Month: February 2017

Some lawn ornament thieves target pink flamingos, but a man in rural North Carolina set his sights on a much bigger bird. He’s been accused of using a tractor to steal a 1000-pound concrete chicken statue, the Statesville Record & Landmark reports.

Alexander County police believe that Andrew Emilious Justice of Taylorsville, North Carolina, stole the lawn ornament, which is more than 3 feet tall, from a poultry farm last weekend. On February 16, authorities apprehended Justice and charged him with felony larceny and misdemeanor injury to real property.

Nobody quite knows what may have motivated Justice to commit such a cocky crime. But we do know that in addition to being massive, the statue was also expensive: It cost $1100 and was a birthday gift from the poultry farm’s owner to his wife, NPR reports.

The chicken statue stood on the farm until it mysteriously disappeared overnight, between February 11 and February 12. Police found the base several miles away, but the statue was still missing; they later discovered broken pieces of the statue scattered along the road. Authorities also located a tractor believed to belong to Justice that had white paint on its forks (presumably from the rooster statue).

Justice is scheduled to appear in court on Monday. In addition to larceny and property damage, he also faces a charge of reckless driving: When arriving to meet police, the accused thief reportedly sped off the state highway and into the driveway, proving that there’s more than one way to run a-fowl of the law. 

[h/t Atlas Obscura]

“At 22:00 precisely the windows open and the screaming begins,” says an Uppsala University webpage covering “academic traditions.”

The line is referring to a local phenomenon that’s been taking place in a specific area of the Flogsta neighborhood of Uppsala, Sweden, since at least the ’80s, and possibly as early as the ’70s. The locals call it the Flogsta Scream, and it’s pretty simple: At the same time every night, a bunch of people lean out of their windows and scream.

The Scream isn’t restricted to only students, of course—or even to Flogsta, for that matter. The Lappkärrsberget residential area near Stockholm University has a neighborhood scream as well, known as the Lappkärr Cry, while Lund University students in the Delphi neighborhood of Lund, Sweden, participate in the Delphi Roar. (Other names include the Tuesday Scream—Lappkärrsberget screams on Tuesdays only—and Elvavrålet, or “the eleven roar,” for the version in Lund, which happens at 11 p.m.) Vuvuzelas (the plastic horns often found at South African soccer games) are incorporated in some versions as well. The screams generally last between one and two minutes, but they vary on a case-by-case basis. Some can last up to 10 minutes.

The lore behind this strange tradition varies as well. Some say that—at least in the case of Flogsta—the practice was started by students in the physics department at Uppsala who needed to let off stress and angst during exam season; others say it was begun as a memorial to a student who killed himself.

It doesn’t necessarily happen every night, either. Arvid Cederholm, who lived in Flogsta in the early 2000s, told mental_floss, “I don’t remember it being every evening, but rather if someone started it, others joined in. The angst wasn’t a very pronounced part of it, I feel. It was more of a fun thing than an angsty thing.”

Experienced the Flogsta scream for the first time tonight, I’m a true Uppsala student now

— Marion is a loser (@MultiSuperM) January 28, 2017

I always forget about the flogsta scream and I’ll just be watching netflix or studying or w/e and just hear people screaming and freak out

— indy (@indyea) February 15, 2017

Back in late 2014, the Flogsta scream received a small burst of attention on the internet thanks to a Reddit thread and a subsequent post on MTV’s website. Amid the swirl, the story somehow changed from “people collectively scream out of their windows at 10 p.m. in certain areas in Sweden” to “you can scream out of your window anywhere in Sweden and people will scream back.” There was so much misinformation circulating surrounding the Flogsta scream that Snopes finally wrote a piece about it in order to set the facts straight. (They also noted that similar practices aren’t unknown on U.S. campuses.)

So just to be clear: This doesn’t happen everywhere across Sweden, only in Uppsala, Lund, or Stockholm, and only on specific university campuses. You can’t just show up in, say, downtown Gothenburg, start screaming, and expect folks to join you. You will just annoy the Swedes. Definitely don’t do this.

But if you happen to find yourself at the right Swedish university around 10 (or 11) at night and you’re feeling brave, it might be worth a shot. Maybe wait for someone else to start screaming first, though. Just in case.

California is bracing for a life-threatening and potentially historic storm today, February 17, with the arrival of some of the nastiest weather to hit the state in many years. Conditions will go downhill in a hurry through the day as the dreary slog of driving rains, gusty winds, and intense mountain snows blankets the Golden State to begin the weekend.

The latest forecasts from the National Weather Service paint a bleak picture for California and its sprawling countryside. A sustained thump of heavy rain will cover the state during the day on Friday, but the system will begin to pick up steam as it approaches shore closer to nightfall. Heavy rain and strong winds don’t seem like too big of a deal to most of us around the country, but California, with its population of around 39 million, is home to more people than 22 other states combined. Any major weather event that affects such a large segment of the population will create huge problems, especially in such a disaster-prone region of the country.

 
Several inches of rain are possible just about everywhere in California save for the mountains, where the precipitation will fall as many feet of snow, and the southern half of the Central Valley, where the Coast Ranges will block rain from reaching the low-lying center of the state in a phenomenon known as a rain shadow. The heaviest rain will fall in southern California near Los Angeles, where up to six inches of rain are possible in the more intense showers and thunderstorms that develop.

Rainfall totals could reach record territory in L.A., where this storm could make today one of the 10 wettest days ever recorded at Los Angeles International Airport, and it could come close to the top of the list in downtown L.A. The storm system causing all of the trouble could rank among some of the strongest low-pressure systems ever recorded off the coast of California; some weather models are predicting a minimum central pressure lower than 990 millibars—a pressure you’d expect to find in a weak hurricane.

Flash flooding will be a major concern in areas that experience sustained heavy rainfall. The National Weather Service’s latest assessment of the flash flood risk in California shows that rainfall rates of only around one inch of rain per hour could lead to flash flooding. The threat for flooding from this storm is compounded by multiple factors that many other parts of the United States don’t have to worry about, including rough terrain, burned ground from wildfires, and the fact that the soil is still recovering from the years-long drought that’s just now starting to wane. These natural factors, in addition to urban sprawl, limit how quickly rainwater can run off into sewage systems and natural waterways.

Areas that suffered under an immense drought for most of the past decade wished for rain every winter, but this winter’s steady rains have been too much of a good thing. Not only do residents now have to worry about flash flooding and mudslides, but folks who live downstream of the Oroville Dam have some extra concerns. Recent rains pushed Lake Oroville, situated north of Sacramento, California, beyond its capacity, sending water cascading down its two spillways. Tens of thousands of people had to evacuate last week when the dam’s emergency spillway came perilously close to failing due to water eroding the soil and rock near the structure. The lake’s water level has slowly receded in the days since, but this rainstorm could push water back to the same dangerous level we saw just a couple of days ago.

Decades ago, cosmetic enhancement entered a new and lucrative era with the emergence of Botox, a botulinum toxin that paralyzes muscles to erase visible signs of aging.

In 2017, Botox is still as popular as ever. And now, a new process that addresses a different portion of the cosmetic surgery industry is quickly gaining ground—one that can freeze and kill off fat cells without injections or anesthesia. It’s been trademarked by one company as CoolSculpting, and those concerned about areas of unwanted fat believe it’s the next big thing in cosmetic enhancement.

In a huge industry vote of confidence, pharmaceutical company Allergan Plc agreed to pay $2.48 billion this week for Zeltiq, the company behind CoolSculpting. Also known as “body contouring,” medical professionals take an instrument and place it over fatty tissue for approximately 35 to 60 minutes (treatment length will vary by procedure). Freezing temperatures attack the fat cells, up to 20 percent of which die off and are then eliminated by the body within weeks.

Because the procedure is non-invasive and doesn’t require the downtime of a surgical intervention like a tummy tuck or liposuction, patients are usually under no restrictions and can resume normal activity quickly. It’s typically used for the abdominal area and under the buttocks.

According to Bloomberg, CoolSculpting and similar efforts are catching on because the patient can pay in cash, eliminating insurance hassles—cosmetic intervention isn’t usually covered—and practitioners can collect up to $4000 per treatment. If patients are happy with the results, they’re likely to return for more, or opt for further refinement with Botox and other methods.

Allergan is betting CoolSculpting will be a huge portion of the body contouring market that’s expected to grow to $10.5 billion by 2020. And they should know: Allergan also owns Botox.

[h/t Bloomberg]

Coffee guru Alfred Peet opened his first coffee bean shop in Berkeley, California just over 50 years ago, effectively launching a caffeine-fueled revolution. Considered the grandfather of the American gourmet coffee movement, his eponymous coffee shops are now found across the country.

1. FOUNDER ALFRED PEET WAS INVOLVED IN THE TEA AND COFFEE BUSINESS SINCE HIS CHILDHOOD.

Born in the Netherlands in 1920, Peet grew up assisting his father at the family’s small coffee roastery. In his teens, he worked in London as an apprentice at a coffee and tea company, and he later traveled to Indonesia as a tea taster in the early 1950s.

2. PEET WAS AGHAST AT WHAT AMERICANS CONSIDERED “COFFEE.”

Seeking new grounds, Peet moved to San Francisco in 1955. At the time however, America was known for drinking coffee that tasted like “dishwater,” according to Jim Reynolds, a longtime ambassador for Peet’s brand (he holds the title of Roastmaster Emeritus). “I came to the richest country in the world, so why are they drinking the lousiest coffee?” Mr. Peet asked himself, and he set out to do something about it.

Hoping to replace the black sludge in Americans’ mugs with premium, imported coffee beans, Peet opened his first store on the corner of Walnut and Vine streets in Berkeley, California in 1966.

3. THE FIRST DEVOTEES OF THE STORE WERE CALLED “PEETNIKS.”

The neighborhood around Peet’s soon gained a reputation as a place where one could find high-quality food. Nicknamed “the Gourmet Ghetto” by the late 1970s, the first foodies flocked to artisanal cheese and chocolate shops in the area, which became known as the breeding ground for socially conscious California cuisine. And Peet’s Coffee was right in the thick of it from the beginning. The brand’s cult following began calling themselves Peetniks, and the company still uses the term today for their customer loyalty program.

4. PEET IS CREDITED WITH STARTING THE HIGH-END COFFEE REVOLUTION IN AMERICA.

Soon, everyone was talking about the new coffee coming out of Peet’s store, including three men who would later start a small coffee shop in Seattle (but more on that later). “Everybody was drinking coffee that came out of a can, but Alfred was a purist rooted in the European tradition,” Alice Waters, the chef of influential Gourmet Ghetto eatery Chez Panisse, told The New York Times. “He taught us a new way to look at food, wine, and coffee—paying attention to the preparation, the ritual, and understanding how the beans and ingredients were grown.”

5. STARBUCKS FOUNDER JERRY BALDWIN LEFT AND THEN RETURNED TO PEET’S.

Jerry Baldwin started his career in the coffee business scooping beans at Peet’s. When he and his two friends Gordon Bowker and Zev Siegel decided to open their own coffee shop in Seattle in 1971, they initially sourced all their green coffee beans (the beans they’d later roast) from Peet himself. “All of my early coffee knowledge came from Alfred and what we learned there,” Baldwin told Fortune last year.

But in 1984, while running his own growing coffee company, Baldwin learned Peet’s Coffee was up for sale. In a decision he says was a no-brainer, he bought Peet’s, and then three years later sold Starbucks (at this point, both Bowker and Siegel had already left the company) to current CEO Howard Schultz. Baldwin still sits on the Board of Directors of Peet’s.

6. PEET’S AND STARBUCKS ONCE HAD A NON-COMPETE AGREEMENT OVER THE BAY AREA.

As part of the deal between Baldwin and Schultz, Starbucks agreed it would not open a franchise on Peet’s home turf for the first five years. But, when that agreement expired in 1992, Schultz immediately bought space and opened a Starbucks right next door to a San Francisco Peet’s. Baldwin was furious, but Peet’s continued to thrive, and the two locations on Chestnut Street in the Marina District are both still open.

7. WHEN PEET’S ANNOUNCED IT WAS BEING BOUGHT BY A PRIVATE COMPANY, EVERYONE ASSUMED THE COMPANY WAS STARBUCKS.

After 11 years of being publicly traded on the Nasdaq, Peet’s was bought by a German conglomerate for nearly $1 billion in 2012—not by the company everyone thought would be Peet’s highest bidder. Joh. A. Benckiser, the current owner, also has majority stakes in OPI Nail Polish, Jimmy Choo, and Caribou Coffee.

8. PEET’S HOLDS A NATIONAL BARISTA COMPETITION FOR ITS EMPLOYEES EACH YEAR.

After making it through district and regional competitions, top-notch baristas are invited to compete in a national competition where they are judged on technical quality and taste. Contestants are given 15 minutes to prepare three drinks for the panel of four judges: an espresso, a cappuccino, and a signature beverage.

9. COFFEE LOYALISTS WERE CONCERNED AT THE COMPANY’S BUYING SPREE IN 2015.

After joining forces with Mighty Leaf Tea in August 2014, Peet’s acquired both Portland, Oregon cold brew darling Stumptown and Chicago’s super-premium coffee company Intelligentsia Coffee in October 2015. The caffeine addicts of the Twitter universe voiced their concerns over the mergers, with hits such as “Dear @Intelligentsia, please don’t lose your soul.” Both brands, however, remain independently run and their founders (both of whom got their start at Peet’s) remain active in operations.