Article:
Incidents listed are selected by the Officer In Charge of each shift that may have significant public interest. Incidents listed are not inclusive of all incidents. To view Calls for Services information, please visit communitycrimemap.com. Requests for information can be directed to the MPD Records Unit: (608) 266-4075.

 Incident Report for Case #2017-460207

 Incident Type Arrested Person

 Incident Date 12/22/2017 - 2:16 PM

 Address 627 State St. (Ruby's Salon)

 Arrested Khaled A. Shabani, age 46, Madison

 Suspect was arrested for mayhem and disorderly conduct while armed.

 Victim(s) Male, age 22, Madison ||||| Close Get email notifications on Logan Wroge | Wisconsin State Journal daily!

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 Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. ||||| An angry barber allegedly retaliated against a 22-year-old customer by shaving his head down the middle and snipping his ear with scissors, leaving him bloodied.

 He requested a No. 2 on the sides, and an inch taken off the top with scissors, police spokesman Joel Despain said.

 The 22-year-old customer, who wasn't named in the Madison Police Department press release , had gone to the salon to get his hair cut.

 Police arrested 46-year-old Khaled A. Shabani at Ruby's Salon in Madison, Wisconsin, after the alleged incident, which they said occurred on Dec. 22.

 However, his cut soon went south. He claimed Shabani began complaining he was fidgeting and moving his head, and twisted his ear. Then, Shabani allegedly grabbed a "zero" clipper, "snipped" his ear, and shaved a line in his head.

 "[The victim] was starting to bleed when the 'zero' was used to cut a close path down the middle of his head, leaving him looking a bit like Larry from the Three Stooges," Despain said.

 The victim then got up and left, with Shabani allegedly shouting after him, "You want a zero right?"

 The man called police when he got home, and Shabani was arrested on suspicion of mayhem and disorderly conduct while armed.

 "While it is not a crime to give someone a bad haircut, you will get arrested for intentionally snipping their ear with a scissors," Despain said.

 On Wednesday, Shabani pleaded not guilty to disorderly conduct, the Wisconsin State Journal reported. The charge is a violation of a county ordinance, not criminal.

 When reached by BuzzFeed News, the Madison Police Department had no further information. |||||Summary:

– A young man who went for a pre-Christmas haircut got a disorderly one, while his barber got slammed for disorderly conduct, the Wisconsin State Journal reports. Per Madison police spokesman Joel DeSpain, the 22-year-old patron headed over to Ruby's Salon on Friday and asked for an inch off the top and the sides shaved, and his stylist, 46-year-old Khaled A. Shabani, set to work. The police report notes the customer asked for a No. 2 buzzer for the sides and that scissors be used to trim the top. The customer soon realized things were "not going well," however, when Shabani started chastising him for not keeping his head still, which earned him an ear-twisting, per the report. The situation got worse when Shabani allegedly "snipped" his ear with the scissors, drawing blood, and used a "zero" buzzer (which provides the closest cut) to swoop right down the middle of his head. The result? The customer got a buzz that left him "looking a bit like Larry from the Three Stooges," DeSpain says. Which is when the customer says he got up to leave, with Shabani allegedly yelling after him, "You want a zero, right?" Shabani was cited for mayhem and disorderly conduct while armed, which the Journal notes is not a criminal charge but a county ordinance violation. "While it is not a crime to give someone a bad haircut, you will get arrested for intentionally snipping their ear with a scissors," DeSpain says. The customer had another stylist elsewhere shave his head all the way to rid himself of the Stooges look. Per a police report, Shabani told cops the ear-snipping was an accident, but BuzzFeed reports on Yelp reviews that note other bad experiences at the salon, including one ex-patron that says his visit felt like it "[bordered] on assault."


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Britain's oldest settlement is not where we thought it was, a team of archaeologists said on Thursday as they announced with confidence that Amesbury should now hold the distinction.

 It was previously considered that Thatcham in Berkshire held the distinction but researchers from the University of Buckingham are certain we need to look 40 miles west, to the parish of Amesbury, in Wiltshire, which also includes Stonehenge.

 Carbon dating of bones of aurochs – the giant cattle that were twice the size of today's bulls – at the Blick Mead dig site, has shown that Amesbury has been continually occupied for each millennium since 8,820BC. Older than Thatcham, occupied since 7,700BC, it is in effect where British history began.

 David Jacques, research fellow in archaeology at the University of Buckingham, led the dig. He said: "The site blows the lid off the Neolithic revolution in a number of ways. It provides evidence for people staying put, clearing land, building and presumably worshipping monuments.

 "The area was clearly a hub point for people to come to from many miles away and in many ways was a forerunner for what later went on at Stonehenge itself. The first monuments at Stonehenge were built by these people.

 "For years people have been asking 'why is Stonehenge where it is?' Now, at last, we have found the answers."

 It was the same dig, at Blick Mead, which last year led to the discovery that Mesolithic Britons were enjoying eating frogs legs about eight millennia before the French.

 At the time, Jaques expressed confidence that evidence would prove it was Britain's oldest settlement. That has now been confirmed and on Thursday it was recognised by the Guinness Book of Records.

 The dig also unearthed the largest number of Mesolithic worked flints ever found; 31,000 were discovered in just over 40 days, all in a 16-sq-metre (172-sq-ft) area.

 The discoveries put a date to the activities of those who built the first monuments at the Stonehenge site, using enormous pine posts. It shows their communities lived in the area for a further 3,000 years, close to the dawn of the Neolithic era when Stonehenge itself was built.

 Archaeologists say the results provide something of a missing link between the erection of the posts, between 8,820 and 6,590BC, and of Stonehenge, in 3,000BC. The findings provide evidence which suggests that Stonehenge, rather than a Neolithic new-build sitting, at first, in an empty landscape should be viewed as a response to long-term use of the area by indigenous hunters and home-makers.

 Bill Dunn, spokesman for the Amesbury History Centre, said: "We are naturally delighted at the confirmation of Amesbury's longevity as the oldest continuously inhabited place in England. We have always known Amesbury as somewhere special and this confirms it. All the visitors to the museum are amazed at what they find, and we hope even more people will now visit."

 • This article was amended on 2 May 2014. An earlier version referred to Amesbury as being continually occupied for each millennia, rather than millennium, since 8,820BC. ||||| Image copyright PA Image caption Amesbury - including Stonehenge - is the UK's longest continually-occupied settlement

 A Wiltshire town has been confirmed as the longest continuous settlement in the United Kingdom.

 Amesbury, including Stonehenge, has been continually occupied since 8820BC, experts have found.

 The news was confirmed following an archaeological dig which also unearthed evidence of frogs' legs being eaten in Britain 8,000 years before France.

 Amesbury's place in history has also now been recognised by the Guinness Book of Records.

 David Jacques, from the University of Buckingham, said: "The site blows the lid off the Neolithic Revolution in a number of ways.

 Historic Wiltshire Stonehenge: Wiltshire's most famous historic site built 2500BC

 Avebury: Stone circle is thought to date back 4,000 years

 Silbury Hill: Europe's largest artificial prehistoric mound

 West Kennet Long Barrow: One of the largest Neolithic chambered tombs in Britain

 Westbury White Horse: Cut in the hillside in the 16th Century

 "It provides evidence for people staying put, clearing land, building, and presumably worshipping, monuments.

 "The area was clearly a hub point for people to come to from many miles away, and in many ways was a forerunner for what later went on at Stonehenge itself.

 "The first monuments at Stonehenge were built by these people. For years people have been asking why is Stonehenge where it is, now at last, we have found the answers."

 Mr Jacques said the River Avon, which runs through the area, would have been like an A road with people travelling along it.

 "They may have had the equivalent of local guides and there would have been feasting," he added.

 "We have found remains of big game animals, such as aurochs and red deer, and an enormous amount of burnt flint from their feasting fires."

 Image copyright Andy Rhind-Tutt Image caption The dig unearthed the largest haul of worked flints from the Mesolithic period

 Previously, Thatcham in Berkshire, 40 miles from Amesbury, held the record for the longest continuous settlement in the country.

 The dig in Amesbury also uncovered 31,000 worked flints in 40 days as well as animal bones such as frogs' legs.

 Mr Jacques said our ancestors were eating a "Heston Blumenthal-style menu".

 Amesbury facts Queen Eleanor of Provence - consort to Henry III - is buried at the town's former abbey

 Amesbury residents get a free visitors' pass to Stonehenge each year

 In 1965, the Beatles stayed at the Antrobus Arms Hotel whilst filming Help!

 The area's most famous resident - Police frontman Sting - lives in nearby Wilsford cum Lake

 The find was based on a report by fossil mammal specialist Simon Parfitt, of the Natural History Museum.

 Andy Rhind-Tutt, the founder of Amesbury Museum and Heritage Trust, said there was "something unique and rather special about the area" to keep people there from the end of the Ice Age, to when Stonehenge was created and until today.

 "The fact that the feasting of large animals and the discovery of a relatively constant temperature spring sitting alongside the River Avon, may well be it," he said.

 The dig was filmed and made into a documentary by the BBC, Smithsonian, CBC and others to be screened later in the summer.

 The project was led by the University of Buckingham. ||||| Bones of cattle twice the size of bulls and pink flints which change colour have led the way to an archaeological breakthrough in Amesbury

 © Courtesy University of Buckingham

 © University of Buckingham

 © University of Buckingham

 Giant bull, wild boar and red deer bones left at a settlement a mile from Stonehenge prove that Amesbury is the oldest settlement in Britain and has been continually occupied since 8820 BC, according to archaeologists who say the giant monuments were built by indigenous hunters and homemakers rather than Neolithic new builders.Carbon dating of aurochs – a breed twice the size of bulls – predates the settlers responsible for the massive pine posts at Stonehenge, suggesting that people had first lived in Wiltshire around 3,000 years before the site was created in 3000 BC. Experts had previously thought the stones had been the work of European immigrants.“The site blows the lid off the Neolithic Revolution in a number of ways,” said David Jacques, from the University of Buckingham, who led the dig at Vespasian’s Camp in the open basin of Blick Mead.“It provides evidence for people staying put, clearing land, building and, presumably, worshipping monuments.“The area was clearly a hub point for people to come to from many miles away, and in many ways was a forerunner for what later went on at Stonehenge itself.“The first monuments at Stonehenge were built by these people."For years people have been asking 'why is Stonehenge where it is?' Now, at last, we have found the answers.”Land clearing had been considered part of the farming culture introduced by continental Neolithic immigrants during the 5th millennium. The finds date clearances around an area of the spring to between 7500 and 4600 BC, when Mesolithic culture had been seen as nomadic.“In effect, Blick Mead was the very first Stonehenge Visitor Centre, up and running in the 8th millennium BC,” said Jacques.“The River Avon would have been the ‘A’ Road – people would have come down on their log boats.“They would have had the equivalent of tour guides and there would have been feasting."We have found remains of big game animals, such as aurochs and red deer, and an enormous amount of burnt flint from their feasting fires. There’s also evidence for a multi-cultural population at the site.”Around 31,000 Mesolithic worked flints were found in a 16-square metre during excavations lasting little more than a month.“Tool types suggest people were coming to it from far to the west of Stonehenge and from the east,” added Jacques. “Another possible reason why people were attracted to the area was the striking bright pink colouring of the flint, which isn’t that colour anywhere else in the country.“The colouring is caused by algae - Hildenbrandia rivularis - and it is due to a combination of dappled light and the unusually warm spring water in the area.“It’s unique to have people of that time come from so many different faraway places. The site and the Stonehenge areas were very well-known places to visit for a very long time – the London of the Mesolithic.”Professor David John, of the Natural History Museum, said that the constant spring water temperature at the site would have been between 10 and 14 degrees, giving the flint its pink tinge once it had been removed from the stream for several hours.“It is a rather magical effect now,” said Jacques. “It may well have been seen so back then.” |||||

– The ancient monument of Stonehenge dates back to between 2500 BC and 3000 BC—but when it was built, people had already been living in the area for millennia, researchers found after a dig. Artifacts from what is now Amesbury, the nearest settlement to Stonehenge, dated to 8820 BC. It's been inhabited ever since, the BBC notes, making it Britain's oldest settlement, something the Guinness Book of Records has now officially recognized. (As such, Thatcham has lost the honor.) The year was established after burnt flints and large animal bones were unearthed; they point to feasts held there, Smithsonian reports. "The site blows the lid off the Neolithic Revolution in a number of ways," says researcher David Jacques, who notes that it provides evidence of "people staying put, clearing land, building, and presumably worshiping, monuments." Experts had believed the stones were erected by European immigrants, notes Culture24, but in fact the area was a hub for people in the region, says Jacques. It "was a forerunner for what later went on at Stonehenge itself," he says. "The first monuments at Stonehenge were built by these people. For years, people have been asking why is Stonehenge where it is; now at last, we have found the answers." Giant pine posts were placed in the area long before Stonehenge was there, sometime before 6590 BC, reports the Guardian; the study offers a "missing link" between the posts and the stone monuments. (Click to read about Stonehenge's sonic secret.)


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The hearse carrying the casket of former President George H.W. Bush arrives at the Capitol, Monday, Dec. 3, 2018 in Washington. (Win McNamee/Pool via AP) (Associated Press)

 The hearse carrying the casket of former President George H.W. Bush arrives at the Capitol, Monday, Dec. 3, 2018 in Washington. (Win McNamee/Pool via AP) (Associated Press)

 WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on events related to late former President George H.W. Bush (all times local):

 8:35 p.m.

 President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump have paid their respects to former President George H.W. Bush at the U.S. Capitol.

 The nation's 41st president is lying in state at the Capitol Rotunda. The Trumps stood in front of the casket Monday evening with their eyes closed for a few moments.

 After Trump saluted the casket, the pair walked out.

 Trump skipped an earlier service at the Capitol, where Bush was eulogized by Vice President Mike Pence, among others.

 Trump plans to attend Bush's state funeral Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral.

 Trump has a fractured relationship with the Bush family, whom he has repeatedly criticized. But he has praised Bush since his passing as "just a high-quality man who truly loved his family" and a "terrific guy" who will be missed.

 ___

 8:30 p.m.

 President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump have arrived at the U.S. Capitol to pay their respects to former President George H.W. Bush.

 The body of the nation's 41st president is lying in state at the U.S. Capitol until Wednesday morning.

 Trump skipped an earlier service at the Capitol, where Bush was eulogized by Vice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Paul Ryan, among others.

 Trump plans to attend Bush's state funeral Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral.

 Trump is not expected to speak at the service and has a fractured relationship with the Bush family. But he has praised Bush since his passing as "just a high-quality man who truly loved his family" and a "terrific guy" who will be missed.

 Bush died Friday at his home in Houston. He was 94.

 ___

 8:15 p.m.

 Several hundred people have gathered in downtown Houston for a memorial to former President George H.W. Bush, a beloved figure in his adopted hometown.

 The ceremony Monday night took place in front of Houston's City Hall, bathed in lights of red, white, and blue.

 City organizers encouraged Houston residents to wear their boldest socks in a nod to Bush's well-known sartorial tradition.

 Michael Meaux (moh), who worked in the U.S. State Department for Bush's son, former President George W. Bush, wore a pair of hot-pink socks that he laughingly said he had owned for a long time but had never worn before.

 The Houston resident called Bush "the last gentleman president that we've had."

 ___

 5:50 p.m.

 Vice President Mike Pence has offered the nation's condolences to the family of the late former President George H.W. Bush.

 He also thanked Bush's family for sharing "this special man" with the country and the world.

 The vice president says Bush left America and the world "more peaceful, prosperous and secure."

 He spoke of first meeting Bush as a 29-year-old entering politics and of a letter his son, an enlisted Marine, received from Bush. Pence's son had just completed a landing on the USS George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier and Pence wrote to Bush. Bush sent a signed photograph and letter.

 Pence spoke at a ceremony in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, where Bush will lie in state through Wednesday.

 Bush died Friday at his home in Houston. He was 94.

 ___

 5:40 p.m.

 Vice President Mike Pence says former President George H.W. Bush's example will always inspire and his lifetime of public service will be enshrined in the hearts of the American people.

 Pence says Bush never failed to answer the call to serve his country.

 Pence is speaking in the Capitol Rotunda as lawmakers, Supreme Court justices and former members of his administration pay their respects to the nation's 41st president.

 Bush also served as vice president for two terms under President Ronald Reagan. Pence says Bush joked there was "nothing substantive to do at all" going into that job.

 But Pence says Bush set the standard as "a sound counselor and loyal adviser to an outsider who came to Washington, D.C., to shake things up, cut taxes, rebuild the military, and together they did just that."

 ___

 5:30 p.m.

 House Speaker Paul Ryan praised George H.W. Bush as a "great patriot," and the first president he had been able to cast a ballot for as a young man.

 Ryan said Monday, "Here lies a great man."

 The Wisconsin Republican was delivering remarks during a ceremony at the Capitol Rotunda where Bush will lie in state, an honor reserved for few. The former president died Friday.

 Ryan says Bush's character was "second to none."

 He says Bush lived his life with "a fundamental decency that resonates across generations."

 Ryan says Bush's presidential campaign in 1988 first drew him to politics. He said Bush showed other political leaders that "how we live is as important as what we achieve."

 ___

 5:20 p.m.

 Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is comparing the "steady hand" with which President George H.W. Bush kept his bomber under control when it was shot down during World War II with the way he guided the country.

 McConnell says Bush "kept us on course" as the Kentucky Republican delivered a eulogy for the late president at a ceremony in the Capitol Rotunda on Monday. Bush's flag-covered casket lay in state as McConnell spoke.

 Bush's aircraft was shot down in 1944 over the Pacific. He completed his bombing mission before bailing out.

 McConnell says Bush "kept us flying high and challenged us to fly higher still" as he steered the U.S. through the end of the Cold War and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait.

 ___

 4:40 p.m.

 The casket carrying the remains of George H.W. Bush has arrived at the U.S. Capitol for the nation to begin its formal farewell to the 41st president.

 His remains arrived Monday afternoon at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington aboard an aircraft that often serves as Air Force One. Former President George W. Bush, the eldest of the four Bush sons, and his wife, Laura, along with brother Neil Bush and his family, were aboard the plane for the trip from Houston.

 Following a short service Monday afternoon, the president's remains will lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda until Wednesday morning.

 Bush died Friday in Houston at age 94. An invitation-only funeral service is set for Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral. President Donald Trump is among the dignitaries who plan to attend.

 ___

 4:10 p.m.

 The body of former President George H.W. Bush is heading toward the U.S. Capitol following a brief ceremony at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington.

 Bush's flag-draped casket was unloaded from the presidential plane and brought to a hearse by an honor guard as a military band played "Hail to the Chief."

 Bush's son, former President George W. Bush, descended from the plane with his wife, Laura, and other family members. Others including Jeb Bush were already waiting on the tarmac.

 Bush will lie in state in the U.S. Capitol rotunda for a ceremony and public visitation from Monday through Wednesday. An invitation-only funeral service will follow at Washington National Cathedral before his casket returns to Houston for burial.

 ___

 3:25 p.m.

 A military aircraft carrying the remains of former President George H.W. Bush has arrived at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, as the nation's capital prepares to honor the 41st president.

 A formation of Navy sailors and Air Force personnel stood at attention as the plane touched down. The sailors assembled were from the USS George H. W. Bush, the Navy's newest aircraft carrier. A group of about 100 civilian dignitaries and well-wishers also were on hand.

 Bush will lie in state in the U.S. Capitol rotunda for a ceremony and public visitation from Monday through Wednesday. An invitation-only funeral service will follow at Washington National Cathedral before his casket returns to Houston for burial.

 President Donald Trump, who will attend the funeral service in Washington, has ordered the federal government closed Wednesday for a national day of mourning.

 ___

 12:10 p.m.

 A military aircraft carrying the remains of former President George H.W. Bush has taken off and is flying from Houston to Washington for official mourning ceremonies, including a state funeral.

 Pallbearers carried Bush's casket from a hearse across the tarmac to a presidential plane commonly known as Air Force One. For the task of transporting Bush's body on Monday, the plane has been renamed Special Air Mission 41, the number being a reference to Bush's place in the roster of America's presidents.

 A military band played "Hail to the Chief." An American flag and one with the presidential seal flew nearby.

 Bush's son former President George W. Bush and his wife, Laura Bush, were among those relatives and Bush friends who walked to the aircraft shortly after the body was loaded aboard.

 George H.W. Bush died Friday in Houston at age 94.

 ___

 11:45 a.m.

 George H.W. Bush's remains have made the journey from a Houston funeral home to Ellington Field, where a presidential aircraft will carry them to Washington for a state funeral.

 Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush, one of George H.W. Bush's grandsons, was among more than 100 invited guests seeing off Bush's remains on Monday. The guests are set to witness a ceremony including a military band and a 21-gun salute.

 Angela Savage one of the people who stood outside the funeral home to watch the passing of the hearse carrying Bush's casket as it headed to Ellington Field. She called it "a once-in-a-lifetime kind of event."

 Savage describes what she saw as "amazing and very respectful," adding, "I feel like that's what he deserves."

 Bush died Friday in Houston at age 94.

 ___

 11:25 a.m.

 More than 100 invited guests have gathered at Houston's Ellington Field for a ceremony to send off the casket of former President George H.W. Bush to Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.

 The guests stood next to the tarmac at Ellington Field on Monday and awaited the arrival of the hearse with Bush's casket.

 The guests and Bush family members are to attend a ceremony that will include a military band and a 21-gun salute.

 The guests stood near the U.S. military plane that's more commonly known as Air Force One. For the task of transporting Bush's body, the plane has been renamed Special Air Mission 41, the number being a reference to Bush's place in the roster of America's presidents.

 Bush died Friday in Houston at age 94. An invitation-only funeral service is set for Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral.

 ___

 10:45 a.m.

 A hearse carrying the casket of former President George H.W. Bush has left a Houston funeral home.

 The casket was draped in an American flag and was carried by six pallbearers on Monday morning. It was placed into a hearse headed to Houston's Ellington Field, where a presidential aircraft waited to carry Bush's body to Washington for a state funeral.

 The hearse was part of a motorcade escorted by Houston police officers on motorcycles.

 Bush died Friday in Houston at age 94.

 ___

 10:35 a.m.

 A spokeswoman confirms former President Jimmy Carter plans to attend the state funeral for former President George H.W. Bush.

 Rosalynn Carter will not attend. The 91-year-old former first lady has limited her travels in recent months.

 With Bush's death, Jimmy Carter becomes the oldest living former president, at age 94. Both men were born in 1924, Bush on June 12, Carter on Oct. 1.

 Bush served as CIA director when Carter first ran for president 1976. Carter replaced Bush with Stansfield Turner.

 Four years later, Bush joined the Ronald Reagan Republican ticket that routed Carter in the 1980 presidential election.

 Bush died Friday in Houston at age 94. An invitation-only funeral service is set for Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral.

 ___

 10:20 a.m.

 Secret Service personnel who had been assigned to protecting George H.W. Bush are serving as honorary pallbearers as his remains begin making their way from Houston to a state funeral in Washington.

 The former president's spokesman, Jim McGrath, tweeted Monday that for "this first movement in Houston" members of "the current @SecretService Bush Protective Division will serve as honorary pallbearers."

 Bush died at his Houston home on Friday at age 94. His remains are scheduled to arrive at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on Monday afternoon and later will begin lying in state at the U.S. Capitol.

 On Wednesday morning, a motorcade will take the remains to a state funeral at the National Cathedral.

 ___

 9:20 a.m.

 Houston is honoring George H.W. Bush with a City Hall tribute and urging people who attend to dress in colorful socks, a nod to one of the former president's favorite fashion accessories.

 Mayor Sylvester Turner is hosting Monday evening's event featuring music and community leaders in front of City Hall. Turner tweeted that those in attendance should "wear their own colorful socks."

 Bush often sported bright socks, sometimes with loud, unusual patterns. He died Friday at his Houston home at age 94, and his body is heading to Washington for a state funeral.

 Spokesman Jim McGrath tweeted Monday that Bush "will be carried to his final rest" wearing gray socks saluting the Armed Forces and paying "tribute to his lifetime of service," starting as an 18-year-old "naval aviator in war."

 ___

 1:35 a.m.

 George H.W. Bush is set to embark on his final tour of Washington as a nation prepares to bid farewell to its 41st president.

 His remains will arrive in Washington on Monday, and he will lie in state at the Capitol through Wednesday. An invitation-only funeral service is set for Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral, to be attended by President Donald Trump and other dignitaries.

 Bush will then be returned to Houston for burial Thursday at his presidential library at Texas A&M University.

 He will be laid to rest alongside Barbara Bush, his wife of 73 years who died in April, and Robin Bush, the daughter who died of leukemia at age 3.

 Bush was president from 1989 to 1993. He died Friday in Houston at age 94. ||||| Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption President Trump visits George HW Bush's coffin lying in state at the US Capitol

 US President Donald Trump and his wife Melania have paid their respects to President George HW Bush as he lies in state at the US Capitol.

 Mr Trump made a brief visit to the rotunda, where the public can visit the coffin until the funeral on Wednesday.

 Mr Trump has in the past clashed with the Bush family but will attend the funeral service.

 Mr Bush, who died on Friday aged 94, will later be buried in his home state of Texas, alongside his wife, Barbara.

 His coffin had earlier left Texas to a 21-gun salute and was carried to Washington on board Air Force One - temporarily renamed Special Air Mission 41 in homage to the late president.

 Mr Bush, who served as the 41st US president between 1989 and 1993, had been receiving treatment for a form of Parkinson's disease and had been admitted to hospital with a blood infection in April.

 An extended salute

 BBC North America reporter Anthony Zurcher, Capitol Hill

 Three hours after an assemblage of officials, dignitaries, family and friends welcomed the coffin of President George HW Bush to the US Capitol, the current president and first lady made a mid-evening visit to pay their respects.

 The motorcade took only a few minutes to travel down Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House. At 20:30 (01:30 GMT on Tuesday) Donald and Melania Trump arrived inside what was now a relatively empty Capitol rotunda. Members of the five branches of the US military continued to stand to attention, as the two approached the flag-draped coffin.

 The president gave an extended salute and the first lady put her hand over her heart. The only sound in the massive, marbled room - where 32 people, including 12 presidents, have lain in state - was the steady whirr of press cameras.

 Mr and Mrs Trump then turned and left. In all, the president was away from the White House less than half an hour, without a word to the public or press.

 The president tweeted that he was "looking forward" to seeing the "wonderful Bush family" at a presidential guest house on Tuesday.

 He added that Mrs Trump would be giving former First Lady Laura Bush a tour of the White House Christmas decorations.

 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Sully visits George HW Bush's coffin at US Capitol

 The public will be able to pay respects at the rotunda until Wednesday's invitation-only funeral service at the National Cathedral.

 Prince Charles will be attending the funeral, representing the Queen, Clarence House announced on Tuesday.

 Mr Trump will attend with Melania but will not deliver a speech.

 According to Mark Updegrove's book The Last Republicans, which came out last year, Mr Bush voted for Mr Trump's opponent Hillary Clinton in the election and had called Mr Trump a "blowhard".

 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption George W Bush struggled to hold back his emotions as his father's coffin passed him by

 His son, former President George W Bush, worried he would be the "last Republican president", despite Mr Trump running on the party's ticket, the book said.

 A service was held in the rotunda after Mr Bush's coffin arrived on Monday afternoon, with members of the military serving as pallbearers. George Bush Jr was in attendance and was clearly moved by the events.

 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption George HW Bush's body is taken to Washington on board Air Force One

 In a eulogy, House Speaker Paul Ryan said: "Here lies a great man", adding that "no-one better harmonised the joy of life and the duty of life".

 Mr Ryan said Mr Bush was a "great leader and a good man, a gentle soul of firm resolve".

 Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell said: "Through the Cold War and the Soviet Union's collapse, he kept us on course. When the rule of law needed defending in the Persian Gulf, he kept us on course."

 Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption A look back at the life of George Bush Senior

 Vice-President Mike Pence said there was a "kindness about the man that was evident to everyone who met him".

 George HW Bush was a decorated fighter pilot in World War Two, a head of the CIA and vice-president to Ronald Reagan before being elected president in 1988.

 Also making the final journey with President Bush was his loyal labrador service dog, Sully.

 Mr Bush's spokesman, Jim McGrath, tweeted a picture of Sully with the coffin, with the caption: "Mission complete." |||||

– President Trump paid his respects Monday after George HW Bush arrived at the Capitol for the final time. The 45th president—who skipped an earlier service—visited the 41st president as he was lying in state, the AP reports. The president, who traveled down Pennsylvania Avenue in a motorcade, saluted the flag-draped coffin and Melania Trump put her hand over her heart. They turned and left after the brief visit. "In all, the president was away from the White House less than half an hour, without a word to the public or press," says Anthony Zurcher at the BBC. The former president died Friday at age 94. Trump is expected at his state funeral Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral. (Bush will be buried in a very fitting pair of socks.)


– Yellowstone National Park usually sees about one bear attack a year, though until this week there hadn't been one since 2015. That changed Thursday, after a 10-year-old was charged at by one, though thanks to his parents' quick thinking and a canister of bear spray, it appears he'll be OK. That's per a press release from the park, which details how a family of four was walking along a trail southeast of Old Faithful Thursday morning when a bear emerged from the vegetation and barreled after the boy as he started to run away. The bear caught up and knocked the boy down, at which point his parents "deployed bear spray about 5 feet from the bear's face." The bear then "shook its head" and retreated. The boy was taken to a local clinic, then to Montana's Big Sky Medical Center, where he was treated for wounds to his buttocks, a hurt wrist, and puncture wounds on his back. Park officials say they're trying to figure out what type of bear attacked him, with Fox News noting both black bears and grizzlies live in the park. The Casper Star-Tribune reports there have been a handful of other animal attacks at Yellowstone this year, including by bison and cow elk. (A man caught on video taunting a bison at Yellowstone just got jail time.)

Expand this summary.

August 24, 2018 Morgan Warthin , 307-344-2015

 MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS, WY – Raymond Reinke, 55, from Pendleton, Oregon, appeared Thursday, August 23, 2018, before U.S. Magistrate Judge Mark Carman at the Yellowstone Justice Center in Mammoth Hot Springs, Wyoming.

 Reinke, scheduled for a trial, entered a change of plea on August 23. He pleaded guilty to four charges in Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks. The charge of under the influence of alcohol on July 28 in Grand Teton and a disorderly conduct charge on July 31 in Yellowstone were dismissed.

 U.S. Magistrate Judge Carmen accepted the terms of the plea agreement for the Class B misdemeanors. Sentencing included:

 130 days of incarceration

 $70 in court fees and assessments, with no additional fines incurred

 5 years of unsupervised probation

 Alcohol and bar ban

 Substance abuse evaluation and successful treatment if required by the evaluation

 Alcohol testing upon reasonable suspicion

 Submit to searching for alcohol and/or controlled substances upon reasonable suspicion

 Additionally, the U.S. Magistrate added as a condition of Reinke’s probation a five-year ban from entering Yellowstone National Park, Grand Teton National Park, and Glacier National Park, where the incidents and subsequent warrant arrest occurred on August 2.

 “The judge’s decision today reinforces the park’s commitment toward protecting wildlife and other natural resources as well as our visiting public,” said Yellowstone National Park Deputy Superintendent Pat Kenney. “We encourage everyone to commit to stewardship of our public lands while enjoying our national parks and respecting the experiences of others.”

 On August 8, Reinke pleaded not guilty to charges in Yellowstone National Park that included disturbing wildlife, disorderly conduct, and carrying an open container of alcohol in a vehicle. Additionally, charges in Grand Teton National Park included being under the influence of alcohol to a degree that endangers self or other, interfering with agency functions/resisting arrest, and disturbing the peace, which resulted in an arrest and ultimately a revocation of bond conditions.

 Visit PACER, Public Access to Court Electronic Records, for court-related documents. ||||| A bear charged and injured a 10-year-old boy in Yellowstone National Park on Thursday, before his parents were able to get a hold of their bear spray, park officials said.

 The unidentified boy was transferred to a Montana hospital after suffering puncture wounds to his back, wounds around his buttocks and an injured wrist, the National Park Service said in a statement.

 The Washington state family was hiking up the Divide Trail, southeast of Old Faithful, when a bear appeared from the brush and charged the family, park officials said. The bear chased the boy, who had run from the approaching animal, and knocked him to the ground.

 The boy’s parents used bear spray about five feet from the animal’s face, driving it off. The family walked back to the trailhead and drove to the Old Faithful Ranger Station. Rangers sent them to a nearby clinic before the boy was transferred to Big Sky Medical Center.

 It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the bear to charge or what species it was. Both grizzly and black bears call Yellowstone home.

 Park officials said that visitors should not run if they encounter a bear and should stand their ground if the animal charges.

 The last reported bear attack in Yellowstone was in 2015, according to the National Park Service. The park averages one bear attack per year.

 Several park visitors had been injured in animal encounters earlier this year.

 A bison gored a woman in June following two separate elk attacks that injured two women. In May, another woman was rammed and injured by a bison.

 The Associated Press contributed to this report. ||||| A man pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to four charges of misconduct in national parks, including a now-infamous incident of aggressively provoking a bison.

 Raymond Reinke, 55, was arrested in early August after video surfaced of the incident where he waves his arms and runs toward a bison.

 The National Park Service says the Oregon man had several run-ins with law enforcement in Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks in the weeks leading up to his arrest, including open container and public intoxication. He was also cited for disturbing wildlife after the bison video surfaced online in late July.

 Reinke initially pleaded not guilty to the charges, but changed his plea during Thursday's hearing to guilty. He was originally charged with five misdemeanors, but had his charges reduced to four in exchange for his guilty plea.

 Judge Mark Carman sentenced Reinke to 60 days in jail on the charge of harassing wildlife for the bison incident, plus 60 days for interfering with law enforcement and 10 days for disorderly conduct, for 130 days total in jail, with credit for 21 days served.

 Reinke has also publicly described himself as an alcoholic.

 In court Thursday, Reinke apologized to the bison, saying - "I'm sorry to the buffalo. He didn't deserve what I did to him. I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to hurt that buffalo."

 Judge Carman said, "You chased and hounded the bison. You're lucky the bison didn't take care of it, and you're standing in front of me."

 Reinke has a criminal history dating to 1991, although no felony offenses.

 A federal prosecutor and Carman described Reinke's behavior as the most "egregious" case of animal harassment they'd seen in Yellowstone.

 Judge Carman also emphasized that the viral video of Reinke's actions did not affect the sentencing decisions.

 Reinke will also be required to serve five years of unsupervised probation, in which he cannot use drugs or alcohol. He's required to go through drug and alcohol treatment. He is also barred from Yellowstone, Glacier and Grand Teton parks during his probationary period.

 -reporting by Jackie Coffin |||||


Write an article based on this summary:

– The families of Perry Cohen and Austin Stephanos are living a nightmare—the 14-year-old boys are missing at sea and their capsized boat was found on Sunday—but they believe the teens have the skills to survive. As the search off the coast of Florida continues, family members say the boys may have crafted a flotation device using items including life jackets, an engine cover, and a cooler that were missing from their single-engine fishing boat, USA Today reports. Relatives and neighbors say the boys, like others in their Palm Beach County neighborhood, are experienced sailors and have been around boats their entire lives, reports the Palm Beach Post. A Coast Guard spokesman says the search is continuing "aggressively" and the water is warm enough that the teens, who were last seen on Friday, could survive for four or five days, the Post reports. Because of currents, search efforts are focusing on the area north of where the boat was found near Daytona Beach, though they could be hard to spot, the spokesman says. "When a person is in the water, you're basically looking for the chest up, so it's a relatively small object you're looking for," he says. "It's a challenging environment." The families have urged people from Palm Beach to the coast of Georgia to look for clues that might have washed up, especially the Yamaha engine cover and YETI cooler, NBC News reports.

Skip Ad Ad Loading... x Embed x Share Video: Roffs in West Melbourne is using technology to help with search for missing teen boaters. Video by Tim Shortt. Posted 7/27/15.

 Austin Stephanos, left, 14, and Perry Cohen, 14, were reported missing on Friday. (Photo: AP)

 WEST MELBOURNE, Fla. — If Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen are floating at sea awaiting rescue, as their families and rescuers hope, subtle current-speed changes surrounding the Gulf Stream could drastically alter their drift course — making search efforts more difficult.

 “Even if it’s only a quarter of a mile-per-hour difference, well, a quarter of a mile-per-hour in 10 hours starts adding up. You get to be 2 to 3 miles apart, and then you start getting 15 to 20 miles apart. Then you’re 30,” said Mitch Roffer, founder and president of Roffer’s Ocean Fishing Forecasting Service.

 “Then if one of those possible trajectories goes into the core of the Gulf Stream, now you’re moving twice as fast,” Roffer said.

 “They could be anywhere from 60 to 180 miles away from where they started, just as a function of where they were in the Gulf Stream. That’s a huge difference, between 60 and 180 miles. So you’re talking about a 120-mile variance in your estimate of where they might be,” he said.

 ROFFS is a West Melbourne oceanographic consulting company that analyzes currents and pinpoints “convergence zones” along Gulf Stream boundaries where fish are likely to congregate. Roffer’s primary customers are recreational and commercial fishermen.

 Mitch Roffer, Ph.D., is founder and president of Roffer’s Ocean Fishing Forecasting Service in West Melbourne, They specialize in fisheries oceanography, environmental monitoring, and operational support. Roffer is analyzing satellite maps as parta of the search for the missing teen boaters, Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen. (Photo: TIM SHORTT/FLORIDA TODAY)

 He said a friend of the boys’ families asked him to help with the search effort, so he analyzed satellite imagery Monday and posted color-coded maps on Facebook and Twitter for use by volunteer rescuers.

 Monday morning, Stephanos’ family stated on social media that they believe the boys may have crafted makeshift flotation devices using a white boat engine cover, life jackets and a white cooler.

 Assuming the boys ditched their boat on the western side of the Gulf Stream, Roffer predicted they may have floated today to a region from Cape Canaveral northward, extending about 30 miles seaward. He said volunteer pilots flew missions from Melbourne and New Smyrna Beach using his information.

 Ted Lund is a Florida Today outdoors writer and Cocoa Beach licensed boat captain. He said the boys’ disappearance demonstrates the power of the sea.

 “It’s just another illustration that the ocean isn’t inherently dangerous — it’s incredibly unforgiving. And it doesn’t care if you’re a captain of industry or a Cuban refugee. The ocean is just indifferent,” Lund said of the incident.

 “And you can find yourself in trouble very quickly,” he said.

 Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1Sa051L ||||| The families of two teenage boys who went missing while fishing off the coast of Florida pleaded for help Monday, asking people to scour the shores for debris or any clues that might lead to their sons.

 The 19-foot white single-engine boat that Austin Stephanos and Perry Cohen, both 14, took out off the coast of Jupiter late last week was found Sunday, roughly 67 miles off the shore of Daytona Beach. There was no sign of the teens in the boat, according to the Coast Guard.

 "We want everybody, once again, from Palm Beach all the way up the coast of Georgia ... to get on down there and look for anything off," Nick Korniloff, Perry's stepfather, said Monday. ||||| Just One More Thing...

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Loving your local Uber driver? That scrappy entrepreneur who’s turned his car into a home office? Well you can kiss him goodbye: The robo-cabs are coming!

 Uber prides itself on being disruptive to the taxi industry by providing personal transport service without all those pesky regulations. Now it’s disrupting itself: On Monday, the company announced a partnership with Carnegie Mellon University to build a robotics research lab in Pittsburgh. TechCrunch reports that the goal is to create a fleet of driverless, robot cabs. It’s further proof that Uber cares so much about its drivers.

 As it turns out, the move may be a response to a warning from a Google exec who sits on Uber’s board: Google is creating its own ride-hailing app, and the cabs could be self-driving.

 Until now, Google has been Uber’s tech-industry BFF, investing $258 million in the ride-hailing app, sharing Google Maps, and lending a C-suiter to Uber’s board of directors. Now it seems those buddy-buddy days are over.

 If Google really does come out with a competitor app, it could autonomously drive Uber into oblivion. Finding new sources of capital shouldn’t be too difficult in Silicon Valley, but there’s no good substitute for Google Maps — MapQuest and Apple Maps are crap. And playing catch-up on self-driving vehicle tech won’t be easy for Uber, either; Google’s driverless cars have already logged over 700,000 accident-free miles on public roads.

 The big G also has a head-start toward building a taxi app network, thanks to Uber drivers and riders, who have generated server farms full of data on urban transportation patterns through Google Maps.

 Google may have simply gotten fed up that the unregulated cab service has been breaking the “don’t be evil” rule by pressuring drivers into sub-prime auto loans and showing little remorse for the disgusting actions of some slimeball drivers.

 At least folks will finally stop calling these apps “ride-sharing” once empty Google-mobiles are patrolling the neighborhood. It’s tough to call it sharing if you’re the only person in the car. ||||| Posted by Craig

 Uber and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) are announcing today a strategic partnership that includes the creation of the Uber Advanced Technologies Center in Pittsburgh, near the CMU campus. The center will focus on the development of key long-term technologies that advance Uber’s mission of bringing safe, reliable transportation to everyone, everywhere.

 “We are excited to join the community of Pittsburgh and partner with the experts at CMU, whose breadth and depth of technical expertise, particularly in robotics, are unmatched. As a global leader in urban transportation, we have the unique opportunity to invest in leading edge technologies to enable the safe and efficient movement of people and things at giant scale. This collaboration and the creation of the Uber Advanced Technologies Center represent an important investment in building for the long term of Uber.”

 The partnership will provide a forum for Uber technology leaders to work closely with CMU faculty, staff, and students — both on campus and at the National Robotics Engineering Center (NREC) — to do research and development, primarily in the areas of mapping and vehicle safety and autonomy technology.

 —Jeff Holden, Uber Chief Product Officer

 The agreement will also include funding from Uber for faculty chairs and graduate fellowships, recognizing and supporting Carnegie Mellon’s world-renowned faculty and attracting the best and brightest graduate students.

 “Uber is a rapidly growing company known for its innovative technology that is radically improving access to transportation for millions of global citizens. CMU is renowned for innovations that transform lives. We look forward to partnering with Uber as they build out the Advanced Technologies Center and to working together on real-world applications, which offer very interesting new challenges at the intersections of technology, mobility, and human interactions.”

 —Andrew Moore, Dean of the School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University

 The Center will aid in local job creation and further the well-deserved reputation of the Steel City for its growing innovation sector. Uber and CMU will hold an event in Pittsburgh to formally kick off the partnership in the coming weeks.

 “I am pleased to welcome Uber to the growing list of leading technology companies that are coming to Pittsburgh to help invent the future. This is yet another case where collaboration between the city and its universities is creating opportunities for job growth and community development.”

 —Mayor William Peduto, City of Pittsburgh ||||| Driver-on-demand service Uber is building a robotics research lab in Pittsburgh, PA to “kickstart autonomous taxi fleet development,” sources close to the decision have confirmed to TechCrunch. They say the company has hired talent from Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute, including lead engineering and commercialization experts.

 No one at Carnegie Mellon or Uber agreed to discuss the deal on the record but an announcement should be forthcoming. Update: Uber published a blog post today outlining its partnership with Carnegie Mellon University, confirming our reporting.

 Sources tell us Uber is hiring more than fifty senior scientists from Carnegie Mellon as well as from the National Robotics Engineering Center, a CMU-affiliated research entity. Carnegie Mellon, home of the Mars Rover and other high-profile robotics projects, declined to comment at this time, as did scientists mentioned by our source. Uber has “cleaned out” the Robotics Institute, said the source.

 The source also noted that most of these technologies came through a “massive” military spending push over the past decade and should net the university millions in IP licensing fees.

 Uber will be developing the core technology, the vehicles, and associated infrastructure at this Pittsburgh facility, according to sources. They have already hired a number of employees and made moves to outfit them with software, including a multi-hundred-thousand dollar investment in third-party engineering workstations.

 In the past, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has said he would replace human drivers with self-driving cars. The decision to run the facility in Pittsburgh makes perfect sense, given the proximity to CMU and the potential secrecy afforded by moving research out of Silicon Valley.

 In a related story, Bloomberg Business is reporting that Google is looking into creating an on-demand car service of its own, which is very interesting considering Uber’s interest in automated vehicles. It also raises questions about Google’s David Drummond maintaining a spot on Uber’s board. Google has integrated Uber into its Google Maps products and has taken an investment in Uber via its Google Ventures arm.

 No specific plans for a roll-out date or goals for Uber’s automated driving efforts were mentioned. The company recently raised $4 billion in equity and debt including $1.6 billion in convertible debt earlier this month. This follows a $1.4 billion Series D funding round over the summer as well as another $1.2 round in December. The company is now valued at $41 billion.

 Updated to add reports of Google competing with Uber. ||||| SHARE THIS ARTICLE Share Tweet Post Email

 Photographer: Evelyn Hockstein/For The Washington Post via Getty Images Photographer: Evelyn Hockstein/For The Washington Post via Getty Images

 Uber faces an ever-growing cast of adversaries that includes dubious regulators, litigious drivers, hostile members of the press, and some well-funded rivals. But the most significant threat to the app-based transportation company may be much closer to home: one of its biggest investors, Google.

 Google Ventures, the search giant's venture capital arm, invested $258 million in Uber in August 2013. It was Google Ventures' largest investment deal ever, and the company put more money into Uber's next funding round less than a year later. Back then, it was easy for observers to imagine Google teaming closely with Uber, or even one day acquiring it. David Drummond, Google’s chief legal officer and senior vice president of corporate development, joined the Uber board of directors in 2013 and has served on it ever since.

 Now there are signs that the companies are more likely to be ferocious competitors than allies. Google is preparing to offer its own ride-hailing service, most likely in conjunction with its long-in-development driverless car project. Drummond has informed Uber's board of this possibility, according to a person close to the Uber board, and Uber executives have seen screenshots of what appears to be a Google ride-sharing app that is currently being used by Google employees. This person, who requested not to be named because the talks are private, said the Uber board is now weighing whether to ask Drummond to resign his position as an Uber board member.

 Uber is also teaming up with Carnegie Mellon University for a research facility in Pittsburgh, Pa., to develop its own autonomous vehicle technology, the company announced on Monday. (The news was reported earlier by TechCrunch.)

 Google has made no secret of its ambitions to revolutionize transportation with autonomous vehicles. Chief Executive Officer Larry Page is said to be personally fascinated by the challenge of making cities operate more efficiently. The company recently said the driverless car technology in development within its Google X research lab is from two to five years from being ready for widespread use. At the Detroit auto show last month, Chris Urmson, the Google executive in charge of the project, articulated one possible scenario in which autonomous vehicles are patrolling neighborhoods to pick up and drop off passengers. “We're thinking a lot about how in the long-term, this might become useful in people's lives, and there are a lot of ways we can imagine this going,” Urmson said in a conference call with reporters on Jan. 14. “One is in the direction of the shared vehicle. The technology would be such that you can call up the vehicle and tell it where to go and then have it take you there.”

 Those comments, according to the person familiar with deliberations of the Uber's board, have left executives at Uber deeply concerned—for good reason. Google is a deep-pocketed, technically sophisticated competitor, and Uber’s dependence on the search giant goes far beyond capital. Uber’s smartphone applications for drivers and riders are based on Google Maps, which gives Google a fire hose of data about transportation patterns within cities. Uber would be crippled if it lost access to the industry-leading mapping application, and alternatives— such as AOL's MapQuest, Apple Maps, and a host of regional players—are widely seen as inferior.

 Google’s entrance into the ride-sharing market would also leave Uber without a partner in the suddenly plausible future in which cars without steering wheels roam the streets. Uber will either have to develop the technology itself or form an alliance with a company that can if it wants to offer autonomous vehicles within its fleet. Mercedes, Audi, Tesla, and other carmakers have said they are developing driverless cars, though it's not clear that any is as advanced as Google's.

 An Uber spokesperson declined to offer a comment for this article. A Google spokesperson also declined to comment, although the company issued a cryptic tweet.

 @business We think you'll find Uber and Lyft work quite well. We use them all the time. — Google (@google) February 2, 2015

 Travis Kalanick, Uber’s CEO, has publicly discussed what he sees as the inevitability of autonomous taxis, saying they could offer cheaper rides and a true alternative to vehicle ownership. “The Uber experience is expensive because it’s not just the car but the other dude in the car,” he said at a technology conference in 2014, referring to the expense of paying human drivers. “When there’s no other dude in the car, the cost [of taking an Uber] gets cheaper than owning a vehicle.”

 There's already an additional sign of a rift between the companies. Last week Google announced it would start presenting data from third party applications inside Google Now, a service that displays useful information prominently on the screen of Android smartphones. Google said it had struck deals to draw data from such apps as Pandora, AirBnb, Zillow, and the ride-sharing service Lyft. The company most obviously missing from that list? Google’s old and possibly former friend, Uber.

 (Updates with Uber's Carnegie Mellon announcement in fourth paragraph.) |||||

Write a summary.

– Uber looks like it's trying to get in on the self-driving cars business, officially announcing this week that it's partnering with Carnegie Mellon University (home to the Mars Rover) to build the Uber Advanced Technologies Center in Pittsburgh—in other words, "kickstart autonomous taxi fleet development," inside sources tell TechCrunch. And while Uber wouldn't say as much, sources allege that the company is hiring more than 50 senior scientists from the university, as well as an affiliated robotics research center; Uber does say the partnership will focus on "mapping and vehicle safety and autonomy technology." It's not the first time Uber CEO Travis Kalanick has talked about turning real drivers into robotic ones. Meanwhile Google, which Grist reports has thus far played nice with Uber by sharing Google Maps and investing $258 million in its app, might be ending that streak. Google appears to be creating its own ride-hailing app, reports Bloomberg Business, and is already well ahead of Uber when it comes to autonomous vehicles. Curiously, David Drummond, Google's chief legal officer, is so far still maintaining a spot on Uber’s board, even though the two companies appear to be on the verge of becoming competitors. (Uber's legal troubles continue to mount around the world.)


Article:
It is not nice to be judged, bullied, or to be "made an example of" @lohanbeachclub just live in GRATITUDE and be happy, otherwise #DOTHELILO ||||| TMZ Sports

 PGA legend John Daly says when it comes to golfing, President Barack Obama is "pretty good" but he doesn't hold a candle to the all-time GOAT presidential links master ... George H.W.… |||||Summary:

– OK, sure, reports of a failed drug test or two are true, Lindsay Lohan tweeted last night, but she's taking responsibility and is "prepared to face the consequences." Those consequences might be pretty grave, notes TMZ: Not only is there a chance of a repeat performance in jail, but Lohan's judge is likely to yank her travel privileges, meaning she won't be able to shoot SNL or movie project Inferno. While acknowledging "this was certainly a setback for me," Lohan thanked fans for understanding she's "a work in progress, just as anyone else." For more LiLo than you can possibly stomach, click here.


Article:

Boston’s New England Holocaust Memorial was targeted by a rock-throwing vandal for the second time in two months last night, when a teen shattered a glass panel etched with the numbers that Nazis tattooed on concentration camp victims, police said.

 Police were called about 6:40 p.m. to the downtown landmark and said witnesses helped them identify a 17-year-old suspect.

 The suspect’s name was not released because he is a juvenile. He is due to be arraigned today in Boston Municipal Court. Police were investigating the motive. ||||| The New England Holocaust Memorial in Boston was vandalized on Monday.

 For the second time this summer, the New England Holocaust Memorial in Boston was vandalized when a 17-year-old allegedly threw a rock Monday evening through one of the glass panels, shattering it.

 The male teenager, who is from Malden, was quickly tackled by two bystanders and held until police arrived. He is charged with willful destruction of property, and police are investigating whether the incident was a hate crime.

 The vandalism, which happened just before 7 p.m., came just two days after a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va. turned violent, and less than two months after a 21-year-old with a history of mental illness shattered a glass panel at the Boston memorial.

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 The glass towers of the memorial, which was installed in 1995, had never been vandalized before the June incident.

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 “It’s a reminder that we as a community need to be united, both in our opposition to all forms of hate but also in the important role that memorials play in our community,” said Robert Trestan, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League.

 Trestan said it was important to let the investigation unfold before jumping to conclusions, but said the destruction was jarring, no matter what the suspect’s motive was.

 “It’s a second blow to the community, and it comes at a time when most of Boston is standing in solidarity [against] the hatred that we saw in Charlottesville over the weekend,” he said.

 On Twitter, Mayor Martin J. Walsh of Boston wrote: “Today and every day Boston stands up against hate. I’m saddened to see such a despicable action in this great city.”

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 In a statement, Boston Police Commissioner William Evans said “Clearly, this type of behavior will not be tolerated in our city. And, in light of the recent events and unrest in Charlottesville, it’s sad to see a young person choose to engage in such senseless and shameful behavior.”

 At the memorial, police tape cordoned off two of the glass towers, and public works crews scooped up the glass with shovels.

 Jeremy Burton, the executive director of the Jewish Community Relations Council, noted that the memorial in Boston stood for two decades before it was vandalized.

 “It’s shocking and it’s particularly shocking for us in the Jewish community, coming as it does in a week in which so many of us spent our weekend watching Nazis marching in Virginia.”

 Keith Bedford/Globe Staff Investigators looked at glass sitting on the ground after it was vandalized.

 Burton said the panels on the memorial are made from a “very resilient” glass.

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 “I can only say from what I know of the June attack, it takes a very, very conscious effort to break this glass,” he said.

 Austin Giles was passing through the memorial and reading the panels, which bear numbers representing victims of the Holocaust, when he heard glass shatter on the opposite end. He saw police take the suspect into custody.

 “I was just walking through and observing,” said Giles, who lives in Marshfield. “My first instinct was, what the hell? Did a rock hit it or something? I couldn’t fathom somebody would possibly do this.”

 Scott Strauss and his family, who are visiting from Miami, said his grandparents on both sides of his family were Auschwitz survivors, and he wanted to show the memorial to his children.

 Walking past the scene, Strauss explained to his 6-year-old that the memorial was for “grandpa.”

 “It’s just awful,” he said.

 “This right here doesn’t represent the city of Boston,” Strauss said. “It represents hate and evil.”

 Natalia Pfeifer, 23, of New Jersey, said she was across the street with a friend in front of the Boston Public Market when she heard a “big shattering sound.”

 When they went to cross the street, Pfeifer said, she and her friend saw a man with a hooded jacket standing right where the glass was.

 According to Pfeifer, the man put up his hood and ran through the memorial and across the street before he was tackled.

 Danielle Souza, 27, of Everett, said the timing of the vandalism was distressing.

 “Especially with everything going on right now, it breaks my heart,” Souza said.

 The memorial reopened around 9 p.m. A family with young children was the first to walk through.

 “It’s for the Holocaust,” the adults explained.

 Police said that at least one officer would be posted at the memorial throughout the night.

 Keith Bedford/Globe Staff Employees cleaned up the shattered glass at the memorial.

 Emily Sweeney and Mark Arsenault of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Aimee Ortiz can be reached at aimee.ortiz@globe.com . Follow her on twitter @aimee_ortiz . Adam Vaccaro can be reached at adam.vaccaro@globe.com . Follow him on Twitter @adamtvaccaro . Reena Karasin can be reached at reena.karasin@globe.com . Follow her on Twitter @reenakarasin |||||
What is a summary?

– A holocaust museum in Boston was vandalized for the second time this summer, and this time bystanders tackled the alleged vandal. Boston police say a 17-year-old shattered a glass panel of the New England Holocaust Memorial with a rock, reports the Boston Herald. The panel contained etchings of the numbers that Nazis tattooed on their Jewish prisoners. Witnesses tackled the teen, who's not being identified because he's a juvenile, and held him until officers arrived, reports the Boston Globe. He's been charged with willful destruction of property, and police are investigating his motive to see whether hate crime charges are warranted in the Monday evening incident. "It's incredibly disturbing ... coming as it does two days after Holocaust survivors had to witness people marching through the streets of Charlottesville, Va., chanting Nazi slogans," says Jeremy Burton of the Jewish Community Relations Council, which manages the site, per the Herald. Boston's police chief also drew a comparison to Charlottesville and said it's "sad to see a young person choose to engage in such senseless and shameful behavior." In June, a 21-year-old was charged with breaking one of the memorial's 132 panels, also with a rock. Prior to that incident, the memorial's panels had stood undisturbed for more than two decades.


Write an article based on this summary:

– Elon Musk's dream of building a hyperloop that can move people between Washington, DC, and New York City in 29 minutes may be a small step closer to becoming a distant reality. A Nov. 29 permit issued by DC's Department of Transportation allows Musk's Boring Company to dig at an abandoned lot beside a McDonald's in northeast Washington that the company says might eventually become a station on a hyperloop connecting NYC, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington. The system would speed up travel times, using electricity and electromagnetic levitation to send people and cars whipping through tunnels in pods. But before you ditch your car, the Washington Post points out the permit is only for "some preparatory and excavation work" at the site, and more permits are needed before any real construction begins. DC Mayor Muriel Bowser has visited a test tunnel Musk is constructing under Los Angeles. But though "we're open to the concept of moving people around the region more efficiently ... we're just beginning, in the mayor's office, our conversation to get an understanding of what the general vision is for Hyperloop," says Bowser's chief of staff, John Falcicchio. Still, the permit "is comparable to an athlete stretching before a race" and shows Musk is serious about moving forward with his plans for high-speed travel since claiming "verbal" government support for an East Coast hyperloop last July, reports TechCrunch. He's also received a conditional permit to build a tunnel beneath Maryland Route 295 in Hawthorne, per the Post, with Maryland officials saying a leg linking Washington and Baltimore will come first. (Read about the hyperloop pod's first test.)

Vacant lot at 53 New York Avenue NE in Washington, where a government permit has been granted for work connected with Elon Musk’s Hyperloop project. (Michael Laris/TWP)

 It’s not much now, just a parking lot with a discarded gin bottle and an old exterminator receipt.

 But the slice of pavement near the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in the District could be the gritty precursor to a tunnel network that could propel pods filled with people and speeding platforms topped with Teslas and Toyotas between the nation’s capital and New York in 29 minutes.

 Or it could be just be a parking lot littered with dashed transportation dreams.

 Electric-car pioneer and space entrepreneur Elon Musk has been touting his vision for a high-speed transportation system since his tweeted announcement last summer that he had received “verbal govt approval” for his tunnel-digging firm, the Boring Company, to build a “NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop.”

 The Boring Company team has received an early, and vague, building permit from the D.C. government that will allow some preparatory and excavation work at the fenced-off parking lot at 53 New York Avenue NE beside a McDonald’s and amid the construction cranes of Washington’s booming NoMa neighborhood.

 Asked about the permit, issued Nov. 29, a Boring Company spokesman said Friday that “a New York Avenue location, if constructed, could become a station” in a broad network of such stops across the new system.

 D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) visited the Boring Company in California this month, walking in a tunnel to learn more about the technology the company says will make tunneling faster and cheaper.

 The District’s Department of Transportation is figuring out what other permits the Boring Company would need to cut under city roads and other public spaces, according to Bowser’s chief of staff, John Falcicchio.

 “We’re just beginning, in the mayor’s office, our conversation to get an understanding of what the general vision is for Hyperloop,” Falcicchio said. Asked whether the Bowser administration supports the project, he was somewhat upbeat but noncommittal, adding: “We’re open to the concept of moving people around the region more efficiently.”

 Musk has received backing from the White House Office of American Innovation, led by President Trump’s senior advisor and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, as well as Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R), whose administration rolled out a welcome mat and provided a utility permit, though more permits are needed and no tunneling has begun. Maryland officials say the tunnel would run under Maryland Route 295. The Baltimore-Washington leg would be the initial stretch in the East Coast system.

 The overall concept is that pods with perhaps 16 people in each could speed around on electric sleds. Those sleds could also carry individual cars to and from numerous stations. There would be a main artery, with spurs connecting to various stations.

 Elevators would take people up and down to the tunnels. And those tunnels would be built relatively close to the surface without disturbing buildings and other structures.

 The stations would be somewhat modest affairs, numerous but not grand in scale like Union Station.

 “Stations in a Loop or Hyperloop system are small in size and widely distributed in a network — very different from large-station termini considered for train systems,” the company spokesman said.

 “Hyperloop” refers to a vacuum-based, people- and car-moving system, which would get rid of wind resistance. Shorter hops within or between cities might have a non-vacuum system, hence the reference to a “Loop” system.

 Tunnel experts say the digging part is technically feasible, if potentially slow and expensive. As for how to safely orchestrate the underground system of multiple superfast pods, transportation experts say the challenges are legion.

 And the naysayers are numerous, though their views are varied. Some point to Musk’s history of overpromising, as with the slow production of his more-affordable Tesla Model 3. But others, even skeptics, say he has a vision and hard-to-beat record of breakthroughs on the road and in his rocket ventures.

 Some transportation advocates worry that moving people and cars — rather than just people — in the high-speed system would undercut the benefits of more-traditional mass transit.

 “We need to fix the Metro. Traffic is just bad,” said Mohamed Hussein, an Uber driver from Virginia who stopped for lunch beside the New York Avenue parking lot. Hussein was not enamored with the idea of being swept along at harrowing speeds. “It’s like a bullet. Woooom!” he said. “Too much.”

 And he was, he said, realistic about time. “How long will it take them to build the tunnel?” he asked. “It will take a long time.”

 But Mohamed Musa, director of housekeeping at the Hyatt Place hotel a couple doors down, can’t wait.

 “Just the idea of going to New York to have lunch and come back, it’ll be awesome,” Musa said. ||||| First honed as a concept by Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk in 2012, hyperloop is touted as the future of passenger transport.

 For the uninitiated, hyperloop is a high-speed passenger transport system that involves a sealed tube through which high-speed pods move, slashing travel times. For example, the journey from London to Edinburgh - which takes more than four hours on a train - would theoretically take just 30 minutes.

 Musk has since encouraged startup firms and student-led projects to create their own versions of hyperloop. The high-speed system uses a version of magnetic levitation, but what is it and how does it work?

 What is magnetic levitation?

 Magnetic levitation, or maglev, is when an object is suspended in the air using only magnetic fields and no other support.

 Along with super-fast maglev trains, magnetic levitation has various engineering uses including magnetic bearings. It can also be used for display and novelty purposes, such as floating speakers.

 How does magnetic levitation work?

 Magnetic levitation’s best-known use is in maglev trains. Currently only in operation in a handful of countries, including China and Japan, Maglev trains are the fastest in the world, with a record speed of 375 mph (603 km/h). However, the train systems are incredibly expensive to construct and often end up languishing as little-used vanity projects.

 There are two main types of maglev train technology - electromagnetic suspension (EMS) and electrodynamic suspension (EDS).

 EMS uses electronically controlled electromagnets in the train to attract it to a magnetic steel track, while EDS uses superconducting electromagnets on both the train and the rail to produce a mutually repellent force that makes the carriages levitate.

 A variant of EDS technology - as used in the Inductrack system - uses an array of permanent magnets on the underside of the train, instead of powered electromagnets or cooled superconducting magnets. This is also known as passive magnetic levitation technology.

 How does Hyperloop use magnetic levitation?

 In Musk’s original concept, the pods floated on a layer of pressurised air, in a similar way to pucks floating on an air hockey table. However, a more recent version of the technology from Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HTT) - one of two companies leading the hyperloop race - uses passive magnetic levitation to achieve the same effect.

 The technology has been licensed to HTT from Lawrence Livermore National Labs (LLNL), which developed it as part of the Inductrack system. This method is thought to be cheaper and safer than traditional maglev systems.

 With this method, magnets are placed on the underside of the capsules in a Halbach array. This focuses the magnetic force of the magnets on one side of the array while almost entirely cancelling out the field on the other side. These magnetic fields cause the pods to float as they pass over electromagnetic coils embedded in the track. Thrust from linear motors propels the pods forward.

 HTT’s main rival, Hyperloop One is also using a passive magnetic levitation system where pod-side permanent magnets repel a passive track, with the only input energy coming from the speed of the pod.

 For both systems, air pressure in the tunnels is lowered using air pumps in order to aid the pods’ movement. The low air pressure dramatically reduces drag so that only a relatively small amount of electricity is needed to achieve top speeds.

 When will hyperloop launch?

 The hyperloop system does appear to be progressing with Hyperloop One recently managing to shoot a passenger pod through a test tube at 192mph (309km/h). But while impressive, it still falls well short of its 250mph (402km/h) goal.

 A student team from the Technical University of Munich recently managed to reach an impressive top speed of 201mph (324km/h) on SpaceX’s custom-built 1.5km test track in Hawthorne, California. The extraordinary achievement was part of Elon Musk’s Hyperloop Pod Competition.

 The first commercial hyperloop track could be built by Hyperloop One in the UAE, after the company agreed a feasibility study with the Dubai Roads and Transport Authority (RTA). The proposed system would connect Dubai and Abu Dhabi with a mere 12-minute journey. However, despite various proposed projects around the globe, critics claim that hyperloop infrastructure is far too costly to ever develop into a comprehensive transport system. ||||| A 29-minute trip from D.C. to New York may seem too good to be true. And it very well may be. But that isn’t stopping Elon Musk from pushing forward with plans to build a Hyperloop along the eastern corridor.

 And while it’s a very small, very vague step forward, Musk’s Boring Company has received a permit for preparation and preliminary excavation of a site in the nation’s capital. The exact location is 53 New York Avenue NE, next to a McDonald’s and near the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, according to The Washington Post.

 In July, Elon Musk tweeted that he had received verbal government approval to build a multi-state underground Hyperloop on the East Coast. While such approval doesn’t formally exist, Bloomberg confirmed that the White House had had positive conversations with The Boring Company over the proposed tunnel.

 Just received verbal govt approval for The Boring Company to build an underground NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop. NY-DC in 29 mins. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 20, 2017

 This latest permit is far from what’s required to actually begin building the tunnel — which would run from New York to Philadelphia to Baltimore to D.C. — but it’s a start. Musk recently received a conditional permit to start operations in Hawthorne, Maryland for a 10.3 mile route. Maryland officials told WaPo that the tunnel would run under Maryland Route 295, with the D.C.-Baltimore leg being built first.

 Stations for the Hyperloop would be relatively small and toned down compared to the stations we’re used to, such as Union Station and Penn Station. There would be a main line running between the four aforementioned cities, with smaller lines spurring out from the city’s central station for other potential destinations.

 Right now, the trip from NY to D.C. takes more than three hours. It would certainly be nice to pop down for a meeting with just an hour of travel time, but this first permit is comparable to an athlete stretching before a race. We have not yet begun. |||||


Article:

Casey Anthony verdict sparks campaign for ‘Caylee’s Law’

 This undated photo released by the Orange County Sheriff's Office in Orlando shows Caylee Marie Anthony. (AP) When Florida mother Casey Anthony was found not guilty of first-degree murder or manslaughter of her two-year-old daughter Caylee Tuesday, many Americans who had followed the case were outraged, including a woman in Oklahoma who decided to start a petition for a “Caylee’s Law.”

 One of the sticking points of the Casey Anthony case was the fact that Anthony never notified law enforcement that her daughter was missing, which led to her being found guilty of four counts of the misdemeanor crime of lying to investigators. Caylee was last seen on June 16, 2008, but her grandmother, Cindy Anthony, didn’t notify the police until July 15, a month later.

 Oklahoman Michelle Crowder, who is a mother of two daughters, says parents need to report their child’s disappearance immediately, and has started a Change.org petition and Facebook page to ask Congress to create a law to enforce that. “Caylee’s Law” would make it a federal offense and a felony for a parent or guardian to fail to report a child’s disappearance to law enforcement.

 “When I saw that Casey Anthony had been found not guilty in the murder of little Caylee, and that she was only being convicted of lying to the police about her disappearance, I was sickened,” Crowder says.

 “I could not believe she was not being charged with child neglect or endangerment, or even obstruction of justice.”

 Nearly 2,000 people have signed the “Caylee’s Law” petition each hour since its creation, making it the fastest-growing campaign on Change.org, according to the site.

 Another campaign on Facebook has nearly two million people pledging to leave their porch lights on for Caylee.

 More on Casey Anthony trial

 Casey Anthony verdict not guilty

 Casey Anthony verdict shocks media

 Casey Anthony and her court of public opinion

 Photos of the Casey Anthony trial ||||| Starting in 1996, Alexa Internet has been donating their crawl data to the Internet Archive. Flowing in every day, these data are added to the Wayback Machine after an embargo period. ||||| Brigham Young UniversityArchive-It Partner Since: Feb, 2013Organization Type: Colleges & UniversitiesOrganization URL: http://lib.byu.edu The L. Tom Perry Special Collections Web Archive at Brigham Young University seeks to enhance scholarship and learning by documenting, providing access to, and persevering the state of Mormonism in all of its variations, as they exist online. The Mormon experience made manifest through culture, expression, history, philosophy, ideology, society, and theology is the main emphasis of this collection. Secondary focus is given to areas of interest such areas as business, education, politics, activism, and philanthropy. |||||
What is a summary?

– Casey Anthony's not guilty verdict sparked Facebook outrage, a couple of Nancy Grace rants, and now a fast-growing petition for a new law. "Caylee's Law," thought up by Oklahoma mom of two Michelle Crowder, would require parents and guardians to report a child's disappearance to police immediately. Caylee Anthony was last seen June 16, but was not reported missing for a full month. Crowder, who started a Change.org petition as well as a Facebook page asking Congress to create the law, says she was "sickened" when Casey Anthony was convicted only of lying to the police, and was not "charged with child neglect or endangerment, or even obstruction of justice.” Her Change.org petition is the fastest-growing campaign in the site's history, with nearly 2,000 people signing it each hour, the Washington Post reports. Click for more on the Anthony trial aftermath.


Freestyle Releasing, which generated strong grosses for “God’s Not Dead,” is offering up a challenge next Valentine’s Day to “Fifty Shades of Grey” with faith-based romance “Old Fashioned.”

 “I wanted to tell a love story that takes the idea of Godly romance seriously,” said Rik Swartzwelder, writer-director and lead actor. “A story that, without apology, explores the possibility of a higher standard in relationships; yet, is also fully aware of just how fragile we all are and doesn’t seek to heap guilt upon those of us that have made mistakes.”

 Swartzwelder plays a former frat boy and Elizabeth Ann Roberts will portray a free-spirited woman. The tagline is “Chivalry makes a comeback.”

 “Opening the same weekend as ‘Fifty Shades,’ there’s definitely a David v. Goliath comparison,” Swartzwelder said. “They will have more screens, more money, more hype . . . but we’re hopeful that we are not alone in our belief that there are others out there who desire more from love–and the movies–than objectification or domination.”

 “God’s Not Dead” topped $60 million earlier this year, representing by far the highest gross for any Freestyle release. Co-president Mark Borde asserted “Old Fashioned” is the first faith-based theatrical release to specifically target the “underserved” Christian singles audience.

 Producers are Swartzwelder’s Skoche Films, Nathan Nazario of Motion Picture Pro Studios, Dave DeBorde and Nini Hadjis. The film also stars Dorothy Silver, Tyler Hollinger, Lejon Woods, Nini Hadjis, Maryann Nagel and Joseph Bonamico.

 The announcement comes four days after Universal debuted the first “Fifty Shades” trailer, featuring several sex and bondage scenes with Dakota Johnson (pictured above). Fox is also releasing its “Poltergeist” reboot on Valentine’s Day weekend. ||||| 'Old Fashioned' is hitting theaters the same day as 'Fifty Shades'… and it's no coincidence.

 A Faith-Based Romantic Drama Wants To Take Down 'Fifty Shades Of Grey'

 There's a faith-based film about "old-fashioned courtship" hitting theaters on the exact same day as the sinful, S&M-filled; adaptation of "Fifty Shades of Grey."

 And if you thought that was some sort of divine coincidence, you'd be wrong. This is a challenge.

 Freestyle Releasing -- the studio behind the equally wholesome "God's Not Dead" -- is rather openly marketing "Old Fashioned" as the anti- "Fifty Shades of Grey," or -- as it words it on its website -- the David to "Fifty Shades'" Goliath.

 The film, whose tagline promises that "Chivalry is making a comeback," was written and directed Rik Swartzwelder, who also stars in the film as a former frat boy who falls for a "free spirited woman" played by Elizabeth Ann Roberts. According the the film's synopsis, together they attempt "the impossible: an 'old-fashioned' courtship in contemporary America."

 Translation: no sex. Not even a little bit. None.

 Why, you ask? Well, according to Swartzwelder, "Old Fashioned" is about upholding a "high standard in relationships."

 “I wanted to tell a love story that takes the idea of Godly romance seriously,” he said. “A story that, without apology, explores the possibility of a higher standard in relationships; yet, is also fully aware of just how fragile we all are and doesn’t seek to heap guilt upon those of us that have made mistakes.”

 "Old Fashioned" hits theaters on Valentine's Day 2015. Choose your side. ||||| Did you watch the Fifty Shades of Grey trailer and think "hmm. There's certainly enough soft core porn-y looking shots of people not having sex. But it definitely needs more Jesus"? Good, because there is a movie company that wants to fulfill your needs—not in that way though.

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 The filmmakers behind faith-based romance Old Fashioned want to take on potential box office monster Fifty Shades of Grey. But they aren't worried about toppling box office records and taking down one of the most anticipated films of the year. Nope. They just want to provide a Christian alternative to a smutty film about people getting tied up and getting it on. Understandable. Via Variety:

 "I wanted to tell a love story that takes the idea of Godly romance seriously," said Rik Swartzwelder, writer-director and lead actor. "A story that, without apology, explores the possibility of a higher standard in relationships; yet, is also fully aware of just how fragile we all are and doesn't seek to heap guilt upon those of us that have made mistakes." Swartzwelder plays a former frat boy and Elizabeth Ann Roberts will portray a free-spirited woman.

 "A free-spirited woman," so sort of like a Christian Manic Pixie Girl? The tagline of this film is "chivalry makes a comeback," which means we'll get lots of lessons on how romance is dead because us womenfolk are way to uppity with our careers and independence from men. We don't know how to let men be chivalrous because we're too "free-spirited," like all those witches they burned in Salem. But much like Aerosmith in the 80s, chivalry is making a comeback. Oh I can't wait.

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 The filmmakers are no slouches when it comes to faith-based films.

 "God's Not Dead" topped $60 million earlier this year, representing by far the highest gross for any Freestyle release. Co-president Mark Borde asserted "Old Fashioned" is the first faith-based theatrical release to specifically target the "underserved" Christian singles audience.

 Good news, Christian Mingle users! Now you'll know exactly what to do on your first date, because this film comes out on Valentine's Day (the same day as Fifty Shades of Grey).

 I have zero plans to go see Fifty Shades of Grey. But I am definitely not going to miss Old Fashioned. This is gong to be amazing. Thank you, Jesus. On a related note, I just watched Heaven is For Real and I highly recommend it for those of you who, like me, work a night shift and your entertainment choices after work are the Cindy Crawford beauty care infomercial or this film. (I DVR'd the infomercial.) |||||

Write a summary.

– If the new 50 Shades of Grey trailer was too much for your innocent eyes, studio Freestyle Releasing has just the flick for you come Valentine's Day: Old Fashioned. In case you couldn't guess by the title, the premise of the flick is "chivalry makes a comeback" (the movie's tagline) as a "former frat boy" and a "free-spirited woman" embark on a "faith-based romance," as Variety puts it. So hot, right? "I wanted to tell a love story that takes the idea of Godly romance seriously," writer, director, and lead actor Rik Swartzwelder says. "A story that, without apology, explores the possibility of a higher standard in relationships; yet, is also fully aware of just how fragile we all are and doesn’t seek to heap guilt upon those of us that have made mistakes." Or, as Jezebel puts it, "they just want to provide a Christian alternative to a smutty film about people getting tied up and getting it on. Understandable." In reality, the film's synopsis, per MTV News, describes a couple attempting "the impossible: an 'old-fashioned' courtship in contemporary America," so you're probably looking at zero sex scenes. Freestyle's co-president explains Old Fashioned will cater to the "underserved" demographic of Christian singles—an audience that helped the studio bring in $60 million with God's Not Dead earlier this year. Despite opening the same weekend as the far-smuttier 50 Shades, "we're hopeful that we are not alone in our belief that there are others out there who desire more from love—and the movies—than objectification or domination," Swartzwelder says.