| Why this city slicker swapped hip hotels for a rustic Alpine retreat
I am sitting here looking down on an eagle, wafting imperiously and improbably slowly across a sublimely vast - in fact, rather scary - green-blue-grey Provencal gorge. This is an unusual and thought-provoking place for an advanced species of urban man to find himself. I am a city person. The nocturnal thwump thwump thwumps of police helicopters are my nightingales, the early flights on final descent into City Airport my dawn chorus. I find the noise of traffic a comfort, the clatter of garbage trucks over speed bumps a cheering confirmation of the life force; litter, a sign of prosperity. Since we live on a busy stretch in central London, these tastes are a survival characteristic. One day recently, surprise overnight excavations closed the road and it became strangely silent, throwing us into existential panic when we woke.
Crocodile Hunter Dead
Instead, a stingray got him. Now, you're probably thinking, "Who would get killed by a stingray?" and that's a good question because people rarely die from these injuries. Sadly, this was a freak accident where the stingray's barbed tail got Irwin in the chest and punctured his heart. From the AP: Irwin was at Batt Reef, off the remote coast of northeastern Queensland state, shooting a segment for a series called "Ocean's Deadliest" when he swam too close to one of the animals, which have a poisonous barb on their tails, his friend and colleague John Stainton said. […] Crew members aboard the boat, Croc One, called emergency services in the nearest city, Cairns, and administered CPR as they rushed the boat to nearby Low Isle to meet a rescue helicopter.
7 winners on Big Saturday
If you care at all about college football this is the Saturday you have been waiting for. No more directional schools (Michigan vs. Central Michigan), hyphenated schools (LSU vs. Louisiana-Lafayette) and I-AA matchups (Nebraska vs. Nicholls State). Fourteen of the teams in the Associated Press Top 25 poll play against each other. Imagine that. I'm only a poor, corrupt sports editor, so I'll be picking six of those matchups (wake me up when TCU and Texas Tech get to 6-0), plus the Division II showdown in Monmouth between Western Oregon and Texas A&M Kingsville. Let's roll. Oregon vs. Oklahoma: This is starting to feel like a conference game for the Ducks. Three times in three years? The last time the two teams played before 2004 was 1975. Oregon is 0-2 in the current series, but I think they'll turn the tide Saturday in Autzen.
|
