thing for me to videotape.

Massachusettes is suing Merrill Lynch after the city of Springfield (hi F & J!) lost 13 million out of a 14 million investment. Again, highly rated bull$hit investments. I've decided to stop using the hyphenated word sub-prime, and just say bogus or bull$hit.

Credit cards and auto loans are expected to see a sharp rise in 2008. Well, sometimes news is simply unsurprising.

Here's a fun one, Why Is the National Debt Out of Control? For my final question I'd like to use my lifeline, dialing the White House now...

Getting a little local, NYC is spending some of its $151 million Homeland Security money to arm police in subways with MP5 submachine guns and bomb sniffing dogs. 24/7/365. They will be on platforms and trains, focusing on Penn Station, Herald Square, Columbus Cirlce, Rockefeller Center, Times Square and Atlantic Avenue (in Brooklyn). Greeaaaat. I feel safe already. So from now on people, never put your hands in your pockets (because you might accidentally get shot taking them out if asked to raise your hands) and whatever you do, no more running to catch your train. You might get shot on the way. Just kidding. The NYPD would never mistakenly shoot a citizen. Especially at 800 rounds per minute.

And to end on a high note, the World's Hottest Chili is the bhut jolokia chili pepper, burning your palate at a heat index rate 200 times that of a jalapeño.

"When you eat it, it feels like dying," touts one online retailer. Even packaging the stuff is a pain. "Our workers wear goggles, face masks, head cover and protective clothing," says Ananta Saikia, whose firm is the pepper's sole exporter. "They look like astronauts." He and his wife have started shipping tons of dried bhut jolokia around the world, including Germany, England and the U.S. Annual sales, he says, are expected to jump 500% this year.

I once made a pasta sauce with an orange scotch bonnet. The carnivore that I am, I picked it from our roof garden thinking that it was a not-fully-grown orange pepper, a tasty but benignly hot pepper. I didn't get a clue when my eyes watered with the first slice on the cutting board (must be a delayed reaction to the onion chopping), nor did I get a clue when my nose started running when the sauce was simmering (must be coming down with a cold). No, my clue came with the first bite. Yes, it felt like death. So this bhut pepper shall remain, unless I make some other mistake and don't notice my fingertips peeling off when I first pick it up, the pepper which was never tasted by PiggyBankBlues.

photo by DogFromSPACE via flickr