For the particularly proud country dweller perhaps, having a cockerel quintet who make their raucous dawn squawks 74 times in seven minutes might be something to crow about.

But not for the neighbours of Roy and Valerie Rylands.

Their complaints that the noise wakes them as early as 2.30am were placed before magistrates yesterday.

Neighbour Roger Morgan called in council noise abatement officials, who logged the farmyard five-piece crowing 112 times in 20 minutes and 74 times in a seven-minute period.

The council officer ordered the Rylands to keep their birds quiet after agreeing that the crowing was intrusive, incessant and would disturb sleep.

But the Rylands, of Bwlch-y-ffridd, near Newtown, mid Wales, went to court to appeal against the ruling.

Jonathan Salmon, for Powys county council, told magistrates in Welshpool yesterday: ‘Its very easy to be flippant about it but that doesn’t do justice to any party in these proceedings.


‘The council receive a number of complaints each year about crowing cockerels. One might say they are the rural equivalent of the burglar alarm that keeps going off in the night.

‘The issue is whether noise amounting to a statutory nuisance has existed at these premises.’

Mr Rylands, 67, and his 69-year-old wife have 106 acres and keep 55 hens and five cockerels named Boris (after London mayor Boris Johnson), Barack Obama, Jet, Rusty and John.

Outside court, he said: ‘We are running a farm. We’ve had hens for years. If we don’t win this, we will be put out of business. The only way to stop them crowing is to eat them.’






Source: Dailymail

As shaggy dog stories go, the one about Norman the very bright Briard who is a wizz riding his scooter ranks high on the list.

The clever canine, who lives with the Cobb family in Canton, Georgia, competes in many obedience competitions and received his Companion Dog Title at just 15 months of age after four first place finishes.
But it's his razor scooter that has remained the pooch's passion since he was a mere pup when his owner, Karen Cobb, took him out for his first spin.

'He began playing with the kid's scooter in the backyard and we thought it would be fun to give him a ride on it,' says Karen. 'Then we decided to teach him to push it, and now he loves riding his scooter.'


His scooting antics have already made him popular on the Internet, and his Facebook page has quite a following.
Norman, now 20 months old, has even attracted the attention of television show host and comedian David Letterman and last month made an appearance on Stupid Pet Tricks on The Late Show.

Briards originate from France and their recognised talents include search and rescue, police work, military work, herding, watchdogging and guarding, but they also also make excellent companions, finding favour with Napoleon and Thomas Jefferson.







Source: Dailymail

An electric chair called Old Sparky, a Ku Klux Klan robe and hood and a cage that mental patients used to be locked up in will go on display in a museum.

The exhibit at Ohio's Historical Centre entitled 'Controversy: Pieces You Don't Normally See' is spotlighting the artefacts from the more provocative side of the state's history.

Curator Sharon Dean said: 'History definitely isn't always pretty.


'The more we can stare some of things that aren't so pretty in the face, I think the more we can have honest, open discussions and start really working through some issues that, to date, have been fairly difficult.'

Old Sparky was used to execute 312 men and three women between 1897 and 1963.

The last time members of the general public could see the chair was when the old Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus offered tours, which ended in the early 1930s.

The prison sold postcards of the electric chair and souvenir pictures of the condemned men until it discontinued the tours.

The chair replaced hanging in 1897 as Ohio's method of execution.

According to the Columbus Dispatch, William Haas, 17, from Hamilton County, was the first to die in the hand-fashioned wood-and-steel chair. Donald Reinbolt, 29, of Columbus, was the last to be electrocuted, on March 15, 1963.

The electric chair was replaced by lethal injection as the state's sole means of execution in 2001. It was donated to the Ohio Historical Society in 2002 and has been in storage since.

Up close, the chair shows ominous signs of 66 years as the machinery of death.

The wooden arms, gripped by hands of the condemned, and the cushioned headrest are well-worn. But the leather bands that circled prisoners' wrists and metal ones that bound their ankles look like new.

Ms Dean said: 'If you look closely, it does show signs of wear on it, that a lot of people have, in fact, sat in it. But it's been maintained very well.'

Other pieces on display at the Columbus museum from April 1 until November 20 are a 150-year-old sheepskin condom found in the diary of a steamboat captain and an aluminium mitt used in the early 20th century to stop children from sucking their thumbs.

The wooden cage used to hold state mental patients is from the late 1800s.

Ms Dean said: 'It's a cage that was used for humans. The proper term was a crib-bed, and even at that time they found that it was a difficult restraint to use on people.'

Children under 18 will be barred from visiting the exhibit unless accompanied by an adult.

The items will be displayed with bare-bones identifying labels in a small room fitting not more than 20 people – to let the objects speak for themselves and to encourage visitors to talk about them, museum officials said.

Executive director of the Ohio Historical Society, Burt Logan, who oversees the historical centre, said: 'We think this is one of the attributes of this exhibit, to generate conversations about complex issues in Ohio's history.

"'History has a good side, which we often remember, and another side that we don't often see. We are not taking a stand of any type with this collection.

'These items represent part of the history of Ohio. It's purely an educational issue.'

The museum usually sticks to more traditional exhibits and this R-Rated one is expected to draw a large crowd.







Source: Dailymail

Investigators say a Ferndale woman masqueraded as her dead mom to keep pension checks rolling in.

Detectives say Loewen B. Craft collected $145,000 in retirement funds.

Craft's adopted daughter says the scheme had been going on for years.

"It is bizarre," said Arielle Stanwyck. "She would wear large glasses to impersonate my grandmother. She would even wear makeup on her face to wear liver spots to look old and look like my grandmother."


Investigators say four years ago, Craft checked her mom, Betty Becker, into a hospital under a fake name. When her 90-year-old mom died a short time later, investigators say Craft kept collecting pension checks from Chevron oil.

"Once the police talked to me, they used the word 'fraud' and 'embezzlement,' " said Becker's caregiver Bonnie Vanfossen. "And (Craft) admitted to me that yes, she was cashing her mother's checks."

At one point, Chevron got suspicious that Becker had died. Investigators say Craft entered banks wearing the disguise and carrying an ID card in her dead mother's name.

It worked to keep the accounts open.

A detective stumbled upon the suspected fraud while investigating an unrelated case. The bank froze the accounts, called police, and invited Craft to come back.

Surveillance photos show her wearing the wig and heavy make-up. Detectives arrested her on the spot.

She's now in jail, suspected of identity theft, criminal impersonation and multiple counts of forgery.

The caregiver says Craft couldn't work after she broke her leg and became too sick from diabetes. She says those pension checks were her only lifeline.

"And one month led to two, and two months led to three. And eventually we got four or five years down the line and she probably got so deep in it, she didn't know what else to do."





Source: Komonews

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

Boy's bedroom features rope ladder to timber pirate ship
Badly behaved shipmates can be locked away in wrought-iron jail
Crew can escape through two-storey spiral slide, or down rope ladder into closet
It looks like every little boy's dream idea of their perfect bedroom.
But this is in fact one extremely lucky six-year-old's very own pirate ship room, complete with rope bridge, crow's nest and a two-storey hidden slide.
This ultimate in cool sleeping quarters was created by designer Steve Kuhl, and also features a wrought-iron jail cell and hidden rope ladder access to the closet.

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

The bedroom was chosen by its owner in Minnesota from a selection of a space ship, racing car, castle and the pirate ship.
Mr Kuhl, who owns Kuhl Design Build, used two large planks to construct the hull of the ship before covering them with layers of plywood as the deck planking.
A mixture of plaster and epoxy resin was then used for the ship's hull.
There is also a spiral slide which is accessed through a hole at the top and comes out in a sports court on the bottom floor of the house.
No doubt the proud owner will not be short of friends.

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

Ultimate Pirate Bedroom for Lucky Six Year Old

On Thursday in West Baton Rogue, LA a sex offender underwent castration to gain his freedom from prison. The surgery took place at LSU Earl K. Long Medical Center.

Francis Phillip Tullier, 78, from West Baton Rogue, was convicted of molesting three different girls hundreds of times during the time spanning from the 1970s to the 1990s. He pleaded to three counts of child molestation in 1999 and was sentenced to 27 years in prison.

As part of his sentencing, the court declared that the paedophile would be eligible for parole only if he under went a surgical castration procedure and only if he paid for it himself.

According to a sheriff's investigator Tullier's surgery had been delayed several years because Tullier was treated for several medical issues.

Tullier is expected to be released next week and will be on parole as a registered sex offender, living in Iberville Parish.

There are 12 US states which allow for surgical castration as a punishment for repeat sex offenders.

Jesus said, spoke of "eunuchs" who were born with birth defects, others who were made eunuchs by men, (those serving kings or for punishment), and others "eunuchs" who were not literally eunuchs, but dedicated their lives to the service of God.
Source: Examiner

Shocking study reveals UK has one CCTV for every 32 people

It's an astonishing statistic that is sure to send chills down the spines of freedom campaigners.
In Big Brother Britain there is an incredible one CCTV camera for every 32 citizens, a study has revealed.
The revelation that 1.85 million cameras are watching our every move confirms the shocking extent of surveillance in 21st century Britain.
Coming a day after it emerged tiny drones could be used to spy on Britons, the CCTV study is sure to add fuel to the debate that we have become a Big Brother state.The research involved police community support officers counting every camera in Cheshire and extrapolating the results nationwide to provide a reliable estimate of the level of CCTV surveillance in the UK.
Officers counted 12,333 cameras in the area, according to a study published in CCTV Image magazine, the majority of which were inside premises, rather than facing public street.
The research also found that most CCTV cameras in the UK are likely to be privately owned, with only 504 of Cheshire’s cameras run by public bodies.
After the Cheshire results were extrapolated nationwide, taking into account urban and rural areas and transport networks, the number of cameras was adjudged to be 1,853,681 – enough for one camera for every 32 citizens in the UK.Despite the proliferation of CCTV cameras, police admit that just one crime is solved for every 1,000 cameras.
Deputy Chief Constable Graeme Gerrard, the lead on CCTV for the Association of Chief Police Officers said the latest numbers, based on a map of CCTV systems in Cheshire, were intended to ‘inject more rigorous figures into the debate’ over Britain as a surveillance state.
A widely quoted estimate of 4.2 million cameras in the UK was based on a 1.5km road in a busy shopping district and extrapolated out for the entire UK, he explained.
And the previous estimate that the ‘average Briton is caught on security cameras some 300 times a day was based on a fictional tour of CCTV hot-spots.
However, he admitted: ‘The figure of 1.85m is still a significant number of CCTV cameras.
‘I'm not saying for a minute that this doesn't mean that we don't have a lot of cameras.’
Mr Gerrard confirmed he was surprised to learn of other research which suggested the London underground network houses as many as 11,000 cameras.
Writing in CCTV Image, Mr Gerrard added: ‘Eight years after the 4.2 million figure was first published, we now have research that indicates that the figure is less than half this guesstimate.
‘We also know that unless you make a particular point of visiting as many CCTV hotspot areas as you can, you are unlikely to be captured on CCTV 300 times a day.'
He admitted the latest figures were still estimates, but said they showed the number of CCTV cameras in the UK to be around 1.85 million.
‘And the real figure for the number of times the average person is likely to be 'caught' on CCTV in a day is less than 70 - and most of these will be at your workplace or fleeting glimpses by cameras located in shops’.
However, Isabella Sankey, director of policy at the campaign group Liberty, said the figures would do little to allay concerns about surveillance in Britain.
‘Who cares if there is one camera or 10 on their street if that one camera is pointing into your living room?’ she asked the Guardian.
‘Concerns about CCTV are not a simple numbers game; what's required is proper legal regulation and proportionate use.’
Read More: Dailymail

MANAMA, Bahrain – Troops and tanks locked down the capital of this tiny Gulf kingdom after riot police swinging clubs and firing tear gas smashed into demonstrators, many of them sleeping, in a pre-dawn assault Thursday that uprooted their protest camp demanding political change. Medical officials said four people were killed.

Hours after the attack on Manama's main Pearl Square, the military announced a ban on gatherings, saying on state TV that it had "key parts" of the capital under its control.

After several days of holding back, the island nation's Sunni rulers unleashed a heavy crackdown, trying to stamp out the first anti-government upheaval to reach the Arab states of the Gulf since the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt. In the surprise assault, police tore down protesters' tents, beating men and women inside and blasting some with shotgun sprays of birdshot.

It was a sign of how deeply the Sunni monarchy — and other Arab regimes in the Gulf — fear the repercussions of a prolonged wave of protests, led by members of the country's Shiite majority but also joined by growing numbers of discontented Sunnis.

Tiny Bahrain is a pillar of Washington's military framework in the region. It hosts the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, which is a critical counterbalance to Iran. Bahrain's rulers and their Arab allies depict any sign of unrest among their Shiite populations as a move by neighboring Shiite-majority Iran to expand its clout in the region.

But the assault may only further enrage protesters, who before the attack had called for large rallies Friday. In the wake of the bloodshed, angry demonstrators chanted "the regime must go" and burned pictures of King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa outside the emergency ward at Salmaniyah hospital, the main state medical facility.

"We are even angrier now. They think they can clamp down on us, but they have made us angrier," Makki Abu Taki, whose son was killed in the assault, shouted in the hospital morgue. "We will take to the streets in larger numbers and honor our martyrs. The time for Al Khalifa has ended."

The Obama administration expressed alarm over the violent crackdown. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called Bahrain's foreign minister to register Washington's "deep concern" and urge restraint. Similar criticism came from Britain and the European Union.
Read More: Yahoo