Quick Takes

Escape deflated

On March 3, Marti Wilson noticed something suspicious at her mother’s St. Joseph, Mo., home. Not only was a strange vehicle idling in her driveway, but the side door of the house showed signs of a break-in. Knowing that no one was home, Wilson suspected a burglar was inside rifling through her mother’s belongings. Before heading inside to confront the burglar, Wilson took the car key and slashed the tires with a pocketknife. Inside, she struggled with the attacker, a man police identified as 30-year-old Casey Hueser. After Hueser took back the key, he tried to make a getaway on a blown-out tire. But police, responding to a call from Wilson, were able to catch him quickly.

Power play

Managing the succession of the Dalai Lama is a complicated subject for China’s atheistic Communist regime. But now, Chinese government officials are demanding the Tibetan Buddhist religious leader reincarnate on their terms. Party leader Zhu Weiqun told Beijing reporters on March 11 that China intends on controlling every aspect of the 80-year-old Dalai Lama’s purported succession. “Decision-making power over the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama, and over the end or survival of this lineage, resides in the central government of China,” Zhu told the People’s Daily. To prevent the Chinese government from gaining control of the powerful religious office, the Dalai Lama, who supports Tibetan independence, has threatened not to reincarnate.

No Jedi mind tricks

A 21-year-old Nebraska man’s plot to fool authorities failed when officers became suspicious of a container labeled “Not Weed.” Lancaster County, Neb., sheriff’s deputies searched the suspect’s 16-ounce plastic sour cream container during a traffic stop on Feb. 28. Inside, deputies found 11.4 grams of marijuana and cited the driver of the car for possession.

Lasting impression

Some fine detective work from a Lakeville, Mass., police officer led to an arrest and the recovery of more than 300 stolen goods. Investigating a break-in of a Lakeville home in early March, police Detective Sean Joyce noticed something suspicious in the snow: the imprint of a license plate. Cold and snowy weather in Massachusetts this winter meant that Joyce could easily make out the imprint in the snow bank at the crime scene. After running the plates, Lakeville Police arrested Robert Beaucaire and Amy Peters, recovered the stolen objects, and charged the pair with breaking and entering and larceny.

Change of days

The top issue for the March 3 Los Angeles election: how to raise voter turnout. Voters were asked to approve a solution for the city’s pathetic voting performance by changing city elections to even years to coincide with state and federal contests. The measure passed overwhelmingly, but according to first reports, just 8.6 percent of the city’s eligible voters made it to the polls to make the decision.

Study fatigue

Researchers at Aalto University in Helsinki, Finland, have published a new scientific study indicating that researchers publish too many scientific studies. By tracking citations to scientific papers published in research journals, lead researcher Pietro Parolo found the scientific community has a short attention span—and it’s getting shorter. According to the researchers, there are 10 times as many publications today as there were in 1960. And in the 50 years tracked by the study, the period of relevancy for each published chemistry paper, for instance, has shrunk from about 13 years of relevancy to just seven years of relevancy. “The decay is getting faster and faster,” the researchers concluded, “indicating that scholars ‘forget’ more easily papers now than in the past.”

Written bequest

More than two decades ago, Janice Sage won the picturesque Center Lovell Inn and Restaurant in Lovell, Maine, in an essay contest. Now that the 68-year-old innkeeper is ready to retire, she plans to hand over the historic property and business in the same way she received it. Sage announced late last year she’d give the property to the winner of an essay contest. The innkeeper told contestants to get their submissions in before May 7 and to keep the essay under 200 words. She hopes to read all the submissions within 10 days and then turn over the stack to a pair of independent readers to pick a winner. With a nonrefundable $125 entrance fee, Sage said she hopes to get enough entries to offset the more than $500,000 she spent renovating the building since 1993.

No takers

It’s a simple job, the pay is good, but England’s chicken farmers are having problems finding workers willing to do it. The British Poultry Council said there wasn’t a single job application for the specialized position called chick sexer last year. Essentially, chick sexers examine baby chickens to determine gender. According to the council chief executive, on-the-job training can take three years, but the job pays $60,000 per year. “I think the problem is the job itself,” said the BPC’s Andrew Large. “You are spending hours every day staring at the backside of a chick. That is not seen as being attractive.”

Editors at large

South American cities are known for their graffiti. A pair of Ecuadorian professionals are hoping to make Quito known for its proper graffiti grammar too. A group calling itself Acción Ortográfica Quito (Quito Orthographic Action) has taken stencils and spray paint to edit the grammatical errors of lovelorn graffiti poets and political vandals in the city. Known in public only as Diéresis, the creator of the group said he was appalled at the numerous grammatical errors in a love poem he saw daily on the way to his job as a lawyer. So he called a friend to help him correct the grammar in orange paint. “Grammatical errors cause stress,” Diéresis told The Guardian. “We only make texts comprehensible that otherwise would not send any message whatsoever.”