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UNIONVILLE, Tenn. -
Parents at a Middle Tennessee elementary school are scared a dangerous spider has invaded their children’s school.
Bedford County school officials confirm a teacher was bitten by a brown recluse spider August 23 at Community Elementary School in Unionville.
”We saw this as an incident that was reported we were taking care of it,” Superintendent Dr. Ray Butrum said. “It got put out that the school was infested and that is not the case.”
According to school officials, the teacher transferred to Community Elementary at the beginning of the school year and was unpacking a box she brought with her.
As she unpacked the box a brown recluse spider bit the teacher. The teacher killed the spider and reported the bit to another teacher.
The teacher and her co-worker emptied out the rest of the box and found two to three other brown recluse spiders. They were then killed.
“Maintenance was here that day and found no spiders lurking around,” Principal Tim Miller said. “Parents are concerned and we are concerned because the teacher was bitten.”
However, parents called Nashville’s News 2 to report there are several other spiders in the school and school officials have not taken measures to eradicate the spiders.
“The kids are aware that something like this has happened,” Miller said. “I had two parents who were concerned I talked to one of those parents this morning she left here with a better feeling.”
Dr. Butrum told News 2 that two years ago Community Elementary did have a problem with large numbers of brown recluses.
Following that infestation the school district implemented a training program for teachers to give them tips on how to keep the insects from nesting in classrooms.
For example, teachers are asked to store items in their classrooms in plastic tubs not cardboard where the insects can nest.
The school is also sprayed yearly by an exterminator and as needed.
In response to the brown recluse bite and the other spiders killed, the school is scheduled to be sprayed next Friday.
It has to happen over the weekend, because no one can enter the building for 24 hours, according to Miller.
In addition to those measures the school puts out traps to catch the insects and monitors them monthly to see if an increase in any specific insect is detected.
“I don’t want to put any alarm out there, but I also don’t want
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Add deadly spider bites to your list of nightmare airline travel scenarios.
A Georgia woman who says she was bitten by a brown recluse spider on a Delta Airlines flight in January has won an ,000 settlement, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Johnny Edwards reports.
Brandi DeLaO, 38, was on her way to South Africa when she felt something pinch her thigh. It wasn’t until a hand-sized “crusty, oozing mass of dead skin” formed after landing that she sought medical attention.
“I would not wish that on my worst enemy for anything,” DeLaO, 38, told the AJC. “It was horrible. It was amazing that a spider could do all that.”
According to the University of Florida’s Department of Entomology, brown recluses often bite on the thigh, upper arm, or stomach, most often after humans unwittingly roll over them in their sleep. DeLaO said she was dozing off at the time.
Thanks to passenger protections under the Montreal Convention, DeLaO walked away with a pretty sizeable settlement. By law, airlines are liable for as much as 5,800 in damages for passengers who are injured during flight.
Most of DeLaO’s winnings will likely go toward medical bills. It took three surgeries to stop the venom from spreading and she has another lined up already.
A Delta spokesperson told the AJC an aircraft inspection turned up no spider infestation.
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Add deadly spider bites to your list of nightmare airline travel scenarios.
A Georgia woman who says she was bitten by a brown recluse spider on a Delta Airlines flight in January has won an ,000 settlement, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Johnny Edwards reports.
Brandi DeLaO, 38, was on her way to South Africa when she felt something pinch her thigh. It wasn’t until a hand-sized “crusty, oozing mass of dead skin” formed after landing that she sought medical attention.
“I would not wish that on my worst enemy for anything,” DeLaO, 38, told the AJC. “It was horrible. It was amazing that a spider could do all that.”
According to the University of Florida’s Department of Entomology, brown recluses often bite on the thigh, upper arm, or stomach, most often after humans unwittingly roll over them in their sleep. DeLaO said she was dozing off at the time.
Thanks to passenger protections under the Montreal Convention, DeLaO walked away with a pretty sizeable settlement. By law, airlines are liable for as much as 5,800 in damages for passengers who are injured during flight.
Most of DeLaO’s winnings will likely go toward medical bills. It took three surgeries to stop the venom from spreading and she has another lined up already.
A Delta spokesperson told the AJC an aircraft inspection turned up no spider infestation.
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Saying Goodbye on His Own Terms
There was no general manager to summon Andy Roddick into his office to say solemnly, “Son, I’m afraid we’re not going to pick up your option.” No one was about to give him a nudge or a shove out the door. Retirement for a professional tennis player is all personal reflection, that elusive intersection of heart and mind, full understanding that the time has come.
It looked like a wave by Andy Roddick, but it wasn’t a goodbye Friday night at the United States Open.
Andy Roddick thrashed the 19-year-old Australian Bernard Tomic in straight sets to reach the third round.
The only remaining questions are how and when.
A career-long source of sardonic wit that could be endearing or irritating, Roddick might not have seemed the type to need or stage a theatrical exit. Certainly his announcement wasn’t made for the benefit of the news media, which he believes have dwelled too much on who he wasn’t rather than who he has been.
But if we have known anything beyond the obvious about Roddick, it has been his fraternal nature, his abiding friendships with other American players, men’s and women’s. So as Gregarious Andy considered the possibility of losing Friday night to a talented 19-year-old Australian, Bernard Tomic, the reluctant heart sought one last concession from the retiring mind.
“I just imagine being off the court tomorrow in an empty locker room,” Roddick said in his most poignant admission while declaring this United States Open his farewell tournament Thursday. “I think I wanted a chance to say goodbye.”
Not yet, though. Tomic, 19 and playing a finesse game teleported from when the Open was played in Forest Hills on clay, was no more ready for such an occasion than the 20-year-old Roddick was in 2002 when Pete Sampras blew him out of the Open quarterfinals during his last run to championship glory. Serving consistently in the mid-130s, mixing big forehands and sliced backhand approach shots, Roddick won the second-round match, 6-3, 6-4, 6-0, and perhaps went to sleep to dream of pulling a Pistol Pete.
“I’m going to try to stick around a little longer,” he said, suddenly excited by his next opponent, 59th-ranked Fabio Fognini of Italy.
With the rarest of exceptions, it is virtually impossible to script the perfect sports exit, although Pete Sampras did just that when he defeated Andre Agassi in the 2002 final at Flushing Meadows in what turned out to be Sampras’s last match. Sampras just didn’t know it yet, and as a result the moment was deprived of a more deserved gravitas.
Agassi, Sampras’s career rival but not his equal, managed to turn his preordained goodbye into a tearful melodrama after losing his third-round match on the Arthur Ashe Stadium court to Benjamin Becker in 2006. We would have expected no less from the Las Vegas showman.
But the period doesn’t have to be the most memorable career punctuation. One of my favorite tennis adieu moments occurred in 1989. Down a service break in the third set to a young Italian, Laura Golarsa, Chris Evert was in danger of closing at Wimbledon where she was a beloved, three-time champion in the quarterfinals on Court 1.
After Golarsa hit a winning volley, a disconsolate Evert stood motionless in the doubles alley head bowed, racket dangling when a high-pitched voice cried out from the stands a few feet away.
“Come on, Chrissie.” It was Martina Navratilova, trying to rouse her forever friend and career measuring stick to a proper burial, on Centre Court, against Steffi Graf. With Navratilova leading the cheers, Evert rallied to win.
Discounting a brief return to Wimbledon and the French Open at 47, Navratilova narrowly missed a Sampras-like ending, only predetermined. She just couldn’t muster enough game to take a 10th Wimbledon title in the 1994 Wimbledon final against Conchita Martinez. Choosing not to play the hard-court summer, Navratilova left her fans misty eyed by bending down to carry off a small piece of Wimbledon lawn.
Most get neither blades of grass nor a blaze of glory. Some burn out and others fade away. Monica Seles and Jennifer Capriati, intense rivals who endured great suffering during bittersweet careers, for years of inactivity couldn’t publicly admit they were done while dealing with an eating disorder (Seles) and depression (Capriati).
Far more fortunate has been Kim Clijsters, who has now called two retirements, even if Wednesday’s final singles defeat to Laura Robson was on a two-thirds-empty Stadium court.
From here on out, Roddick can expect the full capacity treatment, and who knows? Maybe he does have a run in him. Maybe it changes his mind going forward. That would be cool. Just don’t bet the kids’ college savings on it.
“Frankly,” he said, “these guys have gotten really, really, really good.”
Most tennis insiders believed that the most bizarre exit of all Bjorn Borg’s from New York in 1981 was the result of having been surpassed by John McEnroe as the best men’s player. After McEnroe beat him for the Open title, Borg walked to the net, shook hands, picked up his rackets and walked out.
It was later revealed that Borg had received death threats, which explained his departure from the stadium, not the Grand Slam stage. At 25, he never played another.
Taken in that broader and less-scripted context, Roddick’s retirement seems to be perfect. Young American men he has helped mentor are beginning to emerge. Roddick has made millions and married a movie star, Brooklyn Decker. And as his friend, the broadcaster Justin Gimelstob, told me recently, “He’s a certain Hall of Famer.”
For those who might disagree, please remember that the less-credentialed Michael Chang is already a member.
As Roddick said, he “got to play” and win America’s Slam, and so from the courts of the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center he will take his leave. It may be less difficult when someone else makes the decision, but on one’s own terms there is time to set a mood and have folks say thanks for the memories.
A version of this article appeared in print on September 1, 2012, on page D1 of the New York edition with the headline: Ready To Retire, Work Yet To Finish.
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Wichita, Kansas — As Wichita city leaders and state leaders try to get Amtrak back in the air capital, Amtrak leaders say they are committed to bringing passenger rail service to Wichita’s largest city.
“Oh, we would love to see an Amtrak stop in Wichita,” explains Marc Magliari with Amtrak. “Wichita last had Amtrak service in 1979.”
Magliari says Amtrak remains committed to the rest of the state of Kansas as well, even though there are problems with the rail line in Western Kansas.
In a statement released by the passenger rail service, Amtrak says:
“Funding to maintain and improve track will be needed in coming years in order for the Southwest Chief to continue to serve the current route. Several ideas for funding and public action were discussed by Amtrak and BNSF.”
The Southwest Chief from Amtrak runs from Chicago to Los Angeles. It stops in Kansas City and Newton, before moving on to western Kansas.
Amrak officials want to make it clear, they have no plans to move the Southwest Chief out of Kansas. In fact, they say the rail service is firmly committed to serving western Kansas. Still, something needs to be done with the track in western Kansas that need work, or the Southwest Chief could be routed differently.
The Amtrak officials continue in a news release:
“However, decisions and financial commitments will be needed by the end of 2014. If they are not in place, steps will need to be taken to operate the train via a different route between Newton, Kan., and Albuquerque by early 2016.”
Marc Magliari says Amtrak is working hard with cities to see what can be done.
“The cities have already begun to meet and they’ve been talking with their state DOT’s to look at solutions,” explains Magliari. “And we’ve proposed a solution in April. And the state DOT’s sent us a letter saying that solution doesn’t work for them. But we still have a lot of time to work out a solution. We have the rest of this year and all of next and into 2014 before we would have to make a decision in the Southwest Chief re-routing.”
Amtrak asked the states of Kansas, Colorado and New Mexico to come up with 0 Million to help with the tracks in western Kansas. The states department of transportation declined.
“We remain highly committed,” says Magliari. “We get many inquires all the time about expanding service. This last year we had the best passenger numbers we’ve ever seen. Record numbers. We recognized and appreciate all that the cities have done and continued to do along the Amtrak routes.”
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Just a month after Peter Jackson announced that The Hobbit would be turned into a trilogy, Warner Bros. released the name of the flick’s second installment and the release date for the third film Friday.
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug will be released Dec. 13, 2013; the third installment in the series, The Hobbit: There and Back Again, will hit theaters July 18, 2014.
Jackson originally planned to only create two films for the Hobbit series, but decided to add a third when he realized he had enough material to do so.
The Hobbit trailer debuts with four new seconds of Middle Earth!
The Hobbit: There and Back Again (the title will remain unchanged) was to have been the second and last Hobbit film before the change was made.
“We were really pleased with the way the story was coming together, in particular, the strength of the characters and the cast who have brought them to life,” Jackson said via his Facebook page. “All of which gave rise to a simple question: Do we take this chance to tell more of the tale? And the answer from our perspective as the filmmakers, and as fans, was an unreserved ‘yes.’”
Hobbit fans won’t have to wait too much longer for the first flick of the trilogy.
The first film, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, opens Dec. 14.
Take a look at snaps from The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
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NEW YORK Ne-Yo channeled Michael Jackson on the late singer’s 54th birthday at an event to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the King of Pop’s multiplatinum “Bad” album.Ne-Yo performed “Smooth Criminal,” ”I Just Can’t Stop Loving You” and “The Way You Make Me Feel” on Wednesday night at New York’s Gotham Hall, imitating Jackson’s signature dance moves and vocal tones.
The R&B singer said in an interview ahead of his performance: “You just don’t do a Michael song, you try and do the best you can.” He also said he learned how to sing because of Jackson and that the icon’s musical influence was “tattooed” on his heart.
Singer Melanie Fiona also performed at the Pepsi and Billboard event. The Grammy winner belted covers of “Bad” and “Dirty Diana.”
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{WICHITA, Ks.} The Wichita Wingnuts (56-39) defeated the El Paso Diablos (44-50) 5-4 at Lawrence-Dumont Stadium on Tuesday night. The Wingnuts won their fourth consecutive game in their final turn at bat, scoring the winning run in the bottom of the ninth. Tied at 4-4, Jared McDonald led off with a single and took second on Mason Morioka’s sacrifice bunt. After Steve Stanley was intentionally walked, a wild pitch moved the runners to second and third. Ryan Khoury walked to load the bases, setting up a game-winnign sacrifice fly to left from Jake Kahaulelio. El Paso scratched out the game’s first run with a sacrifice fly to center field in the top of the first. In the bottom of the inning, Khoury singled to right-center and moved to second when Kahaulelio walked. Two batters later, C.J. Ziegler cracked a three-run home run to left field that put Wichita ahead 3-1. J.J. Muse grounded a single up the middle with two outs in the top of the second to trim the lead to 3-2. Wingnuts starter Anthony Capra then struck out Maikol Gonzalez to strand runners on second and third. The score remained 3-2 until the bottom of the eighth when David Peralta drove in Kahaulelio on a groundball to shortstop. El Paso rallied for two runs in the top of the ninth to tie the game. Welington Dotel singled to center and scored on a triple to right-center from Jermy Acey. After Daniel Nelson grounded out to first base, Zane Chavez hit a sacrifice fly to center that scored Acey with the tying run. Capra took a no-decision, allowing two earned runs on four hits in six innings. Capra walked three and struck out five. Kevin Cooper started for El Paso and also took a no-decision, allowing three earned runs on six hits in seven innings. Cooper walked one and struck out four. Josh Dew earned the win in relief. Justin Harper took the loss for the Diablos. Nick Walters and James Baker each worked a perfect relief inning for Wichita. Walters made his 54th appearance of the season, tying the American Association’s single-season record (Dustin Pease, Wichita, 2010) that was also matched by Jared Simon in the nightcap of Monday’s double header. The series continues Wednesday night at 7:05 p.m. Derek Blacksher will be on the mound for Wichita. Read Original Here
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CBSSports.com wire reports
Aug. 30, 2012 1:26 AM ET
NEW YORK — Kim Clijsters’ singles career ended where she wanted it to, just not the way she hoped.
The four-time Grand Slam champion lost 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5) to 18-year-old Laura Robson of Britain in the second round of the U.S. Open on Wednesday, and will head into retirement after she finishes playing in doubles at Flushing Meadows.
Clijsters walked away from the sport once before, in May 2007, then returned after a 2½-year hiatus. But now 29 and a mother, the Belgian insisted this season that she means it this time, and decided the U.S. Open — and its hard courts that she conquered on the way to three championships — would be her final tournament.
“It’s the place that has inspired me so much to do well and to do great things. It’s hard to explain sometimes why,” Clijsters said in an on-court interview, her face flushed and her eyes welling with tears.
“This completely feels like the perfect place to retire,” Clijsters told the spectators at Arthur Ashe Stadium, many of whom rose to shower her with a standing ovation. “I just wish it wasn’t today.”
The loss Wednesday ended Clijsters’ 22-match winning streak in New York, encompassing titles in 2005, 2009 and 2010, plus Monday’s first-round victory.
She missed the hard-court major in 2004, 2006-08 and last year, thanks to a combination of injuries and the time she took off while starting a family. Her daughter, Jada, was born in February 2008. By August 2009, Clijsters was back on tour; unseeded and unranked, because she only played in two previous tournaments during her comeback, she won that year’s U.S. Open.
“Since I retired the first time, it’s been a great adventure for my team and my family,” said Clijsters, who was 28-0 against players ranked outside the top 10 at the U.S. Open before Wednesday. “It’s all been worth it. But I do look forward to the next part of my life coming up.”
Her previous defeat at Flushing Meadows came against Belgian rival Justine Henin on Sept. 6, 2003, in the tournament final. Robson was 9 at the time.
This did have the feel, in some ways, of a changing of the guard.
Ranked 89th, and with only one prior victory over a top-25 player, Robson has been viewed — particularly back home in Britain — as an up-and-coming player whose smooth left-handed strokes would carry her far.
But she had never produced the kind of grit and court-covering athleticism that carried her past the 23rd-seeded Clijsters. And until now, Robson never had won more than one match in a Grand Slam tournament; her claim to fame had been teaming for a silver medal in mixed doubles at the London Olympics with Andy Murray, who reached the U.S. Open’s third round by beating 118th-ranked Ivan Dodig of Croatia 6-2, 6-1, 6-3 in the last match Wednesday night.
Robson knows, though, how much Clijsters means to the game, not only as a superb player but as someone who by all accounts is universally liked — by fans, tennis officials and even opponents.
When the contest ended with Clijsters sailing a backhand return long, allowing Robson to convert her third match point, they met at the net. Clijsters began to extend her arm for the customary handshake, and Robson pulled her in for a hug.
“I want to thank Kim,” Robson told the crowd moments later, “for being such a great role model to me for so many years.”
Less than an hour later, Clijsters was hanging out in the players’ garden alongside the stadium. She shared a laugh with some friends, hugs from others, and paused to pose for a photograph alongside 14-time major champion Serena Williams, who was headed out after partnering sister Venus for a first-round victory in doubles.
Clijsters was the only seeded woman who lost during the afternoon session of Day 3, when the winners included No. 1 Victoria Azarenka, four-time major champion Maria Sharapova, defending champion Sam Stosur, 2011 Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova and 2011 French Open champion Li Na.
Joining Robson with a surprise victory was American wild-card entry Mallory Burdette, the NCAA runner-up who reached the third round in her Grand Slam debut by eliminating 69th-ranked Lucie Hradecka 6-2, 6-4.
Until recently, Burdette planned to take premed courses as a senior at Stanford in pursuit of a career in psychiatry.
“It’s been a crazy ride,” the 252nd-ranked Burdette said.
Could get even wilder: She next faces Sharapova, a 6-0, 6-1 winner Wednesday night over 78th-ranked Lourdes Dominguez Lino of Spain.
Earlier on Ashe, the highest-ranked American man, John Isner, let out a big exhale of relief while waving to the crowd after getting past an argumentative Xavier Malisse 6-3, 7-6 (5), 5-7, 7-6 (9) in the first round.
“I know in the nitty-gritty times of a match, I always have that confidence and all those wins in my back pocket,” said Isner, who is 37-13 in tiebreakers this season.
The 6-foot-9 Isner hit 20 aces and ended things with a service winner on his third match point. That came after Malisse pushed an easy backhand volley into the net, then grabbed the ball and shoved it in his mouth and chomped on it as though it were an apple.
The 57th-ranked Malisse, a 2002 Wimbledon semifinalist, was louder and angrier during a few exchanges with the chair umpire and even members of the crowd, earning a warning for profanity.
“Half of the crowd doesn’t understand what’s going on,” Malisse said. “They yell. We’re in New York. So you’re going to get more yells. That’s fine by me. … (But) I’m going to say something back.”
There were no such shenanigans during Clijsters vs. Robson, simply plenty of terrific play.
With her husband — Brian Lynch, an American who used to play professional basketball in Belgium — fidgeting from his front-row seat in the stands, Clijsters wound up getting the worse of lengthy exchanges. As big a forehand as Clijsters owns, Robson was out-hitting her, compiling a 16-11 edge in winners off that wing.
Clijsters went up a break in the second set, helped by a pair of double-faults by a slightly shaky Robson — nerves that were understandable, given the setting and the significance of this match. But Robson got right back in it, playing gutsy, go-for-the-lines tennis, repeatedly pounding the ball hard as can be, and seeing shots land right where she aimed.
“I really enjoyed myself out there,” said Robson, who found herself singing along to the pop songs that blare over loudspeakers during changeovers.
As you might expect from a teen, the youngest player ranked in the WTA’s top 100.
Try as she might, Clijsters could not quite gain the upper hand, no matter how many times she yelled “Come on!” and raised a clenched fist after winning points.
On one well-disguised drop shot by Robson, Clijsters raced forward and did her trademark splits through the doubles alley, stretching to get her racket on the ball. But her response landed in the net.
“I just wasn’t good enough at the end of the match,” Clijsters acknowledged.
She won’t get the chance to play another.
Copyright 2012 by STATS LLC and The Associated Press. Any commercial use or
distribution without the express written consent of STATS LLC and The
Associated Press is strictly prohibited. Read Original Here
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Video
Trogloraptor Spider
Above: Photo montage of the newly discovered Trogolorapter. Video produced by the California Academy of Science.
SAN DIEGO Some amateur explorers were collecting flora and fauna in the caves of southern Oregon when they came upon a brown spider about three inches across. It seemed like a common-enough spider, looking a bit like a brown recluse.
But their specimen got caught in a web of inquiry, and eventually convinced scientists they were looking at something they hadn’t seen in more than a hundred years in North America: an ancient, yet newly discovered spider family. They called the spider the Trogloraptor, aka “Cave Robber.”
Charles Griswold is an arachnologist at the California Academy of Science in San Francisco, where the new spider eventually found its way. Griswold marveled at the creature’s fearsome legs and claws.
“I would compare them to scythes or switchblade knives,” he said.
Spider specialists had never seen one like this before. This spider does not spin webs, but hunts by hanging by a strand from cave ceilings. Studies showed it bore much in common with the goblin spider.
A look at fossils showed it could also trace a unique lineage back 130 million years. Griswold said the spelunkers had discovered not only a new species of spiders, but a new spider family.
“It is a new species of spider, so evolutionary distinct that we’ve had to propose a new family to contain it,” he said.
But are there any family relatives? Fortunately, this story had legs and it traveled to San Diego, where some graduate students were also examining a novel spider they’d collected in a redwood forest. Their San Diego State University professor, Marshal Hedin, said he soon realized their spider was in the same family as the cave robber.
“So whether or not it’s the same species is still unclear,” said Hedin.
There’s still plenty to learn about the Trogloraptor, but research is creeping along.