- Permission denied, Swaziland. You wanted to raise some
quick cash by cleaning out your garage and raffling off a giant stockpile of
rhino horn, but delegates at a U.N. wildlife meeting in South Africa were
having none of it. Those delegates rejected a proposal by Swaziland to let it
sell all of that valuable rhino horn, reinforcing a growing concern that
lifting an international ban on the sale of rhino horn could increase demand
and leave rhinos even more vulnerable to poachers. Swaziland took the
counterculture approach of arguing that the ban has failed to curb poaching and
that it could use funds from the sale of its stockpile of 727 pounds of horn to
pay for the protection of the African kingdom's wildlife. Yes, using the
products of poaching to combat poaching. It seems bass-ackwards, but such is
life in Third World countries where endangered wildlife are as much a commodity
as anything else in the country. A total of 100 delegates voted against the
Swazi proposal, with just 26 voting in favor of the proposal and 17
abstentions. The vote took place at a meeting of the Convention on
International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, or CITES,
and now Swaziland will have to find a way to do enough car washes or bake sales
to finance its future wildlife protection efforts…or just turn to the black
market and look to move the rhino horn on the down low. Either one seems like a
perfectly viable option for the country at this particular point……..
- The Star Wars universe is expanding - literally. Disney is
expanding it in a commercial sense by adding new characters, spin-offs and
sequels to what George Lucas hath built, but now comes news that a new planet
is set to feature in the next Star Wars film, “Episode VIII.” With filming reportedly
planned in Anchorage, Alaska for the next installment of the sci-fi franchise
at an “undisclosed location” in the frozen tundra of a state, it’s rumored that
the stark Alaskan landscape will represent a previously "unknown
planet" in the Star Wars universe. With this story comes word that
producers will seek hundreds of extras for the film from the greater Anchorage
area. Adam Driver, who will reprise his role as Kylo Ren in Episode VIII, recently
compared the franchise's latest installment to “The Empire Strikes Back,” a
comparison that should conjure up plenty of good memories for fans of the
franchise. The project will be the follow-up to last year's “Star Wars: The
Force Awakens,” and is due in December 2017. It also comes on the heels of this
year's spin-off film “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.” To hear Driver tell it,
new and wondrous things are on the way. "It's great," Driver said. “It's
similar to how The Empire Strikes Back has a different tone. For that people
always go, 'Oooh, it's dark' but I don't know that it necessarily is. It's just
different in tone in a way that I think is great and necessary but also very
clear." Regardless, fanboys and girls old and young will camp out, line up
and obsess over this one just as they have with the previous seven films in the
series and copious amounts of money will be made……….
- It’s time you answered for your sins, CrossFit. For years
now, you’ve subjected us to psychopathically obsessed devotees of your particular
brand of fitness religion, belting out burpees and grunting their way through
overhead squats in some sort of insane push to turn working out into a
competitive endeavor. Along the way, hundreds have been injured, some
seriously, and now a Kansas City man injured during a CrossFit workout has
become the first person to successfully sue the company. A jury found the
plaintiff 50 percent responsible, but still awarded him $400,000 in damages. CrossFit
has some 13,000 affiliates worldwide and remains immensely popular, but it’s
clearly not well-liked by the man who went to Sky's Limit Fitness gym on West
80th Street near Wornall Road and found the workout so hard that he was given
an alternative exercise to do while the rest of the class battled its way
through. According to Rob Sullivan, who represented the man in court, the weight went up more than 300 pounds and
when Sullivan’s client tried to lift it, he felt pain in his back and collapsed
to the ground. "At some point, the coach came over and tried to roll out
his back on lacrosse balls, which is something they use in Crossfit to roll out
muscles, which is not a good idea. My client was saying he couldn't feel his
legs," Sullivan said. The client sued the gym, claiming he hadn’t signed
any waiver in which he’d been advised of the risks of the workout. CrossFit
denounced the verdict, claiming there was “zero evidence of any negligence on
the part of either entity, and overwhelming evidence that the plaintiff was
personally responsible for his injury." Classy, CrossFit, blaming this guy
for nearly getting crippled by the one-rep max deadlift…….
- Coaches at major Division I college basketball programs
are typically well compensated for their efforts. They can afford to chip off a
few dollars here and there to do something nice for those around them and for
the second straight year, Kansas Jayhawks men’s basketball coach Bill Self is
doling out some preseason charity courtesy of Kansas staffer Brennan Bechard.
Bechard, the Jayhawks' director of basketball operations, has to be something
of a legend amongst KU undergrads these days after making a half-court shot
during the program’s Saturday's Late Night in the Phog to earn Kansas sophomore
Jordan Stiers $10,000 from the Jayhawks coach. Two students were randomly
chosen to either take the half-court shot themselves or select someone else to
shoot it and Stiers was clearly paying attention last year when Bechard made
the shot for student Jerrod Castro. She tabbed the former walk-on at Kansas to
take his shot, obviously impressed by Bechard’s career average of 0.5 points in
35 career games. Ever the clutch player, Bechard drilled the shot and after
being mobbed by the KU players and watching Self write out a check to Stiers, he
was asked if he should’ve received more court time as a player. "Without a
doubt," Bechard said. "And you guys should tell Coach Self that when
he comes in here too." Stiers apparently doesn’t value the campus icon
status he could garner by using his winnings to throw a badass keg party and
instead plans to use the money to help her grandmother pay bills………
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