Issue 8 2010: August
RARE CHANGE
A hobbyist treasure hunter armed with a metal detector has stumbled upon a hoard of 52,000 ancient Roman coins in an English field, archaeologists reported. Dave Crisp of Wilshire, England, began digging up the coins himself, but then realized he had found something truly significant. So he called the authorities. "Leaving it in the ground was a very hard decision," Crisp said, "but as it had been there for 1,800 years, I thought a few days more would not hurt." Some of the bronze and silver coins, dating from the third century and said to be worth more than $1 million, will soon be on display in the British Museum. ..... The Week
SHARK-FIN SOUP
An estimated 300,000 sharks have been killed off the Brazilian coast since 2009 because of the popularity of shark-fin soup. ..... Time
SANDWICHES IN A CAN
Travis Wright, a Utah money manager recently invested $145 million of his clients' money into Canwich, a startup company that makes canned sandwiches (chicken and peanut butter and jelly) for sale in vending machines. Unfortunately, Mr. Wright told his investors that he was putting their money into commercial real estate. The Securities and Exchange Commission is now involved and is suing Mr. Wright for "lying" to his investors. Not surprisingly, Canwich President Mark Kirkland is now looking for new investors in his venture. He envisions an expansion of the product line to include Pepperoni Pizza Pocket and French Toast in a can. ..... Joe Daly in Huffingtonpost.com and Kirk Johnson in The New York Times
FLU SHOT IN A PATCH
Those scary needle jabs may soon be a thing of the past. Researchers have designed a tiny patch embedded with 100 dissolving microneedles that deliver flu vaccine painlessly into the skin. Mice inoculated against influenza with the patch showed stronger immune responses to the virus than those that received traditional flu shots. .... Time
KODACHROME
The final roll of Kodachrome film that Kodak produced was processed this month in Parsons, Kansas. Kodak, which has retired the color-film brand, selected photographer Steve McCurry to shoot the last 36-exposure roll. McCurry spent two months shooting images in New York, India, and Parsons. ..... The Wichita Eagle
FACES IN THE CROWD
Movie studios have started using inflatable dolls instead of paid extras for crowd scenes. Five-hundred dolls were used to simulate a crowd scene in "Salt", Angelina Jolie's new action movie. ..... The New Yorker
SO YOU THINK SPORTS ARE IMPORTANT IN AMERICA?
After losing all three games in the World Cup, North Korea's national soccer team was subjected to a six-hour public "reprimand" at the People's Palace of Culture in Pyongyang, and accused of betraying the country "in the great ideological struggle." The team's coach was assigned a new job as a laborer. ..... Toronto Star
WAR
The U.S. has been at war for 47 of the 230 years it has existed, or 20 percent of its history. ..... The New York Times
PRISON BREAK DUMMY
As a cost-saving measure, a cash-strapped prison in Argentina placed a dummy in a watchtower to pose as a guard. Two inmates figured out that the guard wasn't real, climbed over a fence and a wall, and escaped. ..... The Week
CHEATING IN SPORTS - THE NEXT FRONTIER
Cycling fans know Fabian Cancellara as a powerful rider with a remakable ability to pedal at top speeds for long stretches. But even the Swiss rider's most loyal supporters raised their eyebrows this spring when he won two of cycling's most punishing races, the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix, by several minutes over the rest of the field. How could anyone so thoroughly crush the sport's top competition? He had help, said cycling's ever-active rumor mill: a tiny battery-powered motor, originally designed for Formula One race cars, hidden in his bike frame. Cancellara laughed off the charge, and subsequent tests on his bike revealed nothing amiss. Nevertheless, knowledgeable mechanics say such "motorized doping" is possible, and Tour officials this year started X-raying competitors' bikes. They haven't found anything yet. (see Jim's Stethascoop) ..... The Week
JIM'S STETHASCOOP
"Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws." ..... Plato, as quoted in Bob Brinker's Marketimer
MILT'S MORSEL OF THE MONTH
"I buy when other people are selling." ..... Jean Paul Getty
