In the News

From the Denver Post:
AURORA — A 6-year-old boy was suspended from his school for three days after school officials say he told a girl "I'm sexy and I know it," a line from a popular song. D'Avonte Meadows, a first-grader at Sable Elementary School in Aurora, is accused of sexual harassment and disrupting other students, according to a letter the school district sent to the boy's mother after he was sent home Wednesday. School officials issued a statement saying they couldn't discuss the case, but they pointed out a school board policy that defines sexual harassment as any unwelcome sexual advance. There is no age limit. "We have policies and protocol in place to prevent any disruption to the learning environment.

(Colorado is doing its part to foster decency amongst the children. Next target: dancing!)

From the LA Times:
MOSCOW -- More than 140 people suffered burns or other injuries Friday in Yerevan, the capital city of Armenia, when bunches of balloons at a concert and political rally exploded. The balloons were supposed to be filled with helium but may have instead been filled with methane, said Aghasi Yenokyan, director of the Center for Political and International Studies, a Yerevan-based think tank. During the concert, teenagers were holding hundreds of balloons in their hands when they suddenly exploded in a huge ball of fire. Dozens of people were taken by ambulances to various city hospitals, and then the show went on again.

(Is this: 1) a fiendish plot by the Joker? or 2) an alternate explanation for the Armenian Genocide: terrorist carnies?)

From the Denver Post:
An antique firetruck typically parked inside the building at the Denver Firefighters Museum caught fire this morning after returning from a funeral service. Dan Farley, a retired Denver Fire engineer, was driving the truck and had just returned from a morning funeral service. He had parked it in front of the museum on Tremont Place in order to hose it down and clean it up when the engine backfired. "The backfire was a real throaty backfire. I expected the worst when I saw the heat rise from the hood," Farley said. Farley and the museum staff called the Denver Fire Department while they scrambled to find anything, including three fire extinguishers, to put out the flames. "I've put a lot of fires out in my day and I couldn't save it," Farley said. "By a stroke of luck the heat burst the radiator hose, which put out most of the fire."

(Oh, the irony. You'd be forgiven for assuming the above is a deleted scene from the Steve Martin film, "Roxanne." Soon to be playing on Star, I'm sure, Marquis.)
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