A rare triple

A Canton Michigan high schooler, Willa Chen, pulled off what is considered an extremely rare triple. She got a perfect score on the PSAT, the SAT, and the ACT. The ACT, a competitor and rival of the SAT, says no more than 1 in 14,000 test takers score perfect on its exam. Ms. Chen will be attending Princeton University in the Fall. Good stuff. Read more here.

Two planets

The LA Times has an interesting article about what scientists consider the two most earthlike planets of the 340 planets discovered outside of our solar system. Oddly enough, both orbit the same star, a dwarf 20 light-years from Earth called Gliese 581. The smaller of the two is one of the smallest planets yet discovered outside of our solar system, only twice the size of Earth. There is a possibility of water on the other based on its distance from its star. Read the whole article here.

Waiting for the next Star Wars movie

We finally found the insurance company where Darth Vader has been working while waiting for the new Star Wars movie to start production. Word is that Yoda only accepts closed door meetings to avoid the paparazzi.

New Label

It is never a good sign when a food product one consumes fairly regularly suddenly adds a new safety label. Cook thoroughly is an especially unappealing notice. It was just added to the outside of the Totino's Combination Frozen Pizza box. What happened? Somebody cook it less than thoroughly and croak? Keel over? Fall out?

Don't take our food that we wish not to think about in that manner and make it scary.

Two stories

His grandfather says he is a wonderful boy. His fiance says he is a great guy. He wouldn't hurt a fly and that they are still planning to marry in August. He is a twenty-two year old Boston University medical student, although he has now been suspended from school pending the outcome of an investigation.

The Boston Police Department says he is a sociopath and killer, who has used the internet ad aggregator Craig's List to lure women to hotels. Allegedly he binds them and robs them. One of his capers went bad last week, and he stands accused of fatally shooting Julissa Brisman, 26, on April 14 in her room at the Boston Marriott Copley Place.

A man leading double lives? A case of mistaken identity? We will keep you posted.

The story continues.

Too much Facebook leads to bad grades!?!

This just in from Captain Obvious at the Ohio State University; too much Facebook can lead to bad grades. No way.

A study of 219 users reported that OSU students who use Facebook spend less time studying and have lower grades than students who don't use the formerly hip social networking site. However, don't count on these folks self-diagnosing. The study noted that noted that 79% of Facebook users said that using the social networking site was not interfering with their studies.

However, the study found that found that Facebook users, who generally studied between one and five hours per week, had GPAs between 3.0 and 3.5, but nonusers, who studied 11 to 15 hours per week, had GPAs between 3.5 and 4.0. Admittedly, the study controls were weak and there certainly could be other causes for the lower grades not considered. But it probably comes as no surprise to the parents telling the kids to get off the darn computer, looks like heavy Facebook use is linked to lower grades.

Read more here in Computerworld.

No names

Duke Cheerleader, Holly Kokinda

The Clarion Content sees photos of cheerleaders all over the internet. Cheerleaders, in general, feel like something of an antiquated pre-feminism institution. The defenders of cheerleading will say it is a sport and that the cheerleaders are athletes, too. If one has ever seen a cheerleading competition, that is quite evident, they are athletes.

This has left us at the Clarion Content wondering. Is it the misogyny of sports, the schools, the news outlets or American society in general that accounts for this difference: NCAA athletes of all stripes are typically identified by name when photographed by media outlets. Cheerleaders almost never are identified individually in photos. Just another pretty face? Pretty objectifying from our vantage point!

Michelle Obama touched the Queen

On no she didn't!?! Actually yes, yes she did. Queen Elizabeth put her arm around First Lady Michelle Obama's back on Wednesday, during the reception that Buckingham Palace threw for leaders attending the G-20 summit in England. Ms. Obama responded to the gesture in kind. The initial reaction of the English tabloids, "Oh the horrors!" Even the more staid, nominally mainstream, Times of London said, "Protocol is abandoned as Michelle Obama cozies up to [the] queen."



However, polls indicate that most Americans found nothing wrong with gesture. Surely, the graceful Queen in no way objected. According to the Atlanta Constitution Journal, a Buckingham Palace spokesman said, "It was a mutual and spontaneous display of affection." He added that he couldn’t remember the last time the queen had so publicly departed from the royals’ no-touching protocol. In typical Obama style what was normally an insuperable barrier was transcended with grace and ease.

Read more here.