Around The Newspapers

According to an article in the January 3rd, 2008 Portland Oregonian written by Thomas H. Maugh II from the LA Times-Washington Post news service your odds of surviving a heart attack are better if you have the heart attack at a casino or an airport than if you have the heart attack at the hospital. According to the article 750,000 people suffer heart attacks in the hospital every year and another 250,000 people suffer heart attacks outside of the hospital. People who suffer heart attacks in the middle of a crowded casino or airport- where defibrillators are widely available- are noticed immediately, whereas a lone patient suffering an attack in a hospital room may not be noticed for much of the crucial window of oppurtunity during which defibrillation is most effective. Odds of survivial are even less in small hospitals with less than 250 beds and less on weekends or nights in the hospital. No wonder I like to gamble, don't like hospitals, and maybe I will start to fly again.

According to another article in the January 3, 2008 Oregonian with the dateline Washington and written by Seth Borenstein of The Associated Press everyone's commute is probably lengthened by cell phone usage because drivers on phones go about 2 mph slower in heavy traffic than those who aren't on the phone. The slowdown can add twenty minutes a year to your commute.

In another article in the January 3, 2008 Portland Oregonian written by Maxine Bernstein of the Oregonian most murders in 2007 in the Portland Metro area where done where the murderer knew the victim. The deadly violence in 2007 mostly resulted from domestic disputes, drug deals gone bad, encounters between intoxicated transients or fights over petty or perceived slights. Most of the victims were male. Some of the astonishing ones, A woman grabbed the wheel of her male companion's motor home, mowed him down and drove off. A 36 year-old man who had sought a restraining order against a former girlfriend was gunned down by her 12 days later. She later committed suicide. In the only stranger murder a 47 year old man was stabbed to death when he tried to intervene in a loud dispute between a man and women. Disputes over a cat, a car, and a parking spot resulted in other murders.

In today's Oregonian in an article written by David B. Caruso of the Associated Press tells of a window washer that survived a 47 story fall from a Manhatten skycraper. The man not only survivied but is expected to recover fully and walk again. "If you believed in miracles this would be one." Dr. Phillip Barie was quoted. The death rate from a three story fall is 50% according to Dr. Barie. People falling more than ten stories almost never survive.

In today's Oregonian dateline Seattle, Washington from the Associated Press with no credited author a King County Superior Court judge will determine whether a man found not guilty by reason of insanity after killing his mother and brother should profit from their deaths. The family won an $800,000 settlement against King County after it was deteremined that two days before the killings a public health clinic refused to give the man anti-psychotic medication. The man is now fighting to target a share of that money from his mother's estate. Under the state's "slayer statue" a killer may not receive property or otherwise benefit from a "willful and unlawful" killing. The appeals court sent the case back to Superior Court because they felt the lower court used wrong standard when it defined "willfully" as "knowningly" rather than as "with intent and design."