6:52 AM
http://www.androidcentral.com/lg-ally-spotted-new-iron-man-2-commercial
Concern about secondhand smoke resulted in the Navy banning smoking below decks on its submarines effective 12/31/10:
http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/04/08/navy-nixes-smoking-on-submarines/
Women have been increasingly involved in long distance running events, with women reaching 51% of participants in US road races in 2008--women outnumber men in half-marathons and 5k races. 30 years ago women weren't allowed to run in the Boston Marathon and now women made up 42% of the runners in the latest Boston Marathon:
http://www.philly.com/inquirer/front_page/91318579.html
MIT PhD student has been working on a plastic, molded pump that has been designed for countries that cannot afford the commercial version. Her pump cost $3 while the only portable versions on the market today cost $100 a day to rent and must have their batteries recharged after 6 hours. She brought 50 of her current version to help with Haiti earthquake relief efforts and they were apparently effective in helping the patients in Haiti heal:
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2010/itw-haiti-0414.html
When the Taliban was in charge in Afghanistan, they banned hashish...but now they get a lot of their funds from growing hashish and opium. Afghanistan already was the world's leading producer of opium, but they now have also become the largest producer of hashish:
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/LD20Df02.html
Wisconsin has become the first state to have a state *microbe*...the lactococcus lactis bacterium earned the honor:
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2010-04/wisconsin-honors-cheese-producing-bacterium-state-microbe
Lori and I are preparing for our children to lose their first teeth, which is why I found this article interesting on how much the tooth fairy pays kids today. Kids in New York get $5 for their first tooth and $3 for later teeth, which kids elsewhere get $1-2 for the first tooth and $0.5 to $1 for later teeth:
http://moneywatch.bnet.com/saving-money/blog/family-finance/how-much-does-the-tooth-fairy-pay/1800/
New York estimates that they lose over $1 billion a year on cigarette taxes by people buying cigarettes illegally on Indian reservations across their State. Reservation members are exempt from cigarette taxes for their personal use...but sales data for one reservation showed that every person (even children!) was smoking 19,200 cigarettes every single day!
http://www.nyc.gov/portal/site/nycgov/menuitem.c0935b9a57bb4ef3daf2f1c701c789a0/index.jsp
I didn't realize that Newark, NJ was in such bad shape, but it is good to hear that their mayor is making a difference and turning the city around:
http://theweek.com/article/index/202155/Saving_Americas_worst_city
UK woman had such a severe migraine attack that she suffered a rare type of brain damage. Even though she has never been to China, for some reason she now speaks with a Chinese accent!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/apr/19/migraine-changes-womans-accent
20-year-old woman became the first person banned from buying or drinking alcohol anywhere in England...she has 26 convictions relating to her drinking including assault, attacking police officer, criminal damage and being drunk and disorderly:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1267655/Laura-Hall-Pub-ban-woman-appears-court-AGAIN-drunken-behaviour.html