Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Remedial Lessons in Terrorist Tradecraft

I lived in Fort Dix when I was tiny, and one of my younger sisters was born there.  My Dad was a doctor in the Army for a short stretch.  I called the place "Four Ducks," apparently influenced more by the presence of ducks than by veneration for a Civil War general.  I remember my sister in a high chair and Tonka trucks and, lessee ... a lamp I had shaped like a clown.  Yes, Fort Dix rocks.
 
Now some would-be terr'rists wanna attack it? 
 
The New York Times reports that Yugoslavian brothers Dritan, Eljvir and Shain Duka, along with another Yugoslavian guy, a Jordanian guy and a Turkish guy decided to form a little terror cell in New Jersey and attack an Army base. 
 
Based on a map one of them obtained while visiting the base in his job as a pizza deliveryman.
 
So they trained with deadliest guns and ran in deadlist woods and plotted deadliest plots and thought deadliest thoughts. 
Plus, one was named "Dritan," which already sounds like the name of a villain.  Or like the name of a nasal spray.
 
Their Achilles' heel?  They made a DVD of themselves shooting guns in the air while "calling for jihad and shouting Allah Akbar."  And then went to a store to have copies made.  A store employee found it "disturbing" and called the Law, who agreed.
 
Jack Bauer, we hardly need ye. 

Tuesday, May 01, 2007

#$%^ A Duck!

In a Memailed article, the NYT reports that male ducks grow enormous spiral phalluses.
 
Why? 
 
Turns out male ducks rape female ducks a lot, and it's better for a female duck if she can reproduce with the mate she chooses (think of all the loser male ducks you know and it makes sense).
So female ducks evolved to have long, labyrinthine oviducts, and the males had to evolve matching phalluses just to keep up and compete with other males.
 
And I thought being oviparous was all mating-for-life and "March of the Penguins."  Yecch.