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Tag: Oddities

  • Elephant in the dining room: Startup makes mammoth meatball

    Elephant in the dining room: Startup makes mammoth meatball

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    AMSTERDAM — Throw another mammoth on the barbie?

    An Australian company on Tuesday lifted the glass cloche on a meatball made of lab-grown cultured meat using the genetic sequence from the long-extinct pachyderm, saying it was meant to fire up public debate about the hi-tech treat.

    The launch in an Amsterdam science museum came just days before April 1 so there was an elephant in the room: Is this for real?

    “This is not an April Fools joke,” said Tim Noakesmith, founder of Australian startup Vow. “This is a real innovation.”

    Cultivated meat — also called cultured or cell-based meat — is made from animal cells. Livestock doesn’t need to be killed to produce it, which advocates say is better not just for the animals but also for the environment.

    Vow used publicly available genetic information from the mammoth, filled missing parts with genetic data from its closest living relative, the African elephant, and inserted it into a sheep cell, Noakesmith said. Given the right conditions in a lab, the cells multiplied until there were enough to roll up into the meatball.

    More than 100 companies around the world are working on cultivated meat products, many of them startups like Vow.

    Experts say that if the technology is widely adopted, it could vastly reduce the environmental impact of global meat production in the future. Currently, billions of acres of land are used for agriculture worldwide.

    But don’t expect this to land on plates around the world any time soon. So far, tiny Singapore is the only country to have approved cell-based meat for consumption. Vow is hoping to sell its first product there — a cultivated Japanese quail meat — later this year.

    The mammoth meatball is a one-off and has not been tasted, even by its creators, nor is it planned to be put into commercial production. Instead, it was presented as a source of protein that would get people talking about the future of meat.

    “We wanted to get people excited about the future of food being different to potentially what we had before. That there are things that are unique and better than the meats that we’re necessarily eating now, and we thought the mammoth would be a conversation starter and get people excited about this new future,” Noakesmith told The Associated Press.

    “But also the woolly mammoth has been traditionally a symbol of loss. We know now that it died from climate change. And so what we wanted to do was see if we could create something that was a symbol of a more exciting future that’s not only better for us, but also better for the planet,” he added.

    Seren Kell, science and technology manager at Good Food Institute, a nonprofit that promotes plant- and cell-based alternatives to animal products, said he hopes the project “will open up new conversations about cultivated meat’s extraordinary potential to produce more sustainable foods, reduce the climate impact of our existing food system and free up land for less intensive farming practices.”

    He said the mammoth project with its unconventional gene source was an outlier in the new meat cultivation sector, which commonly focuses on traditional livestock — cattle, pigs and poultry.

    “By cultivating beef, pork, chicken, and seafood, we can have the most impact in terms of reducing emissions from conventional animal agriculture and satisfying growing global demand for meat while meeting our climate targets,” he said.

    The jumbo meatball on show in Amsterdam — sized somewhere between a softball and a volleyball — was for show only and had been glazed to ensure it didn’t get damaged on its journey from Sydney.

    But when it was being prepared — first slow baked and then finished off on the outside with a blow torch — it smelled good.

    “The folks who were there, they said the aroma was something similar to another prototype that we produced before, which was crocodile,” Noakesmith said. “So, super fascinating to think that adding the protein from an animal that went extinct 4,000 years ago gave it a totally unique and new aroma, something we haven’t smelled as a population for a very long time.”

    ___

    Associated Press reporter Laura Ungar contributed from Louisville, Kentucky.

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  • Finnish leadership condemns attack on veteran lawmaker

    Finnish leadership condemns attack on veteran lawmaker

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    Finland’s leaders have strongly condemned an assault on a Jewish lawmaker who was assaulted and punched in the face while campaigning for the country’s April 2 general election

    ByJARI TANNER Associated Press

    HELSINKI — Finland’s leaders strongly condemned an assault on a Jewish lawmaker who was assaulted and punched in the face Saturday while campaigning for the country’s April 2 general election.

    President Sauli Niinisto tweeted that Saturday’s physical attack on veteran conservative politician Ben Zyskowicz, 68, was “a cowardly act” that delivered a blow to Finnish democracy.

    Zyskowicz told Finnish media that a large man who appeared to be between the ages of 30 and 40 confronted him at a metro station in Helsinki, the capital city that he represents.

    The man started yelling, blaming him for Finland’s decision to join NATO and hurling antisemitic insults, Zyskowicz told Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat, adding that the perpetrator also threatened to kill him and to push him onto the subway tracks.

    The confrontation turned into a scuffle, and Zyskowicz reported he was hit in the face and fell on the ground, suffering bruises, scratches and other minor injuries. Police later apprehended a suspect.

    Zyskowicz has served in Finland’s parliament, the Eduskunta, for over 40 years, and is one of the most visible representatives of Finland’s Jewish community.

    The lawmaker told Helsingin Sanomat he thinks his assailant’s motive was political. Zyskowicz is a member of the center-right National Coalition Party, which polls predict is in position to receive the most votes in the upcoming election.

    The party has advocated for Finland to seek NATO membership for over 20 years.

    “Under no circumstances must physically attacking candidates become part of Finnish society, not even as an entirely marginal phenomenon,” Zyskowicz told the newspaper.

    Political violence is extremely rare in Finland. a nation of 5.5 million where lawmakers and government ministers regularly move around cafes, markets and shopping centers without guards while campaigning, sometimes getting around on public transportation.

    Only the Finnish head of state and the prime minister are known to have body guards. Prime Minister Sanna Marin condemned the attack on Zyskowicz as “shocking”.

    “Everyone must have the right to campaign in peace, without the threat of violence. An attack on a candidate is an attack on democracy.” Marin said.

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  • Book thief in plot that duped famous authors avoids prison

    Book thief in plot that duped famous authors avoids prison

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    NEW YORK (AP) — It was the stuff of novels: For years, a con artist plagued the publishing industry, impersonating editors and agents to pull off hundreds of literary heists. But the manuscripts obtained from high-profile authors were never resold or leaked, rendering the thefts all the more perplexing.

    The Thursday sentencing of Filippo Bernardini in Manhattan federal court brought the saga to an end and, with it, finally some answers. After pleading guilty to one count of wire fraud in January, Bernardini was sentenced to time served, avoiding prison on a felony charge that carried up to 20 years in prison. Prosecutors had asked for a sentence of at least a year.

    Bernardini, now 30, impersonated hundreds of people over the course of the scheme that began around August 2016 and obtained more than a thousand manuscripts, including from high-profile authors like Margaret Atwood and Ethan Hawke, authorities have said.

    In an emotional, four-page letter to Judge Colleen McMahon submitted earlier this month, Bernardini apologized for what he characterized as his “egregious, stupid and wrong” actions. He also offered insight into his motivations, which had long stymied victims and observers alike even after his plea.

    He described a deep love of books that stemmed from childhood and led him to pursue a publishing career in London. While he obtained an internship at a literary agency there, he wrote, he had trouble securing a full-time job in the industry afterward.

    “While employed, I saw manuscripts being shared between editors, agents, and literary scouts or even with individuals outside the industry. So, I wondered: why can I not also get to read these manuscripts?” he recounted.

    He spoofed an email address of someone he knew and mimicked his former colleagues’ tone to ask for a manuscript that had yet to be published. The success of that deception turned his quest for ill-gotten books into “an obsession, a compulsive behaviour.”

    “I had a burning desire to feel like I was still one of these publishing professionals and read these new books,” he wrote.

    “Every time an author sent me the manuscript I would feel like I was still part of the industry. At the time, I did not think about the harm I was causing,” he added. “I never wanted to and I never leaked these manuscripts. I wanted to keep them closely to my chest and be one of the fewest to cherish them before anyone else, before they ended up in bookshops.”

    As part of a bid to avoid prison, Bernardini’s lawyers also submitted more than a dozen letters to the judge from his friends and family. In a novelistic twist of sorts, among them was a letter from a victim — writer Jesse Ball, the author of “Samedi the Deafness,” “Curfew” and “The Divers’ Game.”

    Bernardini impersonated Ball’s editor to convince the writer to send several unpublished manuscripts, Ball said in his letter pushing for leniency. Decrying the state of the industry as “more and more corporate and cookiecutter” and referring to the crime as a “caper” and a “trivial thing, frivolous thing,” Ball argued that “we must be grateful when something human enters the picture: when the publishing industry for once becomes something worth writing about.”

    “For once a person cared deeply about something—what matter that he was an interloper? You cannot imagine the soul crushing boredom of run-of-the-mill publishing correspondence,” Ball wrote, adding that he suffered no harm from the thefts other than some confusion. “I’m grateful that there is still room in the world for something facetious to occur now and then.”

    In weighing arguments from the prosecution and defense, McMahon pushed back on the idea that the crime was victimless, with New York magazine’s Vulture — the publication that brought the mystery to public attention with a 2021 story called “The Spine Collector” — reporting that “she was especially moved by a letter from a literary scout” who had been accused of Bernardini’s crimes. Vulture also reported that McMahon expressed sympathy for Bernardini in light of a new autism diagnosis, but said it didn’t excuse the threats he made in some correspondence. But she concluded a prison sentence wouldn’t help the victims.

    Bernardini — an Italian citizen and British resident who was arrested at John F. Kennedy International Airport in January 2022 — will be deported from the U.S. Court documents show he asked to be deported to the United Kingdom, where he lives with his partner and dog, with Italy as the designated alternative.

    As part of his guilty plea, Bernardini agreed to pay $88,000 in restitution, which court documents show will go to Penguin Random House.

    “The cruel irony is that every time I open a book,” Bernardini wrote of his one-time passion, “it reminds me of my wrongdoings and what they led me to.”

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  • ‘Scream as loud as you can’: 5 boys rescued from NYC tunnel

    ‘Scream as loud as you can’: 5 boys rescued from NYC tunnel

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    Five mischievous boys had to be rescued after they crawled through a storm drain tunnel in New York City and got lost

    NEW YORK — Five mischievous boys had to be rescued after they crawled through a storm drain tunnel in New York City and got lost, authorities said.

    In audio released by the fire department, 911 dispatchers work to pinpoint the boys’ exact location and then tell them to scream once rescuers are close enough to hear.

    “Now you can scream as loud as you can,” a dispatcher says. “They want you to scream and yell.”

    The five boys, aged 11 and 12, crawled into a storm drain on Staten Island at about 6 p.m. Tuesday, fire department officials said at a news conference Wednesday.

    The boys walked about a quarter mile and then called 911 when they couldn’t find their way back, officials said.

    “We’re stuck in the sewer,” one of the boys says on the recording. “You’re stuck where?” a dispatcher responds.

    A second dispatcher says he is familiar with the area and tries to determine exactly where the boys are. “Once you went down, was the sewer left, right, straight — where was it?” the dispatcher asks. “I need you to guide me.”

    When sirens can be heard, the dispatcher tells the boys to scream. At first the boys fear that the rescuers aren’t stopping.

    “It sounded like they went past us,” one boy says.

    The dispatcher assures the boys, “They’re not going anywhere, we’re going to get you out of there.”

    Soon an emergency responder can be heard saying “We might have hands on the kids right now,” and then, “We have all five children removed from the sewer.”

    Firefighters said the boys were in the tunnel for about an hour. The boys and one firefighter were taken to a hospital for evaluation, but none had significant injuries, officials said.

    “Amazing that the cellphone worked in the tunnel,” FDNY Chief of Department John Hodgens told reporters. “That was a key component of us finding them.”

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  • Snap! Venus fly trap fans ask South Carolina to honor plant

    Snap! Venus fly trap fans ask South Carolina to honor plant

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    COLUMBIA, S.C. — Conservationists are pushing for the Venus fly trap to be South Carolina’s official carnivorous plant, joining other official items such as the state bird (Carolina Wren), state opera (Porgy and Bess) and the state snack (boiled peanuts).

    In all, South Carolina has about five dozen official state things. There are already five different plants including yellow jasmine, which is the official flower, to the official fruit — the peach — to Indian Grass, which is, unsurprisingly, South Carolina’s official grass.

    But supporters said honoring the Venus fly trap isn’t about one extra thing students see on an elementary school worksheet.

    Instead, it’s about protecting and increasing awareness of an interesting species found only in this spot on the globe: the upper part of the South Carolina coast and a small sliver of southeast North Carolina.

    “In a state as small as ours that is growing every day, we have to protect the things that belong here,” said South Carolina Sen. Thomas McElveen, who lead a subcommittee Tuesday that voted to advance a bill to elevate the status of the carnivorous plant.

    The Democrat knows all about the allure of the plant with leaves that can trap insects to get a source of nutrition in the nutrient-poor soil where it grows.

    McElveen said his mom bought him one when he was a kid from the market. He named it “Audrey II” after the ravenous and cruel human-eating Venus fly trap in Little Shop of Horrors.

    In the wild, Venus fly traps are the size of a lima bean and mean no harm to anything other than spiders and flies. They have special hairs that when brushed — twice in succession to reduce the amount of false alarms by dust or rain — snap the leaves shut around the insect.

    If the prey continues to wiggle and is too big to escape from between the hairs, the plant releases acid that dissolves and digests the insect and provides nutrients.

    “This is a plant for South Carolina to be proud of. It is globally rare,” Coastal Conservation League biologist Trapper Fowler told senators.

    Venus fly traps face two big enemies — poachers and development. Poaching is illegal and the best groups of plants have been in heritage areas where they can grow away from thieves and avoid people in South Carolina’s fastest growing region. They’re also a fragile plant that needs fire more than water — the blazes clear out faster, denser overgrowth that can choke the smaller fly traps.

    The bill still has to get through the full Senate Family and Veterans Affairs Committee and then approval on the Senate floor before heading to the House.

    But there’s enough time this year for the Venus fly trap to join other official South Carolina things like the official spider (Carolina Wolf Spider), picnic cuisine (barbecue), dance (the Shag) and stone (blue granite).

    “You’re not just naming this plant and putting it in the back of our legislative manual,” McElveen said. “You may be doing something to raise awareness and conservation.”

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  • Millions of dead fish wash up amid heat wave in Australia

    Millions of dead fish wash up amid heat wave in Australia

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    Millions of fish have washed up dead in southeastern Australia in what authorities and scientists say is caused by floods and hot weather

    CANBERRA, Australia — Millions of fish have washed up dead in southeastern Australia in what authorities and scientists say is caused by floods and hot weather.

    The Department of Primary Industries in New South Wales state said the fish deaths coincided with a heat wave that put stress on a system that has experienced extreme conditions from wide-scale flooding.

    The deaths were likely caused by low oxygen levels as floods recede, a situation made worse by fish needing more oxygen because of the warmer weather, the department said.

    Residents of the Outback town of Menindee complained of a terrible smell from the dead fish.

    “We’ve just sort of started to clean up, and then this has happened, and that’s sort of you’re walking around in a dried-up mess and then you’re smelling this putrid smell. It’s a terrible smell and horrible to see all those dead fish,” said Jan Dening, a local.

    Nature photographer Geoff Looney found huge clusters of dead fish near the main weir in Menindee on Thursday evening.

    “The stink was terrible. I nearly had to put a mask on,” Looney said. “I was worried about my own health. That water right in the top comes down to our pumping station for the town. People north of Menindee say there’s cod and perch floating down the river everywhere.”

    Mass kills have been reported on the Darling-Baaka River in recent weeks. Tens of thousands of fish were found at the same spot in late February, while there have been several reports of dead fish downstream toward Pooncarie, near the borders of South Australia and Victoria states.

    Enormous fish kills occurred on the river at Menindee during severe drought conditions in late 2018 and early 2019, with locals estimating millions of deaths.

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  • Berlin to let everyone go topless at public swimming pools

    Berlin to let everyone go topless at public swimming pools

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    BERLIN (AP) — Women in Berlin will soon be allowed to go topless at the city’s public swimming pools, like men, the Berlin state government said Thursday.

    The new bathing rules allowing everyone to go swimming without covering their torsos followed a discrimination complaint by a woman who was not allowed to go topless in a swimming pool in the capital.

    The woman, whose identity was not revealed, had turned to the senate’s ombudsperson’s office for equal treatment to demand that women, like men, can swim topless, the Berlin senate for justice, diversity and anti-discrimination said in a written statement.

    In reaction to the complaint and the ombudsman’s involvement in the case, the Berliner Baederbetriebe, which runs the city’s public pools, decided to change its clothing rules, the statement said.

    “The ombudsperson’s office very much welcomes the decision of the Baederbetriebe, because it establishes equal rights for all Berliners, whether male, female or non-binary, and because it also creates legal certainty for the staff at the Baederbetriebe,” said Doris Liebscher, the head of the ombudsperson’s office.

    In the past, women who bared their breasts at Berlin pools were asked to cover themselves or to leave the pool, and were sometimes banned from returning.

    “Now it is important that the regulation is applied consistently and that no more expulsions or house bans are issued,” Liebscher said.

    It was not immediately clear when exactly the new bathing rules would be applied.

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  • Thar she blows! Canadian woman wins Key West conch contest

    Thar she blows! Canadian woman wins Key West conch contest

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    A Canadian woman and a pediatric cardiologist from Georgia are winners in Key West’s annual Conch Shell Blowing Contest

    A Canadian woman and a pediatric cardiologist from Georgia won the men’s and women’s contests at Key West’s annual Conch Shell Blowing Contest, using different techniques to impress Saturday’s judges.

    Brian Cardis of Macon, Georgia, played the Jimmy Buffett song “Fins” on a a pink-lined conch shell with holes so it can be played like a flute, while Carol Whiteley of Ontario, Canada, blew a long, loud blast with her shell to best other competitors.

    Cardis said he began blowing the marine mollusk shell about 10 years ago during a family visit to Key West, adapting techniques he learned playing the trumpet as a child.

    “You sort of have to just buzz your lips when you’re blowing into it,” Cardis said. “You have to make a ‘pffft’ noise with your lips in order to generate the sound.”

    Whiteley said she plays the shell at her riverside home to celebrate sunsets.

    Judges evaluated entrants ranging from children to seniors on the quality, novelty, duration and loudness of sounds they produced.

    Other winners included Michael and Georgann Wachter, a couple from Avon Lake, Ohio, who performed a conch-shell-and-vocal duet parodying Elvis Presley’s “Hound Dog” that drew cheers and laughter from spectators.

    The conch shell, an enduring symbol of the Florida Keys, has been used as a maritime signaling device in the region for more than two centuries. The island chain is nicknamed the Conch Republic.

    The contest was conceived by the Old Island Restoration Foundation in 1972 and took place in the garden of Key West’s Oldest House Museum.

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  • Fowl-free: McDonald’s debuts plant-based McNuggets

    Fowl-free: McDonald’s debuts plant-based McNuggets

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    McDonald’s McNuggets are going fowl-free.

    The Chicago-based fast food giant is introducing plant-based McNuggets next week. Germany will be the first market to get them.

    McPlant Nuggets __ made from peas, corn and wheat with a tempura batter __ are the second product McDonald’s has co-developed with Beyond Meat, an El Segundo, California-based maker of plant-based meats. McDonald’s has been selling a McPlant burger since 2021.

    McDonald’s said the nationwide nugget rollout to more than 1,400 restaurants in Germany follows a limited-time test at nine restaurants in the Stuttgart area in August. McDonald’s will also start selling the McPlant burger in Germany next week.

    Availability of the McPlant nuggets and burger in future markets will depend on customer demand, McDonald’s said.

    European customers have generally been more receptive to McDonald’s plant-based meat products than those in the U.S. The McPlant burger is now a permanent menu item in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Austria and the Netherlands. Last month, McDonald’s rolled out the Double McPlant burger in the U.K. and Ireland.

    But in the U.S., McDonald’s ended a test of the McPlant burger last summer without announcing any future plans for its sale.

    Beyond Meat began selling plant-based chicken in U.S. groceries in 2021. It has also co-developed plant-based tenders and nuggets with other chains, including KFC and Panda Express.

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  • Auburn student wins car in a long-putt contest at Bama game

    Auburn student wins car in a long-putt contest at Bama game

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    AUBURN, Ala. — In a game where Auburn struggled with its 3-point accuracy, the best long shot of the afternoon by far belonged to a student in the stands.

    During a timeout in the second half of the game against No. 3 Alabama on Saturday, sophomore Craig Noyes made a full-court, 94-foot putt to win a new car.

    Not bad for someone who said he’s not a golfer.

    “Honestly, my main goal was just not to whiff or shank it into the bench,” Noyes told The Associated Press.

    “It was so loud when I stepped up to the ball. Once I hit it, I completely zoned out. I couldn’t hear anyone,” he said. “It wasn’t until the announcer put a hand on my shoulder and said I’d won a car that I believed it.”

    The sold-out crowd at Neville Arena erupted when he became the first person to win the contest since 2014. Noyes, who writes for the student-run paper The Auburn Plainsman, high-fived fans in celebration.

    Noyes went baseline-to-baseline with his winning putt, rolling the ball through a small hole in a poster at the opposite end to win a car in the contest sponsored by a local Toyota dealership.

    The 20-year-old Noyes, from Kensington, Maryland, said he and some friends camped outside the arena for about 24 hours to get prime seats for the game against the in-state rival Crimson Tide. Around halftime, he was randomly picked as the day’s contestant to shoot during an under-12 TV timeout.

    “I was in the tunnel for about 15 minutes, swinging the club and trying to stay loose and relaxed,” he said. “I was so nervous.”

    Noyes instantly heard from a lot of people after the winning shot, saying his phone ran out of juice on the way back to his campus house.

    Auburn players, meanwhile, weren’t nearly as successful from long distance. The Tigers made just 7 of 24 shots from 3-point range in a 77-69 loss to Alabama.

    Noyes, by the way, said he didn’t own a car. But thanks to a lucky putter, he’ll soon be a driver.

    ___

    AP college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/college-basketball and https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-basketball-poll and https://twitter.com/AP_Top25

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  • Funeral home finds woman breathing hours after declared dead

    Funeral home finds woman breathing hours after declared dead

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    MILLER PLACE, N.Y. — An 82-year-old woman was pronounced dead at a New York nursing home but found to be breathing three hours later at the funeral home where she had been taken, authorities said.

    The woman was pronounced dead at Water’s Edge Rehab and Nursing Center at Port Jefferson on Long Island at 11:15 a.m. Saturday, Suffolk County police said.

    The woman, whose name was not released, was taken to the O.B. Davis Funeral Homes in Miller Place at 1:30 p.m., police said in a news release. She was discovered breathing at 2:09 p.m., they said.

    The woman was taken to a hospital. No update on her condition was available Monday.

    The apparent premature declaration of death occurred days after a continuing care home in Iowa was fined $10,000 over a similar incident.

    Authorities in Iowa said that a 66-year-old woman was declared dead on Jan. 3 at the Glen Oaks Alzheimer’s Special Care Center in Urbandale, where she was receiving hospice care.

    The woman was placed in a body bag and taken to the Ankeny Funeral Home & Crematory, where workers found that she was breathing and called 911, authorities said.

    She was returned to hospice care, where she died on Jan. 5, according to a report issued last week by the Iowa Department of Inspection and Appeals.

    The New York case has been referred to the state attorney general’s office for investigation, police said.

    The state health department is investigating, as well, spokesperson Monica Pomeroy said, adding that she could not elaborate.

    An email seeking comment was sent to the nursing home. A person who answered the phone there Monday hung up.

    Officials at the funeral home said in a statement, “Out of respect for the privacy and confidentiality of the families we are honored to serve, we are not in a position to comment further on this matter.”

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  • Michigan man says son, 6, ordered $1K in food from Grubhub

    Michigan man says son, 6, ordered $1K in food from Grubhub

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    CHESTERFIELD TOWNSHIP, Mich. — A Michigan man says he was left with a $1,000 bill after his 6-year-old son ordered a virtual smorgasbord of food from several restaurants last weekend, leading to a string of unexpected deliveries — and maybe a starring role in an ad campaign.

    Keith Stonehouse said the food piled up quickly at his Detroit-area home Saturday night after he let his son, Mason, use his cellphone to play a game before bed. He said the youngster instead used his father’s Grubhub account to order food from one restaurant after another.

    The boy’s mother, Kristin Stonehouse, told The Associated Press on Thursday that Grubhub has reached out to the family and offered them a $1,000 gift card. The company also is considering using the family in an online promotional campaign, she said. Grubhub officials did not immediately respond to a message from the AP seeking comment.

    Keith Stonehouse said he was alone with his son while his wife was at the movies when Mason ordered jumbo shrimp, salads, shawarma and chicken pita sandwiches, chili cheese fries and other foods that one Grubhub driver after another delivered to their Chesterfield Township home.

    “This was like something out of a ‘Saturday Night Live’ skit,” Keith Stonehouse told MLive.com.

    He added: “I don’t really find it funny yet, but I can laugh with people a little bit. It’s a lot of money and it kind of came out of nowhere.”

    Keith Stonehouse said his son ordered food from so many different places that Chase Bank sent him a fraud alert declining a $439 order from Happy’s Pizza. But Mason’s $183 order of jumbo shrimp from the same restaurant went through and arrived at the family’s house.

    Stonehouse said it took the arrival of a few orders of food for him to realize what was going on. By that time, there was nothing he could do to stop the orders from coming.

    Kristin Stonehouse told the AP that Mason is extremely intelligent and has been reading since he was 2 1/2 years old.

    “He’s very smart,” she said. “He’s not your average 6-year-old.”

    She said her husband had just used the Grubhub app on his phone to order dinner before she left and probably just left the app open. She said her son took the phone, hid in the basement and proceeded to order his feast.

    She said she and her husband had a talk with Mason on Sunday morning and told him what he did was akin to stealing.

    “I don’t think he grasped that concept at first,” she said.

    To drive the point home, she and her husband opened up Mason’s piggy bank and pocketed the $115 he had gotten for his birthday in November, telling him the money would go to replenish their accounts. That didn’t seem to faze the boy.

    “Then he found a penny on the floor and said he could start all over again,” she said.

    Keith Stonehouse said most of the food went into the family’s refrigerators. He said he also invited some neighbors over to eat some of it.

    He said he’s heard of things like this happening to other parents, but not at the level he experienced last weekend. He recommends making sure important apps are not readily available for children to click on when they’re using a parent’s phone. He said he’s changing his password.

    “I knew this could happen, but you just don’t think your kid is going to do something like this. He’s definitely smart enough, I just didn’t expect it,” Keith Stonehouse said.

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  • Radioactive capsule that fell off truck found in Australia

    Radioactive capsule that fell off truck found in Australia

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    PERTH, Australia (AP) — Authorities in Western Australia on Wednesday recovered a tiny but dangerous radioactive capsule that fell off a truck while being transported along a 1,400-kilometer (870-mile) Outback highway last month in what an official said was like finding the needle in the haystack.

    Officials said the capsule the size of a pea was found south of the mining town of Newman on the Great Northern Highway. It was detected by a search vehicle travelling at 70 kilometers (43 miles) per hour when specialist equipment picked up radiation emitting from the capsule.

    Portable search equipment was then used to locate it 2 meters (6.5 feet) from the side of the road.

    “This is an extraordinary result … they have quite literally found the needle in the haystack,” said Emergency Services Minister Stephen Dawson.

    Chief Health Officer Andy Robertson said the capsule did not appear to have moved and no injuries had been reported.

    It contains the caesium 137 ceramic source, commonly used in radiation gauges, which emits dangerous amounts of radiation, equivalent of receiving 10 X-rays in an hour. It could cause skin burns and prolonged exposure could cause cancer.

    Search crews had spent six days scouring the entire length of the highway.

    The capsule measures 8 millimeters by 6 millimeters (0.31 inches by 0.24 inches), and people have been warned it could have unknowingly become lodged in their car’s tires.

    A government investigation has been launched into how the capsule fell off the truck and a report will be provided to the health minister.

    Defense officials were verifying the identification of the capsule, which has been placed into a lead container for safety. It will be stored in a secure location in Newman before being transported to a health facility in the city of Perth.

    The capsule got lost while being transported between a desert mine site and Perth on Jan. 10. The truck transporting the capsule arrived at a Perth depot on Jan. 16. Emergency services were notified of the missing capsule on Jan. 25.

    The chief executive of the mining giant Rio Tinto Iron Ore, Simon Trott, has apologized for the incident and expressed gratitude for the find.

    “A pretty incredible recovery when you think of the distances involved, and also the remoteness of the terrain, and I think that really speaks to the tenacity of all those who were involved in the search,” Trott said.

    “The simple fact is this device should never have been lost. We’re sorry that that has occurred and we’re sorry for the concern that that has caused within the Western Australian community,” Trott added.

    Robertson said the investigation of the mishap could lead to a prosecution.

    “We have the ability to prosecute under the Radiation Safety Act and we will certainly look at such prosecutions, and we’ve done that in the past,” Robertson said.

    Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said a 1,000 Australian dollar ($708) fine was an inadequate maximum penalty for mishandling radioactive material.

    “It shouldn’t have been lost, that’s the first thing. And second, yeah of course that figure is ridiculously low,” Albanese said.

    Dawson said the state government was reviewing the penalties under the Radiation Safety Act.

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  • World champion says Rubik’s Cube and violin go hand in hand

    World champion says Rubik’s Cube and violin go hand in hand

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    ANN ARBOR, Mich. (AP) — A University of Michigan student is one of the world’s foremost “speedcubers,” a person capable of quickly solving a Rubik’s Cube. He also is an accomplished violinist.

    Stanley Chapel says the two fields go hand in hand.

    Not only does Chapel say he has equal interest in both, but the 21-year-old says the violin has aided in his speedcubing success.

    “Repetition, breaking things down into their smallest fundamental elements, all of these different things that we use to improve at an instrument, and being able to take these into the world of cubing has certainly been a huge help to my progression,” said Chapel, a junior majoring in violin performance at the university’s school of music, theater and dance.

    Chapel, who grew up in Ann Arbor not far from the Michigan campus, solved his first 3×3 Rubik’s Cube as a 14-year-old. Five weeks later, Chapel entered his first competition, solving the cube in an average of 22 seconds.

    Fast-forward a year to 2017 in Paris, with Chapel placing fifth in both the 4×4 blindfolded and 5×5 blindfolded categories at the World Cube Association World Championship.

    At the 2019 world championship in Melbourne, Australia, the recent high school graduate won both events.

    Factoring in the time it takes for him to review the cube before placing the blindfold over his eyes, Chapel can solve one in around 17 seconds.

    “The deeper I go into the realm of cubing technique, the more I find interest in pushing the boundaries of what’s possible there,” he said.

    Chapel has certain inherent abilities: He is capable of remembering and applying thousands of algorithms to solve a Rubik’s Cube and performing one of Johann Sebastian Bach’s violin sonatas from memory.

    But he also spends hours upon hours honing his craft, including doing regular hand stretches that help Chapel avoid the kinds of aches and pains that come with the frequent and frenetic turning of the cube’s sides.

    Chapel says years of playing the violin also has contributed to him having “very, very fine motor control already built up.”

    Later this year, Chapel intends to defend his world titles in South Korea. Since the 2021 event was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Chapel is the reigning champion in both heading into the 2023 event in Seoul.

    Once he’s done with school, though, Chapel isn’t sure how speedcubing fits into his future plans.

    “I guess it’s cool to know that nobody is able to do this,” he said. “But, at the same time, giving myself a little bit of a reality check, it’s like, ‘How much does that actually matter?’”

    “It’s not going to pay the bills when I’m older,” Chapel said, laughing.

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  • Obnoxiously loud car? A traffic camera might be listening

    Obnoxiously loud car? A traffic camera might be listening

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    NEW YORK (AP) — After the relative quiet of the pandemic, New York City has come roaring back. Just listen: Jackhammers. Honking cars and trucks. Rumbling subway trains. Sirens. Shouting.

    Over the years, there have been numerous efforts to quiet the cacophony. One of the latest: traffic cameras equipped with sound meters capable of identifying souped-up cars and motorbikes emitting an illegal amount of street noise.

    At least 71 drivers have gotten tickets so far for violating noise rules during a yearlong pilot program of the system. The city’s Department of Environmental Protection now has plans to expand the use of the roadside sound meters.

    “Vehicles with illegally modified mufflers and tailpipes that emit extremely loud noise have been a growing problem in recent years,” said City Council member Erik Bottcher, who heralded the arrival of the radars to his district to help reduce “obnoxious” noise.

    New York City already has one of the most extensive noise ordinances in the country, setting allowable levels for a host of noisemakers, such as jackhammers and vehicles.

    A state law known as the Stop Loud and Excessive Exhaust Pollution Act, or the SLEEP Act, that went into effect last spring raised fines for illegal modifications of mufflers and exhaust systems.

    Because police officers often have other priorities, offenders have gone their merry, noisy way. The new devices record the license plates of offenders, much like how speedsters are nabbed by roadside cameras. Vehicle owners face fines of $800 for a first noise offense and a penalty of $2,625 if they ignore a third-offense hearing.

    City officials declined to reveal where the radars are currently perched.

    A year ago, Paris, one of Europe’s noisier cities, installed similar equipment along some streets.

    Evidence is clear that noise affects not only hearing but mood and mental health, not to mention possible links to heightened risks of heart disease and elevated blood pressure.

    “You listen to the noise out there, it is nonstop — the horns, the trucks, the sirens,” New York City Mayor Eric Adams bemoaned during a recent press conference that blamed an expressway for noise and illness. “Noise pollution makes it hard to sleep and increases the risk of chronic disease.”

    Nearly a decade ago, one of Adams’ predecessors, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, launched a war on noise, releasing 45 pages of rules that covered chiming ice cream trucks and how long a canine can continuously yap (five minutes during the wee hours of the night, 10 during most of the day) before its owner gets in the doghouse.

    In 1905, the New York Times had declared the metropolis “a bonfire of sound that is rapidly spreading beyond control of any ordinary extinguisher.” The article asked: “Is there any relief possible?”

    A global pandemic more than a century later answered that question. For a few months in the spring of 2020, the roar of vehicles on city streets stopped as people stayed in their homes.

    The silence allowed people to hear birdsong again — though it was often interrupted by wailing ambulance sirens and, at night, bursts of illegal fireworks.

    “As quiet as it was during the lockdown, it was a very uncomfortable quiet. It was a scary quiet because it carried a lot of implications with it,” said Juan Pablo Bello, the lead investigator of Sounds of New York City, or SONYC, a New York University endeavor to study urban noise.

    Bello and his team initially hoped to collect data on the dissonance of routine urban life but the coronavirus intervened. Instead, they monitored the acoustical rhythms of a city under lockdown.

    The number of noise complaints actually grew during the pandemic, but some experts say that was a symptom of homebound people becoming hypersensitive to their uneasy environments.

    Complaints over noisy neighbors nearly doubled in the first year of the pandemic. Many other complaints were attributed to cars and motorcycles with modified mufflers.

    Still, some people say efforts to quiet loud vehicles go too far. Phillip Franklin, a 30-year-old Bronx car enthusiast, launched an online petition to protest the state’s noise law.

    “The majority of us live here in New York City, where noise is a part of our daily lives,” said his petition, which asserted that quiet vehicles pose dangers to inattentive pedestrians.

    “Fixing potholes is a lot more important than going after noisy cars,” Franklin said in an interview.

    Loud noise, hitting 120 decibels, can cause immediate harm to one’s ears, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Even prolonged noise above 70 decibels can eventually damage hearing. A roaring motorcycle is about 95 decibels.

    Firms specializing in architectural acoustics have multiplied. Designing new buildings or retrofitting old ones with anti-noise technology is now a booming business.

    At the Manhattan offices of the environmental engineering firm AKRF, the company has what it calls the “PinDrop” room — suggesting a space so quiet you might hear a pin drop — that has an audio system that simulates the erratic symphony of sounds that the city’s denizens must endure.

    While architectural drawings might render the use of space, acoustical renderings depict how sound and noise might fill a space.

    “So if it’s for sleeping, we want you to be able to sleep. If it’s for listening, we want you to be able to hear,” said AKRF acoustical consultant Nathaniel Fletcher.

    Even with sound barriers, tight-fitting windows and noise-dampening insulation, there’s only so much that can be done about the racket. Most New Yorkers come to peace with that.

    “I think people developed an appreciation for the fact that it’s a messy, noisy city,” said Bello, the NYU researcher. “We like it to be active, and we like it to be lively. And we like it to be full of jobs and activity, and not this sort of scary, quite unnerving place.”

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  • Police investigate after Dallas Zoo missing leopard is found

    Police investigate after Dallas Zoo missing leopard is found

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    DALLAS (AP) — Dallas Zoo officials said Friday that a missing clouded leopard was found after a daylong search. Evidence was found that the fence of the small cat’s habitat had been “intentionally” cut, police said.

    The zoo tweeted that the cat named Nova, who weighs about 20-25 pounds (9-11 kilograms), did not appear injured and was found near her original habitat. The search had closed Texas’ largest zoo to visitors while staff and police combed the 100-acre (40-hectare) grounds.

    The zoo announced that Nova had been found just moments after a news conference in which police said a criminal investigation had been opened. Police and zoo officials said they have reviewed surveillance footage but would not say what it showed or whether there were potential suspects.

    “It is our belief that this was an intentional act,” Dallas Police Sgt. Warren Mitchell said.

    Mitchell said Dallas police at first dispatched SWAT officers to the zoo, not understanding the size of a clouded leopard. Police drones helped search the zoo grounds, including trees. Harrison Edell, executive vice president of animal care and conservation at the Dallas Zoo, said clouded leopards like to climb.

    The zoo tweeted earlier in the day that the missing cat was a “serious situation,” but officials said the animal posed no danger.

    Another clouded leopard at the zoo, Nova’s sister, did not leave its habitat.

    Animals have escaped enclosures from the Dallas Zoo before. Most notably was in 2004, when a 340-pound (154-kilogram) gorilla named Jabari jumped over a wall and went on a 40-minute rampage that injured three people before police shot and killed the animal.

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  • 2023 public domain debuts include last Sherlock Holmes work

    2023 public domain debuts include last Sherlock Holmes work

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    WASHINGTON — Sherlock Holmes is finally free to the American public in 2023.

    The long-running contested copyright dispute over Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s tales of a whipsmart detective — which has even ensnared Enola Holmes — will finally come to an end as the 1927 copyrights expiring Jan. 1 include Conan Doyle’s last Sherlock Holmes work.

    Alongside the short-story collection “The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes,” books such as Virginia Woolf’s “To The Lighthouse,” Ernest Hemingway’s “Men Without Women,” William Faulkner’s “Mosquitoes” and Agatha Christie’s “The Big Four” — an Hercule Poirot mystery — will become public domain as the calendar turns to 2023.

    Once a work enters the public domain it can legally be shared, performed, reused, repurposed or sampled without permission or cost. The works from 1927 were originally supposed to be copyrighted for 75 years, but the 1998 Copyright Term Extension Act delayed opening them up for an additional 20 years.

    While many prominent works on the list used those extra two decades to earn their copyright holders good money, a Duke University expert says the copyright protections also applied to “all of the works whose commercial viability had long subsided.”

    “For the vast majority—probably 99%—of works from 1927, no copyright holder financially benefited from continued copyright. Yet they remained off limits, for no good reason,” Jennifer Jenkins, director of Duke’s Center for the Study of the Public Domain, wrote in a blog post heralding “Public Domain Day 2023.”

    That long U.S. copyright period meant many works that would now become available have long since been lost, because they were not profitable to maintain by the legal owners, but couldn’t be used by others. On the Duke list are such “lost” films like Victor Fleming’s “The Way of All Flesh” and Tod Browning’s “London After Midnight.”

    1927 portended the silent film era’s end with the release of the first “talkie” — a film with dialogue in it. That was “The Jazz Singer,” the historic first feature-length film with synchronized dialogue also notorious for Al Jolson’s blackface performance.

    In addition to the Alan Crosland-directed film, other movies like “Wings” — directed by William A. Wellman and the “outstanding production” winner at the very first Oscars — and Fritz Lang’s seminal science-fiction classic “Metropolis” will enter the public domain.

    Musical compositions — the music and lyrics found on sheet music, not the sound recordings — on the list include hits from Broadway musicals like “Funny Face” and jazz standards from the likes of legends like Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, in addition to Irving Berlin’s “Puttin’ on the Ritz” and “(I Scream You Scream, We All Scream for) Ice Cream” by Howard Johnson, Billy Moll and Robert A. King.

    ———

    Duke’s Center for the Public Domain highlighted notable books, movies and musical compositions entering the public domain — just a fraction of the thousands due to be unleashed in 2023.

    BOOKS

    — “The Gangs of New York,” by Herbert Asbury (original publication)

    — “Death Comes for the Archbishop,” by Willa Cather

    — “The Big Four,” by Agatha Christie

    — “The Tower Treasure,” the first Hardy Boys mystery by the pseudonymous Franklin W. Dixon

    — “The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes,” by Arthur Conan Doyle

    — “Copper Sun,” by Countee Cullen

    — “Mosquitoes,” by William Faulkner

    — “Men Without Women,” by Ernest Hemingway

    — “Der Steppenwolf,” by Herman Hesse (in German)

    — “Amerika,” by Franz Kafka (in German)

    — “Now We Are Six,” by A.A. Milne with illustrations from E.H. Shepard

    — “Le Temps retrouvé,” by Marcel Proust (in French)

    — “Twilight Sleep,” by Edith Wharton

    — “The Bridge of San Luis Rey,” by Thornton Wilder

    — “To The Lighthouse,” by Virginia Woolf

    MOVIES

    — “7th Heaven,” directed by Frank Borzage

    — “The Battle of the Century,” a Laurel and Hardy film directed by Clyde Bruckman

    — “The Kid Brother,” directed by Ted Wilde

    — “The Jazz Singer,” directed by Alan Crosland

    — “The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog,” directed by Alfred Hitchcock

    — “Metropolis,” directed by Fritz Lang

    — “Sunrise,” directed by F.W. Murnau

    — “Upstream,” directed by John Ford

    — “Wings,” directed by William A. Wellman

    MUSICAL COMPOSITIONS

    — “Back Water Blues,” “Preaching the Blues” and “Foolish Man Blues” (Bessie Smith)

    — “The Best Things in Life Are Free,” from the musical “Good News” (George Gard “Buddy” De Sylva, Lew Brown, Ray Henderson)

    — “Billy Goat Stomp,” “Hyena Stomp” and “Jungle Blues” (Ferdinand Joseph Morton)

    — “Black and Tan Fantasy” and “East St. Louis Toodle-O” (Bub Miley, Duke Ellington)

    — “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man” and “Ol’ Man River,” from the musical “Show Boat” (Oscar Hammerstein II, Jerome Kern)

    — “Diane” (Erno Rapee, Lew Pollack)

    — “Funny Face” and “’S Wonderful,” from the musical “Funny Face” (Ira and George Gershwin)

    — “(I Scream You Scream, We All Scream for) Ice Cream” (Howard Johnson, Billy Moll, Robert A. King)

    — “Mississippi Mud” (Harry Barris, James Cavanaugh)

    — “My Blue Heaven” (George Whiting, Walter Donaldson)

    — “Potato Head Blues” and Gully Low Blues” (Louis Armstrong)

    — “Puttin’ on the Ritz” (Irving Berlin)

    — “Rusty Pail Blues,” “Sloppy Water Blues” and “Soothin’ Syrup Stomp” (Thomas Waller)

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  • Dogs gifted by North’s Kim resettle in South Korean zoo

    Dogs gifted by North’s Kim resettle in South Korean zoo

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    SEOUL, South Korea — A pair of dogs gifted by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un four years ago ended up at a zoo in South Korea after a dispute over who should finance the caring of the animals.

    Kim had given the two white Pungsan hunting dogs — a breed indigenous to North Korea — to then-South Korean President Moon Jae-in as a gift following their summit talks in Pyongyang in 2018. But liberal Moon gave up the dogs last month, citing a lack of financial support for the canines from the current conservative government led by President Yoon Suk Yeol.

    The dogs, named Gomi and Songgang, were moved to a zoo run by a local government in the southern city of Gwangju last Friday after a temporary stay at a veterinary hospital in the southeastern city of Daeju, zoo officials said.

    With Gwangju Mayor Kang Gijung in attendance, the dogs were shown off Monday with their nametags around their necks as journalists and other visitors took photos.

    “Gomi and Songgang are a symbol of peace and South-North Korean reconciliation and cooperation. We will raise them well like we cultivate a seed for peace,” Kang said, according to his office.

    The dogs have six offspring between them, all of them born after they came to South Korea. One of them, named Byeol, has been raised in the Gwanju zoo since 2019. The remaining five are in other zoos and a public facility in South Korea.

    Gwangju zoo officials said they’ll try to raise Byeol and her parent dogs together, though they’re currently kept separately as they don’t recognize each other.

    Gomi and Songgang officially belong to state property. While in office, Moon raised them at the presidential residence. After leaving office in May, Moon was able to take them to his private home thanks to a change of law that allowed presidential gifts to be managed outside the Presidential Archives if they were animals or plants.

    But in early November, Moon’s office accused the Yoon government of refusing to cover the cost for the dogs’ food and veterinary care. Yoon’s office denied the accusation, saying it never prevented Moon from keeping the animals and that the discussions about providing financial support were still ongoing.

    Moon, a champion of reconciliation with North Korea, was credited with arranging now-dormant diplomacy on North Korea’s nuclear program, but also faced criticism that his engagement policy allowed Kim to buy time and boost his country’s nuclear capability in the face of international sanctions. Yoon has accused Moon’s engagement policy “being submissive” to North Korea.

    In 2000, Kim’s late father, Kim Jong Il, gifted another pair of Pungsan dogs to then-South Korean President Kim Dae-jung after their meeting in Pyongyang, the first inter-Korean summit since their division in 1948. Liberal Kim Dae-jung gave two Jindo dogs — a breed native to a South Korean island — to Kim Jong Il. The North Korean dogs lived at a public zoo near Seoul before they died in 2013.

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  • California girl licensed to own unicorn — if she finds one

    California girl licensed to own unicorn — if she finds one

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    These images released by the Los Angeles County Animal Care and Control and posted via Instagram, shows a created a unicorn license tag, right, and a plush toy unicorn, after a young girl requested permission to have a unicorn in her backyard, if she could find one. Animal Care and Control Department officials said this week that they granted the unusual permit to Madeline, whose last name was redacted. (Los Angeles County Animal Care and Control via AP)

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  • The mind behind the Rubik’s Cube celebrates a lasting puzzle

    The mind behind the Rubik’s Cube celebrates a lasting puzzle

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    NEW YORK (AP) — If you’ve ever had trouble solving a Rubik’s Cube, a good piece of advice is to break it down into steps. It’s worth a shot: That advice is from the man who invented it.

    “Problem solving is a very basic activity of the human mind and if a problem is complex you need to divide the problem into smaller elements,” says Ernő Rubik, who invented the cube in 1974.

    Rubik has seen his color-matching puzzle go from a classroom teaching tool in Cold War-era Hungary to a worldwide phenomenon with over 450 million cubes sold and a mini-empire of related toys.

    “For me, the cube represents what freedom means. Freedom is never endless,” he said during a recent visit to New York. “It lets you do what is necessary to achieve your goal.”

    The original 3×3 Rubik’s has more than 43 quintillion — that’s more than 43,000,000,000,000,000,000 — possible configurations, but the principles behind the cube have been refashioned for 2×2, 4×4 and 5×5 cubes, a board game called Rubik’s Race, a pyramid, a tower and a Christmas tree, among others.

    It even made the transition to electronic media with Rubik’s Revolution and Rubik’s Touch. Spin Master acquired the brand in 2021. Their latest brainteaser is called the Phantom, which takes the 3×3 original cube and adds a memory test: Using thermochromic technology, the multi-color tiles revert to black unless the heat of the user’s hand keeps them visible.

    “The principle of the cube is not limited,” says Rubik. “The complexity of the task is to stimulate our mind and it makes it a much more enjoyable activity.”

    The goal of all Rubik puzzles is to start with some randomized and shuffled messy configuration and, by rotating faces or parts, transform each side into a single color or a pattern of colors.

    Practiced cube-solvers can complete the Rubik’s Cube in a matter of seconds, with the current world-record holder solving a cube in 3.47 seconds. There are also records at the World Cube Association for fastest solving while wearing a blindfold or using one hand.

    It took 36 years after the invention of the toy for anyone to come up with an answer for the minimum number of moves to solve it. In 2010, a group of mathematicians and computer programmers proved that any Rubik’s Cube can be solved in 20 moves.

    Rubik was a budding artist who hoped to become a sculptor or a painter before he studied architecture, which he argues is art with a function: “Architecture is changing the environment according to our needs.”

    He got a degree in architecture at Budapest University of Technology and became a teacher in the interior design department at the Academy of Applied Arts and Crafts in Budapest.

    Rubik regularly used physical models and materials to teach concepts in construction and design.

    “As our body needs some kind of exercises, the brain needs that kind of exercise as well,” he says. Thus was born an elegant teaching tool he named “The Magic Cube.”

    “I tried to make it as simple as possible because I thought the task itself is complicated enough,” he says. “You don’t need to complicate anymore.”

    The puzzle — which uses rounded elements for the center core — is easy to use, but also hard enough to solve that more than one cuber has thrown it across a room in frustration.

    “One of the main keys of the cube is the contradiction between complexity and simplicity,” Rubik says. “On one hand, the cube is a very simple form. And on the other hand, the potential of the variation of movement is so complicated.”

    The brain-bending elegance of the Rubik’s Cube is part of the reason it has endured, while other faddish toys and games — Tamagotchi or Shopkins, anyone? — have not.

    “Usually these kinds of crazes are ending very soon,” Rubik says. “But the cube didn’t die.”

    In 2014, it landed in the National Toy Hall of Fame, joining such childhood classics as Barbie, Hot Wheels, G.I. Joe and the hula hoop. The hall noted that the cube has caused its own medical condition, known as “cube’s thumb” or “Rubik’s wrist.” The cube has also show up in TV shows and movies from “The Simpsons” to “The Pursuit of Happyness.”

    Rubik recalls the early days when some people were convinced the cube was impossible to solve. He knew it could be done and was asked to prove it.

    “I tried to explain and show people it is possible and if something is possible for me, you can do it yourself,” he says. “It’s a very nice proof of the power of science.”

    ___

    Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

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