Imagine the ending of this headline: Man shoots himself and mother because of ________.

a) His crystal meth addiction

b) He was breast fed until the age of 10

c) He felt discriminated against as a redhead

Correct Answer: C

As a self proclaimed “ginger” celebrator and general reveler of all things carrot-top, strawberry-blond and flaming fabulousness, you can imagine my surprise, shock, awe and general bafflement at this story!

Clearly this man was one book shy of a full library but seriously - What’s so wrong with redheads anyway!?

Frankly, makes me wonder if there’s something to the phrase “beating like a redheaded step-child.”

Suspended Paramedic Trent Speering 'Sent Redhead Rant' Before Murder-Suicide

Suspended Sydney paramedic Trent Speering fumed that the NSW Ambulance Service was run by "degenerates" and was bigoted towards redheads before shooting dead his elderly mother and himself, a court has been told.

On June 11, 2008, the 40-year-old visited his 70-year-old mother, Monica Speering, at her home in Baulkham Hills, Sydney, and shot her twice in the head before covering her with a blanket and resting her head on a pillow, The Daily Telegraph reports.

Mr Speering then killed himself, a coronial inquest into both deaths heard today.

The day after the shootings, the Daily Telegraph opened a letter to the editor from Mr Speering detailing the reasons for his actions.

John Agius, counsel assisting the coroner, outlined some of contents of the letter in the NSW Coroners Court today.

"There are two main reasons as to why I've taken the action I have,'' Mr Agius read from the letter.

"One is that there is a lot of bigotry towards people with red hair in this workplace ... and I've copped my share in my lifetime...

"I work for the Ambulance Service of NSW and you would be hard pressed to find an organisation more morally bankrupt, and run by a bigger bunch of degenerates if you tried.''

Mr Speering went on to say that he would kill his mother and himself.

The letter triggered a police investigation but officers arrived at the house too late.

Mr Agius told coroner Mary Jerram that repeated recommendations from paramedic colleagues and medical experts that Mr Speering undergo a psychological assessment, had not been adopted.

"There are issues here about the duty of care for the ambulance service to Mr Speering as an employee ... given what the ambulance service ought to have known of Mr Speering's mental state,'' he said.

The inquest, set down for two weeks, is due to hear from numerous witnesses, including senior NSW Ambulance management.

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/national/suspended-paramedic-trent-speering-ranted-about-redhead-discrimination-before-murder-suicide/story-e6frfkwi-1225894075937#ixzz0uJyTXXWi

Spy Ring's 'Femme Fatale'

By BRUCE GOLDING, ANDY SOLTIS and CATHY BURKE

A ring of 10 Russian moles right out of a Cold War spy novel was smashed yesterday — and among those busted was a flame-haired, 007-worthy beauty who flitted from high-profile parties to top-secret meetings around Manhattan.

Russian national Anna Chapman — a 28-year-old divorcee with a masters in economics, an online real-estate business, a fancy Financial District apartment and a Victoria’s Secret body — had been passing information to a Russian government official every Wednesday since January, authorities charged.

In one particularly slick spy exchange on St. Patrick’s Day, Chapman pulled a laptop out of a tote bag in a bookstore at Warren and Greenwich streets in the West Village while her handler lurked outside, receiving her message on his own computer, the feds said. A similar exchange occurred at a Midtown coffee shop at 47th Street and 8th Ave.

The FBI claimed the two were corresponding via a secret online network.

Last week, an undercover agent pretending to be a Russian official arranged a meeting to talk about the weekly laptop exchanges, pretending to be ready to send the sexy spy on a mission to deliver a fake passport to another female agent, according to the federal complaint.

"Are you ready for this step?" he asked. "S¤-¤-¤-, yes," Chapman allegedly gushed.

The undercover instructed her on how she would recognize her fellow spy and how to report back on the handoff, the feds said.

"Haven’t we met in California last summer?" the spy expecting the fake passport was supposed to say. Chapman was to respond, "No, I think it was the Hamptons," according to the FBI.

Chapman allegedly was also supposed to hold a magazine under her arm so her counterpart would recognize her, and plant a stamp on a wall map indicate the handoff was a success.

It never took place.

Another spy-movie-like maneuver took place in Brooklyn shortly after the meeting with the undercover agent when Chapman darted into a Verizon phone store to buy a cell using the name Irine Kutsov, and an address of "99 Fake Street," the feds said. She only planned to use the phone to "avoid detection of her conversations," the FBI alleged.

At her arraignment last night, she was held without bail as federal prosecutor Michael Farbiarz called her a "highly trained agent" and a "practiced deceiver."

The other suspects, including four middle-aged couples living seemingly ordinary professional lives, were supplied with bogus names and documents and told by Moscow to become "Americanized," infiltrate "policymaking circles" in the United States and send secrets back to the Kremlin, the feds said.

All allegedly were on deep-cover assignments and schooled in spying tradecraft — from using high-tech methods like digital gadgets to traditional methods like invisible ink, sending encoded radio bursts of data and using innocent-looking "brush-by" encounters to pass documents.

Among the extraordinary allegations detailed in documents filed in Manhattan federal court yesterday:

A senior Russian spy who used the name Christopher Metsos served as a go-between for agents across the country. He buried cash under five inches of dirt in upstate Wurtsboro that was dug up two years later by a Yonkers couple who were members of the ring.

Metsos turned over an orange bag of cash to a Russian government official in May 2004 when they passed one another on a stairway at the Forest Hills, Queens, LIRR stop.

Other handovers and meetings between spies occurred in a Fort Greene, Brooklyn, coffee shop, a Sunnyside, Queens, restaurant and a subway entrance at Columbus Circle, the feds said.

In May 2006, spies based in Boston gave their handlers information about changes at the CIA and about the 2008 presidential election. The information came from a well-connected "former legislative counsel for the US Congress," they told Moscow.

The Boston spies also boasted in 2004 that one of their agents had talks with a US nuclear expert about research on bunker-buster warheads.

A spy in Montclair, NJ, who used the name Cynthia Murphy, told Moscow in February 2009 that she had "several work-related personal meetings" with a prominent New York financier, who was a big campaign fund-raiser and friend of a former Cabinet member.

"Of course, he is a very interesting target," Moscow replied.

Her husband, who used the name Richard Murphy, was told last January how he would be able to identify another spy when he traveled to Rome to get a bogus Irish passport.

"Excuse me, could we have met in Malta in 1999?" he was told to ask.

If the contact was legitimate, he would reply, "Yes, indeed I was in La Valetta, but in 2000."

But if his contact was carrying a copy of Time magazine in his left hand, it was a signal that the meeting was in danger, according to the instructions from Moscow.

"You were sent to USA for long-term service trip," one message said. "Your education, bank accounts, car, house etc. — all these serve one goal: fulfill your main mission, i.e. to search and develop ties in policymaking circles in US and [send] intels."

The court documents also reveal day-to-day travails of the spy business.

Last March, two of the suspects were watched as they met at a payphone at DeKalb and Vanderbilt avenues in Brooklyn. They went from there to a coffee house for a long chat. One alleged agent complained about the computer Moscow had given him.

"They don’t understand what we go through over here," he kvetched.

Before they left, one spy gave the other a package believed to contain cash, the feds said.

Moscow Center, the infamous headquarters of Russian intelligence going back decades, closely monitored how much it was spending. In one message, it listed all the expenses for two Boston spies, including $8,500 for rent, $160 for telephone and $180 for a car lease.

The Yonkers spies, meanwhile, struggled financially, and after one of them flew to an unidentified South American country to collect eight bags each packed with $10,000, he used some of it to pay off nearly $8,000 in back taxes to the country and city, the FBI said.

Neighbors of the suspects were stunned.

The two Montclair "Murphys" moved to the neighborhood about a year ago and were described by one neighbor as very normal. "They were suburbia personified," he said. Near the crowded, book-filled Yonkers home of suspect Vicky Pelaez — an op-ed columnist for El Diario — and another defendant, Juan Lazaro, neighbors were stunned.

One, Ellen Shaffren, said that the couple had lived there 12 to 15 years and that one of their two sons is a piano prodigy.

Shaffren said Lazaro was an economics professor.

Two other defendants, Michael Zottoli and Patricia Mills, were arrested at their residence in Arlington, Va.

Mikhail Semenko, was busted Sunday at his home in Arlington.

Donald Howard Heathfield and Tracey Lee Ann Foley, were arrested at their Boston residence Sunday.

Outside their home near Harvard Square, local residents said the couple never quite fit in the offbeat neighborhood.

"There was no interaction," said neighbor Lila Hexner. "Everything was very nondescript."

Metsos, who apparently was able to enter the United States repeatedly over several year, is not in custody.

Each of the 10 arrested was charged with conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison on conviction.

Nine were charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering, which carries a maximum 20 years in prison.

Additional reporting by Perry Chiaramonte, Erin Calabrese, Rebecca Rosenberg and Doug Montero in New York and Marcia Harrison in Boston

The announcement that the brand new 23 mile long ‘silver line’ that metro will construct for the bargain price of $1.63 billion has made DC all a twitter. Personally, it leaves me less than thrilled.

While the inception of the Silver Line carries with it the ability to schlep my pedestrian ass out to Tysons Corner – a luxury once reserved for the vehicle owning and/or ride-mooching residents of DC – thus multiplying potential opportunities to ‘stimulate’ the economy exponentially, this is hardly the most efficient use of funds designed to ‘enhance’ the lives of DC residents.

Does anyone else feel deprived on a daily basis that by the fact that they are currently unable to get to Dulles by means other than the super shuttle, taxi, or bus??? Trust me, there are many things that keep me up at night. Greater accessibility to Dulles is NOT one of them.

Even if Dulles were located in Silver Spring, I would prefer DCA. It’s closer to DC, lines are shorter, security is more efficient for the frequent flyers among us, terminals within walkable distance of each other and accessed without the use of a little space-like pod from the first terminal to the next. If these weren’t enough reasons to make the average DC Metro rider shake their heads at this mammoth and in my estimation COMPLETELY UNESSARY project, the following are:

 SCARLETT'S TOP TEN WAYS TO BETTER SPEND $1.63 BILLION IMPROVING THE LIVES OF DC AREA RESIDENTS:

 #10. Homeless Shelters. Invest the money in more homeless shelters to house/care for/rehabilitate the residents of McPherson Square/Dupont Circle/Franklin Park/ 15^th St so they’ll stop bugging me every time I walk out of my local Starbucks or the Dupont CVS.

#9. Projects in Progress. Finish what you start. Now I’m no I-95 road warrior, but I do venture out on a Zip Car from time to time. Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t there several highway construction projects around Alexandria, The Woodrow Wilson Bridge, and various traffic jam issues that should be finished/fixed before creating a brand new mess???

#8. Clean up the Potomac. ‘Nuff Said.

#7. Reduce Tolls/Metro Fare. As I understand it, the poor car drivers that caravan up and down the Dulles toll-road will help in footing this bill through increased tolls. That HARDLY seems fair seeing as how it’s the people with CARS who will NOT be utilizing the Silver Line as they, well….DRIVE places instead of metro. Most car owners love their vehicles – good luck in convincing them that lugging their to-be checked and carried on luggage through the beautiful efficiency that is the DC metro rail system  the better way to go to the airport.

#6. Invest in more busses. Ever morning, without fail, I wait for the bus. 10, 15, twenty minutes in either the freezing cold or dreadfully humid air (take your pic as DC weather is in one way or another abysmal 85% of the year). Take the money, buy some more busses (of which the majority are now eco friendly), pay some more bus drivers and put some more busses on the road because unless you’re riding the 42 line, chances are you’re waiting a while for a bus).

#5. Fix/keep the tracks already in place in working order. Every single weekend, without fail I, and hundreds of DC residents and tourists flocking to the nation’s capital, are inconvenienced by ‘routine track maintenance’ causing 20, 30 or in some cases 40 minute intervals between trains leading to inevitable overcrowding, pushing, shoving, and all around unhappy people. Especially when these people are waiting on outdoor platforms in the freezing winter air.

#4. Replace Outdated Metro Cars. Continue the process of replacing the metro cars that are still sporting orange carpet circa 1973 with the newer, carpetless and more efficient (in terms of passenger capacity) metro cars.

#3. The National Mall. Take the $1.6 Billion and grow some grass, clean monuments, plant flowers – beautify one of the most historic and recognizable symbols of American democracy, legacy and history. Put in a irrigation system in the summer to keep the grass from being singed like a piece of hair on a curling iron in the summer, keep the reflecting pool..well….reflecting instead of a murky mess.

#2. Metro Stops. There has yet to be a convenient metro stop in Georgetown, Adams Morgan, or a more efficient way to go from Cleveland Park to Columbia Heights without traveling via China Town! Ever thought of making actual DC neighborhoods more metro accessible before making Bumble-Fuck Virginia easier to get to!? Hell, my friends can’t even get me to go out in ARLINGTON, let alone travel to Reston!

And the #1 way to better spend $1.63 Billion than a metro line to Dulles Airport....(drum roll please.....)

#1. Law Enforcement. While the DC crime rate has dropped like a stone since its peak in the mid 90s, violent crime was reported to be more than three time the national average of 466.9 reported offenses per 100,000 people in 2007.  Spend the $1.63 billion on more police officers, their salaries and benefits. Not being killed/raped/assaulted is of FAR greater value to me than riding the metro out to Dulles.

Could someone please point out the silver line-ing to this monstrous project? If you disagree, I’d LOVE to hear why.

Frankly,

Instead of regaling you with tales of my date with Irish on Friday (i.e. the BEST SEX of my LIFE) – I've chosen to add a few opinions and commentary on last night's Oscar celebration. After all, what kind of pop-culture obsessed, aspiring bitchy fashionista would I be if I didn’t give you a play by play of the red carpet??

There I was, watching all of the glitz, the glam, the extensions…in tres fabulous homebody mode in boxer shorts, a grey, faded U of M sweatshirt, my favorite pink, fuzzy slippers and the perfect accessory: a freshly popped bottle of champange. What more could a girl want, right? Well, I'll tell you. I WANT TO WEAR A PRETTY DRESS and spend hours having my hair done, my makeup professionally applied, my nails manicured, spray tan applied and my own personal fashion consultant!!!!

Sigh. Pout.

But even in the far more subdued glamour style of fuzzy slippers I still felt compelled to provide a stream of conscious-type commentary.

The Oscars: The Good

Of course the Oscars bring out the beautiful people of the silver screen - however - watching all of these just incredibly stunning women makes me just want to give up!

Penelope – you looked AMAZING!!! While I prefer you in your signature black dress, you looked equally alluring in your pale shaded ball gown. Equally poised was your acceptance speech. Bravo.

Natalie Portman – I frequently reel over her performance in "Closer", but she is just such a perpetually stunning woman.  

Kate Winslet – Congrats to you, Kate with your Academy Award and thank you for giving us girls with curves something to aspire to (i.e. not size negative 4). Also, hands down my favorite dress of the night (with Reese Witherspoon coming in at a close second). Apparently the one shoulder statement was tres en vogue this year. I’ll have to remember that for my next black tie event….of course by the time that comes around – who knows!?

Angelina: YES YES for the green jewelry with the black dress. Understated. Classic. Bravo.

Jen: GOOD FOR YOU! Way to walk on stage looking stunning directly in front of your ex and the women that he left you for. I know I personally could not do it with your grace and poise no matter now many millions of people were watching. Then again they were on a 7 second delay and who knows WHAT went on in the theatre while they were rolling the animation clips. What do you think Brad was thinking as he watched her? Hm.

Incidentally – did you see the RED!? Yea for the comeback of the red dress, Amy Adams, Heidi Klum and several others!!!

The Frightful

Courtesey of PinkNic - I thought this was a fun little quote for Friday (even if it IS about pink instead of red). I've been thinking a lot about belief and so its appropriate.

Hopefully by now, I will have landed safely in the UK. If not, I'm tredding water or floating on a piece of twisted steel somewhere over the general direction of Titanic wreckage in the middle of the North Atlantic. Either way, have a lovely weekend!

"I believe in pink. I believe that laughing is the best calorie burner. I believe in kissing, kissing a lot. I believe in being strong when everything goes wrong. I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe that tomorrow is another day, and I believe in miracles"
-Audrey Hepburn

I have been on the phone with U.S. Airways for the past 90 Minutes and I may or may not be going home for Christmas due not to the blizzards flurrying around the country - but MECHANICAL DIFFICULTIES!! Un-fucking believeable.

I want to cry.

Anyone feel like praying for a Christmas miracle for moi?

All I need is a great big bow on my ass....as if it could get any bigger!