Friday, January 30, 2004

this is why i don't...

internet date!

Google date test 'nets US fugitive'

A suspected US fraudster on the run for a year has reportedly been caught after a woman checked his name on the Google website before meeting him for a date.
LaShawn Pettus-Brown was wanted in Ohio for allegedly siphoning off city funds from restoration projects.

The woman found his name on an FBI arrest warrant after using the Google search engine and contacted authorities, local media reported.

Analysts say using web engines to check people's credentials is now common.

'Good tip'

The woman, who has not been identified, told the Federal Bureau of Investigation that she was meeting Mr Pettus-Brown in a New York City restaurant last Friday evening, Cincinnati news channel WLWT reported.

Mr Pettus-Brown showed up to meet his date only to be greeted by several FBI agents, not the woman of his dreams.

"We had surveillance there to see if the tip was good and, lo and behold, the tip was good," FBI spokesman Jim Turgal told the Cincinnati Enquirer newspaper.

He is currently being held in New York City but will be returned to Cincinnati, Ohio, to face the fraud charges, law officials said.

Mr Pettus-Brown was wanted in connection with a failed plan to rehabilitate a 90-year-old theatre in Cincinnati's city centre, the paper said.

The city is said to have lost more than $180,000 after investing in the project and the FBI told the newspaper that more than $90,000 paid to Mr Pettus-Brown is missing.

The use of the Google search engine to check out prospective dates has become so common that the company name has become a verb - "to Google".

However, because the company name is trademarked it has not been included in any official dictionary.

full story here

Thursday, January 15, 2004

nye

take a look at our pics from nye....the papparazzi was following us again. damn them!

click here to see photos

Tuesday, January 06, 2004

Tussin! Its not just for Teens.

Teens Still Getting High on Cough Remedy - By Daniel DeNoon (WebMd)

Jan. 5, 2004 -- It's not new. It's not illegal. And when abused as a recreational drug, it's not safe.

Generations of teens have used the cough suppressant dextromethorphan to get high. And every year, according to the U.S. government statistics, thousands of users end up in emergency rooms.

Users call it DXM or dex. It's an ingredient in more than 125 over-the-counter cough and cold remedies. Some of the more popular ones have their own drug-culture nicknames: "C-C-C" (Coricidin HBP Cough & Cold tablets), for example, or "robo" (Robitussin). Other nicknames include "candy," "skittles," and "red devils."

What does it do? The intoxicating effect is similar, but much less intense, to the effects of PCP and LSD, says Ronald Strong, supervisor of the national drug threat assessment unit at the U.S. National Drug Intelligence Center (NDIC).

"PCP and LSD as hallucinogens are far more potent than DXM," Strong tells WebMD. "But the effects you would get from what these kids are taking is similar."

The side effects are much less fun, notes Ilene B. Anderson, PharmD, associate clinical professor at the University of California, San Francisco, School of Pharmacy and senior toxicology management specialist for California's poison control system.

"The primary effects are nausea, vomiting, feeling dizzy and lightheaded -- kids taking DXM can become drowsy and can look like they are drunk," Anderson tells WebMD. "They have dilated pupils, increased heart rate and blood pressure, and they can have hallucinations. Many patients also are agitated. And the potential is there for seizures, although these are uncommon."

Here, There, and Everywhere

When used as directed, DXM is good medicine, says Deborah Mitchell, an intelligence analyst at the NDIC. It acts on the brain's cough center to relieve the misery of nagging, unproductive coughing. That's why it's included in so many cough and cold products.

And those products are everywhere. You can buy them at your local drug store. You can get them over the Internet. Many pharmacies make no effort to keep children from buying these products.

Normal doses of the drug range up to 30 mg, which is the highest potency available on the market. That's the amount in Coricidin HBP Cough & Cold tablets, and also the dose in DexAlone Maximum Strength Cough Suppressant liquid gelcaps.

Anderson notes that the dose needed for a hallucinatory effect is about 400 to 500 mg. That's about 15 doses of the high-strength DXM products. These huge doses of DXM are bad enough. But as most DXM products contain other medicines, abusers risk overdoses of other serious medicines. These include the antihistamine chlorpheniramine and/or pain reliever acetaminophen. Overdoses of these drugs can be extremely dangerous and cause lasting damage.