7/22: Morning Communique

THESE DAYS

A prominent eating disorder expert, Lisa G. Berzins, who collapsed in a supermarket after allegedly inhaling propellant from whipped cream cans, applied for a special form of probation Thursday.

Multiple sclerosis patients in Canada with constant tingling pain can get a doctor's prescription for a new drug, Sativex, derived from the marijuana plant.

Was ABC's craptacularly successful reality show Dancing With The Stars rigged to prop up winner Kelly Monaco's struggling daytime soap General Hospital? Seinfeld footnote and second place contestant John O'Hurley thinks so, as does a source close to the show.

MINNESOTA BLOG OF THE DAY

Scooter lives in Eagan and is a lead developer for a legal company. His commentary on political and religious news can be found at A Nod to Nothing.

TIME WASTERS

Benny Hill theme/50 Cent mash-up.

This week's screed at Avery Ant and His One Minute Rant is about Karl Rove. Not bad, but goes down hill after the initial Bush twins joke.

FREEDOM OF SPEECH

"If [Scholastic] had printed the book on 100 percent recycled paper, its 10.8-million print run could have saved 217,475 trees."

-- Pamela Wellner, a Greenpeace senior campaigner in San Francisco, who's organization had joined other conservation groups in calling for a boycott of the U.S. edition of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince because it wasn't printed on recycled paper