Panda Porn?!

What will they think of next? I'm speechless. So much time and effort spent on making sex tapes for pandas!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2069371.stm

China's pandas have sex education lessons
There are only 1,000 giant pandas left in the wild
Pandas in a Chinese research centre are being shown videos of other pandas mating as part of a plan to encourage the animals to reproduce.
The films are screened twice a day at the Giant Panda Breeding and Research Centre in Wolong, in the south-western province of Sichuan, the state news agency Xinhua reported.
Didi seemed to like his gift immensely, as his eyes were glued to the screen
Xinhua news agency The so-called "sex education lessons" have now become standard practice for all male pandas entering adulthood at the centre.
Pandas only rarely produce offspring in captivity, and the film screenings are among a number of plans designed to boost the numbers of this endangered species.
Birthday present
The latest participant, Didi, was placed in front of a television set for his sixth birthday, for his first lesson in the facts of life.
Didi seemed to like his gift immensely, as his eyes were glued to the screen, Xinhua reported.
The method has been tried in the past - it was last attempted at Wolong in April 2000 - and experts are optimistic the scheme will be a success.
"Through this kind of sex education, we expect to arouse the sexual instincts of giant pandas, enhance their natural mating ability and raise their reproductive capacity," said Zhang Hemin, director of the Wolong centre.

Few panda cubs are born in captivityZhang Guiquan, an official with the China Giant Panda Protection Centre, added, "We won't use drugs, such as Viagra, to help giant pandas increase their sexual desire and capacity. We believe this can be achieved through sex education and physical exercise."
Initial signs are encouraging. A panda called Ximeng completed his sex education programme last year and is now a father, the Xinhua report said.
"Didi seems to be heading in this direction. After receiving intensive sex education, he has exhibited a stronger libido than Ximeng," the agency added.
Endangered
Such measures are necessary as pandas, which have relatively low fertility rates even in the wild, lose virtually all interest in sex once they are in captivity.
More than 60% of male pandas in zoos or sanctuaries exhibit no sexual desire at all, while just a tenth of them will mate naturally, according to Xinhua.
Thus the vast majority of panda births in captivity are the result of artificial insemination.
Captive births are vital to the survival of the species. There are only about 1,000 giant pandas left in the wild, mostly in Sichuan.

From Nashvillian cows to Sudanese goats

Luckily, not similar stories....I shudder to think of the possibilities.

I found this article on BBC News today, am posting it here to save everyone the bother of clicking on links. For the compulsive link-clickers:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/4748292.stm
and the sequel: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6619983.stm

To tell you in brief, Mr. Tombe (of Sudanese nationality) was caught by Mr. Alifi (also of Sudanese nationality) having sex with Mr. Alifi's goat (assumed to have Sudanese nationality before her marriage). The Sudanese law (applicable in this case) rules that if a man is caught having sex with an unmarried female (of any species, apparently), he has to immediately marry her and give a dowry to her 'father'. In this case, the father of the goat demanded that the same punishment be applicable since Mr. Tombe had besmirched the goat's reputation and thus the honor of Mr. Alifi's family. The council of local elders approved and thus Charles Tombe found himself the proud owner of Mrs. Goat Tombe after paying Mr. Alifi a dowry of 15000 Sudanese dinars. Mrs. Goat was renamed Rose after her marriage and presumably was officially given a Sudanese passport.
In the course of their year-long sojourn into holy matrimony, they had one male kid "not human" according to Mr. Rhodes, who first reported the story in his newspaper.
Unfortunately, Rose today left for her heavenly abode in the wide grassy fields on the other side of the rainbow. It is as yet unknown whether Charles Tombe would choose to be buried next to her. Charles is now free to take a wife of the human persuasion for a change. That is unless, Sudan allows polygamy (which is possible) and thus he already one.

Restaurant Review - Zola's in Nashville

Since my blog is becoming a very Nashville-oriented one, I figured I would take it one step further and make it a things-to-do and places-to-see in Nashville tourism site. Starting with a restaurant review for Zola's on Westend Avenue.

The prime motivation for experimenting at Zola's was that I bought a new dress. $150 at Ann Taylor's. Walked in to look at the bargain rack and bought the dress off the mannequin in the front window. It's a really nice dress http://www.anntaylor.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Merchant_Id=1&RestartFlow=t&Section_Id=376&Product_Id=866852. Of course, after spending that much on a dress, one has to go to a good place to exhibit it. Zola's had some very high ratings from various websites - "a blend of Italian, French and Spanish cuisines", so it won out.

The restaurant itself is in a pretty decent location, just off Westend Avenue, which is like downtown Nashville. It looks charming from outside and the ambience is carried over inside. There were Bay windows instead of the wall facing the road. As my companion said, it resembled some restaurants in the South of France with Bay windows overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. In this case, the Bay windows overlooked the Dodge pickup trucks parked on 19th Avenue, but hey, what's an imagination for?

The table we were seated at left something lacking for a romantic meal, being bang in the middle of the room, but people were minding their own business on the whole, so it didn't matter very much. The menu had a very interesting collection of cocktails. I went for a Pear Martini, but that wasn't very good. The pear was drowned in the vodka, and yours truly is more of a pear fan than a goose fan. The Grey variety, I mean. So I nabbed T's Ginger Peach martini and proceeded to get tipsy on it. That one is definitely recommended. Tastes a bit like aalepak with alcohol.

Moving on to the starters, T ordered a cheese platter and I had a stuffed romaine hearts salad. There were a lot of romaine hearts in it, the stuffing was sadly missing. It was more of a lettuce salad made to sound fancy. The cheese platter was really good, with goat cheese, Brie, sheep cheese and salami and bread to go with it. I gorged on that. The goat cheese with sun-dried tomatoes and salami with olives was excellent. The martini was beginning to make its effects felt on my system, which was never very balanced to begin with...so the tablecloth had started sharing our meal. The martini also made me less aware of my table manners and I proceeded to tear ham and salami apart with my fingers. I could see T's internal struggle on witnessing this disgusting spectacle, but he smothered his embarassment in cheese and stayed there like a man.

Till this point, my choices hadn't been anything to write home about. The main course changed that. I went for a Porcini something. Basically pork in lentil sauce. That turned out really good. It was not very spicy in the Indian sense of the word, but had a very interesting blend of tastes. T's Mediterranean lamb schnitzel was also very good if you like hummus and stuff like that. Unfortunately, all the cheese that had been consumed had established priority on stomach space. The pig had to fight hard for room, and it eventually lost.

Since we were there and T doesn't function without dessert, we looked again at the menu. The dessert selection is not very wide at all. They had about 6 options, most of them related to chocolate one way or the other. The fresh fruit sorbet trio was really good. Very light and refreshing. It had lemon-lime (too sour to me), strawberry and pineapple. Delicious. I ordered an Espresso, which I hoped would keep me awake for the drive home. The Espresso was about 4 sips long and luke-warm. I didn't want to display my ignorance about coffees (are Espressos normally served luke-warm? Ewww! Who wants to drink luke-warm coffee??!) so I asked for cream and tried to dilute the caffeine with cream and sugar. Didn't quite succeed, so just left it.
Not having the seen the cheque, I can't comment on the value-for-money, but it's definitely worth a look-see if you're in the Country Music Capital.

How does it compare with Cracker Barrell? Well, you can wear better clothes to Zola's.

On Polygamy...

Truly phenomenal--
Protect children, yes, but leave cockamamie grownups alone
Will comment later. Meanwhile, please use your freedom of speech and don't wait for me.

Tennessee Ballpark shootings

I should rename my blog Tennessee News or something. Latest titbit of interest:

Details emerge from Tennessee ballpark killings
By Duncan Mansfield
ASSOCIATED PRESS
KNOXVILLE - The maternal grandfather of a 10-year-old boy at the center of a custody dispute fatally shot the boy's paternal grandparents during an argument after watching him play baseball, authorities said yesterday. Then, Samuel L. Noe, 61, was fatally wounded while wrestling with three onlookers trying to disarm him. Among them was the boy's father, Jerry B. "Brent" Shands, 39, who also was shot in the struggle, District Attorney General Jimmy Dunn said. The shooting occurred Monday night as about 75 adults and children were making their way to the parking lot at a city-owned ball field nicknamed Field of Dreams in Dandridge, a lakeside community overlooking the Great Smoky Mountains about 30 miles east of Knoxville. "These two families were walking (to the parking lot) and were yeah-yeahing with each other, and then the next thing you know it escalates, and the shooting starts," Dunn said. Four shots were fired from Noe's five-shot revolver, the prosecutor said. Paternal grandfather Jerry D. Shands, 63, and Noe died instantly. Paternal grandmother Ellen E. "Sue" Shands, 62, was dead on arrival at a local hospital. Brent Shands was flown to University of Tennessee Medical Center in Knoxville, where his family said he was in serious condition. All were from the Jefferson City area. Austin Shands, 10, was uninjured but dazed, witnesses said. Noe's wife, Patricia Noe, who also attended the game, may have sparked the confrontation when she said something to Jerry Shands and pointed an umbrella at him, Dunn confirmed.
"Then, of course, he says, 'Get that blankety-blank thing out of my face.' ... And the next thing you hear is pop, pop, pop (from Noe's gun)." Brent Shands and at least two other men ran over to Noe. They wrestled for the gun "and at some point during the struggle the gun went off at least one time, maybe twice," wounding Brent Shands and killing Noe, the prosecutor said.
Asked if there is anyone to charge, Dunn said, "It doesn't appear to be." This was not an argument that began Monday night, he said. "This has been going on for some time, and I don't know how long." Dunn said he knew that Brent Shands and his former wife Diane Shands Robbins, Noe's daughter, had been battling for many months over custody of Austin.

Let me fill in the gaps here. I've been following this story out of personal interest. I just visited the Smoky Mountains east of Knoxville 2 weeks ago, so I feel like I know these people. You could see the hick towns populated by rednecks in that area and you know it would be very easy for trouble to brew there. In this particular case, the mother of the boy was arrested and sentenced for marijuana trafficking. She thought the father-in-law had turned her in, which was what sparked off the bad blood between the families and the subsequent (or maybe prequent if that's a word) divorce. Thus stems the custody battle which culminated in the poor boy having 3 grandparents dead, his father in a serious condition, and his mother was in jail to begin with. Happy families, aren't they? Oh, and did I mention that these towns with populations of 600 people still have about 5 churches of different denominations? Talk about the Bible belt. And this state will of course vote against gun control. Why do we need the government controlling guns? We're mature enough to handle them. Way to go, Tennessee!

Spinach and E-Coli

19 states in the United States of America are suffering an outbreak of E-Coli through eating tainted spinach. Guess what? Tennessee isn't amongst those 19. And guess why? Because we don't eat spinach, silly! We eat only beef and potatoes. And if we feel like being healthy, we eat some fried okra. But spinach? Please, no! So if it were the mad cow disease, people here would be breaking out in a cold sweat. But E-coli through spinach? Hell man, we're laughin' our asses off!

Summer Wine

Andrea Corrs and Bono Vox attempting a cover of the classic Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazelwood song.