Russian bears are among the large and growing number of species that have been observed to learn new techniques and teach them to conspecifics.  In the Russian Republic of Komi (Респу́блика Ко́ми), a scorching summer has led to a shortage of traditional food, leading bears to venture further into human habitation.

Bears dig very well.  And one bear learned a useful trick, which he or she taught to the other bears.  Namely, how to open a coffin.  Thus a new phenomenon: Arctic bears visiting village cemeteries at night, digging up fresh(ish) graves, and eating the well-refrigerated contents.

A representative of World Wildlife Fund’s Russian branch was quoted as saying  “The story is horrible.  Nobody wants to think about having a much-loved member of their family eaten by a bear.”

Huh.  Is that a given?

For the record:  If any reader is in the position of some day having to dispose of my remains, then after transplant surgeons, research scientists, and a wig-making charity are done salvaging anything of potential use, you have my explicit permission to feed anything left to a starving bear.  I could not be more serious.

Of course, the claim is that no one wants to think about a family member being eaten by a bear, and this doesn’t contradict that.  But if you use as a criterion whether I would be OK with my lifeless corpse being used to save the life of a wild animal?  Please know I would be.

UNIX/Linux trick with sed:  To strip blank lines off the end of all PHP files, recursively, starting in the current directory, use this script:

find . -name '*.php' -exec sed -i -e :a -e '/^\n*$/{$d;N;ba' -e '}' '{}' \;

This edits files in place.  It changes files.  Caveat.

Credit to @Ace_NoOne at jimbojw, who in turn credits unnamed users at freenode.

Here is the formal mcgees.org privacy policy, in case you didn’t see the link in the sidebar.  It is long, but I think it’s actually useful and readable (perhaps this is a new innovation!), and the key stuff (a handful of sentences) is in bold text.

Hey, that performer Gallagher?  Yeah, that Gallagher?  You’ve got to read this article.

According to the performer, he invented the mosh pit.  Also, there weren’t any amusement park “splash rides” before he started performing thirty years ago.  Performers used to be able to be able to do a two- to three-hour show without a water bottle onstage, but now it’s standard for a performer to have one.  “How is that funny?” he asks.

People don’t know how to behave in public any more (reminder: Gallagher).  And Bill Clinton “ruined oral sex”.  And “Barbara Walters [is] the kind of person you would [want to] have as an anchorperson,” but she didn’t get the job that went to Couric because Walters “doesn’t speak good”.

Comedians need meaning in their acts (yes, seriously, that Gallagher.)  Prop comedy has faded from popularity because comedy now has “an emphasis on the mediocre”.

He’s “pissed” because he “knows he is an “excellent performer”, yet he’s “been excluded from a lot of show business in America”.  But the fact that he’s “still in business 30 years later proves that [his] is the proper way to think about things.”  And he’s happy to express his thoughts because he’s “really not ruining a career that’s not really happening.”

And oh fuck my gun is jammed!  And there are all these salmon left in the barrel!  Well, minnows.  One minnow.  Floating belly up.

I’ve established explicit licenses for content on mcgees.org.  The link also appears (as of this writing) in the “Site” section of the sidebar.

Insectoid aliens attack Earth, but target the insects, both out of racial bias and (rightly?) considering them the apex creatures.  Humanity fights on behalf of them, realizing that if arthropods are eliminated, almost all (or actually all?) terrestrial multicellular life would disappear.