? How does one explain this mess
by JOHN HIGGINSON - Wednesday, November 5, 2008
.The Queen yesterday questioned why nobody saw the credit crunch coming
She asked why no one noticed the 'awful' situation sooner, while opening a £71million building at the London School of Economics.
'At every stage, someone was relying on somebody else,' she was told by LSE's management research director, Prof Luis Garicano.
Meanwhile, David Cameron took his opportunity at prime minister's questions to call for an inquiry into a regulatory failure in the markets
'Our system has failed so badly the Treasury minister said he wanted to see a public inquiry,' the Conservative leader told Gordon Brown.
'Can you tell us when we're going to have that inquiry?' Mr Cameron said that, by refusing to hold an inquiry, the prime minister was demonstrating he could not provide 'the change people want'.
Mr Brown said the only change the Conservatives represented was that 'they change their minds every week'.
Mr Cameron retorted: 'You killed change when you bottled that election. You buried change when you appointed Peter Mandelson.'
Meanwhile, former Tory cabinet minister Stephen Dorrell said it would be 'absurd' if Mr Brown chose not to express his views on whether the Bank of England had moved too slowly to cut interest rates, given he had seen fit to criticise Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross
Landscapes that are picture-perfect
by JOHN STAPLES - Wednesday, November 5, 2008
A shaggy dog on a windswept seafront, the Sun setting over a poppy field and the sea battering the Yorkshire coastline are some of the stunning photographs that capture the beauty of the British landscape at a new exhibition
. The images are all winners of the Landscape Photographer of the Year competition
Among them is the overall winner, Gary Eastwood's picture of his dog Barney on Hove seafront, and an image of the Sun setting over poppy fields in Dorset by Gabrielle Barnes, 14, who won the youth section
The competition, now in its second year, has a prize fund of more than £20,000 and covers four categories - including images people have taken with their mobile phones.
. A free exhibition opens at the National Theatre in central London on November 17
Readers can get AA Publishing's book of the exhibition at the discounted price of £22 by calling 01903 828 535 and quoting reference LPOTY2
Cute dog WLTM a mate for puppy love
Thursday, November 6, 2008
A desperate dog owner has posted a profile of his terrier on the internet in a bid to find his lovesick pet partner
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John Roberts decided to take action to try to stop Perkins making indecent advances towards female dogs
'He is six years old, charged up and ready to go. It can get quite embarrassing when we go out. As soon as he sees a female, he is up on two legs and jumping all over them,' the 59-year-old said
A lonely hearts advert for the Jack Russell-cross was also placed in the local paper in Shrewsbury but there have been no takers.
'I have set him up his own e-mail address in case anyone wanted to apply. He's very distressed because he's had no messages or phone calls,' said Mr Roberts.
His e-mail is
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'Food lunacy 'will make labels bigger than tins
The proposals say the print size on packs must be at least 3mm high and extra nutritional guidelines must also be added.
On a small tin of Nestlé cream, the current 45mm-tall label fits comfortably - but under the new laws the label would have to be 90mm high - twice the size of the tin.
The same applies to a new label on Coca-Cola light bottle - there is bigger wording but it is more squashed together
'What the commission is proposing is disproportionate - in more ways than one,' said Susanne Doring, spokeswoman for the confederation of food and drink industries of the EU.
Ironically the problem threatens the smallest portions of products which do most to discourage obesity.
In the next few weeks, food makers will be urging Euro-MPs to reject a one-size-fits-all labelling policy. The proposals have also been criticised by Conservative Euro-MP Chris Heaton-Harris.
'Better food labelling is important but the current proposals seem to have been dreamt up on the back of a napkin,' he said
Truckers' revenge as Clarkson gets splatted
His remarks about truckers murdering prostitutes have caused anger, with thousands of people complaining to the BBC
As he completed a lorry-driving task on Top Gear, he said: "This is a hard job and I'm not just saying that to win favour with lorry drivers.
"It's a hard job: Change gear, change gear, change gear, check mirror, murder a prostitute, change gear, change gear, murder. That's a lot of effort in a day." In the online game, Run Clarkson Run, you get to navigate the TV host past speeding lorries. The object is to try to pick up as much cash as possible before being splatted by a truck.
The game was built and released on internet by Glasgow games development company T-Enterprise.
T-Enterprise's managing director Sadia Chishti said: "Jeremy Clarkson is a loveable rogue, but we think he's overstepped the mark this time.
"So we figured we'd give truckers the chance for revenge. And not just truckers; the whole family can spend hours playing the game, running over and killing Jeremy Clarkson just for fun
... How to turn dollars into star bucks
by MILES ERWIN - Thursday, November 6, 2008
You wouldn't have thought origami was a particularly expensive hobby - or one which involves a detailed knowledge of spacecraft
But for artist Won Park, it's a bit of both. The paper-art master twists and folds his creations entirely from one- dollar notes and has fashioned models of some of Hollywood's most famous spaceships.
Among his designs are fantastically intricate replicas of the Millennium Falcon, Tie Fighters and X-Wing jets from the Star Wars films and Captain Kirk's USS Enterprise from Star Trek
The talented - and extremely patient - artist has also created wonderfully detailed models of koi carp, scorpions and a spider.
.The 38-year-old, from Hawaii, took up origami when he was just five and was taught to fold simple models by his mother
'As I got more advanced in my folding skills I started to fold my own creations. Then, in junior high school, I started to fold dollar bills and was hooked on that ever since,' he said
Basketball player, 73, shoots hoops
Ken Mink made both of his foul shots Monday night in a U.S. college basketball game
Nothing unusual there - except that Mink is 73 years old
Mink, a full-time student at Roane State Community College, entered the game with about 16 minutes left and missed one shot in about three minutes
Seven minutes later, he went back in the game, was fouled and made two free throws as his team beat King College's junior varsity - or "B" team - 93-42
I found myself on the free-throw line 52 years after my last college game," Mink said. "I said, 'Just relax and shoot it like you know how to all day long.' I just floated the shots in there. I'm in the books now. I can relax a little bit."
Mink last played college basketball 52 years ago at Lees College in Jackson, Kentucky.
Last year, after shooting baskets at a neighbor's house, he wrote to several area colleges, and Roane State coach Randy Nesbit agreed to give him a chance.
Mink has practiced regularly with the team since school began in August
Muscle men flex their pecs
Don't try this at the gym. Competitors flex their muscles in the men's World Bodybuilding Championships in Bahrain
