Overnight Briefing & General Reality Check

Totally useless Groundhog trivia:

1. Horniness and hunger are the elements that determine a Groundhogs behavior. Weather has nothing to do with it.
2. The folklore that is the origin of this day started with 16th century German farmers. Which means they were pretty lousy farmers if they had time to stand around and think THIS stuff up.
3. The original animal in German folklore is a Badger. But if we called it "Badger Day" my mother-in-law would think it's her cue to come visit for a week.
4. German settlers found no Badgers when they settled near Punxsutawney, PA, so they adapted their story to the Groundhog.
5. The story goes that if the day was sunny and the animal saw it's shadow it would be frightened back into it's hole and six more weeks of winter would follow. If the animal stayed out, Spring would come early.
6. Scientific studies over a 60 year period show that the Groundhogs accuracy in forecasting the onset of Spring is only 28%. Oddly enough, the National Weather Service only has a 31% accuracy, so there.

More Groundhog facts, courtesy Nickelodeon magazine:

--A groundhog is the same thing as a woodchuck. It's the largest member of the squirrel family.
--Groundhog Day comes from a European holiday called Candlemas.
--A groundhog removes about 700 pounds of dirt from the ground to dig a burrow.
--Groundhogs live alone.

Fast Food:

Market-research firm Sandelman & Associates data show that, on average, 18- to 34-year-olds went to fast-food chains about 13 times per month from January to September 2009, down from almost 19 times per month in 2006. (Kaye)

Today's police blotter:

Highway robbery is on the rise --literally. Over the past year, reported incidents of cargo theft have surged across the country as more robbers target big rigs responsible for hauling thousands of dollars worth of goods.
   In 2009, an estimated 859 truckloads were hijacked, totaling over $487 million worth of cargo. Authorities say that most of the robberies are nonviolent --instead of holding up drivers at gunpoint, thieves simply wait for truckers to take a break before driving the unattended vehicle away, or hitching the trailer up to their own trucks.
   Unlike the organized crime rings that terrorized truckers in the 1960s, officials suspect that many of today's thieves are amateurs. In order to ensure that they're targeting goods worth stealing --usually electronics, pharmaceuticals and clothes-- thieves often trail drivers after they leave their plants, and wait for them to pull into a rest stop.
   The robberies are "directly related to the economy," say officials. "People are stealing things that they can get rid of quickly, and consumers are looking for a deal." (Maiman)

Reality Round-Up:

Football-quarterback-turned-dogfighter MICHAEL VICK begins his reality show on BET tonight. Vick tells the LA Times, "I just want people to really get to know me as an individual. What I want to do is change the perception of me. I am a human being. I've made some mistakes in the past, and I wish it had never happened. But it's not about how you fall, but about how you pick yourself up."
   "The Michael Vick Project" will reportedly show Vick's first season with the Philadelphia Eagles, his troubled childhood and his arrest for dogfighting in 2007. Nobody's talking about how much money he's making for the show, but Vick has to repay $20 million to creditors under the terms of his bankruptcy settlement last August.