Blog Marco - News by Marco

Wall St Stripper Dilemma

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 02:05:12 -0700

Teaser:
Wall street trader seeking damages after a stripper hits him on face with heel

Body:

I don't know what to make of this story... Should I empathise with the trader? Or should I just laugh at him for being there in the first place? (remember that he is MARRIED and he went there ON HIS OWN)

A Wall Street trader is seeking damages after allegedly being hit in the face by a stripper's high heel as she performed a lap dance for him.

Stephen Chang, a securities trader, claims in court papers filed at the Manhattan Supreme Court that he "sustained serious personal injuries" on his visit to the Hot Lap Dance Club near Madison Square Garden in November last year.

His lawsuit against the club states: "During the course of said lap dance, the employee suddenly swung around, striking [Mr Chang] in the eye with the heel of her shoe." Mr Chang, who is married and in his early 30s, had visited the club on his own. The establishment, which describes itself as the "Playboy Mansion of Manhattan party lofts" charges a $50 cover charge and a $10 one-time joining fee. A lap dance typically costs around $40.

Mercy Ministries Scandal

Sun, 16 Mar 2008 16:33:34 -0700

Disappointing. To see an institution linked with the Christian community to be smeared in the public media - yet again (again? Hillsong already has a controversial regard following mainstream publicity in Current Affairs TV programs). This time its a scandal involving Mercy Ministries:

A SECRETIVE ministry with direct links to Gloria Jean's Coffees and the Hillsong Church has been deceiving troubled young women into signing over months of their lives to a program that offers scant medical or psychiatric care, instead using Bible studies and exorcisms to treat mental illness.

Government agencies such as Centrelink have also been drawn into the controversy, as residents are required to transfer their benefits to Mercy Ministries. There are also allegations that the group receives a carers payment to look after the young women.

American Politics on YouTube

Thu, 12 Jul 2007 02:56:04 -0700

American politics taking on Web 2.0 - on YouTube! First one is "I Got a Crush...On Obama" By Obama Girl and the second video is the answer to that video from the Hillary Clinton camp: "Hott4Hill feat. Taryn Southern"

The song and video features scantily clad actor and model Amber Lee Ettinger lip-synching to lyrics that profess her "devotion" to US presidential candidate Barack Obama.

A parody of the Obama Girl video, Hot 4 Hill involves another good-looking young American woman gyrating and cooing her affections for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. The video starts with a direct reference to the Obama Girl video, which began with actor Amber Lee Ettinger calling Obama on his phone. Taryn Southern the girl in this film spends much of the video dressed in a stars and

Live Action TV

Thu, 12 Jul 2007 00:20:18 -0700

Teaser:
Live Action TV - The action happens right in front of you

Image:

Body:

Here's a photo of two men watching news on live TV - when the real action is happening in the distance. Live Action TV when the Action happens right in front of you

Finally We Don't Need to Download TV Shows

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 17:48:56 -0700

According to news reports, Channel Seven is going to air both Heroes and Prison Break on the same day as their US screenings. So does that finally mean we don't need to download TV shows from the Internet? It possibly does. It would definitely save internet surfers time (and electricity!). Both TV shows wiil be aired in September and October. Also, Channel Seven is looking to release TiVo in Australia soon. CHANNEL Seven will broadcast two of its cult import dramas, Heroes and Prison Break on the same day as their US screenings in a ploy to lure drifting audiences away from DVDs and the internet.

Raining in Sydney

Fri, 22 Jun 2007 04:08:43 -0700

Nope, its not raining in Sydney now.. but the rains have increased our dams by 10.8 percent to 50 percent full (or is that 50 percent empty?) anyhow, the previous week of rains (and floods) have brought about 7 and half months worth of water to Sydney's drinking supply. The dams are now at their highest since May 2004 with about 180 millimetres of rain falling across the Warragamba catchment since June 7. "Over the past two weeks up to 320 millimetres of rain has fallen on Sydney's catchment areas, boosting the dams by 336 billion litres of water," said the Premier, Morris Iemma. "This is some of the best rain we've had in more than eight years."

Web Bullies and Suicides

Sat, 28 Apr 2007 03:03:52 -0700

Once again, the tabloid newspapers in London astound me. First they reveal a restaurant which delivered an exploding sausage, then this... have a read of this article:

Web bullies 'drive pupil to suicide'
"A boy of 13 has hanged himself in his bedroom after being bullied by classmates on an Internet site. Casey Knibbs is thought to have received taunts and death threats from four other pupils on his Bebo web page. Sources claim he was found dangling inside his wardrobe when his mother and father returned from a parents' evening at Kingsbury Comprehensive school in Sutton Coldfield. The alleged bullies were allowed to return to school just days after Casey's death, but police are now looking into the suicide. 'We are now conducting an investigation to find out why a seemingly happy boy should coose to take his own life." Said a Warwickshire Police officer."

Seems like real life is being replicated in the virtual world. We have commercial websites, a red light district on the internet, people on the internet through networking sites like Bebo, Friendster and MySpace…. And…. Web bullies. Same as real life bullies, the bullying would only get worse the more you pay attention to them – so ignore the web bullying.

English magazines can report suicide? I’m not sure if it is true but I have heard that it is illegal to report suicides and even if they are, they don't go into such detail as above! If you haven't had enough read this:

Sausage Sizzle Burns Customer

Thu, 26 Apr 2007 03:03:38 -0700

The latest news from a free London newspaper (much like our local mX here in Sydney): "Restaurant diner was left with horrific burns after a sizzling sausage dish blew up in her face. The unnamed woman spent two weeks in hospital and needed skin grafts, said it was like 'being hit by a flame-thrower'. Rui Daniel Faria Velosa, owner of Sporting Clube de Londres in Westbourne Green, West London, was fined £4,000 and £2,000 in court costs at West London magistrates court for breaching safety rules."

A few things to note about the article:

A Sausage can Blow up
English law allows the news to name and shame restaurant owners

(Unlike in Sydney, Australia, it is not allowed for the councils to report to the public which restaurants have breached safety/health regulations

Pay Less Tax - Have More Kids!

Sun, 22 Apr 2007 10:54:00 -0700

Think about it. The world has an underlying population trend. Nearly every developed country in the world had a boom in births after WWII - i.e. the Baby boomers. That group of people are now aging and are now starting to retire from full-time work. If you are are trading shares, or are an investor, this fact would have already crossed your mind. Think about this: if you have more kids, the taxes that you would pay would be less since the public tax bill would be spread out. And that's what many developed countries are planning to do: to increase their population by both artificial and natural means. They are boosting their populations artificially through immigration - mostly from third world or industrial countries. They are also encouraging their residents to increase the population naturally by having more kids through tax benefits.

Baseball Bat Murders

Mon, 06 Nov 2006 15:20:39 -0800

Freaky... I wonder what drove this Engineering student to kill his fellow mates... Studying engineering could be hazardous to your health...

""A man who bludgeoned his two flatmates to death with a baseball bat has been sentenced to life imprisonment for their murders.

""The three University of NSW engineering students from Singapore had been living together when Tiwary, who owed one flatmate $5,000 in rent, bought a baseball bat and murdered them two hours apart, the court heard.

""In sentencing Tiwary today, Justice Michael Adams said there was nothing in the evidence which established a motive for the heinous crimes.

-- SMH

One Year Anniversary

Thu, 05 Oct 2006 22:01:55 -0700

This Blog's one year anniversary just went floating by the other month. I posted up my first blog post on the 21st of August 2005. Since then the number of hits to this blog has been increasing. Blog Marco officially gets about 2000+ hits a day and has 844 blog posts (including this one).

In the beginning I was posting quite a few posts about Programming, but once I had the kinks out of this blog, I was also blogging about my trip to China, record petrol prices in Sydney and the City 2 Surf. But now I've been posting Celebrity photos, YouTube videos and Photography.

Thanks for everyone's support and I hope this blog will continue to flourish. Enjoy your stay.

Qantas QF20: Pilot Security

Wed, 13 Sep 2006 17:59:48 -0700

Teaser:
Qantas pilots refuse security check on QF20, Manila to Australia

Image:

Body:

Qantas pilots delayed QF20 flight from Manila to Sydney via Brisbane the other day. How? They refused to remove their shoes for a security check at Manila's Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA). The Australian pilots reportedly had argued with airport officials that they were being mistreated. The plane carrying 200 passengers left 70 minutes late after the two pilots yielded for the security check.

Security at the airport has been stepped up since the discovery of the plot to bomb planes flying from Britain to the US. In the last week, a local newspaper had reported that a security consultant was able to smuggle in C-4 explosives attached to the soles of hs shoes on a flight bound for southern Philippines. The consultant also claimed to have put together a bomb inside the plane's toilet. Were the Qantas pilots in the right for refusing security checks? Who gives? I think they should have submitted and they made such a big fuss for nothing, wasting 200 people's time. So what does that amount to? 200 people * 70 minutes is 14,000 minutes which is a total of 9.72 days of lost time for these people. ARGH!

CityRail Delays

Mon, 11 Sep 2006 17:59:47 -0700

Teaser:
30 minute CityRail train delays! CityRail! This was the first time I've felt the train jolt like that

Image:

Body:

30 minute CityRail train delays! CityRail! This was the first time I've felt the train jolt like that in my 11 years of riding these Sydney trains. It was like a slow speed car crash from the rear. The train jolted about 6 or seven times before the train driver finally had the train at Redfern station. The CityRail train did it a few times between Macdonaldtown and Redfern. A lot of people must have been late for work.

It took about 20 minutes for people to get from one platform to the other. Just imagine if there was an emergency at Redfern train station. If there was an accident and it takes that long to move up a set a stairs, many people would have died or suffered. Although, I guess there are two ways to exit from the platform, from the top or to the bottom end.

CityRail delays like this used to happen quite often. Especially with the old train timetable. Last year they revamped the timetable, with less frequent and much slower services. The trains suddenly became punctual. But with the odd accident and inevitable train breakdown, there are bound to be delays in CityRail's network.

Banana Shortage To End

Sat, 26 Aug 2006 18:47:40 -0700

Looks like Australia's shortage of Banana's will be ending soon. Tens of thousands of Bananas will soon be landing in markets around Australia with the Queensland plantations bouncing back 5 months after Cyclone Larry wiped out the banana crop (in March). Queensland typically supplies 90 percent of Australia's Banana supply with Australia refusing to accept Bananas from the Philippines. Prices in NSW will drop from around $8 per kilo to about $3 with the new incoming supplies. In the market's peak - Sydney prices for bananas rose to $16 per kilo.

Sydney House Prices Falling

Tue, 22 Aug 2006 01:51:49 -0700

Sydney house prices are falling. In the weekend, a house in St Clair, in Sydney's western suburbs, sold for only $260,000 last weekend. The price was 42 percent cheaper than the last sale in the same area in 2003. It was a mortgagee sale - the owners were forced to sell as they could not meet the interest payments on their $405,000 loan.

In addition to rising interest rates, petrol prices seem to be a compounding factor that is driving down Sydney house prices. Looks like a fair number of people are going to be looking at negative equity for quite some time...