Cover by Heidi Larsen

SUMMER 2012

F e a t u r e s

Gain Muscle

Cheat Death

Bounce Back

Go to any gym and you’ll find most guys doing body-part split routines. They’ll train five to six times a week… one muscle a day… going to failure on every set in order to get pumped… and using at least ten isolation exercises per workout to hit each muscle from every angle. I’m sure this sounds familiar to you.

On January 26, 1972 our gal was working an extra shift due to a clerical error. She took the shift anyway to earn a little extra scratch, probably to supplement her bear-wrestling hobby or something. Anyway, some terrorists decided to blow up her plane and succeeded in doing so at the worst possible time, when the plane was really high up in the air.

OK Debt has an interest rate well under 10% -preferably with some tax advantages to boot. In the best case, what you bought with borrowed funds will appreciate in value. They often satisfy the low-rate piece, but automobiles almost never appreciate in value. Bad Debt is everything else -- from your titanium credit card to the 35% loan from Larry’s Kwik Kash.

T h e Fa ct s

Bulls Eye

Gre e n Pla n e t

Li k e t o k n ow the sca r y f a cts a b o u t t h e w orl d you l ive in ? Sh o c k i n g n ew s a bout Hippyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a n d p e a c e sign s.

Wh o k n ow tha t shootin g a n a r row a t a ta rget coul d get yo u a b ran d n ew ca r! Time to s t ar t p rac t icin g.

Now a d a ys, the pl a n et seems t o b e s l ow l y sl ippin g in to a m i s e ra b l e depression . Un til t o d ay w h e n we kil l ed it.

B o u n c in g Ba c k

L o st B oy s

Ha rd l y Hu m a n

It s a b o u t t i me yo u t o o k a h o l d o f yo u r fi na nc e s by t h e h o nc h o s a nd p u mp e d i t i nt o su b mi ssi o n d o nt y a t h i nk ?

T h i s sa d st o r y i s su c h a sa d st o r y, I c a nt e ve n t e l l yo u . And i f i fe l t g o o d e no u g h t o t r y, I mi g h t e nd u p b u ng i ng

So me p e o p l e h a ve e nd u re d g re a t t r i a l s i n t h e i r l i fe wh e n l o o si ng a l i mb... Now g e t a ro b o t i c a r m!

BUCKS

MONEY WITHOUT LIMITS

About time to bust out that credit card! By: Kelly Hipson

hey’re young, rich and seem to have the world at their feet. So what do the latest generation of rock stars spend their money on? Fountains, fancy stoves and security systems, if the hit show MTV Cribs is anything to go by. The show, which goes into its fifth season next month, has generated a loyal following among MTV’s audience of teens and 20-somethings. A Cribs appearance by rock legend Ozzy Osbourne has led to a new show, The Osbourne, which is MTV’s most successful new series in the cable network’s 21-year history. Like its predecessor from the 1980s, Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, Cribs offers a voyeuristic glimpse at the fabulous, over-the-top mansions that stars use to celebrate their success. But unlike the glitzy Lifestyles, the MTV show has a down-home feel, with the aim of giving fans an intimate, personal look at their idols. Fans learn, for instance, that rapper Redman does not make his bed, and that actress Jaime Pressly’s favorite cereal is Froot Loops. The show

to see how they lead their daily lives. Are they different from us? Are they the same as we are? This stuff helps us figure that out.” From the outset, the producers wanted Cribs to feel as much as possible like a personal tour of a star’s home. They decided not to have the show presented by a host, so it would seem more intimate — “as if they were a friend of yours,” says Sirulnick. Each visit starts with the star opening his front door and saying, “Hi, I’m ______. Welcome to my crib.” The stars — mostly rock and hip-hop artists, with the occasional actor or sports star — talk straight into the camera, as if they’re addressing the viewer directly. Using a steadicam to give a fluid feel (“like you the viewer were in fact walking through a room,” says Sirulnick), the Cribs camera then follows the star around his home. The camera takes frequent close-ups of objects, often repeating them, to re-create the

“I think everybody wants to see what other people have,” says Sirulnick. tries to show that celebrities, despite their eight-car garages and custom-built swimming pools, are “just people like everybody else,” says Sirulnick. Cribs always makes a point of going into the stars’ kitchens and looking in their refrigerators. “There is sort of a common denominator element about that,” he says. Cribs appeals to Americans’ fascination with the famous and wealthy, says Leonard Steinhorn, a media professor at American University. “But we also want

TOP DOLLAR WHIPS

Aston Martin One-77 $1,850,000. The name “One-77” says it all: beauty and power in One, limited to 77 units. With 750 hp, it is able to travel from 0 to 60 mph in 3.4 seconds and reaching a maximum speed

of 220 mph.

experience of being somewhere and looking around. Rather than focusing on the material possessions alone, the Cribs producers ask stars to talk about their possessions, why they chose a certain object and what it means to them. Rapper Missy Elliott, for instance, told the show she treasures her autographed photograph of Oprah Winfrey because the talk show host was a role model for her. Some of the stars have the kind of outrageous furnishings one might expect from a rock star: Tommy Lee, former Motley Crue drummer and ex-husband of Pamela Anderson, has a disco in his basement and sex swing in his bedroom, while the hip-hop duo Outkast has a “boom boom room” complete with a stripper’s pole. MTV Cribs and CMT Cribs, depending on which channel it airs, is a franchise reality television program that originated on the MTV Networks’ MTV. It later aired on its CMT channel that features tours of the houses and mansions of celebrities. The first show aired September 2000. By 2005, Cribs had featured tours of the homes of over 185 celebrities, musicians, actors, and athletes over the course of 13 seasons.

Pagani Zonda Clinque Roadster $1,850,000. One of the most exotic cars out there is also one of the most expensive. It can go from 0-60 in 3.4 seconds with a top speed of 217 mph.

Lamborghini Reventon $1,600,000. The most powerful and the most expensive Lamborghini ever built is the third on the list. It takes 3.3 seconds to reach 60 mph and it has a top speed of 211 mph.

Koenigsegg Agera R $1,600,000. The Agera R can burn 0-60 in 2.8 seconds, reaching a maximum speed of 260 mph. It has the parts to reach 270 mph, but the supercar is electronically capped at 235 mph.

FACTS

IMPOSSIBLE MATH A Guy Walks Into a Class...

By: Kelly Hipson

young college student was working hard in an upper-level math course, for fear that he would be unable to pass. On the night before the final, he studied so long that he overslept the morning of the test. When he ran into the classroom several minutes late, he found 3 equations written on the blackboard. The first 2 went rather easily, but the 3rd seemed impossible. He worked frantically on it until - just 10 minutes short of the deadline - he found a method that worked; he finished the problems just as time was called. The student turned in his test paper and left. That evening he received a phone call from his professor. “Do you realise what you did on the test today?” he shouted at the student. “Oh, no,” thought the student. I must not have gotten the problems right after all. “You were only supposed to do the first two problems,” the professor explained. “That last one was an example of an equation that mathematicians since Einstein have been trying to solve without success. I discussed it with the class before starting the test. And you just solved it!” Origins: This legend combines one of the ultimate academic wish-fulfillment fantasies - a student not only proves himself the smartest one in his class, but also bests his professor and every other scholar in his field of study - with a “positive thinking” motif which turns up in other urban legends: when people are free to pursue goals unfettered by presumed limitations on what they can accomplish, they just may manage some extraordinary feats through the combined application of native talent and hard work. And this particular version is all the more interesting for being completely true! One day In 1939, George Bernard Dantzig, a doctoral candidate at the University of California, Berkeley, arrived late for a graduate-level statistics class and found 2 problems written on the board. Not knowing they were examples of “unsolvable” statistics problems, he mistook them for part of a homework assignment, jotted them down, and solved them. (The equations Dantzig tackled are perhaps more accurately described not as unsolvable problems, but as unproved statistical theorems for which he worked out proofs.) weeks later, Dantzig’s statistic professor notified him that he had prepared one of his two “homework” proofs for publication, and Dantzig was given co-author credit on another paper several years later when another mathematician independently worked out the same solution to the 2nd problem. George Dantzig recounted his feat in a 1986 interview for the College Mathematics Journal: It happened because during my first year at Berkeley I arrived late one day at one of [Jerzy] Neyman’s classes. On the blackboard there were two problems that I assumed had been assigned for homework. I copied them down. A few days later I apologised to Neyman

for taking so long to do the homework - the problems seemed to be a little harder than usual. I asked him if he still wanted it. He told me to throw it on his desk. I did so reluctantly because his desk

was covered.

Showing up to class late can be more of a pain then you thin!

ORIGINS

DID YOU KNOW? The Unknowns... By: Kathy Lakner

Toxic Profession t is believed to have come about because hatters in the eighteenth and nineteenth century frequently suffered from mercury poisoning. Mercury is a chemical which used to be used in the production of felt hats. It is extremely toxic and can cause symptoms which appear to be

similar to ‘madness’. Hatters in Danbury, Conneticut, USA are known to have suffered the ill effects of mercury poisoning, the symptoms of which were known locally as “the Danbury shakes.” It is also claimed that the Danbury hatmakers were known as “the mad hatters,” but evidence is unavailable as to whether this predates the appearance

of the phrase in Blackwood’s. Apparently in New Zealand the name “hatter” was given to miners /prospectors who work alone. It was thought that they frequently went mad from the solitude of their claim away in the bush although it is more likely that they were named “hatters” after the phrase, rather than the phrase being named after them. There also

is a theory that the phrase is a corruption of the term ‘as mad as an adder’, which is roughly equivalent to ‘as angry as a rattle-snake’. The phrase has of course been immortalised by the Hatter in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, who was named “the Mad Hatter” in Disney’s 1951 adaptation.

The Quiz of the History of Quiz

Dublin theatre proprietor by the name of Richard Daly made a bet that he could, within forty-eight hours, make a nonsense word known throughout the city, and that the public would supply a meaning for it. After a performance one evening, he gave his staff cards with the word ‘quiz’ written on them, and told them to write the word on walls around the city. The next day the strange word was the talk of the town, and within a short time it had become part of the language. The most detailed account of this supposed exploit (in F. T. Porter’s Gleanings and Reminiscences, 1875) gives its date as 1791. The word, however, was already in use by then, meaning ‘an odd or eccentric person’, and had been used in this sense by Fanny Burney in her diary entry for 24 June 1782.

Literally Saved by the Bell

he expression “Saved by the bell” came from the Black plague time when they used to bury people not knowing whether they were really dead or not. If the person was still alive, they would ring a bell that was attached by a string, and the night guard would unbury them.” I am not sure I buy this answer. I saw that it was used on an episode of CSI: New York, but this hardly justifies this explanation or supports the idea. I have seen another explanation on some sites that this arose from the early days of boxing in the U.S. where a boxer could be ‘saved by the bell” from a pummeling by his opponent. This seems more plausible. One big problem I have with the notion that the phrase came from accidental burials is (a) lack of cited historical evidence that such burials were particularly common, and (b) the contraptions noted that were to save people from accidental burial were typically for the upper classes. Hard to imagine such a rare notion trickling into ordinary speech, but I would like to see further historical evidence (hard data) for where this phrase came from. Truth is there is no evidence that this phrase was ever used in the 17th century as you describe. It is simply a boxing term that started to be used in the late 1800’s. Boxers who were at risk of losing a fight, could not be saved by the bell at the end of the round. Thus, if they we knocked down, the count would continue, even if the bell signalling the end of the round had sounded. This expression like many others came merry old England. After the cemeteries started filling up the British started constructing ‘bone yards.’ When this began and previously buried bodies were dug up, there was sometimes evidence that a person was buried alive. It could have been for a number of reasons, but this was to be avoided by having a wake where the body would usually sit on the dining table for a few days to make sure they were dead, and then the person assigned the ‘grave yard shift’ would listen for a bell tied to the toe of the supposed deceased, and if it rang, they were ‘saved by the bell.’

Murderer Cereal Killings Near You...

In December 1970 two teenagers disappeared from the Heights neighborhood, in Houston. Then another and another and another. As the number of missing kids grew, no one realized that the most prolific serial killer the country had ever seenâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;along with his teenage accomplicesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;was living comfortably among them. by Skip Hollandsworth

Or that the mystery of what happened to so many of his victims would haunt the city to this day. One morning this past September, Mrs. Mary Scott walked out of her tiny brick house, one hand clutching a plastic tub of birdseed, the other holding on to the front door in case she lost her balance. Taking her time, she stepped off the front stoop and onto a pebbled sidewalk that her husband, Walter, dead now for a decade, had laid down one weekend in the mid-sixties. From out of nowhere, half a dozen doves arrived, soon followed by half a dozen more. “Look at the one that’s all white,” Mrs. Scott said. “Miss Whitey, I call her.” Suddenly her voice faltered, the doves forgotten. Mrs. Scott had noticed a young man down the block, walking past one of the new three-story townhomes that now line the street, some of them still unoccupied, the builder’s signs advertising wood-paneled ceilings, recessed lighting, and granite countertops. She stared in his direction, her eyes blinking behind her glasses. For a moment, she didn’t seem sure what to do. “Sometimes I see someone and I think it’s my son,” she said. “I think he’s come home.” Mrs. Scott, who is 83 years old, lives on West Twenty-fifth Street in the Heights, a Houston neighborhood about five miles northwest of downtown. On April 20, 1972, her seventeen-year-old son, Mark, a blue-eyed kid whose cheeks dimpled when he smiled, walked out the front door

of that house and was never seen again. Mr. and Mrs. Scott and their younger son, Jeff, called Mark’s friends and classmates, asking if they had seen him. They got in their car and roamed the streets, peering down alleys and stopping at the local drive-in restaurants. They called hospitals to see if Mark had been admitted, and Walter, a self-employed carpenter and handyman, drove to the Houston Police Department to report that Mark was missing. A few days later, they received what seemed to be a hastily written postcard from Mark. “How are you doing?” he wrote. “I am in Austin for a couple of days. I found a good job. I am making $3 an hour.” His mother and father shook their heads in disbelief. Their son, who was only a junior in high school, had left for Austin without saying a word? They were convinced that something terrible had happened. Mark hadn’t even taken his beloved Honda C70 motorcycle. Mrs. Scott was then 44 years old, a switchboard operator for Dresser Industries. In those first few weeks, she left work early to wait on her stoop, looking left and right. She walked to the chain-link fence at the edge of the yard, cocked her head, and stared down the street. Some days she would meet the postman at the mailbox to see if he had another postcard. But Mark never wrote again. He never called. “At night, whenever I heard a noise, I’d get out of bed and walk to the front

door,” Mrs. Scott says. “I always prayed he would be there, so I could give him a hug.” Then, on the evening of August 8, 1973, the Houston television stations cut into their regular programming, and Mrs. Scott, sitting on a flower-print couch in the living room, stared at her black and white screen and sensed that her prayers would forever go unanswered. According to the reporters, a 33-year-old man named Dean Corll had been shot to death at his home in Pasadena, a Houston suburb. The police had learned that Corll had been renting a metal storage shed located just off a narrow, dead-end street about nine miles southwest of downtown. Detectives were at the shed now, the reporters con-

tinued, their voices rising, and they were digging up the bodies of teenage boys—all of whom had apparently been murdered by Corll. Checking their notes, the reporters said Corll had once been a resident of the Heights, where he had helped his mother run a small candy factory on West Twenty-second Street. Mrs. Scott grabbed her husband’s hand and said, “Oh, Mark. Our poor Mark.” By the next day, police officers were exhuming bodies from a wooded area near Sam Rayburn Reservoir, outside Lufkin, and on a beach at High Island, east of Houston. Some of the bodies were covered with a layer of lime powder and shrouded in clear plastic, their faces looking up

the remains of 27 young males had been found

People Murdered

at the men uncovering them. Others were nothing more than lumps of putrefied flesh. A few still had tape strapped across their mouths; others had nylon rope wrapped around their necks or bullet holes in their heads. One boy was curled up in a fetal position. Within a week, a couple of them as young as thirteen, one as old as twenty. The New York Times quickly labeled the killings “the largest multiple murder case in United States history”—the phrase “serial killer” had not yet been coined—surpassing the 13 women choked to death by the Boston Strangler in the early sixties, the 16 people shot by Charles Whitman in 1966 from the Tower at the Uni-

Year

versity of Texas, and the 25 itinerant workers killed by Juan Corona in California just two years earlier. Soon reporters began flying to Houston from every corner of the United States. A few arrived from as far away as Japan and Pakistan. Even Truman Capote, hoping to revive his floundering career and produce his next In Cold Blood, showed up, wearing his signature Panama hat, smoking cigarettes, and being trailed by an entourage of assistants. It wasn’t just the number of murders that caught everyone’s attention. Of the victims the medical examiner’s office was able to identify, at least twenty of them had been residents of either the Heights or an adjoining neighborhood. Or they

were Houston boys who had been somewhere in the Heights right before they disappeared. All of the Heights victims had gone missing between December 13, 1970, and July 25, 1973. Eleven of them had attended the same junior high. How, Capote and everyone else wanted to know, was it possible that so many boys could have been snatched away from one working-class area of Houston, a mere two miles wide and three miles deep, without anyone—police, parents, neighbors, teachers, or friends—snapping to what was happening? And why, they asked, had Corll wanted to kill them? Big and broad-shouldered, with thick black hair and sideburns, he was known, in the words

of one reporter, as the “pleasant, smiling candy man of the Heights,” always handing out treats to neighborhood children who dropped by his mother’s factory. A police officer who had gone to high school with Corll and married his cousin insisted that he was “a quiet, well-mannered, well-groomed, considerate person.” He had a nice girlfriend, Betty, a single mother who let her children call him Daddy. No one in the Heights could fathom that Corll, who had no criminal record of any kind, could be the worst predator in American history. As one man put it, “He didn’t have no temper.” What made the story simply chilling, though, was the revelation that Corll hadn’t acted alone.

Everyone wanted to know, was it possible that so many boys could have been snatched away from one working-class area?