Back in January, we warned you that BART would start coming down hard on those miscreants who think it's okay to pee, poop, and stab people on their way home. Four months should have given you plenty of time to potty train yourself.

Let's just hope, because today, no more. BART is cutting the cord and officially banning those of you who can't seem to hold it ... together. The transit agency's new anti-gross law goes into effect today: Assembly Bill 716, which passed last year, allows BART to issue a "prohibition order," meaning it can (and will) ban anyone who commits a criminal offense on BART property.

In other words, if you are busted holding up trains, assaulting workers or commuters, being lewd and lascivious (masturbating), selling drugs, scrawling missives on BART property, or just bothering others, then you'll be walking home.

http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2013/05/bart_ban.php

BRIDGETON — Where is the groundhog?

The vicious animal that terrorized Bridgeton Little League Saturday with its teeth exposed before being caged by police apparently escaped from its cage at Wilwynn Animal Hospital sometime Saturday night or Sunday morning.

Dr. Bill McAloanan, who runs the Hopewell Township clinic, said when he showed up Sunday morning to take care of the animal, the cage left by the Bridgeton Police Department was empty, but secured.

http://www.nj.com/cumberland/index.ssf/2013/05/bridgeton_groundhog_escapes_fr.html

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) -- The nuns' habits didn't seem to be habitual garb for three young women so Colombian police asked them to step aside when they arrived on the Caribbean island of San Andres on a flight from Bogota.

Police Capt. Oscar Davila says the three women appeared nervous, and the fabric didn't look right.

The chief of the island's judicial police says more than four pounds of cocaine (two kilos) was strapped to the legs of each woman. Davila says all three broke into tears and launched into tales of financial hardship.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LT_COLOMBIA_FALSE_HABITS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

A Kazakh artist who was born without arms says he could not get permission to enter the UK last month because he could not give fingerprints.

Karipbek Kuyukov planned to attend an anti-nuclear conference in Edinburgh.

But he got a letter from the British Consulate in Istanbul saying his "biometrics were of poor quality" and asking him to resubmit his application.

The UK Home Office said his visa was not refused and it may have been the result of a "miscommunication".

Mr Kuyukov, 44, who was forced to cancel his attendance at the conference, spoke of his disappointment.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22428923

Snow, rain and gloom of night might not slow Brownsville mailmen down — but gangbangers sure will.

Postmen are too scared to deliver letters and packages to one of Brooklyn’s most crime-ravaged neighborhoods, a US Postal Service worker told The Post yesterday.

“The neighborhood is bad,” the worker said outside the Brownsville Station Post Office on Bristol Street. “I wouldn’t want to go into those buildings.”

Snail mail that goes undelivered finds its way back to the post office, where it can stew for several days until a carrier decides to deliver it — or residents are forced to come pick it up.

“Have you seen this neighborhood? It’s on the news every day,” the terrified employee said.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/brooklyn/mailmen_deliver_us_from_evil_9TJh9RgtiTv1FGwOw05MOI

Messages from the Onion's Twitter and Facebook feeds prompted questions about whether the accounts had been hacked by the Syrian Electronic Army on Monday. The hacker group claimed responsibility for the posts.

"The Syrian Electronic Army Was Here" appeared on the Onion's Facebook page on Monday morning. Similar messages appeared on the Facebook and Twitter feeds for Onion Sports, and have since been removed.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/06/onion-syrian-electronic-army_n_3223367.html

(Reuters Health) - Toddlers are less likely to have asthma and itchy rashes if their parents "cleaned" their pacifiers by sucking on them when the kids were infants, a small new study suggests.

The findings don't prove that technique protects kids against asthma, eczema or other allergies. But researchers said it's possible the transfer of mouth microbes from parents to baby may help boost the bacterial diversity of the young child's digestive system and foster immunity.

"We know these bacteria are important for development," said Dr. Wilfried Karmaus from the University of Memphis, who has studied asthma and eczema but wasn't involved in the new research.

Being delivered through a vaginal birth, for example, exposes babies to more of their moms' bacteria and has been linked to fewer allergies in childhood. But no one has ever looked at transfer of bacteria through pacifiers, Karmaus said.


http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/06/us-sucking-kids-pacifier-idUSBRE94503520130506

Would-be serial killer Mark Twitchell has been given unlimited access to the blood-soaked television series that inspired his killing, despite being held in one of the country’s highest-security prisons.

The 33-year-old former Edmonton filmmaker, who modelled the luring, murder and dismemberment of a complete stranger on the Dexter TV series, is continuing to watch the ultra-violent program inside the maximum security wing of Saskatchewan Penitentiary.

A National Post investigation has found that while Twitchell was prevented from watching the show while awaiting trial in the Edmonton Remand Centre, he has not faced similar restrictions at the federal prison.

http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/05/05/mark-twitchell-allowed-to-watch-dexter-in-prison/?utm_source=feedburner

A 58-year-old Brookfield woman charged by Riverside police Friday for driving under the influence said she had been out celebrating the imminent return of her driver’s license from an earlier drunk driving conviction.

According to a news release from the Riverside Police Department, Erin James, 58, was charged after she was stopped for speeding at 2:10 a.m. Friday in the 3400 block of South Harlem Avenue. The release said that when she later underwent a breath test at the department, her blood alcohol level was 0.155 percent; the legal limit is 0.08.

In the release, police said that James’ driver’s license had been suspended in 2012 after a DUI arrest in North Riverside and that she had told a Riverside officer she had been out celebrating at a Forest Park bar the fact that she would be getting her license back from the 2012 arrest.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-police-dui-charge-for-woman-celebrating-end-of-earlier-dui-suspension-20130504,0,4401203.story

The 25ft tall water-powered structure houses a 3ft wooden cuckoo which pops out every hour to the sound of a pipe organ.

It is powered by a complex system of cantilevers, counterweights and pulleys which convert energy from a stream.

Retired Richard, 72, used his experience as a hydrogeologist to design and build the wooden structure at his water gardens in Herefordshire.

He said: “I think it’s quite fun and rather beautiful. I wanted to make something that made people laugh. It took a while to build, but I did almost all the work myself.

“I had a local carpenter and local machinists help me with some of the frame and the metalworking though.”

http://www.express.co.uk/news/weird/397360/Gardener-who-spent-20-000-building-a-giant-clock-not-cuckoo