Researchers from the School of Medicine at the University of California have shown that the more germs a child is exposed to, the better their immune system in later life. Their study found that keeping a child's skin too clean impaired the skin's ability to heal itself. From the article: "'These germs are actually good for us,' said Professor Richard Gallo, who led the research. Common bacterial species, known as staphylococci, which can cause inflammation when under the skin, are 'good bacteria' when on the surface, where they can reduce inflammation."

RichZellich writes "Police arrested a senior vice president from Island Def Jam Records, saying he hindered their crowd-control efforts by not cooperating. The crowd at a mall where Justin Bieber was appearing got out of control, and police wanted the man to send a tweet asking for calm; he refused and they arrested him on a felony assault charge 'for putting people in danger.'"

cohensh writes "A Purdue engineering student was arrested for terroristic mischief. After receiving a parking ticket and having a boot put on his car he put the ticket, boot and payment in a box and left it at parking services. Someone thought the box was suspicious and the building was evacuated. Eventually it was traced back to the student who was arrested for 'leaving something that a reasonable person may think is a weapon of mass destruction.'"

10 North Naples middle school students were suspended for participating in "kick a Jew day." South area council for the Florida Anti-Defamation League, David Barkey said, “You are talking about an incident that has anti-Jewish bias if not anti-Semitism. You have Jewish students being singled out, harassed and assaulted. If the allegations are true, it is possible these students violated Florida’s new anti-bullying law. And, if students were physically assaulted, it could rise to the level of criminal conduct.” How the students knew it was kick a Jew day remains unclear but the school district has now set aside the first 20 minutes of each day to focus on character traits. I can't think of anything that can't be fixed in 20 minutes a day, problem solved.

overcaffein8d writes "A man who was paralyzed and thought to be comatose for 23 years had his nightmare ended. A hi-tech scan showed his brain was still functioning almost completely normally. From the article: 'I screamed, but there was nothing to hear,' said Mr. Houben, now 46, who doctors thought was in a persistent vegetative state. "I dreamed myself away," he added, tapping his tale out with the aid of a computer. Mr. Houben said: "I shall never forget the day when they discovered what was truly wrong with me — it was my second birth. I want to read, talk with my friends via the computer and enjoy my life now that people know I am not dead."'"

Movement rules, combat order, and spells are not the limit to a Dungeon Master's knowledge. How different is keeping track of a hobgoblin village than keeping track of a heart? Here's a collection of questions and answers about love and relationships specifically for role players. "Warn your parents that Charisma is your girlfriend’s dump stat" is a personal favorite.

Right after "be careful what you wish for" in the idiom dictionary is a picture of 41-year-old Matthew Roberts. 12 years ago, Roberts began to search for the identity of his biological parents. He eventually found his birth mother and was shocked to learn that his father was none other than Charles Manson. Roberts said, "I didn't want to believe it. I was frightened and angry. It's like finding out that Adolf Hitler is your father. I'm a peaceful person — trapped in the face of a monster."

destinyland writes "Sunday night saw a reading of the William Gibson's classic cyberpunk novel featuring porn star Sasha Grey at a New York art museum, along with sculpture-props simulating virtual reality. Artist Brody Condon promised to combine 'Gibson's 1980s dystopian techno-fetishism with early twentieth-century abstraction,' but the editor of H+ magazine challenges that description. 'In a 1993 interview, Gibson himself told me: "I think my world looks dystopian if you're a middle class white guy doing reasonably well in 1993... There are so many places in the world today that are so much crappier than anything I'm writing about."' And earlier this month William Gibson shared his response to a blog post about the event. 'Gol' dang! It's news to me!'"

An anonymous reader writes "Ever wondered how much the internet physically weighs? 498,438,559,990kg, according to CNET. To reach this figure, they added together public data on the weight of every computer, server and connecting cable. To this they added 6,075,000kg of iPhones, and over 6,800,000kg of Blackberries. Finally, they added the weight of 287,524 viruses and 85 billion+ webpages."

An anonymous reader writes "Take a look at this awesome new product on Amazon. The laptop steering wheel desk is just the thing for the person who can't be sufficiently distracted by newspapers, eating, or cell phones while they drive. The user comments and reviews are great."

nk497 writes "London tech workers have stripped off to create their very own naked calendar for charity. Created by TechCrunch Europe contributing editor Milo Yiannopoulous, London Nude Tech 2010 isn't half as frightening as you'd think. It features photos (a few included at the link) of female and male tech entrepreneurs — one with strategically placed Mac — for every month of the year. It's raising funds for Take Heart India, so pick up your copy — it's for charity, right?"Click here to check out a few pics from the calender.

Since 1954, the US Postal Service, with the help volunteers from the small Alaskan town of North Pole, have responded to thousands of letters addressed to Santa each year. All that has come to an end. It was discovered last Christmas that one of the volunteers opening children's letters was a registered sex offender. The scare was enough for the Postal Service to drop the program. North Pole Mayor Doug Isaacson said, "It's Grinchlike that the Postal Service never informed all the little elves before the fact." I can see how it would be confusing for a child to get a letter back with all the things Santa wants for Christmas.

Peruvian officials have arrested four people for allegedly killing at least 60 people to sell their fat and other tissues to Italian co-conspirators for cosmetic use in Europe. The indictment says the fat harvesters went after farmers and indigenous people in remote areas, tricking them by offering jobs. The arrests have revived the Andean legend of white foreigners called "Pishtacos." The Pishtacos were said to suck the fat out of people traveling on lonely roads at night, making fine soaps, lubricants, healing salves and beauty creams out of the tissue. We call them cosmetic surgeons.

An anonymous reader writes "The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has taken pity on it's loverlorn engineers and is now offering to help find dates for them. From the article: 'Jim McDermott, chief human capital officer of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, thinks he's found a foolproof way to convince young engineers to come to his agency: Find them dates. "There are incentives, and then there are incentives," McDermott told a crowd of human resources officials at the HCMF Conference in Arlington, Va., earlier today. "When we’re hiring, we say, 'Is there a significant other in the picture'; If there’s no significant other, I tell them, 'We can help.''"

Sherri and Tom Milley may be the coolest parents in the world, at least in the eyes of their children. The Milley's were tired of having to help their children with hours of homework each night so they negotiated the "Milleys' Differentiated Homework Plan" with the school. The plan, which ensures their youngest two children will never have to do homework again, was signed by the children, parents and teachers. "It was a constant homework battle every night," Sherri told Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper. "It's hard to get a weeping child to take in math problems. They are tired. They shouldn't be working a second shift."

d'Armond Speers has a doctorate in computational linguistics but that wasn't enough for him. He is now pursuing the coveted "World's Worst Dad" title. To this end he has decided to treat his child like a verengan Ha'DIbaH and speak only Klingon around the child for the first 3 years of his life. "I was interested in the question of whether my son, going through his first language acquisition process, would acquire it like any human language," Speers told the Minnesota Daily. "He was definitely starting to learn it."

Congressman Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO), who grew up with the rest of his 149 member family living in a shoe box in the middle of the road, would like everyone to stop complaining next Wednesday. He's co-sponsored House Concurrent Resolution 155, which designates the day before Thanksgiving as "Complaint Free Wednesday." He states, "From time to time, we all experience anxiety, frustration, stress, and regret. And often, we respond to these feelings with a criticism or a complaint. Regrettably, complaining keeps people stuck on current problems, inhibiting them from thinking constructively to find solutions. Research has also shown that complaining can be harmful to one’s emotional and physical health; relationships; and can limit professional career success."

MikeChino writes "Working in partnership with the US Army Corp of Engineers, Berry Plastics has rolled out a new breed of bomb-proof wallpaper. Dubbed the X-Flex Blast Protection System, the wallpaper is so effective that a single layer can keep a wrecking ball from smashing through a brick wall, and a double layer can stop blunt objects (i.e. a flying 2×4) from knocking down drywall. According to its designers, covering an entire room takes less than an hour."

PETA found a way to make sure nobody would ever eat pork again. The organization asked permission to bring a pretend pig farm with real pigs, and 3,500 buckets filled with pig urine and waste to the US Capitol plaza. The plan would have worked too, if it hadn't been for those darn Capitol Police, and the fact that pigs are so delicious.

Robert James is suing Butler County sheriff’s deputy Daron Rhoads, wildlife officer James Tunnell, and a third, unknown officer, alleging that they redecorated his house while they searched it. Unlike most home redecoration projects, the officers seem to focus on his girlfriend’s sex toys, which they turned on and left in plain sight “for James to see that they had found them." James says they also did the same with some porno tapes, unlocked all of his weapons and ammunition, leaving them strewn in insecure locations around the house. And worst of all, they “placed a hat, Christmas lights and goggles on deer antlers that were affixed to James’ wall.”