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ST. PAUL, Minn. — A man was in custody Sunday after police said he ripped the head off a tame duck that lived in a hotel lobby's ornamental pond.< >"He was allegedly drunk," Wuorinen said.< >"I think Embassy Suites needs to take another look at this and review how they keep ducks safe, or use fish like most hotels would use," Shields said.< >

Just in time for the High Holy Days, a pair of prominent Jewish leaders are putting the City Council's two Jewish aldermen on notice: They risk incurring the wrath of God if they push to repeal Chicago's foie gras ban. "Beyond the Kosher dietary laws, God has told us to do what is 'good and proper in the eyes of God,'" Rabbi Asher Lopatin of Anshe Sholom B'Nail Israel Congregation wrote to Aldermen Burton F. Natarus (42nd Ward) and Bernard Stone (50th Ward). Jana Kohl, former director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies, accused Natarus and Stone of...

Near the restaurant where Mao Zedong and President Nixon shared roast duck during the heady days of 'ping pong diplomacy', Beijing's new ducks strut their stuff at a popular nightspot. They are easy to pick out: in tight clothes and sunglasses, the ducks sway to the beat and scan the seething dance floor. For many Chinese women, male prostitutes - yazi, or 'ducks', after their female equivalents ji, or chicken - are an increasingly essential part of a girls' night out. Xiao Yu, a prostitute in his twenties who sports a tight red T-shirt with aviators atop spiked hair, is...

The voice of the AFLAC duck has been named the Unsexiest Man in the World. Comedian Gilbert Gottfried tops the list compiled by the Boston Phoenix's Web site. The list is a mix of entertainers, sports stars, even terrorists. Osama bin Laden is number eight on the list. Of Gottfried, the Phoenix says "The parrot-voiced, pickled-face comic is to sexy what Kryptonite is to Superman."

Actor Ben Affleck has made it very clear where his sympathies lie in the Leakgate affair -- and it isn't with the White House. Appearing on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher," Affleck charged that President Bush "probably also leaked” CIA agent Valerie Plame's name and so "if he did, you can be hung for that! That's treason!” He continued: "You could be killed. That's not a joking around Tom DeLay 'I'll do a year, I bribed the state officials with corporate money.' That's like they shoot you in the battlefield for doing that.” Affleck also called DeLay a "criminal."

Couple of ducks 'come out' in Sweden 1 hour, 44 minutes ago STOCKHOLM (AFP) - In the middle of mating season, a couple of male ducks returned to a park in southern Sweden, for the third consecutive year, ignoring the siren calls of all the lady ducks around them. Far from the torments of bird flu and temptations of the opposite sex, the two common shelducks appear only to have eyes for each other -- in a sort of ducky gay marriage. "We can state that they act exactly like a couple (composed) of a man and woman, the bigger...

A car wash in the South Bay is offering a reward for the identification of a man who deliberately ran over and killed 10 of the ducks that have been an attraction at the business for years. A grainy surveillance tape at the Delta Queen Classic Car Wash -- a “theme” wash shaped like a Mississippi riverboat -- shows a man in his late teens or early 20s driving through the parking lot three or four times, aiming for the animals and running them down. “It’s sickening,” said Chris Foley, a manager at the business, popular for its duck pond...

A string of break-ins last month at Lima businesses had police baffled - until a laptop computer disappeared from an insurance office on Cable Court. Tracking software on the stolen machine alerted a Tennessee company to its location, which allowed police to track down the computer and a suspect. Chad Thompson, 32, was arraigned yesterday in Lima Municipal Court on one count of breaking and entering, police said. He was being held in the Allen County Jail on $10,000 bond. Lima police Detective Tim Clark said the tracking software - known as "CyberAngel" - provided the break in a case...

Call it Bennifer: Part Deux. Nine months after they started dating, Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner are engaged, People and Star magazines are reporting. Citing a "close friend" of Affleck's, People says the "Pearl Harbor" actor has been privately spreading the news. A friend of Garner's told the magazine in February that she expected Affleck to propose. Affleck's publicist, Ken Sunshine, would not comment on the reports. A call to Garner's rep was not returned. As you may have heard, Affleck got engaged to Jennifer Lopez in 2002, but they called it off in January 2004. As opposed to the...

Two Taiwanese men have been arrested for allegedly smuggling raw duck tongues from China in the first such case amid lingering concerns over bird flu, an official said yesterday. Investigators in central Taiwan nabbed the two men early Wednesday and confiscated nearly four tonnes of tongues from about a million ducks, said the official at the Bureau of Investigation. The tongues, with a retail value of about NT10 million (US$317,000), were suspected to have been shipped from China, the official said. They were destroyed immediately as China is considered vulnerable to bird flu, he said. Cooked duck tongues are a...

Kwanzaa, a time to foster pride in African culture Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services Associated Press Gary Harvey stands behind a kinara, a candleholder similar to a menorah, as he gives a Kwanzaa presentation Sunday at the Hope Chapel A.M.E. Zion Church in Utica, N.Y. The seven-day festival, which was established 38 years ago by Maulana Karenga, celebrates family, community and culture. HACKENSACK, N.J. -- For Marlene Ware, a teacher at Teaneck High School, Kwanzaa is an opportunity to demystify Africa. "A lot of African-Americans to this day really don't acknowledge the role that Africa has in the world," Ware said....

Today, January 27th 2004, the world as we know it changed. NASA's Mars rover "Opportunity" sent back to earth near absolute proof of life on mars . . . life of a form NOBODY ever expected. It would be monumental if the rovers geological tools and microscopic cameras sent back evidence of primitive life . . . and they may indeed do just that. But we do not have to wait. "Proof" is right there in panoramic photos received today . . . . DUCKS . . . GIANT MONSTER DUCKS ROME THE SURFACE OF MARS!!! . . . Either...

AFLAC Billboard Prompts 911 Call Caller Believed Man On Sign Was Real POSTED: 11:50 a.m. EDT October 3, 2003 UPDATED: 12:52 p.m. EDT October 3, 2003 INDIANAPOLIS -- A billboard designed to be eye-catching for passing motorists accomplished that goal this week -- and then some. An AFLAC insurance company billboard on Interstate 465 prompted a 911 call Wednesday because the caller thought a real person was hanging from the sign, according to RTV6 in Indianapolis. The billboard actually shows a mannequin falling off a ladder next to the words "Pays You Cash If You Get Hurt And Miss Work."...

'Access Hollywood' has learned that the highly anticipated wedding between super couple Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez has been postponed.Accoring to sources, the nuptials, originally scheduled to take place this Sunday (at the Four Seasons Hotel) in Santa Monica, California have been postponed due to the media frenzy surrounding the ceremony. (after ABC News revealed the location-ed)No word when or where the union will be rescheduled. 'Access Hoillywood' is produced by NBC and distributed by NBC Enterprises Domestic Syndication.

I'm sick of these eloan ads, that woman grates me to death. Now there's some sort of clone of the original on. Is this more common now than Cristy Lane?

Dems take trip on corporate dime; Junket follows attacks on biz excesses By Andrew Miga / Boston Herald Sunday, July 14, 2002 WASHINGTON - Senate Democrats, after railing last week against the rising tide of corporate abuses, Friday hopped aboard a fleet of company jets for a secret Nantucket weekend retreat with top party donors. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, a leading Senate health-care reformer who this week will launch a major fight on prescription drug coverage, flew aboard health insurance giant AFLAC's company jet, an aide confirmed. Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Bay State colleague Sen. John F. Kerry are among the...