- The guy who owns the company that makes Segways died. They found him at the bottom of a cliff, in a river, WITH HIS SEGWAY!!!!! He very possibly drove his Segway off a cliff into a river and somehow this is not huge news. Or he just died of old-man-being while putting about on his Segway, but that's not as funny. And he's British, so you can imagine Benny Hill music playing as he rides his Segway down a cliff like the man from Snowy River, but without a very stupid horse or making my mother and sister drool.

- The old lady from the Titanic movie was suprisingly still alive as of a couple of days ago. Though not so much now. I recall all sorts of hype about her and her performance back when that movie came out and there was little or no internet to point out the egregious plot holes and errors in the film., yet upon closer examination, she actually played a rather wretched individual. This egomaniacal old bat couldn't visit a boat without all sorts of pictures...which makes her appear to beat worst sentimental and is implied in the film to be evidence of the wonderful and full life she has lived since getting off the Hellship of doom, but as my brother pointed out once, they're all pictures of her, and only her. Family? Screw them! Which is what she does when she throws a multi-million dollar necklace into the ocean. That necklace was considered sufficient incentive to fund Bill Paxton's whole research expedition with its submersibles and robots and cutting-edge-for-the-90s-but-rather-superfluous-for-a-salvage-vessel shipwreck-animation computer. Think of what that money could have done for her family's future educations and so forth. At the very least, leave the damn thing to the granddaughter who has given her life to taking care of the old crank and toting her pictures and goldfish around to ships, where, to paraphrase Dr. Johnson, she is experiencing something akin to prison with the chance of drowning, plus Bill Paxton & his crew of nerds leering at her. Not only that, she deliberately lets this salvage company fly her out (gold fish, pictures and all)to fondle Titanic artifacts, listen to her pointless stories as all old people crave more than anything, and get screwed around when she tells them, "oh I have no clue where the item you brought me out here to to help you find is"! Either they are so extravagant as to fly people back and forth to their boat at the drop of a hat, or else she resisted all their attempts to extract any information over the phone, incluing her bona fides which they didn't confirm until she got aboard! She strung these guys along for the chance to get a captive audience and a ride out to throw her necklace at DiCaprio's grave, when she could have just told them "that diamond you're looking for isn't down there" over the phone. What's the deal? Was the necklace her ticket to Titanic Heaven as portrayed in the final scene? I assume it's heaven, since I was informed when leaving the theater that I am a jerk for asking out loud whether dying and going to Titanic counts as Heaven or Hell.
Too bad about the old lady actress though. I am certain that she isn't nearly as awful a person as her character was, though if they find tons of little baby skeletons under her house or something, I will have to revise my opinion.

- A reality TV show about a polygamous "family" has led to the family being investigated for ... polygamy. Here's a hint for all those aspiring reality TV show stars out there: Make sure the hook for your show is not actually illegal! Hearing about this sort thing always makes me think about WoT, of course. If B-Sand needs to do any research on the dynamics of Rand's relationship(s), at least they're conveniently located! By the way, unless there are fertility problems, 13 kids by three women is kind of slow for a group of religious fundamentalists who have been "married" for over a dozen years. That averages out to 4 each, which is not a lot, let alone the tiny family portrait on that Big Love show. My rather mainstream parents had their fourth child in the same month as their seventh wedding anniversary. By the time they were married 15 years they had 7. One third the wives and half the kids. Catholics reproduce way more efficiently.

- On the other hand, Mormons are better informed about their relgious beliefs. I don't understand how anyone can call themselves a member of a religion and NOT know the important issues of their faith. Out of 32 questions about their own religions, Mormons, Jews & Atheists did better than Catholics, less than half of whom even understand the point of communion. That was one of the two crucial facts Homer Simpson wrote as clues on his hands when he dabbled in Catholicism in the Liam Neeson episode! I shudder to think how people did on the other such topic he noted (God = Good, Devil = Bad). And what's with Aetheism? What do you need to know about your religion that they were able to come up with 32 questions, that many people got wrong? How many ways could they phrase "Is there a god?" (answer: No) And who is to say whether or not they were wrong? What does the magisterium of the Church of Aetheism teach about the Valar, for instance?