| Appetite for sashimi causes prices to soar
TOKYO -- "Tuna cannot look like skinny Japanese women." So says Tsunenori Iida, and he ought to know. His family has been buying and selling tuna for seven generations here at the world's largest fish market. Six mornings a week for 43 years, Iida has been casting his eyes and running his fingers over the torpedo-shaped carcasses of bluefin tuna, the most precious fish in the sea. They are brought here to Tokyo's Tsukiji market, where a dawn auction sets the global price. "I look for beauty and balanced plumpness," Iida said. "I am looking for a Catherine Zeta-Jones type of tuna." Alas for Japan, which wolfs down a quarter of the global tuna catch, and for the rest of the world: An increasingly voracious appetite for sushi is driving the supply of plump pulchritude served raw perilously low.
A Walk On Memory Lane: University's Senior Walk endears, endures
Dotted with brightly colored chalk luring students to the next meeting of the whatever society with the promise of free pizza, the University of Arkansas' sidewalks are more than just a path to class. They are the school's history and its future.The sidewalks of the UA list the names of all the University's graduates in a more than five-mile-long network called the Senior Walk. As documented in "Beacon of Hope: the Story of the University of Arkansas" by Larry Foley and Dale Carpenter, the tradition began with the class of 1905. The president of the University, John Tillman, suggested the walk as a more-refined alternative to the fights that were occurring over the previous tradition of seniors hanging a class flag from the top of Old Main and underclassmen dutifully tearing it down.The seniors liked the idea, despite the lack of good ol' boy bloodshed, and their names were the first inscribed in the walk by Old Main.The class of 1904 heard about the walk, and sent money back to have their names engraved, too.
New gym caters to kids
A new local gym is focusing on getting children to start good health habits early. PowerKidz describes itself as a "youth fitness center", the first of its kind in the nation. Children like 12-year-old Elizabeth Gore, a student at St. Matthews, can use PowerKidz to learn how to work out without feeling intimidated. "I like working out in this environment," she said. "It is so much more fun with kids and not a bunch of adults that are taller than you, and know what they are doing, and have all these big muscles and you are just sitting there like, 'okay, I'm supposed to work out now'." She also likes the smaller scale machines at the gym. "This equipment is the only kind in the nation built especially for kids," said PowerKidz owner Karin Glass.
Investors cheer as Clorox purchases Burt's Bees
Oakland-based The Clorox Co. is waxing green with its $925 million acquisition of eco-friendly personal care company Burt's Bees, a move that sent Clorox stock up Wednesday despite a decline in quarterly profit. "This is part of the trend of corporate America moving into more environmentally friendly products to open that market for themselves," said John Grubb of the Bay Area Council, a locally focused business-backed public policy organization. "It's a sign that green products are going mainstream," Grubb said. "This acquisition allows us to enter a growing market that's consistent with consumer megatrends," said Donald Knauss, Clorox's chief executive officer. Clorox stock jumped 2.6 percent in the wake of the news, closing at $62.57 a share. The maker of Glad bags and its signature bleach announced its agreement to acquire North Carolina-based Burt's along with its first-quarter earnings report.
A solution to the stem cell debate?
Two teams of scientists have figured out how to make ordinary human skin cells act like embryonic stem cells. Who you callin' a "ho," Santa?Jolly Old Saint Nick muzzled in Australia. Can hair color make other people act dumb?A study suggests that just the sight of blond women can "make men less clever." Halftime harassmentA ritual at Giants Stadium involves crowds of men clamoring for women to take off their shirts. When is a breast just a breast?Women in Sweden are fighting for the right to go topless. Miss Landmine 2008At a beauty pageant held for Angola's land mine victims, the prize is a prosthetic leg. Colorado: Human rights for eggsA measure to extend state constitutional rights to fertilized eggs creeps forward. Quote of the dayBitch magazine co-founder offers an explainer on the B-word.
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