Extra-Extra Small Bits of News

Forklift Removes 900-Pound Man From Home
Sep 19, 2007
LANSING, Mich. (AP) - Firefighters cut a hole in the side of a house and used a forklift to extricate a 900-pound man from his second-floor bedroom after a visiting nurse became worried about his health.
Rescue workers were called in Tuesday by the nurse, who determined the 33-year-old man needed medical help, Fire Chief Tom Cochran said.
Cochran said the man had not left his home since 2003.
The man's brother, who lives with him, said he suffers from Prader-Willi Syndrome, a rare genetic disorder that creates a chronic hunger feeling that can lead to overeating and life-threatening obesity.
Rescue workers brought in a forklift, high enough to raise a platform to a hole cut into the wall of the house. They covered the man with a blue tarp to shield him from onlookers and slid the platform onto a flatbed truck for a trip to Sparrow Hospital.

Seattle Trolley Line Has Acronym: SLUT
Sep 18, 2007
SEATTLE (AP) - Officially, it's the South Lake Union Streetcar. But in the neighborhood where the new line runs, it's called the South Lake Union Trolley - or, the SLUT.
At Kapow! Coffee, a shop in the old Cascade neighborhood, 100 T-shirts bearing the words "Ride the SLUT" sold out in days, and another 100 are on order.
"We're welcoming the SLUT into the neighborhood," said Jerry Johnson, 29, a part-time barista.
Some claim - incorrectly, according to representatives of Vulcan Inc., the company that is developing the area - that South Lake Union Trolley was the original name and that it was changed when officials belatedly realized the acronym.
The $50.5 million project should be completed with streetcars running in December. Underlying the lighthearted opposition, however, is resentment over changes in the old working-class neighborhood.
"There was a meeting with representatives from the city several years ago," Johnson recalled.
"They asked us, 'What we could do for you?' Most people raised their hands and said, 'Affordable housing,'" he said. "Then the people from the city huddled together - 'whisper, whisper, whisper,' - and they said, 'How about a trolley?'"
Since then, Cascade has been ignored in Vulcan brochures that lump the neighborhood together with Denny Park and Denny Triangle under the term South Lake Union. With the streetcar, said Don Clifton, a Cascade resident, "We learned how fun it is to change the name of things."