The Eleven Satanic Rules of the Earth

• Do not give opinions or advice unless you are asked.
• Do not tell your troubles to others unless you are sure they want to hear them.
• When in another’s lair, show them respect or else do not go there.
• If a guest in your lair annoys you, treat them cruelly and without mercy.
• Do not make sexual advances unless you are given the mating signal.
• Do not take that which does not belong to you unless it is a burden to the other person and they cry out to be relieved.
• Acknowledge the power of magic if you have employed it successfully to obtain your desires. If you deny the power of magic after having called upon it with success, you will lose all you have obtained.
• Do not complain about anything to which you need not subject yourself.
• Do not harm little children.
• Do not kill non-human animals unless you are attacked or for your food.
• When walking in open territory, bother no one. If someone bothers you, ask them to stop. If they don’t stop, destroy them

I kind of like the last rules.

'Sexting' teens don't need behavior class: judge

WASHINGTON (AFP) - - A federal judge in Pennsylvania said that three teen girls who posed semi-nude for pictures distributed via cellular phone could not be forced to attend behavior classes as a prosecutor demanded.

In the temporary restraining order filed Monday, Judge James Munley prevents District Attorney George Skumanick from filing child pornography charges against the girls, who were 13 when the pictures were taken. He said the pictures were not illegal and that there was no reason to prosecute.

The sending of sexually suggestive pictures to portable phones or posting them on blogs, known as "sexting" -- a play on the word "texting" -- is a popular practice among US teens.

Teachers at a Pennsylvania high school alerted the authorities in October after discovering a waist-up image of two girls covered just by a bra, and another image of a girl topless on the portable telephones of several school students.

Skumanik called for the girls to undergo five weeks of behavior courses and take a drug test or face prosecution, according to a letter sent to the teenagers' parents.

Skumanik described the pictures as "provocative," and insisted the teens need to "gain an understanding of how (their) actions were wrong," as well as "what it means to be a girl in today's society."

If they did not meet his demand Skumanik threatened to press child pornography charges, in accordance with Pennsylvania law.

The American Civil Liberties Union sued Skumanik on behalf of the teens, arguing that his threat was unconstitutional because it forced the girls to recognize their guilt for something that was not wrong, and prosecution could have landed the girls on the sex offenders register, tarnishing future job prospects.

The teens "have a constitutional right to avoid the courses ... because the girls' pictures were not illegal," Munley wrote.

According to a survey by a US family planning organization, published in December, 20 percent of American teenagers said they had participated in sexting.

HTC Google Phone

Hardware

Like the iPhone, it can be used in either a vertical or horizontal orientation, but the top slides open to reveal a physical keyboard when the phone is used horizontally. As a result, horizontally is the only way to type anything. Never having used a Blackberry or similar, I’m not used to typing on a keyboard like this. I personally find the iPhone’s software keyboard easier to use but that’s just due to experience and familiarity; plenty of Blackberry users disagree. The physical buttons for the phone and home screen take a little getting used to as well; I keep looking on-screen for these controls.

There’s a design on the back instead of the Google logo seen on the T-Mobile models, and of course there’s no T-Mobile branding anywhere, either on the hardware or software.

Software

The Android OS does pretty much everything the iPhone does — not as well, but it does them. In the course of my playing around with it, I used the maps and GPS, e-mail, SMS, the Marketplace (the Android version of the iTunes app store), the web browser, and, of course, made some phone calls. The phone is wifi-capable out of the box, so everything but the phone and SMS just worked as soon as I joined the phone to my wireless network. And because the phone isn’t carrier-locked the way most US cell phones are, I was able to just pop in the AT&T SIM from my iPhone to try out the phone features.

There were two problems with that last bit however: First, the phone is only configured for T-Mobile data service by default and using it on AT&T’s network required manually setting up a new data access service. The second problem is that once this was done, data access worked, but I was restricted to Edge rather than the faster 3G. This apparently has something to do with either AT&T or T-Mobile using non-standard frequencies for 3G service but I’m a bit fuzzy on the details.

E-mail and the web browser worked pretty much the same as they do on the iPhone (unsurprisingly, because the browser is based on Webkit, same as MobileSafari). Setup was a pain though — there’s no way to sync data from my computer, so I had to input all my mail settings by hand. I was really annoyed by the inability to sync my Mac’s address book until I found that I could work around it by syncing Address Book to my Google Apps account and syncing the phone to that. A bit convoluted, but it works, and Google syncs any changes over-the-air just as Mobile Me does for my iPhone.

Overall, this phone is a pretty nice piece of work. What failings it has are all in software, which can be fixed as new Android releases become available, so it’s bound to improve over time. I don’t plan to give up my iPhone so the real value from this phone comes from its being unlocked and therefore usable world-wide. I mentioned just a few months ago that I keep my old unlocked RAZR around as a travel phone, so I can buy a local SIM from anywhere I go outside the US. With wifi, GPS, maps, and everything else in addition to being unlocked, this phone is miles ahead in usefulness as a travel phone. The RAZR has been replaced and is now for sale on Ebay (too bad these phones have almost no resale value).

Woman dead after eating at Geylang Serai food stall

SINGAPORE: The Geylang food poisoning outbreak claimed its first victim on Monday. 57—year—old canteen assistant Aminah Samijo died at 6.50am.

A statement from the Changi General Hospital (CGH) said Mdm Aminah suffered from acute renal failure as the infection had affected her kidneys.

She was hospitalised on Friday at 11.45pm after she became unconscious after eating Indian rojak (salad) at a Geylang Serai market stall.

CGH said she was unresponsive and had breathing difficulties. She had a fever and was diagnosed with severe gastroenteritis.

CGH said Mdm Aminah was treated with antibiotics and put on a ventilator support. She was also given medications for low blood pressure and diarrhoea. Mdm Aminah passed away without regaining consciousnesses.

CGH said it is unable to comment on the cause of her death as it is now under a coroner’s inquiry.

As of Monday, the hospital has treated 77 patients who came down with food poisoning. 16 of them are currently hospitalised at CGH and are in a stable condition. They were admitted for diarrhoea and dehydration and were treated with antibiotics and intravenous infusion.

Meanwhile, a 38—year—old woman miscarried after contracting food poisoning from eating rojak from the same stall. Rosiah Samat lost her two—month old foetus over the weekend.

Her husband had bought the rojak for her on Friday. While eating, the housewife noticed that the gravy tasted slightly off. She fell ill hours later and was sent to KK Hospital that evening.

Madam Rosiah has two other daughters. One is twelve years old, while the other is eight.

Another pregnant woman, Madam Sarina, is now recuperating at KKH after eating the same rojak. Her sister—in—law, Madam Sharifah, said she is four months pregnant.

Madam Sharifah said: "My sister—in—law was admitted to KKH with stomach cramps and she had diarrhoea and she was vomitting. From what I understand, the gynaecologist had to do a thorough medical checkup and he checked whether the baby was ok. The heartbeat is alright. So the baby is pretty safe at this point in time.

"But they are keeping a very close watch on her. She is still totally resting in bed. ... In her ward, there are other women who are also down with the same (condition) — diarrhoea, due to the same stall. She is still very weak."

More than 100 people fell ill after eating from Stall number 302, Rojak Geylang Serai.

The National Environment Agency said investigations are still ongoing.

Flash floods in various parts of Singapore

SINGAPORE: There were flash floods in various parts of Singapore, including Marine Parade and Chai Chee Road, on Sunday.

A video sent in by a Channel NewsAsia viewer shows dark clouds gathering in Tampines. The clouds there looked like a small twister, but dissipated after a while.

The flash floods caused a huge headache for some living in the Upper Paya Lebar area.

Once the rain subsided, many in the area were busy cleaning up inside and outside their houses. Some said the water level reached their ankles during the heavy downpour.

For others — they had to deal with damage to their cars.

One car owner said: "(The water level was) about one metre, and my car was flooded. There’s a short circuit now. I can’t start (my car) and I think a few cars here also have (the same problem)."