My blog will be updated daily, so make sure you come back! If you would like to add or reply to a comment on one of the articles below just send me your comment and, if it's reasonably decent and not libellous or anything like that, I'll add it to the article (don't forget to include the date and title of the article).
27.10.12
Men ARE better at multitasking than women, Swedish researchers claim
Working mothers may have to juggle more tasks than their husbands, but the long-held belief that women are better than men at multitasking is a myth, according to new Swedish research.
'On the contrary, the results of our study show that men are better at multitasking than women,' Timo Maentylae, a psychology professor at Stockholm University, said.
Men are sometimes better than women at handling multiple tasks simultaneously, but the performance gap is correlated to the female menstrual cycle, according to his study, to be published in US peer-reviewed journal Psychological Science.
The participants, 160 men and women between 20 and 43 years of age, were instructed to keep track of three digital 'clocks', or counters, that displayed different times at different speeds.
While registering certain times displayed by the clocks, defined by a simple set of rules, they also had to watch a scrolling ticker featuring common Swedish names, pressing the mouse button when one of the names was repeated.
In line with previous research, men and women with good so-called working memory were also better than others at multitasking.
However, Maentylae found that the ability to combine several different tasks at once was also linked to spatial ability which, for women, is linked to their menstrual phase.
'Previous studies have shown that women's spatial skills vary across the menstrual cycle with high capacity around menstruation and much lower around ovulation, when oestrogen levels are high,' he said.
'The results showed a clear difference in multitasking between men and women in the ovulation phase, while this effect was eliminated for women in the menstrual phase.'
The participants, 160 men and women between 20 and 43 years of age, were instructed to keep track of three digital 'clocks', or counters, that displayed different times at different speeds.
While registering certain times displayed by the clocks, defined by a simple set of rules, they also had to watch a scrolling ticker featuring common Swedish names, pressing the mouse button when one of the names was repeated.
Differences in spatial ability and working memory were based on separate tests.
vicious.sid: I can absolutely, catagorically and honestly say that I cannot multitask at all. My wife is far, far better than me. She can play a game on the iPad, check her Facebook, talk on the phone and watch a programme on the television all at the same time. Scary.
27.10.12
It's a bum wrap: Rod Stewart confesses he put cocaine up his backside
WRINKLY rocker Rod Stewart has confessed he took cocaine up his bum during his hell-raising days. During a candid chat on US TV Rod revealed he and Faces bandmate Ronnie Wood popped pills loaded with the Class A substance up their bottoms during wild sessions in the 1970s.
The pair were forced to resort to the odd method after Rolling Stone Ronnie snorted so much of the drug he burned a hole through his septum.
The 67-year-old made the incredible revelation during an appearance on Access Hollywood to promote his tell-all book Rod: The Autobiography.
He said: "(What happened to Ronnie) scared him, so we found another method of taking the drug. We put them in a little pill like the French do them, a suppository.
"We did that for a little while."
But he backtracked on his drug-taking habits after remembering he was on camera.
He said: "Are we still on the air?"
He added: “As far as the drugs are concerned, I was never an addict.
“I was never, you know, in rehab. It never affected my family or my relationships. I was just a social user."
vicious.sid: I can't see how cocaine can be used socially. Everyone I've known who took it just looked like babbling idiots, it's so obvious and not very social.
ElviriaDreamer: It's very social...used regularly by the socially inept! LOL. I know losers from the 80's/90's who are still powdering their ugly noses now. From policemen to grandmothers to dregs of society. Oh and the crimes it leads them to commit, is another story. What losers!
27.10.12
Conor Maynard adds the newly single maneater Katie Price to his growing list of fans
IT looks like British singer Conor Maynard should be treading carefully. The star has added newly single maneater KATIE PRICE to his ever-growing list of fans.
Conor, however, doesn’t seem too bothered by the attention.
He said: “Don’t get me wrong, if I bumped into her in a club and she was friendly I’d talk to her and party with her.
“She’s probably a fun person to party with.”
Could say that.
vicious.sid: OMG! Start crossing yourself now, Conor! You in trouble, boy!!!!
27.10.12
Man who allegedly barbecued and ate a PUPPY faces jail for cruelty
A MAN faces jail after he allegedly admitted barbecuing and eating a puppy, according to officials in South Africa. The unnamed suspect, 43, reportedly slit the six-week-old animal’s throat before cooking it on an open fire and tucking in.
He was taken into custody yesterday after he allegedly admitted preparing the gruesome meal for lunch at his home near Cape Town.
Inspector Pete Eccles of the Society for Prevention for Cruelty to Animals told how he visited the scene and found just the puppy’s head and part of its intestines in an oil drum filled with coals.
He told South Africa’s Daily Voice newspaper: “I saw the fire drum and I kicked it and then the head rolled out and then I saw the intestines.
“When I spoke to him, he told me: 'I slit the puppy’s throat, skinned it and [barbecued] it and I ate it’.”
Mr Eccles added: “This is extremely horrific. I’ve never had a guy just say I cut up a dog and ate it.
“He said he read it somewhere that the SPCA said it was OK and I explained to him that it was not.”
The SPCA said they acted on a tip-off from a member of the public, and that inspectors believed the dead puppy was one of eight dogs living at the suspect’s shack home in the Cape Town suburb of Mitchell’s Plain.
Officials removed an adult dog and six puppies for safekeeping.
vicious.sid: I know it's illegal to make an animal suffer and it's a bit yucky morally to eat a puppy, but is it actually illegal to do so? Is it against the law to eat any animal? That'll be interesting.
27.10.12
Lady-garden of remembrance
A GRIEVING widower hired a stonemason to carve an exact replica of his late wife's private parts on her grave, it was reported today. Devoted Milan Marinkovic, 75, is said to have commissioned the unusual anatomical tribute in accordance with her dying wishes.
Wife Milena died three years ago and reportedly left instructions for the headstone carving to "make sure he never looked for another woman".
She also left a series of photographs of her lady-garden to be recreated in detail on her £2,100 tomb.
But stonemasons said it was "blasphemous" and Milan had trouble persuading a sculptor to do the job.
Now it is finally done and he believes the result is a fitting memorial to his wife and their 50-year marriage.
Serbian media reported that Milan, a retired lorry driver of Velika Krusevac, Serbia, said: “The problem wasn’t finding the money but finding an artist who would do it. Most of them said it was blasphemy.
“Now it’s finished I love it and it’s a really good likeness.
“And this way, a part of her will always be with me."
"People from funerals and anniversaries of deaths, come to see the headstone with my wife's vagina."
However, not everyone realises what the carving is, and Milan recalls his brother-in-law asking why the bird on Milena's grave had such a large beak.
He said: "I couldn't help but laugh."
Now that's what we call a vagina monolith...
vicious.sid: That reminds me, I have to get a bag of chopped liver from the butchers.
27.10.12
What granny wants for Christmas...
IT may come as a surprise what granny wants in her Christmas stocking this year — as a range of sex toys for the elderly has been launched. Manufacturers Desire and Pleasure are part of sexual health charity FPA and have aimed a new set of naughty gadgets specifically at older and disabled people.
With devices like remote-controlled vibrators, penis pumps, and 'Kegel devices' - used for exercising weak pelvic floor muscles – they hope to help randy retirees who have trouble using conventional toys.
They were launched online two weeks ago and have already caused a huge surge in traffic to their website.
vicious.sid: Ooh, I just had a bit of sick in my mouth.