Feed The Birds….It’s Worth It!!

Birds in the neighbourhood may mean higher house prices

The gentle tweeting of birds from the back garden can be enough to lift anyone’s mood, but new research suggests it may also be a sign that your house will be worth more too.

A new study has shown that houses in areas rich with bird life sell for an average of £21,000 more than those with fewer birds.
The research, which attempted to compensate for factors such as house size, age and levels of urbanisation, found that the presence of even just one uncommon species of bird was an indication of higher house prices.
The more species there were, the higher the prices became, the researchers found.
It suggests that house-hunters would do well to listen out for the sound of woodpeckers and nightingales to gauge the quality of a neighbourhood.
The researchers also found that nearby parkland did little to influence the number of birds, meaning their presence was due to nearby domestic gardens in the area.
Michael Farmer, from the department of agricultural and applied economics at Texas Tech University in Lubbock who led the research, which is published in the journal of Urban Ecosystems, said: “The addition of another desirable, less ubiquitous bird species improves mean home price by $32,028 (£21,000).
“This is likely due to the human created landscapes on private properties immediately surrounding a home sale.”
Bird song is already known to have a number of benefits such as helping people to relax. One study in Liverpool found it could help calm young patients as they received injections in a hospital.
The National Trust also suggests people listen to birdsong for a few minutes each day to help improve their mood.
Miles Shipside, a housing analyst and commercial director at property specialists Rightmove, said the relationship between property prices and birds could be explained by the value home owners place on having a garden.
He said: “Birds are very sensitive to their environment and it could be a sign of an area having good quality gardens.
“This would be reflected in the property prices. But in the UK particularly people do also put a high value on wildlife so an area where we can see it and be close to it would be more desirable.”

Oh Please Put It Away!

Man ordered to cover up his massive ‘anatomically correct’ gargoyle

DAVID Smith has erected a big gargoyle in the grounds of his Paulden, Arizona, home. The nine-foot-tall statue in his yard boasts a 13-foot wing span. The statue is naked. And not everyone likes the view.
“I thought I was living in a free country,” says Smith. of his creation that he assures us is “anatomically correct and proportionally sized”.
How does he know the demon is anatomically correct? Can’e demons be out of proportion, like people with big ears and tiny feet? He adds:

“It just seemed like it needed to be there.I don’t like Ken dolls. It wasn’t put there to offend anybody. That isn’t the reason. Everything has a sex.”

He’s right. Get a load of those trees.

The upshot is that the county has told Smith must be be on public view. He must remove the statu, dress it in hot pants and boob tunes or face a fone of up to $1,000.
Smith says he wont’t. He says the the metal beast is “an extension of himself”.
Other men get a sports car. He gets a gargoyle…

U.S. Are At It Again!

US Authorities Targeted BitCoin Exchange Service

The Department of Homeland Security seized assets from Mt. Gox Dwolla account a few days ago and accused it of violating money transfer regulations. As everyone knows, BitCoin is growing rapidly today, and some companies invest thousands of dollars on the venture. One of the largest BitCoin exchange services was the Japanese startup Mt. Gox. It allowed people to convert US dollars to BitCoins and vice versa, with their most popular service being Dwolla – an electronic wallet providing real time transfers between people and businesses.
A few days ago the US authorities have seized all of the assets in the Mt. Gox Dwolla account for infringing money transfer regulations. Dwolla had nothing else to do but to acquiesce to the request. The problem is that as a currency exchange service, Mt. Gox set up a Wells Fargo business account for Mutum Sigillum LLC and was asked to complete a document stating whether the company planned to provide money services. The authorities point out that the document listed Mutum Sigillum LLC as a company which didn’t engage in money services. Indeed, the business answered “no” to those important questions: “Do you deal in or exchange currency for your customer?” and “Does your business accept funds from customers and send the funds based on customers’ instructions (Money Transmitter)?”

Moreover, in order to limit fraudulent activity, the company also needed to register with FinCEN like any money services in the United States. For people who use the exchange service, this move will only affect BitCoin traders using Dwolla to fund their trades. In the meanwhile, other traders in the United States may still use bank wires to send and receive money from Mt. Gox trades. Those traders with Dwolla accounts won’t be affected, only their ability to transfer directly to the company with Dwolla will. Finally, all these limitations only apply to the traders from the United States.

Industry experts point out that for those that have utilized Dwolla, there was still a lot of other BitCoin options, including BitInstant. The latter allow people to make deposits by cash. In the meanwhile, BitInstant still accepts Dwolla and is able to make transfer to different exchange services.

Going To The Dogs?

Pooches, owners march for more dog-friendly Paris

Some Parisians want just a little bit more of their city to go to the dogs.
At least 100 pooches — with owners in tow, holding leashes — marched near the Louvre at a demonstration to demand more park space and access to public transportation for the four-legged friends.
Tongues and tails wagged Saturday under a warm Paris sun as collies, pugs, boxers, bulldogs, Labradors and other breeds paraded around the famed Paris museum.
Organizers of the canine-citizen march dubbed "My Dog, My City" estimate about 200,000 dogs live in Paris. They say other cities like New York, London, Montreal and Brussels offer more dog-oriented public spaces.
According to the city's website, two of Paris' 20 sections have only one reserved public park space for dogs. Leashes are required.

Peacock & Chips Anyone?

Kevin the peacock rules the roost in Breadsall

Residents in a small village in Derbyshire reveal how they are being terrorised by a peacock called Kevin.

When Kevin the peacock crash-landed in the Derbyshire village of Breadsall, the locals were more bemused than bothered.
Soon, they reasoned, the bird would regain its bearings and head back to whichever stately home or ornamental park it had come from.
Instead, Kevin did what peacocks tend to do. Which is to take the joint over.
It has pecked its way through entire gardens, paralysed traffic by taking naps in the main road, terrorised the village hall’s cleaning lady and caused mass sleep deprivation.
That’s the trouble with having an uninvited peacock in your village. After a few weeks you stop thinking about how beautiful they are, and start wondering what they taste like.
The worst thing Kevin does is try to attract a mate. This involves hoisting its impressive tail feathers and screeching at 115 decibels — roughly the sound level you hear when a fighter jet takes off, or from the front row of a Twisted Sister concert.
The opening blast comes at around 5am when the bird wakes up to discover it’s still single. Then, from the vantage point of an overnight roost in a pine tree, it lets loose for real.
The contrast between a peacock’s outer loveliness and the sordid racket it makes has to be nature’s idea of a joke – one that is starting to wear thin in Breadsall. But at least it makes the bird easy to find.
You simply stand in the middle of the otherwise sleepy village and listen for what sounds like an axe-murder. Or the air-horn of a runaway truck.
I found Kevin sitting pretty on an ornamental tree stump behind Prem Singh’s house in Church Lane. One morning, Mr Singh, 56, the former chief executive of Derby NHS, looked out of his French windows to see 1,000 eyes looking back.
“I thought, 'my God’,” he said. “I was completely stunned. Normally you’d expect to see a few starlings, and here was this huge great thing about six feet long swishing around the garden.”
Peacocks originate from India, where, Mr Singh said: “Some Indians think they bring good luck.”
Not that his tolerance hasn’t been tested. Kevin quickly learned to home in on the bowls of food left out for Mr Singh’s cats, Millie and Rossi.
“He seems to love the stuff,” Mr Singh tells me, “but I’m not sure it loves him. You wouldn’t believe the mess he makes.
“I think he’s fantastic, though. He’s a real character. I call him The Captain after Captain Peacock [Frank Thornton’s character in Are You Being Served]. We’ve no idea where he came from, but he doesn’t show much sign of wanting to leave.”
Kevin’s provenance is, indeed, a mystery. With so much plumage to haul around, peacocks can only fly short distances and rarely stray far from their regular turf.
Yet no one near Breadsall has reported one missing, and inquiries by the local policeman, Russ Crooks, appear to have led nowhere.
At one point a posse, led by Simon Dowling, a local smallholder, was formed to catch Kevin only to discover — as John Humphrys recounted in The Telegraph last week — that the birds are fiendishly hard to lay hands on.
“We thought we’d got him cornered at one point,” says Linda Morris, one of the six-strong peacock patrol, which included Pc Crooks. “
But at the last minute he jumped over a wall and into the next-door garden. There have been a few other attempts and they’ve all failed.”
So, the months have slipped by, and Kevin’s grip on the village has tightened. Residents sleep to the hours the bird permits, traffic moves in sync with the bird’s own movements.
Lately it has been taking on a more activist role, turning up to watch fixtures at the tennis club, monitoring Sunday attendances at All Saints’ Church and making unscheduled inspections of the local primary school.
“We’re not really sure what to do about him,” admits Chris Goodwin, the parish council chairman. “Some people love having him here, but you do get grumbles about the noise, and we have concerns about him being a road hazard.
"Not long ago a cyclist nearly came off his bike because of Kevin, and sometimes he just sits in the road and holds up all the traffic and the drivers get pretty cross about it.”
Then there’s the fear factor. Peacocks aren’t usually aggressive – effectively they are pheasants in finery – but close up they can look and sound scary.
Earlier this year, Jackie Payne was cleaning the Memorial Hall when she saw Kevin advancing across the car park.
Too nervous to leave, she locked herself in the lavatory, eventually resorting to throwing biscuits out of the window to distract him until she could escape.
“It’s not the sort of problem we’ve had before as a parish council,” admits Mrs Goodwin. “I suppose we’re really hoping that his owner will turn up and take possession of him.”
For now, though, it’s Kevin taking possession of the village.

Sleepy Head?

'Sleepwalking' drink driver avoids jail after crashing car at 100mph

A drink driver who crashed his car at 100mph has avoided jail after telling a court he was sleep walking.

Marine engineer David Hamnett, 47, downed whiskey and wine before getting behind the wheel of his Volvo S40.
He travelled 150 miles and reached speeds of up to 100mph before hitting another car and slamming into a motorway's central partition.
Hamnett was cut free from the wreckage wearing just a T-shirt and jogging bottoms. He was twice the drink drive limit.
But he told a court he had been "sleep driving" and had slept-walked to his car and headed off on his usual weekly commute to Devon from his home in Ormskirk, Lancs.
Hamnett said he must have been asleep during the entire drive before the crash which happened in Worcestershire in the early hours of July 9, 2011.
He told Shrewsbury Crown Court he put the clothes on to go to bed and woke up to find himself in the smash 150 miles away on the M5.
But Dr Idzikowski, director of the Edinburgh Sleep Centre, said it was "highly unlikely" he could have snoozed behind the wheel without crashing for two hours.
Judge Peter Barrie accepted he had a genuine sleeping disorder and that Hamnett may have got into his car while asleep.
But he said he had likely carried on with the "pointless" journey after waking up.
He was found guilty of dangerous driving and handed a twelve month community order, banned from driving for six months and ordered to take an advanced test.
Judge Barrie said: "This was a highly dangerous incident at high speed, weaving on a motorway and causing an accident in which you and the occupants of another car suffered significant injuries.
"It could have been much worse and an aggravating feature was that you were well over the drink drive limit."

Gobble, Gobble!!

Michael Douglas: oral sex caused my throat cancer

Michael Douglas has said that his throat cancer was caused by oral sex

The Oscar-winning star went into detail about the cause of his illness for the first time in an interview with the Guardian.
It had been assumed by some that the cancer could have been related to his years of smoking, but the Basic Instinct star said it followed his contraction of HPV (human papillomavirus), a sexually-transmitted virus that is best known as a common cause of cervical cancer, but which can also cause throat cancer.
Asked if he regretted having smoked, the actor told the newspaper: "No. Because without wanting to get too specific, this particular cancer is caused by HPV which actually comes about from cunnilingus.
"I did worry if the stress caused by my son's incarceration didn't help trigger it. But yeah, it's a sexually transmitted disease that causes cancer."
He jokingly added: "And if you have it, cunnilingus is also the best cure for it."

It’s Camp!!

Glastonbury tents to be given new lease of life

Dumped Glastonbury tents are to be given a new life and made into luxury gift wrap.

Discarded tents at this year's Glastonbury, Latitude and Wychwood festivals are set to be collected, cleaned and transformed into sustainable wrapping paper.
Nicky Rajska and Louise Oldridge, founders of Devon based company Wrag Wrap, will be getting their hands dirty salvaging unwanted tents at each site, then recycling them into wrapping products that can be used time and time again.
The tents that can be reused will be given to community groups and charities.
Nicky said: "We're looking for broken and torn tents, so we can clean and launder them, restoring them to perfect condition in an environmentally friendly way - dye them and sell them as beautiful gift wrap - with a percentage of sales going back to each festival to help protect the land and environment.
"We can't take away all of the waste but we know we can help to make some kind of a difference and hopefully shine a spotlight on the issue of discarding unwanted items at festivals."
Approximately 615,000 people will be camping at UK festivals this summer, with over 3,000 tents estimated to be discarded.
Over 83 square kilometres of wrapping paper ends up in UK rubbish bins each year.

Ugly?….Sod Off!!

Recruitment site only offers jobs to beautiful people

A recruitment site has been launched that only offers jobs to beautiful people.

Companies who count complexion as one of their key competencies can log on to the "lookist" dating community BeautifulPeople.com and browse their handsome selection of attractive jobseekers.
The dating site has 750,000 good looking members on its books and is launching the employment agency as a spin-off.
It will allow employers to advertise their vacancies to the members and, should any of the good looking guys and girls be interested, they can apply for the job directly through the website.
Greg Hodge, Managing Director of BeautifulPeople.com, explained: "An honest employer will tell you that it pays to hire good looking staff.
"Attractive people tend to make a better first impression on clients, win more business and earn more.
"Most of our members are high earners and happily in employment.
"But for those who aren't, giving them access to potential employers is an added benefit to their membership, especially in these economic tough times.
"We have a dedicated team to validate each business which applies to our recruitment service so that every introduction is safe and legitimate," he said, adding: "This isn't an invitation for crack-pots to come and ogle our beautiful members."
Los Angeles-based real estate agency, Urban Homes Group, is one of the website's early adopters.
Their CEO, Dominic Pietrangelo, said: "Securing prospective realtors through BeautifulPeople makes sense; it's no secret that attractive agents have an advantage and more often than not are better received by clients, in a highly competitive market every advantage counts."
London bridal designer Sassi Holford, said she would consider hiring through the service.
"My requirements are so specific, I will consider any worthwhile avenue for recruitment," she explained.
"My staff are hired not simply because they are attractive, they have to be excellent performers.
"Brides want to look beautiful on their wedding day so the whole gown buying experience should build their confidence and make them feel they are entering a glamorous world – they need to put themselves in a mindset of beauty and well-presented consultants will add to this."
But beauty can be a double-edged sword for those on the lookout for work, as Sassi explained: "An absolutely stunning member of staff could have the opposite effect if the client has less self-confidence."
And it's not just image-conscious businesses who can use the service.
Working mother Olivia Kinnard intends to use BeautifulPeople.com to find a nanny.
She explained: "The truth is, my toddler, Kit, responds better to good looking people.
"And I'm sure I'm not the first parent to think they need a slim and fit nanny to be able to keep up with a busy child – it's just that many wouldn't dare to come out and say it!".
Employment experts warn that there are potential pitfalls in the plan – such as possible discrimination claims if looks were found to be a reason for an unsuccessful application.