Around the Globe and Yale Index

IM players, beware! Six South African players were injured on Tues., Oct. 27, when a bolt of lightning struck the field during a Premier League soccer game. Spectators helped carry four players, two from the Moroka Swallows and two from the Jomo Cosmos, off the field. All four suffered from shock and irregular heartbeats, according to a commentator at the game. The very next day, lightning killed 11 soccer players instantly during a match in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Thirty spectators were treated for burns. Interestingly, the local newspaper reported that "the athletes from [the home team] curiously came out of this catastrophe unscathed."

Sperm hate tobacco

Ever wonder what Joe Camel stores in his humps? The warning "Smoking Causes Sexual Impotence" will appear on cigarette packages in Thailand starting this month, officials announced on Wed., Oct. 28. Thailand's National Committee for the Control of Tobacco Use reported it would be the first country to add such a warning to cigarette packs. Committee Secretary Prakit Vathisathojkit cited research evidence which demonstrates that smoking leads to deformed sperm and a decrease in sperm production and mobility.

Everyone hates the library

The library is ugly and crumbling, books are hard to find and disappear constantly, the employees are belligerent--and it's not Sterling Memorial Library. Workers at France's national library are striking to protest alleged flaws in the new building. Citing computer failure and architectural mishaps, the entire staff stopped work on Tues., Oct. 20, just 11 days after the building became fully operational. A new computer system was programmed to shelve and retrieve books, but librarians claim that the robots constantly lost or misshelved volumes. When the building refused to let visitors leave via the automated exits, believing they had failed to return their books, the staff claim they "lost their cool."

--Compiled by Andrew Swan from The Johannesburg Mail and Guardian, Kinshasa l'Avenir, and Reuters.

YALE INDEX
1. Number of eating establishments in Morse and Stiles	4
2. Number of eating establishments in Las Vegas MGM Grand Hotel	21
3. Number of towers in Morse and Stiles	2
4. Number of towers at the MGM Grand Hotel	4
5. Number of rooms in Morse and Stiles	488
6. Number of rooms at the Las Vegas Mirage Casino and Hotel	3,054
7. Year that the Las Vegas Mirage opened	1989
8. Number of Top Five songs by New Kids on the Block, Nov. 1989	2
9. Number of dates it takes Jordan Knight to fall in love	3
10. Number of times you can leave Rod Stewart	100
11. Number of times he'll take you back	100
12. Number of Luftballons	99

-Compiled by Anne Kinderman and Sharon Lin

Sources: 1,3) Titan Number Crunchers; 2,4) MGM Grand Hotel, Las Vegas; 5) MC/ES Masters' Offices; 6,7) The Mirage Hotel, Las Vegas; 8) Billboard Charts; 9) New Kids on the Block, "The Right Stuff"; 10,11) Rod Stewart, "This Old Heart of Mine"; 12) Nena, "99 Luftballons"

JOHN YI/YH HAUNTED HOUSE: Workers clear rubble from the old Hyperion Theater, which tumbled down on Halloween night, causing damage to businesses.

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