Jury Duty...Meow!

Today's posts have been a little heavy. So, it is time to lighten the mood somewhat.

Here is bureaucracy in action.

Sal, the pet cat, has been summonsed for pussy jury duty. It would seem that in spite of Sal's limited language and comprehension skills, and the fact that he is a cat, he is still required for jury duty at the Suffolk Superior Crown Court in Boston.

Sal's owner, Anna Esposito told the powers that be that Sal was a cat. She even went to the trouble of getting Sal's vet to confirm that Sal was not fit for jury duty. It would certainly liven up proceedings to see a cat occupying Chair No. 12. It would be even more fun if young Sal was elected forepussy  foreperson of the jury. But, when push comes to shove, it will not take the court long to realise that Sal is disqualified from sitting on the jury because he does not speak English.

On a serious note though. This case should highlight how badly bureaucracy can get things wrong. Perhaps it is something one needs to remember when dealing with a bureaucracy, as frustrating as they can be. The cat for jury duty arose because the last US census asked for people to note down family pets. It seems Sal graduated from family pet to family member, and then qualified for jury duty.

I have to say, this story certainly allowed me a giggle. After all, could you imagine Sal sitting on the jury in a case of a dog doing the doo on the pavement? The dog is a goner, electric chair all the way!

Miami Loses...

A Team of Stars vs. a Star Team...

...and the winner is the Star Team!

I would have to admit that I am more a Boston Celtics fan than I will ever be a Miami Heat fan. Perhaps my enjoyment of watching the Celtics play is an extension of watching "Cheers", and harbouring secret desires to see a Baiton educated at Harvard. Who knows.

But, as they say. "look at the scoreboard...88-80 Boston Celtics over the Miami Heat!"

LeBron James might be "The King" and he might have a pretty awesome supporting cast with the likes of Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh...even the King gets lost in the crowd of superstars in the NBA, sometimes!

Cocaine Currency...

I wonder what people carrying US dollars are doing in their spare time. A recent study has found that 90%, yes that is nine out of every ten bills tested, tested positive for cocaine. So, whoever is laundering this money is not doing a very good job at getting it clean before it goes into circulation. The study was presented at the Annual National Meeting of the American Chemical Society (I wonder if that is some kind of secret code for a meeting of like-minded individuals in the chemical field, if you know what I mean ;D).

The figures would suggest that the worlds largest consumers of cocaine, the US, are still maintaining a strangle-hold on the number one spot when it comes to users of cocaine. How does money end up with traces of cocaine on it; it is either used to snort the drug or it picks it up during a drug transaction.

Funnily enough, the dirtiest cities are Baltimore, Boston, and Detroit. The cleanest happens to be Salt Lake City, which means that apparently Mormons are not too into doing cocaine or they are just better at laundering their money.

The tests on the money were done with a gas chromatograph mass spectrometer. For those of you who don't know, and I was one of you, this is apparently a very accurate way of determining residues on banknotes.

But, never fear dear readers, you have absolutely zero chance of being able to go out and buy some greenbacks and start sniffing them for a cheap high. I still have a few greenbacks in my wallet from my last trip to Washington DC. Perhaps, it is time to dig around. The tests generally revealed only minute traces of cocaine.

More Shark Stories

I am not a huge fan of sharks but have never found it necessary to prove my courage by going and searching one out for a close encounter of the toothy kind! However, it seems that once you hit on one story then more on the same theme pop up all over the place.

The last couple of shark stories have focused on Australia. However, this little ripper comes from the US of A. To be specific the story comes out of Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts, which ironically enough also happens to be where they shot the classic film, Jaws.

Edgartown was the location of an unconfirmed sighting of a great white shark. Obviously, these sharks like to do the rounds of the world's oceans because this is the same type of shark that was reported to have made its way into a lake and estuary system in Australia.

The sighting forced the closures of a couple of beaches in the area and a spotting plane was launched to try an locate the shark. But the shark had obviously chosen to go hunting elsewhere as it was not spotted in the area again.

Shark attacks are apparently rare in that part of New England however I am pretty sure that I would not want to be a statistic that started a new trend towards more frequency.

I still love to swim in the ocean. I guess the law of averages catches up to all of us sooner or later!