CaaC (John)

Chelsea have opened talks with forward Tammy Abraham and defender Fikayo Tomori to give the English 21-year-olds new five-year contracts. (Guardian)

Poor firefighter's...what a (lovely) load of bullshit...

Manchester United defender Victor Lindelof has signed a new contract through to the summer of 2024, with the option of a further year. The Sweden international, 25, has made 74 appearances for the club since joining from Benfica for £31m in June 2017. "Since the day I arrived at United it has felt like home," said Lindelof. "I've grown significantly both as a player and as a person in the last two years." Lindelof has started every game for United so far this season alongside £80m summer signing Harry Maguire. He is the second Manchester United player to commit his future to the club this week after goalkeeper David de Gea signed a new deal on Monday. "I know that everyone at the club shares this vision and will give everything to get Manchester United back to where it belongs," added Lindelof, who began his career at Swedish club Vasteras before moving to Benfica in 2011. "I'm still young and know I can improve further but with the help of the boss and his coaching staff, I believe that only good things are ahead for this great club." United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer said: "Victor has established himself here and has become a very important part of our team. He brings calmness on the pitch and I can see that he is determined to help this club and to be successful here. "I'm extremely happy that he has committed his future to Manchester United. We're all looking forward to working together to deliver the success and get United back to where we know the club belongs." https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/49745989

Aye, great to hear that seeing he is only 19 years old. Max Taylor returns to Manchester United training after cancer treatment

First measurements of 'interstellar comet' Astronomers are gathering measurements on a presumed interstellar comet, providing clues about its chemical composition. The object, C/2019 Q4 (Borisov), is only the second interstellar object ever identified, after 'Oumuamua, which was spotted in 2017. Telescopes across the world are being trained on the object. Early results suggest its make-up might not differ that much from comets in our cosmic neighbourhood. One expert told the BBC that the object was about to become one of the most famous comets in history. The team used the Osiris instrument at the 10.4m Gran Telescopio Canarias in La Palma, Spain, to obtain visible spectra - measurements of sunlight reflected by Borisov. By studying these spectra, scientists can draw conclusions about its chemical composition, including how it might differ from comets that were "born" around the Sun. "The spectrum is the red side of the comet's total spectrum, so the only thing we can see in the spectrum is the slope," said Miquel Serra Ricart, from the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) in Tenerife. "This inclination is similar to Solar System comets." Astronomer Julia de León, also from the IAC, said this indicated that Borisov's "composition must be similar" to comets in our neighbourhood. FULL REPORT

Rob Howley: Wales backs coach sent home from World Cup over alleged betting breach Wales backs coach Rob Howley has been sent home from the World Cup for an alleged breach of World Rugby's laws covering betting and anti-corruption. The 48-year-old's departure is a huge blow just six days before Wales' opening game in Japan against Pool D opponents Georgia. A Welsh Rugby Union statement said Howley had "returned to Wales to assist with an investigation". The WRU confirmed it was in relation to a potential breach of betting on rugby. World Rugby's regulation 6.3.1 reads: "No connected person shall, directly or indirectly, bet and/or attempt to bet on the outcome of any aspect of any connected event and/or receive and/or attempt to receive part or all of the proceeds of any such bet and/or any other benefit in relation to a bet." FULL REPORT

John Stones: Man City defender suffers muscle injury Manchester City and England defender John Stones will be out for between four and five weeks after suffering a muscle injury in training. Stones suffered the injury in Ukraine on Tuesday, where City are preparing for Wednesday's Champions League group game with Shakhtar Donetsk. The injury is a setback for City, who are also without Aymeric Laporte until January or February because of injury. It leaves City with one established central defender in Nicolas Otamendi. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/49733568

You haven't stopped and still at it.

World's biggest amphibian 'discovered' in the museum A newly-identified amphibian is possibly the largest on the planet, according to DNA from museum specimens. Reaching nearly two metres in length, the South China giant salamander is critically endangered in the wild. Scientists say renewed conservation efforts are needed if the animal is to be saved from extinction. Harvesting for the luxury food trade has led to a collapse in numbers across China. Previously considered a single species, analysis of specimens, living and dead, suggests there are in fact three species found in different parts of China. The South China salamander is the largest of the three, which researchers suspect it is the largest amphibian alive today. Prof Samuel Turvey of ZSL (Zoological Society of London) said the decline of numbers in the wild has been "catastrophic". "We hope that this new understanding of their species diversity has arrived in time to support their successful conservation, but urgent measures are required to protect any viable giant salamander populations that might remain," he said. Co-researcher, Melissa Marr, of the Natural History Museum London, said measures must be put in place that preserves the genetic integrity of each distinct species. "These findings come at a time where urgent interventions are required to save Chinese giant salamanders in the wild," she said. What is the Chinese giant salamander? Giant salamanders were once found across a large area of central, eastern, and southern China. Over-exploitation has increased in recent decades, to supply a domestic luxury food market. A large‐scale farming industry has developed, which may threaten wild populations through poaching and the spread of infectious diseases. What did the research find? Scientists used museum specimens to look at the genetic history of the Chinese giant salamander, a family tree so ancient that the animal is regarded as a "living fossil". 'Living fossil' heading for extinction Zoo unveils smuggled giant salamander The nuns helping save a sacred species - BBC News. The idea that the South China giant salamander was a separate species was first proposed in the 1920s, then abandoned, based on an unusual animal that was kept at London Zoo. The team used the same animal, which is now preserved as a specimen in the Natural History Museum, to define the characteristics of the new species. The research is published in the journal Ecology and Evolution. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-49692583

The world's second-richest man Bernard Arnault is preparing an £890m takeover bid for Serie A side AC Milan. (Mail)

Celtic could make a move for out-of-favour Tottenham and Kenya midfielder Victor Wanyama, 28, in January, says Bhoys boss Neil Lennon. (Team Talk)

Aye, how times change alright, same as Cricket nowadays, Safetyhat with a face grid and padding all over yet when you remember the likes of 'Beefy' Botham, Viv Richards etc, none of that in their days.

Remember that old photo of guys sitting on scaffolding years ago when building the Rockefeller Building, that photo always scared the shite out of me and I always thought how the fuck could they do that then I found out a while back that... .. That photo was not as it appeared to be but was doctored for advertising purposes and the guys sitting on it had a floor level just below them, that made sense then lol.

Fuck that, I am scared shit of heights and that reminds me of my army days going on leave or coming home you had to walk across a bridge with planks when you got off or on the Ferry in Zeebrugge to get on land and the fucking thing would sway in the wind, something like that below.

Sept. 13, 2019 This image, taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, focuses on an object named UGC 695, which is located 30 million light-years away within the constellation Cetus (the Sea Monster), also known as the Whale. A bounty of diverse background galaxies is also visible in this image. UGC 695 is a low-surface-brightness (LSB) galaxy. These galaxies are so faint that their brightness is less than the background brightness of Earth’s atmosphere, which makes them tricky to observe. This low brightness is the result of the relatively small number of stars within them — most of the normal, or “baryonic,” matter in these galaxies exists in the form of huge clouds of gas and dust. The stars are also distributed over a relatively large area. LSB galaxies, like dwarf galaxies, have a high fraction of dark matter relative to the number of stars they contain. Astronomers still debate about how LSB galaxies formed in the first place. Text credit: ESA (European Space Agency) Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, D. Calzetti Last Updated: Sept. 13, 2019 Editor: Rob Garner

I saw that a couple of months ago and mentioned it in here and I even made some screenshots from it in Name That Movie game, a bit slow starting off but it got better as it went on, I gave it a 7/10.

Broad loves Warner Warner c Burns b Broad11

World 'losing battle against deforestation' A historic global agreement aimed at halting deforestation has failed, according to a report. An assessment of the New York Declaration on Forests (NYDF) says it has failed to deliver on key pledges. Launched at the 2014 UN climate summit, it aimed to half deforestation by 2020, and halt it by 2030. Yet deforestation continues at an alarming rate and threatens to prevent the world from preventing dangerous climate change, experts have said. The critique, compiled by the NYDF Assessment Partners (a coalition of 25 organisations), painted a bleak picture of how the world's forests continue to be felled. Deforestation 'accelerating' "Since the NYDF was launched five years ago, deforestation has not only continued - it has actually accelerated," observed Charlotte Streck, co-founder and director of Climate Focus, which co-ordinated the publication of the report. The report says the amount of annual carbon emissions resulting from deforestation around the globe are equivalent to the greenhouse gases produced by the European Union. On average, an area of tree covers the size of the United Kingdom was lost every year between 2014 and 2018. Tropical forest loss accounts for more than 90% of global deforestation, with the hotspot being located in Amazon Basin nations of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia and Peru. Craig Hanson, vice-president of food, forest, water & the ocean at the World Resources Institute, described the findings as a "mixed report card". "There are some places in the world where we are suffering a dramatic loss of primary forest, so we are losing the battle on stopping deforestation," he told reporters. "In other places, we are finding that there are new trees that are enriching rural landscapes, but we are still seeing a net reduction in the number of forests the world has." Emerging hotspot Worryingly, say the authors, a new deforestation hotspot in West Africa is emerging. The rate of tree-felling in the Democratic Republic of Congo has doubled in the past five years. The New York Declaration on Forests (NYDF) is a voluntary and legally non-binding agreement to take action to halt global deforestation. It was first endorsed at the United Nations Climate Summit in September 2014, and by October 2017 40 governments, 57 multi-national companies and 58 non-government organizations had endorsed the declaration. Political action Despite the bleak outlook on a global scale, the report did highlight the positive steps being made in Indonesia, which has long been associated with devastating deforestation. The authors said political action was a contributing factor. The country's president has banned the development of peatlands and primary forests. However, researchers highlighted why the overall picture was so gloomy and why halting deforestation was so vital in the battle against climate change. "Halting deforestation and restoring tropical forests, for example, could provide up to 30% of the mitigation required to help meet the Paris Agreement," explained Eszter Wainwright-Deri, forestry technical advisor at the Zoological Society of London. "This cannot be achieved while zero-deforestation commitments continue to be dishonoured." The WRI's Mr Hanson concluded: "We are losing the battle but we should not give up hope. This report, among other things, gives a clarion call that we need to re-energise commitment, action and financing towards the NYDF." https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-49679883

AC Milan and Inter Milan are interested in signing Serbia midfielder Nemanja Matic, 31, from Manchester United in January. (Corriere Dello Sport - in Italian) Juventus' 33-year-old Croatia forward Mario Mandzukic, who was linked with Manchester United over the summer, is close to a move to MLS side LAFC. (Calciomercato)

Dangerous new hot zones are spreading around the world LA CORONILLA, Uruguay —The day the yellow clams turned black is seared in Ramón Agüero’s memory. It was the summer of 1994. A few days earlier, he had collected a generous haul, 20 buckets of the thin-shelled, cold-water clams, which burrow a foot deep into the sand along a 13-mile stretch of beach near Barra del Chuy, just south of the Brazilian border. Agüero had been digging up these clams since childhood, a livelihood passed on for generations along these shores. But on this day, Agüero returned to find a disastrous sight: the beach covered in dead clams. “Kilometer after kilometre, as far as our eyes could see. All of them dead, rotten, opened up,” remembered Agüero, now 70. “They were all black, and had a fetid odour.” He wept at the sight. FULL STORY

Cavemen were eating cheese 6,000 years ago - despite being lactose intolerant A groundbreaking study has found cavemen were drinking milk and possibly eating cheese and yoghurt 6,000 years ago - despite being lactose intolerant. Scientists at the University of York identified milk protein entombed in the mineralised dental plaque of seven prehistoric British farmers. The fascinating discovery represents the earliest direct evidence of milk consumption anywhere in the world. The ancient human remains tested as part of the research lived in modern-day Britain during the Neolithic period, around 6,000 years ago. Interestingly, it's known humans at that time were lactose intolerant, so it's believed Stone Age people were only drinking small amounts of milk at a time. Alternatively, they could have been processing it into other foodstuffs such as cheese and yoghurt, thereby removing most of the lactose, researchers say. The caveman remains came from three different Neolithic sites - Hambledon Hill and Hazleton North in the south of England, and Banbury Lane in the East Midlands. Individuals from all three sites showed the presence of milk proteins from cows, sheep or goats, suggesting people were exploiting multiple species for dairy products. The proteins were entrapped within dental plaque which had become mineralised by components of saliva to form tartar or 'dental calculus'. Lead author of the study, Dr Sophy Charlton, from the Department of Archaeology at the University of York, said: "The fact that we found this protein in the dental calculus of individuals from three different Neolithic sites may suggest that dairy consumption was a widespread dietary practice in the past. "It would be a fascinating avenue for further research to look at more individuals and see if we can determine whether there are any patterns as to who was consuming milk in the archaeological past - perhaps the amount of dairy products consumed or the animals utilised varied along the lines of sex, gender, age or social standing." Dr Charlton said the discovery of milk proteins is particularly interesting as recent genetic studies suggest people who lived at this time did not yet have the ability to digest the lactose in milk. Dr Charlton added: "If you are lactose intolerant and you consume very, very small amounts of milk, then it doesn't make you too ill. You can just about cope with that. "The alternative option, which I think is perhaps slightly more plausible, is that they were processing the milk in such a way that it's removing a degree of the lactose. "So if you process it into a cheese, or a fermented milk product, or a yoghurt, then it does decrease the lactose content so you could more easily digest it. "That idea fits quite well with other archaeological evidence for the period in which we find dairy fats inside lots of Neolithic pottery, both in the UK and the rest of Europe." https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/offbeat/cavemen-were-eating-cheese-6000-years-ago-despite-being-lactose-intolerant/ar-AAHh35t

Oh for the love of a Golden crap or pee Golden toilet worth £1m stolen from Blenheim Palace A £1m solid gold toilet has been stolen from Blenheim Palace in an audacious overnight burglary, police said today. The 18ct lavatory, designed by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan was part of a new exhibition at the country home where Winston Churchill was born and was ripped out and driven away in the early hours of this morning. The piece is called "America" had been plumbed into the water system so that visitors could fully engage with the artwork, as long as they obeyed a three-minute time slot. Police have arrested a 66-year-old man in connection with the theft but confirmed that the golden toilet is still missing and that there was "significant damage and flooding." Detective Inspector Jess Milne, from Thames Valley Police, said: “The piece of art that has been stolen is a high-value toilet made out of gold that was on display at the palace. FULL STORY

Photos: 2019 Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards finalists SLIDES - 1/36