Clicks of the Day: March 16, 17, 18 2012 Weekend Edition!

Welcome to the three-day roundup …

Weekend Edition (March 16, 17, 18) of Clicks of the Day!

(I only do one Clicks of the Day post for the weekends so that I can actually have a weekend, lol. And amount of content will fluctuate depending on how much of a weekend I actually have!)

  • Authorities express extreme disapproval at St. Patrick’s day mob in London, Ont.
  • “Disgust and extreme disapproval were running high in London, Ont., Sunday after an intoxicated crowd of St. Patrick’s Day revellers spent the previous night fuelling a huge street fire and attacking authorities who tried to intervene. While no one was seriously injured as a mob of some 1,000 people took over a residential area popular with students, police said every officer responding to the situation was attacked during an upheaval that could have turned into something far worse.”

    Ridiculous. I will never understand rioting partygoers.

  • Air Canada accuses pilots of calling in sick to disrupt operations
  • “Facing a raft of delays and cancellations on the busy March-break weekend, Air Canada is seeking federal intervention and accusing the pilots’ union of encouraging members to flout back-to-work legislation. ‘While Air Canada supports the right of its employees to book off when they are unwell or otherwise unfit to work, we cannot condone such activities as part of industrial action to disrupt our operations and we have asked the [Canada Industrial Relations Board] to intervene. Customers should be reassured that the vast majority of Air Canada employees are hard at work to get them safely to their destination.‬'”

    Lol. Yeesh. They really don’t want to work. Meanwhile…

  • Aveos Fleet Performance Inc shuts down plants, lays off 2,400 workers: union
  • “The union representing aircraft machinists says Aveos Fleet Performance Inc., a company that provides aircraft maintenance to Air Canada, has shut down its plants in three cities, laying off more than 2,400 workers.”

    That’s a lot of jobs…

  • Canadians brace for a bad news budget: poll
  • “Many Canadians are expecting hard choices in the budget, but most don’t trust that Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Conservatives will make the right ones, according to an exclusive Ipsos Reid poll released on Friday.”

    Sorry state of our government finances.

  • Albertans ‘smug’ and ‘condescending,’ says poll of Toronto and Vancouver residents
  • “The city that likes to consider itself the Centre of the Universe now thinks that Calgary and Edmonton are the ones getting too big for their britches… ‘In Toronto, we found clear evidence of frustration that Alberta was becoming a stronger pillar and a more central agent in terms of Canada’s economy, eclipsing Ontario in some respects,’ said a report on the Harris Decima poll, released in 2009 but unpublicized until now… It found 40 per cent of non-Albertan respondents felt Albertans didn’t care much about the rest of Canada. More than a quarter described Albertans as greedy and another quarter found them arrogant.”

    Interesting results.

  • Environmental crunch worse than thought: OECD 2050 report
  • “Pressures on Earth’s ecosystem are now so great that future generations could be doomed to falling living standards, the OECD said on Thursday in a report looking to the mid-century. ‘The prospects are more alarming than the situation described in the previous edition,’ it said, speaking of ‘irreversible changes that could endanger two centuries of rising living standards.'”

    I apologize to my descendants for the sad lives they’ll be left to live on this dying planet. (Lol. I am so dramatic).

  • Climate ‘tech fixes’ urged for Arctic methane
  • “An eminent UK engineer is suggesting building cloud-whitening towers in the Faroe Islands as a “technical fix” for warming across the Arctic. Scientists told UK MPs this week that the possibility of a major methane release triggered by melting Arctic ice constitutes a “planetary emergency”. The Arctic could be sea-ice free each September within a few years.”

    Gotta do something…

  • Cellphone use during pregnancy linked to hyperactivity
  • “Cellphone radiation that fetuses are exposed to in the womb may be responsible for rising rates of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and other behavioural problems in children, according to a new study.”

    Ah so cellphone radiation won’t kill us, just alter our children’s personalities, lol. Would this make you reconsider the amount of cell phone use you’re involved in when you’re pregnant?

  • Common antibiotic linked to asthma: UBC research
  • “A widely used antibiotic can increase the risk and severity of asthma, according to groundbreaking Canadian research that could help explain why millions of children now need to use puffers.”

    Bad antibiotics!

  • Super-Rich Americans Now Have Emergency Rooms In Own Homes
  • “Some wealthy households are choosing to forgo health insurance in favor of paying a monthly fee — totaling up to $30,000 per year — for concierge medicine, or the ability to have access to their physicians anywhere, anytime, Bloomberg News reports. Some families even have emergency rooms in their own homes, which can cost $1 million.”

    Blegh. Rich people…

  • Invisible Children boss Jason Russell arrested for masturbating in public: report
  • “San Diego police have confirmed they detained a 33-year-old white man on Thursday after getting reports at 11:30 a.m. he was running naked in the street, blocking traffic, screaming incoherently and performing a sex act in public. The man detained is reported to be Jason Russell, the 33-year-old filmmaker behind the controversial Kony 2012 viral video, and the co-founder of the charity Invisible Children.”

    Wow how this exploded on Twitter (#kony2012 turned into #bony2012). So bizarre.

  • Bell snaps up Astral Media for $3.38-billion
  • “BCE Inc. is pushing the envelope once more in what now plainly looks to be the telecom giant’s ambitious plan to become the epicentre of Canadian television content around which all others in the domestic marketplace orbit. BCE agreed Friday to acquire outright Astral Media Inc. in the latest in a string of deals that will make the country’s biggest telecommunications provider, through its new Bell Media division, the biggest holder of television properties in the country by far.”

    The joys of having the majority of our news and media being distributed by one company.

  • Bell-Astral deal should be stopped in its tracks
  • “If this deal goes through, we will have lost yet another independent and our position as having one of the most concentrated set of TMI industries amongst the developed capitalist economies will be yet further cemented.”

    Just bad news bears all around.

  • What We Talk About When We Talk About “Curation”
  • “[It’s] a drive to find the interesting, meaningful, and relevant amidst the vast maze of overabundant information, creating a framework for what matters in the world and why — is an increasingly valuable form of creative and intellectual labor, a form of authorship that warrants thought.”

    I’m curating right here with my Clicks of the Day! When it comes down to it, what I talk about it when I say curation, is gathering and delivering news, links, tidbits, photos, videos, etc., that I find interesting or “cool” and that I think others would be interested in as well.

  • Pay the TSA $100 and bypass airport security
  • “Most of us accept the inconvenience in the name of safer travel, but it looks as though even the TSA has realized none of us enjoy the experience. Their solution is not to speed things up or reduce the checks, though. Instead, the TSA will gladly accept a one-off payment of $100 from you to bypass security checks almost completely. The program is called Precheck, and will allow an individual to just walk through a metal detector before boarding a plane.”

    The rich really do get all the luxuries.

  • Pinterest addresses copyright concerns
  • “In a statement, the company said that it believes that it is protected under the safe harbor of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and that it is committed to quickly responding to alleged copyright issues… Much of the debate over Pinterest and copyright stems from a blog post by photographer and lawyer Kirsten Kowalski, who said that she removed some of her pinboards because she was concerned about what may happen in the event that someone sues a Pinterest user for copyright infringement. She later wrote to say that Pinterest chief executive Ben Silbermann had called her to get her input on how to rework the site’s terms and conditions. ‘All in all, it was a great conversation and he assured me that some changes are on the way in the very near future,’ Kowalski wrote.”

    Great to see a response because I was really backing off from Pinterest because of all the copyright concerns.

  • How Iceland Is Rebuilding Its Economy With Social Media
  • “Its 2011 “Inspired by Iceland” campaign encouraged citizens to take travelers on tours throughout the country. Even the president participated, inviting tourists into his home for pancakes with whipped cream and rhubarb jam… Overall, the Internet has played a big role in modern day Iceland…. The country has been embracing the Internet to boost tourism, and it seems to be working.”

    Really interesting! Also really makes me want to go Iceland!

  • West Edmonton Mall Apple Store to expand by over 4,000 square feet
  • “For those living in Edmonton, your Apple Store at the West Edmonton Mall has just had their expansion plans approved, which will increase retail space by 4,230 square feet, with construction to begin soon, according to ifoAppleStore. Total square footage will reach 6,930, and expansion will move directly into the adjacent retail space, formerly occupied by the Disney Store, which previously rumoured to make way for the move.”

    Crazy because that store is already so big.

  • Scientists develop the un-printer – vaporises ink from paper
  • “A team of scientists at the University of Cambridge have determined that as long as you are using the right type of laser, it is possible to remove toner from paper… They go on to explain that they have expanded on that method and found that ‘with the right laser, it is possible to remove toner from paper to enable its reuse.'”

    No more tree killings perhaps??

  • Want A New Bike? Check One Out From The Library
  • “Ever want to try that new electric bicycle zipping around town, a folding bike, or maybe that rugged looking cargo bike? At London’s Bicycle Library, the librarians are actually bike experts and the books are bicycles, and they invite any patron to come in and check out their bikes. It works as if you were checking out a book (although a deposit is required), and you get the experience of a traditional library (there are actual books and magazines on the art of cycling), along with a test track to see how you like the ride you’ve chose.”

    What a neat idea.

  • Theatres embrace tweet seats
  • “One of the last refuges from smartphones is now embracing the technology of instant communication… theatres, ballet companies and opera houses have been quietly opening their doors to tweeters and texters. It even arrived on Broadway Feb. 19, when a production of Godspell held a special performance with ‘tweet seats.’ For now, these tweeters need to be kept at the back of the theatre because of the light problem: the glow from a phone can be even more irritating than hearing it ring. But Haynes believes that technology will solve this problem and make it possible to put phone users anywhere in the house.”

    Definitely evolving in the world of theatre. Fort Saskatchewan’s Shell Theatre is really embracing it. I still feel the glow makes for a very awkward situation.

  • Ribbit! Frog species found in New York City has a croak of its own
  • “While it’s fairly common to find new species of animals in the remote wildness or in rain forests, to discover one in marshes and ponds within an urban area such as New York is nothing short of amazing, according to Leslie Rissler, program director with the National Science Foundation. ‘The species is completely distinct,’ said Rissler, part of the team of scientists that found the species. ‘It has a very small range and it was quite a surprise to find a new species in New York City.'”

    Cool :)

  • World’s tallest man finally stops growing, US doctors say
  • “Good news for Turkey’s Sultan Kosen, at eight foot three (2.51 meters) the world’s tallest living man: he can now say with confidence that he’s finally grown up. Nearly two years after gamma ray radiosurgery at the University of Virgina, doctors confirmed that Kosen, 29, has overcome acromegaly, a rare hormonal disorder that caused him to keep growing well into adulthood.”

    Yikes. Can you imagine if he just kept growing and growing and growing? I picture him peeking out above the clouds…

  • The man who used Google Earth to find his long-lost family
  • “An Indian man separated from his family for 25 years has defied the odds by tracking them down — using little more than a vague recollection of his childhood and some help from Google Earth’s mapping technology.”

    Great story.

  • World’s first flying car on the market at £800,000 (and it’s been in the air since 1946)
  • “If waiting in traffic jams leaves you ready to explode, the solution is finally here. Drivers can switch from the road to the air in minutes at the wheel of the world’s first flying car – which is on the market at a sky-high price of £800,000. The two-seat automobile can reach speeds of 60mph on land and up to 110mph at 12,000 feet, despite being more than 60 years old.”

    It’s not really as slick looking as I’d have hoped a flying car to be, lol.

  • 20 Hilarious ‘Hunger Games’ Memes Taking Over the Web
  • Lol these definitely made me laugh out loud!! Hahaha.

  • [Video]: Every Itchy & Scratchy episode from The Simpsons
  • 48 minutes long!! Too long for my video A.D.D. but still worth linking for the world.

  • A street cat named Bob
  • “Street musician James Bowen busks with cat Bob in Covent Garden in London March 13, 2012. Bowen has written a book named “A Street Cat Named Bob” about the experiences of the then homeless pair and how they met.”

    SUCH a cute story!! And wow, Bob is so stylish with his scarf. Watch some video of them here. So, so cute.

  • [Video]: Dog gets rejected by kittens, heart broken, but then gets his heart un-broken
  • These two videos are beyond adorable! <3

  • [Video]: St. Patrick’s Day Leprechaun Kitten
  • Lol!! I look like such an idiot while watching these fluffy cat videos! So cute.

  • [Photo]: Tom And Jerry IRL of the Day
  • “An actual game of cat and mouse unfolded in a garden in Reigate, Surrey, when an audacious rodent took on his kitty captor for a full ten minutes before managing to escape. According to witnesses, the wood mouse was brought into the garden by the cat, who had most likely expected an easy meal. But the critter soon went all Mighty Mouse, pummelling the cat with a succession of effective blows before escaping.”

    Wow!! This is awesome. Great photo.


Thor Photo of the Day:

Trip to the vet! Apparently Thor is overweight… but I think she’s beautiful!


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Linda

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