Lobotomy By the Boot

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1335465/Steven-Cloaks-forehead-removed-drunken-attack-Jack-Hobbs.html

This sickening picture shows the result of a drink-crazed attack by a thug of 16.

Steven Cloak ended up with half his forehead missing after he was punched to the ground and booted in the skull.

Attacker Jack Hobbs, drunk on sambuca and beer, claimed his victim bumped into him outside a takeaway then "looked at him".

Steven, 26, was left with massive head and brain injuries.

attacker Jack Hobbs

Surgeons were forced to remove a huge piece of forehead to treat the damage.

Pictures taken after the op were so shocking a judge ruled they would prejudice Hobbs' trial.

But Steven's family took their own and have now released them to show how drunken violence ruins lives. Steven, who had a titanium plate fitted to rebuild his head, is recovering after the attack in Bideford, North Devon.

Hobbs, now 17, faces up to ten years' detention after being convicted of grievous bodily harm. An Exeter Crown Court judge lifted a ban on identifying the thug because of his age as he remanded him in custody for pre-sentence reports.

Hobbs told the jury: "I noticed him looking at me. I thought he was going to hit me."

But prosecutor David Evans said: "The truth is he was fired up on drink and playing the hardman."

The family of jobless Steven, who can't remember the attack, said: "He hasn't a violent bone in his body. All this because someone thought he'd been given a look."

VIDEO: Winter Fun! 3 Crazy Swedes on Sleds Being Pulled by a Jet Plane

JOKE: A guy gets pulled over by a cop

A guy cruises thru a stop sign and gets pulled over by a local policeman. Guy hands the cop his driver's license, insurance verification, plus his concealed carry permit.

"Okay, Mr. Smith," the cop says, "I see your CCW permit. Are you carrying today?"

"Yes, I am."

"Well then, better tell me what you got."

Smith says, "Well, I got a .357 Ruger in my inside coat pocket. There's a 9mm Glock in the glove box. And, I've got a .38 Charter Arms Undercover in my right boot."

"Okay," the cop says. "Anything else?"

"Yeah, back in the trunk, there's an Colt AR15 and a Mossberg Cruiser 12 gauge. That's about it."

"Mr. Smith, are you on your way to or from a gun range...?"

"Nope."

"Well then, what are you afraid of...?"

"Not a damn thing..."

Diver plunges 100 meters, unassisted on one breath, to set world record

William Trubridge on Monday accomplished what had long been regarded as an impossible feat: swimming to a depth of 100 meters, or 328 feet, on a single breath and with only hands and feet for propulsion.

The New Zealander did not use swim fins; he wore no weights and required no heavy sled during the descent. Nor did he use an inflatable airbag to swiftly reach the surface after his dive.

Rather, he set a new unassisted freediving record and achieved the historic 100-meter mark -- previously attained only in an assisted manner, with weighted sleds and airbags -- while wearing only a thin wetsuit and displaying remarkable power of mind over body.

"It's different than when you use sleds and airbags," Trubridge said of a his dive, made at Dean's Blue Hole in the Bahamas. "Because when you turn around at 100 meters and start swimming back to the surface with just your hands and feet, it can be a little bit daunting because of how much water you have over your head."

A diver cannot always see the surface at 328 feet. It's more than three times deeper than what's considered safe for recreational scuba divers, who must ascend from any significant depth at a painstakingly slow pace to avoid developing embolisms in the bloodstream, associated with breathing compressed air.

Trubridge held his breath for 4 minutes, 10 seconds, from start to finish. In reaching 100 meters he matched a depth first attained by a freediver in 1976, when Jacques Mayol completed his dive using a weighted sled and inflatable airbag. Mayol's exploits were legendary. The Frenchman was portrayed in the 1988 adventure movie "The Big Blue," which delved into the obscure sport of freediving.

Trubidge's accomplishment, however, reveals how far breath-hold diving has evolved, and to what extreme the human body and mind are capable of coping. At 100 meters, lungs fill with blood as a natural means of preventing their collapse. The heart rate slows to the point where a diver can become disoriented, feeling either sleepy or euphoric.

Man says he was thrown out of court because of his hair

A Mississippi man claims his unique and festive hairstyle got him kicked out of a courtroom. "I don't like looking like nobody else," Bobby Todd said

Todd's head-turning style features braids, spiked pony tails and even a holiday greeting shaved in back. But he said his look caused a stir at Southaven Traffic Court last week. "The bailiff said you can't come in here with your hair like that," Todd said. "I was like 'What are you saying?' He said 'I told you that last time. My captain didn't like how your hair was.' I said 'How is a black man supposed to wear his hair?' He asked me to leave."

Todd said he never got to the courtroom and was kicked out for his festive locks. "It shouldn't be a problem at all," he said. "I'm going in there to conduct business. You got people murdering, killing, doing all kinds of stuff and you want to pinpoint my hair. I just think it's wrong."

Court officials would not discuss the incident. A dress code is posted outside the courtroom, but it says nothing about hair. Todd said he usually adds ornaments and lights to his hair, but didn't on Friday because he was going to court.

Indian man becomes woman to get a job

Poverty has forced a 24-year-old youth to turn himself into a woman. The youth, a native of Vaddera Colony in the mandal, underwent a sex change operation in Mumbai and returned home recently.

"My family members were shocked and cried for two days when I informed them about the sex change operation," Kondapalli Shankar aka Ankita said. Shankar went under the scalpel six months ago in a Mumbai hospital.

But what made Shankar transform himself into a woman? He said acute poverty and humiliation by neighbors forced him to migrate to Mumbai in search of livelihood. "Nobody gives a job to a man. So I had decided to become a woman and earn money," he said. "My immediate priority is to earn money and bail out my poor family from the severe financial problems," he said.

Shankar lost his father Ramchander when he was a small child, and could not pursue education, which made it difficult for him to get any job. He disappeared from the village a year ago. "It took two months for us to trace him out. We were worried when he didn't call us immediately," his brother Purushotham, a daily wage laborer, said. Ankita, attired in a colourful sari and bangles, says she now earns Rs 3,000 a month/$66 USD at a small firm in Mumbai.