Top Ten List…

Top Ten Things You Don't Want To Hear Your Pilot Say

10. "The union president called – he said the pilots' strike starts IMMEDIATELY."
9. "We'll just ask the flight attendant to wake us up when we get there."
8. "My name is Forrest Gump– people call me Forrest Gump."
7. "Hey, Jim, do you remember where we're going?"
6. "Buckle your seat belt– I'm going to try something I saw in a cartoon."
5. "Bye, bye, Miss American Pie…"
4. "Wow, we're sure a lot lighter now that we dropped that second engine!"
3. "Only 500 more flight hours, and I'll get my license!"
2. "They say this plane practically flies itself. Good thing, huh?"
And the #1 thing you don't want to hear your pilot say:
1. "TODAY WE DIE FOR ALLAH!"

Lakeland, FL– Morgan Kelly wasn't looking for special treatment or a handout. She simply wanted an answer to the question: "Why can't there be a Barbie in a wheelchair?" That innocent query prompted Morgan's mother to confront a multinational corporation. In the end, the eight-year-old Lakeland girl wound up with what she considers an 11-inch-long, plastic version of herself.

Why can't Barbie have a wheelchair too? She's got everything else.

CAMBRIDGE, England– The Fitzwilliam Museum has banned a visitor who accidentally smashed a set of rare 300-year-old Chinese vases after tripping over his own his shoelaces.
Nick Flynn, a regular visitor of the museum in Cambridge, told BBC radio he received a letter from directors asking him not to come back.
Flynn, 42, tripped over his shoelaces as he was coming down a flight of stairs. The accident caused £100,000 in damages.
"I snagged my shoelace, missed the step and crash, bang, wallop, there were a million pieces of high-quality Qing ceramics lying around underneath me,” said Flynn. "I suppose that, seeing they were the prize possession of the museum, they were just lying on a window sill... I thought they might take a bit better care of them."
The three Qing vases, dating from the late 17th or early 18th century, had been at the museum for at least 40 years and were among its best-known artifacts.
Shortly after the accident, Flynn received a letter from museum director Duncan Robinson banning him from the institution.
Flynn, who is single and receives disability benefit following a bike accident, explained he was still sore after the tumble, which happened last month, and that regular staff had not harbored a grudge.
"I think this is just the directors or trustees because they seem to have got egg on their faces," he said.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska– Michaela Hutchison has become the first girl to win a state high school wrestling title.
Amid chants of "Girl Power," Hutchison beat the best boys in her 103-pound weight class at the Alaska state championships.
Michaela walked away from her title match with a bloody nose and said it was "awesome."
She was also just one pin shy of setting a new record in her weight class.

Kangaroo Gets Plastic Surgery

MOORPARK, Calif.– A celebrity kangaroo, underwent lip surgery after being bitten by a wolf at a Hollywood animal farm.
According to the Associated Press, the 75-pound kangaroo named Feznick underwent plastic surgery Feb. 5 and veterinarians say the marsupial will soon be ready to resume his acting career.
Feznick is an aspiring actor who often appears at corporate events and was on the red carpet for the opening of last year's movie flop "Kangaroo Jack."
Feznick stuck his snout under a fence last year at a Kern County farm for Hollywood animals and was bitten by a wolf, leaving the 4-year-old kangaroo with a toothy, Billy Idol-style sneer.
The surgery turned Feznick's muzzle back into a fuzzy, made-for-TV face.
Westlake Village plastic surgeon Dr. Theodore Corwin performed the two-hour lip surgery, the first time he's ever worked on an animal. He didn't charge for Feznick's lip repair.

HINCKLEY, LEICS, England– After spending £12,000 turning his home into the Starship Voyager, a Star Trek fan has gone bankrupt.
Tony Alleyne's flat in Hinckley, Leics, has moulded walls, touch-panel blue lighting and a life-size model of the show's transporter room.
He even built a command console, reshaped windows to look like portholes and set up vertical lights so he can pretend to be "beamed up".
He hoped his pad would tempt other Trekkies to pay him to convert their homes too.
He took out two huge loans and ran up debts of over £100,000 on 14 credit cards marketing his idea and paying for the merchandise before filing for bankruptcy.
Tony, who’ wife Georgina split up with him after he replaced their fridge with a "warp coil" said he was convinced Trekkies all over the world would want a house like his and pay him to create such homes.
"But I was wrong and just overstretched,” said Alleyne. “Building it in my apartment was the enjoyable and easy bit. But then I got hooked up with marketing and merchandise people here and in America and it all got out of hand.”
Alleyne says he’s still proud of what he created, but it's been a financial disaster.

MIAMI, Fla.– Police say a North Miami Beach man drove his new Ford Escape through a dealership showroom, poured gasoline on it, and set a fire that caused nearly a $1 million in damage.
Gerald Georgettis was arrested after walking away from the fire Sunday at the Metro Ford in north Dade County.
Fire officials say the blaze scorched about a dozen cars, including a limited edition 2006 Ford G-T Heritage. Only 250 of the cars that sell for $150,000 were made.
Miami-Dade police say Georgettis was angry about the price he paid for a new sport utility vehicle. New Ford Escape costs around $20,000, but it wasn't immediately clear what Georgettis paid for his.
Georgettis was charged with first-degree arson and a felony criminal mischief. He posted a $1,500 bail.

WAXAHACHIE, Texas–A 15-mile stretch of Interstate 35 in Ellis County, Texas may be seeing some different type of plant growth this spring.
Marijuana seeds were inadvertently sown after a police officer stopped a car with no license plate early Feb. 3 and smelled a strong odor of pot. When the officer returned to his car and called for backup, the driver sped away.
As several law enforcement agencies joined the chase, the fleeing driver tore open 17 to 19 bags and threw the contents out of his window.
"There was marijuana flying everywhere," Milford Police Chief Carlos Phoenix told the Waxahachie Daily Light.
After driving over two sets of spikes set out by authorities, the suspect finally stopped and was taken into custody, and he was "literally covered in marijuana," Phoenix said.
Officers picked up two duffel bags, a backpack and three or four gallon-size freezer bags from the interstate, but the wind had blown much of the substance and seeds.
According to Phoenix, some people with police scanners heard that a man was throwing marijuana out of his car window and drove to the scene to try to retrieve it.

13-Year-Old On Secret No-Fly List

LONGMONT, Colo.– The parents of a Longmont Middle School student were stunned when the found out that their 13-year-old son was on a secret government no-fly list that is supposed to include the names of suspected terrorists and felons.
His parents wanted to know why Stephen Mitchell, their 13-year-old son who has no criminal record was being continually stopped at the airport, and why, after nearly a year, the Transportation Security Administration hadn't cleared him.
The Mitchell family learned that Stephen was on the list when they were taking a red-eye flight to Cancun. They arrived at the Frontier ticket counter at Denver International Airport and were shocked when told their 13-year-old son couldn't get on the plane.
"We were told that Stephen was on the no-fly list. We sort of didn't understand why a 13-year-old would be on the no-fly list," Donna Mitchell, Stephen's mother, said. "And I ask her, 'What do we do?' She said, 'Well, I've got to call Washington and clear him as well as I have to clear all of you because you were on the travel record with him.'"
After an hour, Stephen was finally allowed on the aircraft. The Mitchells assumed the mistake had been corrected. But then when they went to the airport in Cancun, they were told their son could not get a boarding pass.
"They take all of our passports and disappear ... Finally they came back. They had called Washington and cleared us all again and we were able to get on the plane," Mitchell told the AP.
Stephen, now a 14-year-old middle school student in Longmont, is apparently considered a potential threat by the TSA.

14-year-old Stephen Mitchell has been on TSA's no-fly list for over a year. No one knows why.

Sources familiar with the secret watch list confirm it still includes Stephen's name and date of birth.
But now, Stephen is supposed to take a school trip in March.
"I'm pretty sure I can get there, but my parents aren't going to be there to clear me on the way back. So, unless I get off this list, I am not sure I am going to be able to go," Stephen said.
He said his friends would not characterize him as a terrorist.
"They were wondering why I was on the list. They thought I was a terrorist at first because they were like, 'What did you do? What did you do?' But then I was like, 'It wasn't me,'" Stephen said.
Stephen has been stopped on every trip for the last year. Each time he is told he is on the list that contains the names of suspected terrorists and felons. The most recent incident occurred last month.
"We have asked why, but no one is quite sure. It might be someone with my name that's a terrorist or somebody just put me on it," Stephen said.
For almost a year Stephen's mother has been writing and calling the TSA, filling out and sending in information with all her son's credentials.
"We sent the letter registered mail with confirmation to the TSA. We got confirmation back that they had received it. That was at the end of March 2005," Mitchell said.
She said she got nothing back. She has contacted TSA twice since then.
"Never heard anything," she said.
Being under government scrutiny has raised questions for Stephen and his family about the TSA's competence.
"If I wasn't on the list, I wouldn't understand what big importance there is to it. Now, I realize that it is a big deal," Stephen said.
"Your name is on the list and there is no recourse for you as a citizen," Mitchell said. "If his name is on one list then it could be on other lists I don't even know exist. It is sort of scary. I feel there is no accountability from the government."
Officials from the TSA contacted the local television station Feb. 2 and claimed Stephen Mitchell wasn't actually on a no-fly list or a watch list.
In a statement, the TSA said the family, "should have been notified within several weeks that (Stephen) had a name similar to one on a TSA watch list. Due to an administrative error, that did not happen. We issued and mailed a clearance letter to Stephen Mitchell and his parents this week. They will also receive a letter of apology for our very delayed response."
But a TSA spokesman warned that after all this, Stephen should still carry the clearance letter with him when he goes to the airport because even now, he could be stopped and asked for additional information.