VirusHead

What caught my eye this morning, in no particular order…

• A majority of members of Iraq’s parliament have signed a draft bill that would require a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. soldiers from Iraq and freeze current troop levels.
• Support our Oops
• The cost of postage stamps will go up again Monday – 41 cents for a first-class letter.
• Over the past four years, between 100,000 and 300,000 barrels a day (about $5-15 million daily) of Iraq’s oil production has gone missing, perhaps through “corruption or smuggling.”
• Still ok with nuclear power? Of the tens of thousands of federal claims filed by ill nuclear arms workers exposed to radiation, most have been denied.
• A billboard proclaiming “Life’s short. Get a divorce” caused such an uproar that city workers tore it down a week later. Nonetheless, the attorneys said that calls have gone up dramatically.
• The divorce rate is the lowest it’s been since 1970, for whatever reasons…
• Our solar system is bullet-shaped. No comment.
• It’s possible that King Herod’s tomb has been found.
• At Slate, see the illustrated guide to GOP scandals.
• Creepy republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is worth at least $260 million.

And (even) weird(er) news…

A drunken German man climbed into an emergency postbox for unwanted babies, slid down the chute and landed in an incubator. Medical staff found him there, smoking a cigarette.

Ummm…there are postboxes for unwanted babies?

Hundreds of babies have been deposited in the boxes set up across Germany and Austria since the scheme started five years ago. It came into effect after more and more young mums unable to cope with their newborns had been abandoning them on the street. The baby boxes offered a safe ‘no questions asked’ alternative.

I’m assuming it’s not like a roadside postal box. It’s got to be more like an ATM, right? On the outside of a hospital? I’m trying to imagine a newborn sliding down a “chute” into an incubator. How does that work? I want to see a photo.