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A young shopper at a Wal-Mart in West Virginia had to watch out for more than falling prices. A 12-year-old girl picking up a seedless watermelon from a bin was stung Sunday by a tan, 1-inch-long scorpion that had apparently stowed away in a shipment from Mexico.

Twenty-five years ago, Ed Offley stumbled into a story that ultimately could rewrite the way history views the Cold War. The USS Scorpion nuclear submarine sank in the Mediterranean Sea in May 1968 with the loss of all 99 men on board. For decades, the sinking was considered to be one of the great unsolved naval mysteries of all time. On May 27, 1968, the Scorpion failed to arrive in port at Norfolk, Va., at its scheduled time. The Pentagon immediately launched a massive search operation, which concluded a week later with the presumption that the submarine was lost with...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 2, 2006 -- The irony stung worse than the scorpion. Army Capt. Stephen Garvin, an entomologist with the 981st Medical Detachment supporting 3rd Army/U.S. Army Central in Kuwait, was stung by a deadly scorpion. U.S. Army photo  '(Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. A soldier dedicated to studying dangerous wildlife recently got attacked by one of the aggressive fat-tailed scorpions he spent months warning other soldiers to avoid. Army Capt. Stephen Garvin, an entomologist with the 981st Medical Detachment supporting 3rd Army/U.S. Army Central in Kuwait, made a routine visit to a portable toilet at Camp Buehring...

HO CHI MINH CITY (Reuters) - Would you like your crickets deep fried and crispy? Peppered and presented in a neat circle on a bed of green leaves? Breeders of crickets say the insects have become "finger food for beer drinkers" in an age of increasing prosperity in Vietnam compared with the recent past when they might have been food for the hungry or for wartime soldiers surviving in the jungle. Businessman Le Thanh Tung raises hundreds of thousands of the flying insects in barrels and sells them to restaurants in Ho Chi Minh City, the Southeast Asian country's largest...

Forests, mountains, streams and valleys - 325 miles of them: this is the Polish-Ukrainian border. "It's easy to cross illegally without being watched. And if someone crosses it, the EU is open to them," says Jerzy Ostrowski, a group leader for the Polish border police. Help, however, in rooting out potential illegal immigrants - or, indeed, would-be terrorists - has arrived in the incongruous form of Indian scouts. Last week, three American-Indian trackers from the Navajo and Tohono O'odham tribes joined a 26-strong group of Polish customs officers around the small town of Huwniki, which lies about 250 miles southeast...

Lord, Keep our Troops forever in Your care Give them victory over the enemy... Grant them a safe and swift return... Bless those who mourn the lost. . FReepers from the Foxhole join in prayer for all those serving their country at this time. ...................................................................................... ........................................... U.S. Military History, Current Events and Veterans Issues Where Duty, Honor and Countryare acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated. Our Mission: The FReeper Foxhole is dedicated to Veterans of our Nation's military forces and to others who are affected in their relationships with Veterans. In the FReeper Foxhole, Veterans or their family members should feel...

Radio host fuels protests over alleged cover-up of teen sex ring MONTREAL - A visitor to Quebec City could get the impression there is a new sports team in town. Flags of a black scorpion on a blood-red background fly from cars. Crowds in the street cheer Go Scorpion! A baker even has scorpion-shaped loaves on display in her window. The scorpion in question, however, is not a team mascot but the code-name for one of the most sensational police investigations the provincial capital has seen. Stoked by a daily barrage of invective from Quebec City's king of trash radio,...

Sting in scorpion's tail a new high for trendy IndiansMay 1 2003 The trendy and the elite in India's wealthy western state of Gujarat, bored with mundane drugs, are turning to the sting of a scorpion to get their kicks, a press report said yesterday. The Times of India said the affluent head in their cars to tribal areas near the coastal town of Bharuch, where scorpions abound, seeking their fixes. Locals have put up stalls under trees and keep a number of the arachnids in tin cans with perforated lids. After the customer pays a fee of 150 to...

Wed Apr 20, 3:35 AM ETTrendy Indians in Gujarat are turning to the sting of a scorpion to get their kicks. (AFP/File)

ZURICH (Reuters) - Creepy creatures approach women in bars all the time, but a Swiss woman was shocked to discover an African scorpion had stabbed her hand in a pub near Zurich early Wednesday, police said. Police were still scratching their heads over how the 3-cm (one-inch) scorpion got into the pub in a Zurich suburb. It remained in the custody of a police reptile expert. The 31-year-old victim was rushed to the hospital by ambulance with sharp pain and swelling in her arm. She remained in hospital Wednesday.