(MSNBC.COM) 22 May 2008:

The American Idol audience brings posters and signs for the show tapings with names of their favorite contestants. One such sign at a recent taping read “Cougars for Cook.” Yes, that’s right, Cougars. Think Demi Moore and any woman of a certain age that would rather be with a man of a much younger age. Think May-December romance except the woman in the relationship is the December.  Soccer moms love David Cook, the latest American Idol winner.  42-year old Linda Sharp from Texas voted 473 times for Cook after his final performance. She said, “The biggest thing: He’s legal, and that goes a long way. He’s 25. That’s old enough that we can openly ogle him, and we can drool over him, and it doesn’t make us feel like we could be his mother.”

(NEW YORK TIMES) 21 April 2008:

A problem not faced by previous generations is now rearing its head. In a double career family, what’s the right time to retire? When the man is ready? The woman? does it even have to be the same time for both?

Given that in the generation now beginning to retire many women didn’t really start careers until the children were older, even until they had left home, it can turn out that 20 years into their career they’re not ready to stop: while the man might have been working 40 years and would love to fold his hand.

It’s going to be interesting to see how it all works out.

(DAILY TELEGRAPH) 17 April 2008:

New research shows that the stereotype of the confused little old lady isn’t all that accurate: it should be the confused little old man. The study found that more men than women in old age had cognitive impairment (memory loss and so on) and that it started at an earlier age as well.

Further proof that men are in fact the weaker sex perhaps. Although it has to be admitted that no wife would be surprised at the result: husbands can never remember anything, can they?

(THE REGISTER) 5 March 2008:

A man in the UK is set to stand trial for harassment using the social networking site Facebook. He is accused of breaking the Harassment Act of 1997 when he used Facebook to contact an ex-girlfriend.

A police spokesperson said, “We have prosecuted harassment cases before where people have sent letters, made phone calls, and even text messages in recent years, but to my knowledge this is the first case where a Web site like Facebook has been involved.”

(CAPE TIMES) 23 January 2008:

A Washington state man has been charged with theft and burglary of over 1000 pairs of panties, bras, and other womens’ undergarments stolen from laundry rooms all over town. He plead guilty and was sentenced to 45 days in jail. Many of the pilfered panties were found in his home.

(MEN’S NEWS DAILY) 17 January 2008:

In Down and Out in London and Paris, George Orwell wrote of his time researching poverty in London and Paris. One of the points he makes about real poverty (that is, absolute poverty, not just relative) is that one of the things a man is starved for is female company.

According to Orwell, there are almost no female “tramps,” almost no women at all on the very lowest rungs of poverty. And as women will very rarely, if ever, “condescend” (as Orwell puts it) to men of a lower economic status than they are, those men who are homeless are left entirely wihout the company of the other sex.

Orwell had spent time in this sort of poverty and described this lack of female companionship as perhaps the most painful deprivation of all.

(THE BELLINGHAM HERALD) 2 January 2008:

In many areas throughout the world, New Year’s Day means a polar bear swim, where mostly men take dips in freezing cold water.

A swimmer in British Columbia swam his last polar bear swim on New Year’s Day 2008.

According to The Bellingham Herald:

“One swimmer in this southeastern British Columbia city died after diving into some rapids.

The man, believed to be between 30 and 40, was not immediately identified Tuesday. His body was found a few hours after he disappeared.

The man was seen and photographed by many in the Gyro Park crowd. He was wearing a large fluorescent green inflatable octopus.

He ran into the water with the other 115 swimmers and then swam out to some rocks just beyond the beach area.

“He climbed up on the rock, took the inflatable off and sat for a minute looking at the water,” said witness Steve McVicar. “He then dove in and we saw him swimming back and forth across the rapids and we wondered what he was doing.”

Within seconds, the man disappeared and didn’t resurface. He never called for help.

A woman on the beach said she saw him kiss the inflatable octopus before he went into the water.”

(KITSAP SUN) 25 December 2007:

A 19-year-old woman who beat up her ex-boyfriend Monday after he drunkenly urinated in a closet told officers she hoped he would bail her out of jail because it was the right thing to do for their baby.

Bremerton police were called to the residence after receiving initial reports that the 25-year-old had assaulted the woman, reports said.

When met by officers, the woman explained that the man had been drinking and was extremely intoxicated when he went to bed. At some point he woke up to use the restroom, but was so confused he urinated in the closet.

“I attacked him,” she told the officer, reports said. “He was so drunk that I beat the (stuff) out of him.”

During the “wrestling,” as the man described it, she “repeatedly” kicked him in the face.

When police arrived, they arrested the 19-year-old woman and booked her into the Kitsap County jail for investigation of fourth-degree assault, third-degree malicious mischief and unlawful imprisonment.

The woman told officers she hoped her ex-boyfriend would come to the jail and bail her out because they “always did what was best for their child,” the report said.

(THE SCOTSMAN)  2 July 2007:

Something rather odd appears to be happening with telephone habits in the UK. Men are now greater users of telephones than women are.

The average man is now on the phone 32 minutes a day, up from 22 five years ago, while the average woman is down to 26 minutes from the previous 35. So the old stereotype of women nattering away seems to have disappeared. Other such has remained though, 70% of men spend most of their time talking about sport, women or money.

Women seem to have replaced many of their previous calls with texts or emails: perhaps this simply shows that women are more literate than men?

(REUTERS) 10 April 2007:

A Saudi Arabian man is currently recovering from having seven stitches in his nose (he also lost a part of it) after his two wives attacked him. He claims that he jokingly suggested that the way to resolve a domestic dispute over the division of the house was that he should take a third wife.  A Saudi man can have up to four wives.

The wives did not see the funny side and then attacked him, leading to his injuries.

His claim now is that the only way he can maintain his dignity is to indeed take that third wife: but he is aware enough to note that he’s not quite sure what he will lose if he does, perhaps more than part of his nose.