The Daily Grill

The Meat Of The Matter

Last Friday the United States offered needy countries more than 330,000 packaged meals donated by Britain to feed Hurricane Katrina victims but rejected due to a U.S. ban on British beef. U.S. Agriculture Department officials said the "Meals Ready to Eat", or MREs, could not be distributed in the United States because they contained British beef products. In the same finicky spirit, U.S. officials refused to reimburse meals that were purchased by hurricane refugees at both Olive Garden and Long John Silver restaurants because "we think Americans should be eating at more upscale eateries."

What next?

After battling intense hurricane seasons and plant-destroying citrus canker, Florida citrus growers now have another threat to deal with – yellow dragon disease. Like the avian bird flu, I guess it's a condition that has jumped from yellow dragons to citrus plants. Fortunately, it doesn’t affect humans. Unfortunately, we apparently now have dragons.

Did Someone Else Pack Your Bags?

In Newark, NJ, Melanie McGuire was indicted on murder and other charges alleging she killed her husband. William T. McGuire, was fatally shot between April 28 and May 5, 2004, according to the indictment. His dismembered body later floated ashore in his own matching luggage in the Chesapeake Bay near Norfolk, VA. It took three days for all the bags to come in, which is sort of like what happens to your luggage when you fly on Delta.

It's Bull Shirt, Man...

A woman, Lorrie Heasley of Woodland, WA, was tossed off a Southwest Airlines flight in Reno for refusing to remove her t-shirt, which bore images of President Bush, Vice President Cheney and Secretary of State Rice, along with the words "Meet The F**kers", a mildly humorous play on the title of a recent movie, "Meet The Fockers". (The "**" are placeholders for the letters "c" and "u", not necessarily in that order...)

"Here we are trying to free another country, " Heasley told a newspaper, "and I have to get off a plane...over a T-shirt. That's not freedom." Several people reportedly complained about the t-shirt.

Somewhere in a cave near Pakistan, Osama Bin Laden is most likely smiling while his dialysis machine chugs away...

Congrats, Ig Noble Winners!

Congratulations to this year's winners of the Ig Noble Prizes, as announced at Harvard University by the Annals of Improbably Research Magazine. The prize for medicine was awarded to Gregg Miller, who mortgaged his home and maxed out his credit cards to mass produce his invention — prosthetic testicles for neutered dogs.

"Considering my parents thought I was an idiot when I was a kid, this is a great honor," he said. "I wish they were alive to see it." Idiot? The Daily Grill thinks not: Miller has sold more than 150,000 of his Neuticles, more than doubling his $500,000 investment. The silicone implants come in different sizes, shapes, weights and degrees of firmness.

Some awardees, like Benjamin Smith of the University of Adelaide in Australia, who won the biology prize, actually nominated their own work. "I've been a fan of the Ig Nobels for a while," he said.
Smith's team studied and catalogued different scents emitted by more than 100 species of frogs under stress. Some smelled like cashews, while others smelled like licorice, mint or rotting fish.

This year's other Ig Nobel winners include:

• PHYSICS: Since 1927, researchers at the University of Queensland in Australia have been tracking a glob of congealed black tar as it drips through a funnel — at a rate of one drop every nine years.

• PEACE: Two researchers at Newcastle University in England monitored the brain activity of locusts as they watched clips from the movie "Star Wars."

• CHEMISTRY: An experiment at the University of Minnesota was designed to prove whether people can swim faster or slower in syrup than in water.

And best of all, perhaps, the Ig Nobel for literature went to the Nigerians who introduced millions of e-mail users to a "cast of rich characters ... each of whom requires just a small amount of expense money so as to obtain access to the great wealth to which they are entitled."