The Cows, a Sequel to Hitchcock's the Birds

Photo by Ryan Thompson

Remember that cow that got shot outside the primary school in the UK? You know, the one that got shot, and then got shot again, and then got shot again, and then was finally killed? The one the police insist they definitely did not miss, because it is better to be inhumane than inaccurate? Of course you remember--unless you're from Oklahoma, in which case you're excused. Well, after promising to take seriously the "significant public interest" in the not-at-all-disproportionate response--four marksmen, one sergeant, five officers, four PCSOs, five patrol cars, and a police van--to a cow loose in a residential area, the Lincolnshire Police issued a statement:

"The animal's presence in a residential area posed a serious risk to safety. A significant amount of resources were committed to containing the animal. The intention was to safely remove the animal from the area without destroying it if at all possible.

"After more than two hours of working towards this aim, it became apparent that it was not achievable. Several options, including sedation, were considered. The RSPCA and the owner of the animal were consulted.

"As more members of the public turned up to watch the incident, prompted by online commentary on the situation, the animal became increasingly distressed and there were fears that it would jump further fences and re-enter a residential area."

A compelling argument.

Meanwhile, on the continent, the Austrians are dealing with a full blown cowpocalypse.

A police statement says the 43 steers defied attempts by police and volunteer firefighters to recapture them after wandering off Thursday and heading toward the Upper Austrian town of Freistadt. After being chased away from the railway station, they endangered motorists by stampeding onto a two-lane highway before running into a town suburb.

Two firefighters who tried to stop them were injured and needed hospital treatment.

The statement says 18 of the animals remain on the loose Friday. The rest have been corralled or tranquilized.

Oh, the humanity! Of all people, the Austrians should have a keen cultural awareness of the danger of appeasement techniques like corralling and tranquilizing. Lives are on the line, and the casualties are racking up. After two hours days of trying to control these stampeding menaces, surely it is time to take off the kid gloves and bring in the amateur marksmen with the seventy-two rounds necessary to fell eighteen cows. The real question for Americans is, if Austria solicits military aid in this time of crisis, should we send troops or should Obama just call in a drone strike?

Cow Shot, Shot Again, Then Killed

In front of an elementary school, it would appear:

Police were slammed yesterday after shooting dead an escaped cow in a primary school car park. The Belgian blue went on the run for almost three hours after fleeing its field.

Armed officers eventually cornered the terrified beast outside a primary school. Marksmen were ordered to shoot to kill and opened fire with a high-powered rifle.

But the cow survived the first two shots and did not die until it was hit by two further bullets 15 minutes later. Horrified locals accused police of animal cruelty...

"It kicked its back legs for another five or 10 minutes.

“The so-called marksman was less than 100 yards away. It was a joke.”

I'm not sure what about the cornered cow was so threatening. Or why they needed to take a coffee break between shooting it the first couple of times and finally killing it. I'm not sure why they don't have tranquilizers. I thought the police weren't as trigger happy in the UK as they are here. So much about this doesn't make sense to me.

Almost as tragic was the decision of the journalist to caption the picture in the article "Udder disgrace."

In Other News

Continuing to bring you the latest from the Orthodox world, this offer from the Orthodox Church of Cyprus is rightfully making waves:

The head of Cyprus' influential Orthodox church, Archbishop Chrysostomos II, says he will put the church's assets at the country's disposal to help pull it out of a financial crisis, after lawmakers rejected a plan to seize up to 10 percent of people's bank deposits to secure an international bailout.


Speaking after meeting President Nicos Anastasiades Wednesday, Chrysostomos said the church was willing to mortgage its assets to invest in government bonds.


The church has considerable wealth, including property, stakes in a bank and a brewery. Tuesday's rejection of the deposit tax has left the future of the country's international bailout in question.

Whether or not anything will come of the offer--and whether or not the church's assets are enough to make a substantial difference in Cyprus's financial crisis--it strikes me as precisely the right move for the church, which has been roundly and rightly criticized from all corners and in most developed countries for being inexcusably wealthy. I wonder what kind of dent the US churches could have made in 2008 if they had made a similar offer. Of course, they didn't and lack the institutional unity to make such a gesture. No longer living in an age when the apostolic heirs can honestly say "Silver and gold I have not," the Cypriot church has made a gesture that powerfully displays the way sacrifice on a church-wide scale can influence society.

Even so, there are many who would argue that the world is becoming an increasingly churchless place no matter what denominational bodies do. This "none" movement is constituted in part by those postmodern Christians enamored of the idea that Jesus never went to church, so why should they? Launching off of a quote from Toby Mac (“Jesus didn’t hang out in the church") that appeared on the Huffington Post, Revelation rock star Rick Oster has thoroughly debunked the notion of a church-free Jesus:

Since everyone knows there was no Christian church in existence in the days of Jesus’ earthly ministry, this statement is designed for its rhetorical impact, rather than its historical accuracy. Sometimes, though, rhetorical statements have a life of their own, and hearers forget the limitations of rhetoric. More probably the rhetoric of this statement was meant to emphasize the viewpoint that Jesus did not spend time associating with religious/Jewish organizations or hanging out in Jewish meeting places or chillaxing with the officialdom of Jewish religion. A fact-check of this viewpoint led me to conclude that it did not represent the whole story of Jesus.

This anti-institutional view of Jesus has a long history, but it stands in stark contrast to the picture of Jesus given us by the major writer of the New Testament, Luke, and also by John the prophet.

...To be sure, the validity of Christian ministry is determined by the authenticity of its message and accompanying lifestyle and not by its location. Bars and brothels are certainly within the purview of modern Christian ministry, but we need to be clear that this was not the fundamental approach used by Jesus. Most of Jesus’ time was spent in synagogues, in travel through the Jewish countryside, and in Jewish homes. It does not seem to have been an erratic choice when Jesus decided to give his inaugural teachings in synagogues (Lk. 4:14-15).

...We contemporary believers just might need to reconsider whether we want to recapture apostolic belief by acknowledging and confessing “that Jesus is not a parachurch Messiah” ([Oster's commentary on Revelation] p. 89), but a churchy Jesus, notwithstanding all the abuses and heresies propagated by his ostensible followers, both past and present.

Meanwhile, will Pope Francis go to Moscow? It's hard to care when you consider the momentous event that just occurred in Melfort, Saskatchewan:

Wally and Kerry LaClare raise cows on their farm near Melfort, and have seen hundreds of calves born. But last week when one of their cows gave birth, they witnessed something they've never seen before.

"Kerry came into the barn, and noticed the cow was straining a bit," said Wally LaClare. "I checked the cow and there was another calf, so we delivered it. We figured that was it, you never imagine triplets. When I came back in an hour later she was delivering her third,” he said.

The chances of a cow giving birth to triplets are so rare, about once in every 105,000 births, that a person has a better chance of hitting a hole in one.

I wonder how the chances of Orthodox-Catholic reunion stack up to that.

Animal Advocacy in North Stonington

Todd Caswell is still on the loose, but animal rights advocates are seizing the Angel shooting as an opportunity to improve the system of justice for cows, among others.

A bipartisan group of legislators, including state Rep. Diana Urban (D-North Stonington), is introducing a bill that would allow court-appointed advocates for animals during legal proceedings that concern the animals’ welfare or custody.

It a logical extension of the near universal practice in the US judicial system of appointing advocates for those without a voice, and it will almost certainly be a big step forward in animal rights law (one they've already taken in Rhode Island). Unfortunately, we still only care about violence against animals as an indicator of future violence against humans.

Urban cited data, which she noted has been available since 1971, that point to animal abuse as an early indicator of violence against humans. She has already authored legislation, now a law, that requires cross reporting of animal-abuse and domestic-violence cases. About 80 percent of school shooters were once animal abusers, she said.

“I just want society to take this seriously,” she said.

It's too bad society won't take seriously shooting a cow in the face, fatally wounding her, just for thrills and then conspiring to conceal your crime unless it can be shown to somehow threaten human well being. Baby steps, I guess.

Connecticut Takes Their Cows Seriously

And why shouldn't they. There have been fascinating new developments in the Angel assassination case. I must say, as necessarily corrupt and unjust as our legal system inherently is, I find the seriousness with which they people of North Stonington are taking the death of the Palmers' cow both intriguing and--in the interest of confession--a little reassuring. Though the trigger man remains at large, they have caught the getaway driver and the owner of the truck and gun, both of whom are being treated with righteous severity. According to The Day, Judge John J. Nazzaro has declared Max Urso, driver and senior at Wheeler High School,

a threat to the community and ordered him placed on intensive pretrial supervision, including GPS monitoring and home confinement except for medical, legal and educational outings, while his case is pending.

This in addition to being held for a time on a $25,000 bond and being in the process of getting expelled from school. It is an overwhelming reaction to what, in the minds of many, amounts to little more than the destruction of private property. The Christian response to violence is, of course, forgiveness, something which ought to be counseled particularly to members of the same church as is the case here. Yet, a secular evaluation of the progress in the protection of animals from recreational cruelty cannot help but reassure.

I can be less conflicted about the response of the community to this travesty.

After the shooting, state Rep. Diana Urban, D-North Stonington, known as a champion of animals, established "The Angel Fund" at Chelsea Groton Bank to raise money for the Palmer family. More than $3,500 has been raised. Farmer George Palmer told state police the replacement cost of the cow is $1,500, veterinary fees were $139 and it cost approximately $200 in labor to care for and move the injured cows.

Palmer's son, Asa, had been raising the cows. He said Tuesday that he was angry that people he knew from school and church would do such a thing to the animals.

Michael Jackson Finally Convicted

In the ongoing parade of atrocities that has become the staple of cow news here, the New Zealand Herald reports this "worst case of its kind" abuse case:

West Coast farmer Michael Jackson, 43, admitted breaking or injuring 230 cows tails trying to usher them into his milking shed.

Jackson pleaded guilty to a charge of failing to alleviate pain or distress in 230 injured dairy cattle under Section 11 of the Animal Welfare Act 1999.

At Christchurch District Court yesterday he was sentenced to 300 hours of community service, ordered to pay reparation of $223 for veterinary costs and was banned from owning cows for five years.

The question that leapt immediately into my mind was how many tails did he need to break before they would ban him from owning cows indefinitely. Somehow, I get the suspicion that if I were to break or injure the tails of 230 golden retrievers, I might fair worse than Michael Jackson has.

Angel Killer Caught!

It is only rarely that I am able to provide substantial follow-up for the countless bovine news that I share here, mostly because people are fleetingly interested in the goings-on in the cattle world, even if they condescend to report it. That is why I am grateful to the Bridgeport's Connecticut Post for staying on top of the slaying of Angel the Cow. Back in January, Angel and her Holstein companion were attacked in a drive by that left the Holstein hurt and Angel so badly wounded that she was euthanized. Now, it seems, the culprits have been caught:

State Police have arrested two men and are looking for a third in connection with the shooting of two cows at a North Stonington farm.

Troopers charged 18-year-old Max Urso of North Stonington on Tuesday with cruelty to animals and other crimes. Twenty-year-old Henry Williamson of Stonington was charged with hindering prosecution and making a false statement to authorities.

State police say they're also seeking 23-year-old Todd Caswell of North Stonington on animal cruelty and other charges.

According to Connecticut General Assembly website, it is "an unclassified felony to maliciously and intentionally maim, mutilate, torture, wound, or kill an animal" punishable by five years in prison, a $5,000 fine, or both.

If they'll keep reporting on it, I'll keep sharing updates.

Angel Killed by Drive-By Shooter

There has been a merciless assassination in Connecticut:

Sometime during the night of Friday Jan. 18 or the morning of Saturday, Jan. 19, someone driving on Pendleton Hill Road took aim at two cows in a field. Using a high powered rifle, the shooter or shooters shot a Holstein and an Ayrshire in their faces.

The good news is, the Holstein will recover. The Ayrshire, whose name is Angel, will be euthanized. The damage is apparently too extensive. I can't help but agree with the owners evaluation:

“They have to be degenerates. They have to be someone who has nothing to lose,” he said. “I don’t have any enemies that I know of.”

I can't imagine the Ayrshire having any enemies either. Perhaps the worst part is that these gentle creatures were destined for a life as dairy cows on a little New England farm as part of a herd of five, no reduced to four.

All elegiac excesses aside, what sort of callous anthropo-chauvinism makes someone believe that it is appropriate to shoot cattle with a high powered rifle for thrills (or revenge)? Perhaps the same logic that permits sport hunting.

Too Cute to Eat

Meet Archie the bull. At a little over two years old, Archie is only 30 inches tall making him the world record holding shortest bull and apparently much too cute to eat.

“When we bought Archie he was destined for beef,” [Ryan Lavery, 15,] explained.

“However, by Christmas time, he still hadn’t grown and because we had become so fond of him we decided to keep him.

“His size saved him and now he’s going to live out the rest of his life as a pet.

If I were the judge of cuteness, all cows would quickly be converted into companion animals, but alas...

Hey Diddle Diddle

As if to confirm my long held belief that anything horses can do, cows can do cuter, an eleven year old girl in Belgium has trained her cow to jump fences.



Sadly, I'm afraid I weigh more than a prepubescent girl, forever dashing my hopes of competitive cow jumping.

#500

When I began this project, it took me more than a year to reach one hundred entries. My rate of posting has increased dramatically, not because I have more to say but because I have had the opportunity to allow others to speak with greater frequency. The commemoration of the numerous quotes shared here has become something of a personal tradition, and so, on this my five hundredth post, I offer you once again my favorite ten quotes from the numerous insights shared in previous ninety-nine posts.

10) The absurdity of the news is a recurrent theme here, and the past six months has offered no respite from the onslaught of ridiculous news stories. The election stands out as a year long tribute to this insanity, from which numerous quotes might be drawn. Yet, it was this understated, now forgotten story of a couple suing over a baseball injury:

A New Jersey woman who was struck in the face with a baseball at a Little League game is suing the young catcher who threw it.

Elizabeth Lloyd is seeking more than $150,000 in damages to cover medical costs...Catcher Matthew Migliaccio was 11 years old at the time and was warming up a pitcher.

9) Not all sports news was so amusing or so obscure. Since the last top ten, the drama at Penn State has continued to unfold in ways that I continue to find indefensible. The NCAA handed down what were supposed to be program destroying sanctions (never mind that the Nittany Lions have marched proudly on to have a respectable season), but the Paterno family continues in the level-headed tradition of its now deceased patriarch:

The point of due process is to protect against this sort of reflexive action. Joe Paterno was never interviewed by the University or the Freeh Group. His counsel has not been able to interview key witnesses as they are represented by counsel related to ongoing litigation. We have had no access to the records reviewed by the Freeh group. The NCAA never contacted our family or our legal counsel. And the fact that several parties have pending trials that could produce evidence and testimony relevant to this matter has been totally discounted.

Unfortunately all of these facts have been ignored by the NCAA, the Freeh Group and the University.

8) Many of the quotes shared here relate to issues of war and peace, indicating my distinct preference for the latter. To an already extensive catalog, I was able to recently add the collective wisdom of several Nobel laureates protesting, of all things, a reality show that trained celebrities in the art of war:

Real war is down in the dirt deadly...Trying to somehow sanitize war by likening it to an athletic competition further calls into question the morality and ethics of linking the military anywhere with the entertainment industry in barely veiled efforts to make war and its multitudinous costs more palatable to the public.

7) Historians, as a rule, affect me less profoundly than do theologians, philosophers, and ethicists. Eugene Genovese is an astounding exception to this rule. Much to my dismay, he died not so long ago, but he has left us with a tremendous body of work that will continue to live on and continue to stimulate. This quote was offered as a sample as we said goodbye to Gene Genovese:

Southern conservatism has always traced the evils of the modern world to the ascendency of the profit motive and material acquisitiveness...to an idolatrous cult of economic growth and scientific and technological progress; and to the destructive exploitation of nature. Thus, down to our day, southern conservatives have opposed finance capitalism and have regarded socialism as the logical outcome of the capitalist centralization of economic and state power...

What goes largely unnoticed is that, on much of the American Right, the conservative critique of modernity has largely given way to a free-market liberalism the ideal of which shares much with the radical Left’s version of egalitarianism.

6) Germany, it was discovered recently, could benefit from a greater sensitivity to history. Ignoring the obvious perception it would create, a German judge effectively outlawed religious circumcision. As an advocate for the responsibility of parents to make medical (and religious) decisions on behalf of children, I was delighted when the American Academy of Pediatrics weighed in on the issue:

"It's not a verdict from on high," said policy co-author Dr. Andrew Freedman. "There's not a one-size-fits-all-answer." But from a medical standpoint, circumcision's benefits in reducing risk of disease outweigh its small risks, said Freedman, a pediatric urologist in Los Angeles..."The benefits of newborn male circumcision justify access to this procedure for those families who choose it."

5) Meanwhile, there was real religious strife going on in the world:

We will not encourage our people to carry arms against anybody whatsoever the situation may be. For those that are behind Boko Haram, you come to us with AK47, bombs, charms and other dangerous weapons, but we come to you in the name of God.

I want to assure Christians in Nigeria that Christ has always been with his people. He will never give victory to those persecuting Christians and the Church. Whoever is trying to exterminate Christians and Christianity from Nigeria is neither pleasing God nor his people.

4) Having prophetically (and oh so modestly) argued that the solution to the education crisis in America was to pay teachers less, the atavistic Chicago teachers went on strike and proved themselves better fear-mongers than educators, tragically unaware of their own disastrous behavior:

"The mayor and his hedge fund allies are going to replace our democratically controlled public schools with privately run charter schools. This will have disastrous results," union president Karen Lewis wrote in an opinion column in the Chicago Sun-Times on Saturday.

3) In the run up to the election, we explored the nature of the news and freedom of the press, including this insight from a letter sent to George Washington:

Judicious and well-timed publications have great efficacy in ripening the judgment of men in this quarter of the Continent.

2) Even as my academic focus, and consequently my focus here, shifts from the Orthodox Church to indigenous American Christianity, I can never forget my first academic love. Here is a teaser for a particularly amusing bit of satire that I was directed to:

Hipster Christians, I'm going to help you out. I see you are grasping at something, trying to find the ironic Church of your dreams, where men can grow beards of foolish proportions and women can dress like their grannies' grannies, a place where scarves are worn in every unfashionable fashion imaginable, a place where people do shots and eat hummus at community gatherings, enjoy rooms filled with a fog of incense and prefer to read books that pre-date industrialisation.

I would like to direct your attention to "The Orthodox Church."

1) But, of course, the best news recently...the best news always...was cow news:

Would protection against the deadly human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) make you willing to give up your vegan lifestyle? New research from Australia’s Melbourne University suggests that a type of treated cow’s milk could provide the world’s first HIV vaccine.

And now, let us rush headlong together into many more hours wasted merrily in reflection and sardonic commentary.

Cow News

If you thought the story, previously shared, of cows producing lactose-free milk was astonishing, just wait until you see what these magnificent creatures are doing now:

Would protection against the deadly human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) make you willing to give up your vegan lifestyle? New research from Australia’s Melbourne University suggests that a type of treated cow’s milk could provide the world’s first HIV vaccine.

Working together with biotechnology company Immuron Ltd., the Australian research team vaccinated pregnant dairy cows with an HIV protein. This injection posed no risk to the cows, as they are unable to contract the disease, according to researchers. After giving birth, the first milk produced by the cows was found to contain HIV-disabling antibodies...

“We were able to harvest antibodies specific to the HIV surface protein from the milk,” said Dr. Marit Kramski, who is presenting her research as one of the winners of Fresh Science — a national program for early-career scientists. “We have tested these antibodies and found in our laboratory experiments that they bind to HIV and that this inhibits the virus from infecting and entering human cells,” she said.

Got milk?

Tainted Love

This has been making the rounds for the past couple days now, but it is so wonderfully amusing--even touching, if you're of a certain bent...and I'm bent. It involves a peculiar elk who has been hanging around a ranch in British Columbia for several years:

For the first two years, it seemed too shy to make a move. That all changed this year, however, when the huge bull elk finally got up to the nerve to approach Messner's cows.

"This year, he decided to go for it," Messner, the owner of 100 Mile Ranch, told the Canadian Press. The Elk dominated the bull cows, in both size and aggression, which gave him a definite advantage during rutting season, when he found a frequent "partner" in one particularly frisky, if unconventional, cow.

"If you were there watching, it would be an X-rated movie. Several times a day," Messner added.

Apparently, the elk began to attract the attention of hunters who were admiring his rack. Fearing for his safety, and in spite of the fact that hunting is illegal in British Columbia, conservationists removed the elk's antlers and relocated him a dozen miles outside of town. The ranch owner expects him to find his way back to his beloved, and, perverse as it may be, I hope he's right.

Lactose Free Cows?

New Zealand researchers have genetically engineered a cow whose milk, produced for the moment by artificially stimulated lactation, lacks β-lactoglobulin protein, one of the primary milk allergens affecting humans. Great news for people who are lactose intolerant!

Or not, since apparently it is presently illegal to market or even consume transgenic milk. There are perhaps more important reasons to take the linked story as less than the revolutionary news the headlines make it out to be. For example, the researches can't explain the curious rise in casein proteins in the milk. They also are dismissing as irrelevant--though unconvincingly--the premature birth of their franken-cow and the significant absence of Daisy's tail. (Perhaps Eeyore has it.)

If only there were a way for lactose intolerant people to survive, even thrive, without scientists amusing themselves by tinkering with the genetic makeup of cows. If only we could get baby cows the old fashioned way, the way God intended. Using smart phones.

Cow News

Several weeks ago, I had intended to share a story about an Oregon farmer who invested more than $100,000 in waterbeds for his dairy cows. The trend apparently started in the Midwest and is starting to catch on. The principle is simple, according to farmer Ben Van Loon: "Happier cows, happier milk."

A recent story about a rancher feeding his cattle chocolate brought it to mind again. This time the principles motivating the farmer are more explicitly commercial and the disclaimer "not fit for human consumption" puts a damper on the illusion, but it is nevertheless amusing to think about a world where cows are pampered with waterbeds and chocolates.

Cow News

Is anyone else flabbergasted by the fact that we can put an R/C Tonka truck on Mars and develop a birth control pill for men but have yet to master the quick and humane execution of our meat? According to the Associated Press:

Federal regulators shut down a Central California slaughterhouse Monday after receiving undercover video showing dairy cows — some unable to walk — being repeatedly shocked and shot before being slaughtered...

Four minutes of excerpts the animal welfare group provided to The Associated Press showed cows being prepared for slaughter. One worker appears to be suffocating a cow by standing on its muzzle after a gun that injects a bolt into the animal's head had failed to render it unconscious. In another clip, a cow is still conscious and flailing as a conveyor lifts it by one leg for transport to an area where the animals' throats are slit for blood draining.

"The horror caught on camera is sickening," said Erica Meier, executive director of Compassion Over Killing, based in Washington, D.C. "It's alarming that this is not only a USDA-inspected facility but a supplier to the USDA."

...The videos show workers pulling downed cows by their tails and kicking them in an apparent attempt to get them to stand and walk to slaughter. Others shoot downed cows in the head over and over as the cows thrash on the ground. In one instance, the video shows workers trying to get cattle to back out of a chute while repeatedly spraying them with water and shocking them.

It's a good thing the USDA is around to inspect these places. Otherwise, imagine what they would be doing.

The Song of the Summer

I don't typically go in for Top 40 music, but this song (shockingly) hit the spot. I'm not sure what it is:



Incidentally, to all those who have, for whatever inexplicable reason, visited The Itinerant Mind, thank you. The Blogger edition just passed the ten thousand pageview mark, with the much newer Wordpress edition sliding past one thousand at almost the same time.

The Real Victims of the Heat

Why aren't more people talking about the cows?

For farmers this extreme heat can be just as hard on cattle as it is on their crops.

Farmers told 13 NEWS spoke with are using misters and watching their cows around the clock because they know this heat can have a devastating affect on their lives.

"Anytime the temperature gets above 70 degrees actually, cows start feeling heat stress and so you add 35 more degrees with a heat index on top of that, those cows are not having a good day."

More than just not having a good day, some cows are dying. It breaks my heart. If I thought it would help, I would start a Lemonade for Cows charity, but I don't know how well that would go over.

Step Aside, Miss Cleo

We've been following the meteoric rise to fame of Yvonne the Cow from the very beginning, including her movie deal. Now she has been entrusted with the important task of predicting the results of Euro 2012 games:

Yvonne the runaway cow has made an unpopular start to her career as successor to Paul the psychic octopus by predicting that Germany will lose to Portugal on Saturday night.

Germany has been in mourning since the demise in 2010 of Paul, who became an international star two years ago after successfully predicting the outcomes of World Cup games, and a Bavarian radio station has decided to turn to Yvonne for guidance.

Unfortunately for Yvonne, though nice for the Germans, Portugal ended up losing the match which took place last Saturday. There are really only two explanations: either Yvonne isn't psychic or Germany, fearful of her predictive prowess, cheated in order win the match. I'll let you guess what I think.

Cow News

Speaking of beef behaving badly, apparently a pair of lascivious cattle decided to hold up traffic outside of Pittsburgh in order to have sex in the middle of a highway, causing a traffic jam and outshining the parkway pig.

"It's right in the construction zone so it's making a big mess out there," Trooper John Corna said.

The bull rebuffed any notion of interruptus and police had to summon Pennsylvania Farm Bureau personnel. They coaxed the animals into custody.

In other news, while digging up the link to this amusing article using the search terms "cow sex road," an article about the Queen's diamond jubilee was the fifth result. I'm not sure what that's about, but congratulations to her majesty nonetheless.