Armoral Tuttle Public Library

It took over five years for Nathaniel Rich to finish his first novel — maybe because he was writing The Mayor's Tongue secretly, first as a college student, and then while writing film criticism during the day.

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By Teresa Shipley.

Abortion-rights backers want quick action from the president-elect, although they may not press for sweeping changes. Obama has said he is looking to find common ground on reproductive health issues.

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Evan Ratliff eschewed his identity and picked up a new one, challenging Wired readers to find him in 30 days in a contest sponsored by the magazine. Lured by a cash price, readers mobilized online in a mad dash to locate Ratliff — who got a little too cocksure for his own good.

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Sen. Carl Levin, the chairman of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, said there may be additional e-mails that could have tipped off law enforcement or military officials to the alleged Fort Hood shooter before the deadly rampage.

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Having moved to Boise in late 2007, I’ve only known the monolithic Capitol building as the gated structure that sits between Sixth and Eighth Streets, always with a watchful security guard and bevy of construction activity. Boise natives have often told me of their fourth grade trips to the Idaho Statehouse, and their lessons on the architecture by John E. Tourtellotte.

So when I found myself staring straight up into the oculus of the 208 foot tall Rotunda of Idaho’s most stately building, I was overcome with vertigo. I craned my neck to capture all of the gleaming marble. I believe my simple statement was something like: “Wow.”

Robyn Lockett, capitol services coordinator, guided me through the new underground legislative hearing rooms that replace the old fashioned ‘Knight of the Round Table’ style rooms that were used in the early part of the century.

After we descended the outside staircase into the basement, we walked down a long marble hallway. Robyn told me, as we passed an antique 20’s roll-top desk, that we’d just entered the original basement. A few short steps seamlessly blend the new with the old.

The additions are capped with skylights made of a special glass that keep the basement from roasting, but allow both an excellent natural light source, and provide a view of that impressive dome.

The Idaho State Capitol Commission released a statement this week, deeming the Capitol building “substantially complete.”

The Legislature will begin moving in, selecting chamber seats, and finalizing furniture arrangements this coming Monday, with the executive following within the next month and a half. The building will open once more to the public on Jan. 9, “on-time and on-budget” as Robyn put it.

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Our question of the day off Questionland is more of an answer of the day. In a lengthy response to A&E editor Amy Atkins' question "Do raccoons hibernate?" user Trespasser somehow slipped in the following oh-no-you-didn't raccoon cutdown:

"If La-Z-Boy made a recliner out of half-eaten bacon, you can be sure a raccoon would never be chivalrous enough to offer that seat to a lady."

Geeeeenius.

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The Justice Department intends to drop manslaughter and weapons charges against one of the Blackwater Worldwide security guards involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, prosecutors said in court documents Friday.

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Yesterday, TMZ.com reported that an agent for BMI—Broadcast Music Inc.—was doing a little desert recon and found Lewiston bar Boomers' Sports Cellar in violation of playing music without having paid licensing rights.

A case, filed in Idaho District Court in September against TTJ's Inc., d/b/a The Sport Cellar, a/k/a Boomers' Sports Cellar and Club 301 and The Garden, a/k/a Boomers' Garden, Jay B. Starnes, lists among the plaintiffs, Songs of Universal Inc., EMI Blackwood Music Inc., Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp., BMI and Taylor Allison Swift, an individual d/b/a Taylor Swift Music.

Boomers' Sports Cellar owner Jay Starnes couldn't be reached for comment, but a daytime employee at the bar said she'd only learned of the allegations after someone from Georgia kept calling repeatedly asking about the story, so she looked it up online.

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Narseal Batiste, who faced a maximum of 70 years in prison, was convicted in May of conspiracy to provide material support to al-Qaida, plotting to blow up buildings and conspiracy to wage war against the U.S. Officials acknowledged the plot never got past the discussion stage and the group never acquired the means to carry it out.

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Two fingers and a tooth removed from Galileo Galilei's corpse in a Florentine basilica in the 18th century and given up for lost have been found again, a Florence museum said Friday.

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Brazil's ghettos are poverty stricken and violent. But there are people fighting against the odds to turn things around for the poor children of Rio de Janeiro. Among them is an unusual apostle: a Rio socialite who founded a school for slum-dwelling children and views education as an equalizer.

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When the Marines of "America's Battalion" first arrived in Afghanistan, they were eager to get into the fight against the Taliban. Now, as they wrap up their seven-month deployment — and after the loss of a dozen comrades — they see warfare in a different light.

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Is it common for a Sex Worker to fake an orgasm or to fake an emotion with a "Trick"?

You mean my desk is a bed and I get paid to orgasm too?

Who ...

Fake it? Why fake when you can have one.

Focus ... focus ... here it comes ... here it comes and

WHAM

What!? You're done, I was almost there. There's no time. I'm gonna get my call.

Oh well, can't be selfish. I'll just play with the perfect man—the one with attachments.

Trick: Did you?

Kitty-Cat: Umm ... yeah

Trick: How many times?

Kitty-Cat: Umm ... two times

Trick (Scratching his head): Are you lying?

Kitty-Cat (Slipping on her heels): Couldn't you tell?

Was that apart of the negotiations you really want

to pay me to please me? I thought you were paying

me to please you. Oh, the confusion.

It's just sex.

You pay

we play

we both go our separate ways ...

It's just sex?

For some, there is always that one that can make

a pro—Working Girl fall in love ...

With Love, Sex Guidess

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Based on studies, two panels of medical experts this week recommended fewer screening tests for breast and cervical cancer. But people don't always want to do what the data say to do.

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News from Yemen has been dominated recently by an escalating rebellion along the border with Saudi Arabia. But the country has been making news for decades because of its severe overuse of a rapidly disappearing water supply, the result of natural and political causes.

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Levies on liposuction, breast augmentation and other cosmetic procedures would generate billions of dollars to help cover the uninsured.

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Raging floods engulfed northern England's Lake District on Friday, killing a police officer and trapping dozens in their swamped homes. In Ireland, more than 3 feet of water shut down the center of the country's second-largest city, Cork, and more than a dozen other towns and villages.

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Police arrested three members of a gang in the Peruvian jungle that allegedly has been killing people and draining fat from the corpses to sell on the black market for use in cosmetics. Medical experts expressed doubt about an international black market for human fat, though it does have cosmetic applications.

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The Ohio school has a 20,000-seat stadium, a $3 million indoor practice facility and a live tiger for a mascot. Massillon teams have won 22 state championships and they're in the running for another one. It's football "sunup to sundown," the head coach says.

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