The Coors Belfast Giants shocked the Coventry Blaze tonight at home in the Odyssey Arena with a 3-1 win over their rivals to leapfrog the Blaze into second place in the Elite League standings.

The Giants were without leading scorer Paul Deniset and his linemates Andrew Martin and Bobby Robins who had combined for 44 goals so far this season. All three were in the stands, out with injuries and although the Giants were short-staffed, they stepped up to the plate with their most important victory of the season so far.

Davey Phillips opened the scoring when he picked up the puck at the blueline and walked into the middle of the ice, firing home a cannon of a shot over the shoulder of J F Perras in net for the Blaze at 9:25 of the first period. Six minutes later, it was the Giants again, this time Evan Cheverie finishing off a Paul Sample pass at 15:32 to make it 2-0 Giants going into the second period. Both teams had plenty of opportunities to score in the second frame but Stevie Lyle in net for the Giants and Perras for the Blaze both stood tall. With less than a minute remaining in the second period the Blaze finally converted, courtesy of Adam Calder who tipped in a shot from Jonathan Weaver to make it 2-1 going into the third.

The Blaze and Giants traded powerplay opportunities in the third but neither team could take advantage with the extra man. The Blaze were pressing hard, but Lyle stopped everything they threw at him. The final nail in the coffin came with five minutes remaining when Steve Thornton took advantage of a missed call that the Blaze protested when George Awada looked like he tripped Danny Stewart. Thornton picked up the puck and skated in on Perras and made no mistakes, putting the puck top shelf over Perras”””” shoulder to lock up the win.

Thornton was pleased with the effort from his team and praised the efforts of the entire squad.

“Every guy stepped up BIG TIME, that was our best effort of the season. The guys made no excuses, they just went out and got the job done. It wasn””””t easy, that was a great team we faced tonight, but I am proud of the entire team tonight. I asked them to raise their game to another level and they did just that.”

Period Scores: 2-0,0-1, 1-0
Penalty Mins: 8-30
Powerplay: Bel 0/5 - Cov 0/4
Shots On: Stevie Lyle 22 - JF Perras 43
Referee: D. Smith

BERLIN (Reuters) - The French say they need the largest condoms in Europe while Greeks get by on smaller ones, according to a Europe-wide study by a German consultancy that provides advice on condoms.

The study by the Singen-based Institute of Condom Consultancy was done by asking 10,500 men in 25 countries to measure their penis and enter the number into a database.

The results show Frenchmen on average claim to need 15.48-cm (6.09-inch) long condoms, about 3 cm longer than Greeks, whose condom-size requirement was the most modest.

Jan Vinzenz Krause, the institute's director, told Reuters Friday the data was collected over a period of eight months.

He did not want to comment on how honest he thought the Frenchmen had been in reporting the data.

The survey was aimed at educating youngsters about the importance of effective contraception.

The institute also offers online condom-size advice and hosts "Pimp Your Condom" -- an annual fair organised in cooperation with the national Aids Trust -- with the aim of educating teens about sexually transmitted diseases.

Krause was in the spotlight in the past when he produced a prototype of the "spray-on condom" -- an aerosol can which contains latex that creates a perfectly fitting condom. But the idea was not developed further.

By Catherine Hornby

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The Netherlands will ban the sale and cultivation of all hallucinogenic "magic" mushrooms from next week, the latest target of a country seeking to shed its "anything goes" image.

The Dutch government proposed the ban in April, citing the dangerous behavioural effects of magic mushrooms following the death of a French teenager who jumped from an Amsterdam bridge in 2007 after consuming the hallucinogenic fungus.

"The use of magic mushrooms has hallucinogenic effects. It is proven that this can lead to unpredictable and therefore risky behaviour," the Dutch Health Ministry said in a statement.

There is a chance that the ban could be delayed as a Dutch court will rule on a challenge to it on Friday.

The active ingredient in magic mushrooms is psilocybin. Effects last up to about six hours and can include nausea, vomiting, muscle weakness and drowsiness in the early stages after consumption.

The psychological consequences of psilocybin use include hallucinations and an inability to discern fantasy from reality. Panic reactions and psychosis also may occur, particularly if a user ingests a large dose, according to the U.S. National Drug Intelligence Centre.

Some proponents of magic mushrooms say that their use aids in spiritual awareness, gaining personal insight and meditation.

The Dutch ministry noted that the sale and possession of dried magic mushrooms is already illegal in the Netherlands, but from December 1 the ban would extend to fresh mushrooms which have been previously sold in so-called "smart shops."

Staff in the stores, which stock mushrooms or "paddos" ranging from Thai to Hawaiian varieties for about 15 euros (13 pound) a pack, said the ban will put users at greater risk.

"People will just go picking in the forest, and that can be dangerous. Or they will go to street dealers, and get mixed up with hard drugs," said David Henriks from the Tatanka shop.

Posters in shops outlined the effects of different types of mushrooms, such as strong visual experiences or feelings described as "body highs." They also suggested dos and don'ts of consumption, and rated the mushrooms for their intensity.

"It's always safer to have the information before taking drugs," said Roy Williams of the Innerspace shop, adding that in the past few weeks people had increasingly been buying "grow your own" mushroom kits in the lead-up to the ban.

The Dutch association of smart shops (VLOS) had tried to reassure authorities by promising tighter self-regulation and noted that most mushroom-related incidents involved young tourists mixing mushrooms with alcohol and cannabis.

Figures from the Amsterdam emergency services show there were 55 call-outs for mushroom-related incidents in 2004, a figure which had more than doubled by 2006 to 128, with the majority of youngsters involved coming from Britain.

In recent years the Netherlands has dropped some previously tolerant policies and has tightened laws on drug use and prostitution.

Several brothels and sex clubs were shut down in 2008, city councils are planning to close marijuana-selling coffee shops near schools, while tobacco smoking and alcohol consumption in coffee shops have also been forbidden.

Prank! hot girl with hair dryer

   Video: Prank! hot girl with hair dryer

BEIJING (Reuters) - A panda at a zoo in southern China attacked a student who snuck into its pen hoping for a cuddle with the endangered bear, state media said on Saturday.

The 20-year-old male student surnamed Liu jumped over the fence at the zoo in the tourist city of Guilin, ignoring warning signs not to, Xinhua news agency said.

"The panda, named Yangyang, was wide awake. Apparently scared by the intruder, he bit at Liu's arms and legs," it quoted an unnamed worker as saying after zoo keepers managed to calm the bear and rescue Liu, the report said.

"Yangyang was so cute and I just wanted to cuddle him," Liu was quoted as saying from his hospital bed. "I didn't expect he would attack."

Scientists believe fewer than 2,000 giant pandas live in the wild in China.

The new software will protect machines running XP, Vista, and Windows 7

In a surprise move, Microsoft has announced it will offer a free anti-virus and security solution from the second half of next year.

It will stop selling OneCare, its all-in-one security and PC management service, from the end of June 2009.

The new software, code-named Morro, will be a no-frills program suited to smaller and less powerful computers.

The software will be free to download and will support Windows XP, Vista and Windows 7.

The move comes as sales of the OneCare subscription service are flagging - reportedly because the anti-virus marketplace is already flooded with big-name players such as Symantec and McAfee.

Since its launch in May 2006, OneCare has garnered less than 2% of the security software market share.

In a statement, Microsoft said that Morro would be designed specifically to be a small-footprint program that uses fewer system resources. This, it said, would be ideal for users with low-bandwidth connections or computers without much processing power.

That will be of particular interest to consumers buying comparatively low-powered "netbook" computers.

Amy Barzdukas, senior director of product management in the online services division at Microsoft, said: "This new, no-cost offering will give us the ability to protect an even greater number of consumers, especially in markets where the growth of new PC purchases is outpaced only by the growth of malware."

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - A Dutch couple on a visit to the eastern Indian state of Bihar paid 10,000 rupees (136 pounds) for four samosas, a spicy deep-fried snack that usually doesn't cost more than a few rupees, a newspaper reported on Monday.

After the tourists ate the snacks, a stall owner at the Sonepur cattle fair last week told them his "special" samosas cost more because they were made of herbs and had aphrodisiac qualities, the Hindustan Times said.

After an argument, the couple paid the shopkeeper. But they later complained to a policeman.

Police forced the shopkeeper to return the change -- 9,990 rupees.

ATHENS (Reuters) - "I'll tell you what's wrong with it. It's dead, that's what's wrong with it."

For those who believe the ancient Greeks thought of everything first, proof has been found in a 4th century AD joke book featuring an ancestor of Monty Python's Dead Parrot sketch where a man returns a parrot to a shop, complaining it is dead.

The 1,600-year-old work entitled "Philogelos: The Laugh Addict," one of the world's oldest joke books, features a joke in which a man complains that a slave he has just bought has died, its publisher said on Friday.

"By the gods," answers the slave's seller, "when he was with me, he never did any such thing!"

In a comedy act Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch, first aired in 1969 and regularly voted one of the funniest ever, the pet-shop owner says the parrot, a "Norwegian Blue," is not dead, just "resting" or "pining for the fjords."

The English-language book will appeal to those who swear that the old jokes are the best ones. Many of its 265 gags will seem strikingly familiar, suggesting that sex, dimwits, nagging wives and flatulence have raised laughs for centuries.

FAR-FETCHED CLOAK

In many of the jokes, a slow-witted figure known as the "student dunce" is the butt of the jokes. In one, the student dunce goes to the city and a friend asks him to buy two 15-year-old slaves: "No problem,' responds the dunce. "If I don't find two 15-year-olds, I'll get one 30-year-old.'

In another, someone asks to borrow the student's cloak to go down to the country. "I have a cloak to go down to your ankle, but I don't have one that reaches to the country," he replies.

The manuscript is attributed to a pair of ancient comedians called Hierocles and Philagrius. Little is known about them except that they were most likely the compilers of the jokes, not the original writers.

The multi-media e-book, which can be purchased online (www.yudu.com/oldestjokebook), features veteran comedian Jim Bowen, 71, reviving the lines before a 21-century audience.

"Jim Bowen brings them back from the dead. It's like Jurassic Park for jokes," Richard Stephenson, CEO of digital publisher YUDU, said in a statement.

For Bowen, much of the material seemed very familiar: "One or two of them are jokes I've seen in peoples' acts nowadays, slightly updated: they put in a motor car instead of a chariot."

Other one-liners in Philogelos may baffle a modern audience, such as a series of jokes about a lettuce, which only make sense in light of the ancient belief it was an aphrodisiac.

British Open runner-up Ian Poulter has pulled out of the Singapore Open after being unable to replace the driver he had stolen at the HSBC Champions Tournament in Shanghai which ended on Monday.

"I am really gutted," he told reporters on Wednesday. "I have been thinking about it for four hours and I have decided to withdraw because my new driver will not arrive on time.

"It is disappointing because I did not come all this way not to play. But with so many world ranking points at stake, if I played badly (by using a different driver) I may have lost ground."

The tournament starts on Thursday but world number 25 Poulter would have been unable to secure a replacement driver until Friday.

India's Anirban Lahiri will take the Englishman's place in the field for the $5 million (3.3 million pound) event at Sentosa Golf Club, the richest national open on the Asian Tour.

Great idea Ian, I’m sure they don’t have any decent clubs for you in Singapore...

This morning I read this in the newspaper:

MORE than 70 companies or individuals are allowed to dump effluent into one of the north's most polluted rivers under permits issued by the Department of the Environment.

The Sixmilewater River near Antrim, which is around 20 miles long, has been polluted around 300 times in the past five years.

It has also seen some of the worst cases of pollution ever recorded with more than 37.000 fish killed this year alone.

However, the department confirmed 78 companies or individuals hold “discharge consents” which allow them to release a limited amount of waste into the river.

The consents also contain conditions about tthe type of effluent that may be discharged.

According to information released by the department to the Green Party, the consents include drainage approval for five quarries, 10 waste disposal operations, four concrete products, drainage of a coal yard and a scap yard as well as 24 private sewerage discharge consents.

One of the quarrying companies has held a drainage approval permit for more than 30 years.

In March, more than 2000 fish, including wild brown trout and salmon, were killed when chemicals were discharged.

In June, more than 35000 fish and other wildlife were killed after pollutants were dumped in the river – one of the most serious cases of river pollution ever recorded in the north.

However, Northern Ireland Environment Agency has said no-one would be prosecuted for the pollution in June because it was impossible to pin-point the source.

Reading this shocked me. It is unbelievable that this is still possible in a civilized country, and even a country that is part of the European Union.
I thought the environment had taken a proper place in modern European politics, but this proves that this is just not yet the case, and all the people saying it is seem to be only doing it to prevent actions by environmentalists.

A bit further in this article it says this:

“Failure to comply with the conditions of a discharge consent is an offence under the Water Order and, if a discharge is non-compliant, appropriate action is taken by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency, depending on compliance history and/or the severity of the breach of consent and environmental effect.”

“An example of this is the recent case where a Mallusk company was fined £6000 for not meeting the terms of its discharge consent.”

This is of course a big joke. £6000 pound is nothing for such a violation. It would probably cost the company more to get rid of a part of its waste in another way, so they still had a bargain.
For violations like this heavier sanctions are absolutely required.

The UDA has warned of being ready to “do battle” in a statement read to several thousand loyalist supporters at venues across Northern Ireland.
The paramilitary group used last year’s remembrance day to “stand down” the gunmen of the UFF in a landmark move delivered by South Belfast loyalist leader Jackie McDonald. However, this year’s statement was a throwback to more militant times with the loyalist organisation using the commemorations to attack republicans verbally accusing them of “agitation”.
The address to members and supporters on Sunday made no reference to the issue of UDA weapons, instead highlighting continuing tensions between loyalist and republican communities.
The Independent Monitoring Commission warned yesterday that the continuing failure of the UDA and UVF to decommission could not be allowed to continue unchallenged.
The UDA statement read: “Our people and country continue to face meny challenges.”

“We must stand ready to do battle but we must be on the right battlefield and continue to train in the skills that will enable us not only to defend our community but take the lead”

“The threat from Irish republicanism and nationalism has not abated. They are challenging our very existence at every level.”

“They are challenging through agitation and non-violence but it is every bit as dangerous and must be combated.”

The loyalist group also made mention of tensions surrounding last week’s British army parade and the Sinn Fein protest against it in Belfast.
”Sinn Fein’s propaganda machine continues to push out it’s declared position on human rights,” the statement read.

“They must recognise that even in their so-called own communities there are British Irish people who serve this day for Queen and country and do not see the world through Sinn Fein green spectacles.”

“This Irish republican racism, ignorance and bigotry manifested itself last Sunday where Sinn Fein and other Irish dissidents protested at the RIR homecoming.”

“They squandered a massive opportunity to reach out to unionism in a bid to understand us as a people and as human beings whose only crime is that we are different to them.”

“They squandered an opportunity to reach out to working class loyalists who suffered the same social and economic deprivation as many of their own communities, doing untold damage to community relations that we in our organisation have been fostering for some time.”

Frankie Gallagher, a spokesman for the UDA-linked Ulster Political Research Group, said the statement reflected feeling among working-class loyalist communities.

“The current battle should be one for jobs, economic growth and equality,” he said.
“But what loyalists are doing in trying to rise up by engaging with the democratic process is being seriously hindered by the current political stalemate – and in the absence of positive political leadership things drift.”

This once again shows the attitude of the loyalists. While the majority of the nationalist community use the way of non-violence (also called politics) to try and achieve their goals, for instance in last week’s demonstration, which stayed non-violent even though all kinds of things like bottles, fireworks and golfballs were thrown at them by loyalist rioters, the loyalist threaten again with battle.