Good morning. Coffee for you? U.S. researchers are taking a cautiously positive view of the dark and delicious stimulant as they review the value of certain foods in their regular five-year program of such studies. Alert readers will be aware of many works in recent years which suggest that a Cup of Joe can be useful in forestalling cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, Parkinson’s disease and a couple of cancers, including breast and prostate cancer. It seems to be true, the Americans are saying. At the same time the scientists are urging a careful approach. They say we should enjoy our cup or two of coffee but not start taking it like medicine.

A patient has been transferred from Barrie to the Ebola treatment facility at Sunnybrook Hospital tonight after complaining of symptoms which might suggest the disease. Officials and doctors seem optimistic however that it is probably not that disease even as the patient is isolated and tests begin. All parties are saying they consider the present actions precautionary. The patient has been in West Africa and arrived in Canada for about ten days.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAhH5yLAD18&w=500&h=280

This was International Pillow Fight Day in case you didn’t get the memo. The video above is from Nathan Phillips Square and is rather gentler than some of the scenes today but none was very violent. (You can see many videos on YouTube). This is nice because it plays to the child-like quality of the activity (Music: Mary Had A Little Lamb). We were particularly struck by the courtly pillow fighter who chose to carry his friend on his shoulders which gave her quite a commanding position. Anyway, in Bucharest, people watched a pillow duel on stage before feathers flew in their own pillow battle. In the Netherlands, hundreds of people gathered in the central square in the Dutch city of Utrecht for a pillow brawl. Other pillow fight events were scheduled in the U.S., including in Chicago and New York, and around the world in cities in China and Germany. Is that enough of Pillow Fight Day?  Possibly.

Elmer Lach, centre for the Montreal Canadians and linchpin of the Punch Line, has died at 97. Wikipedia tells the story: The Punch line was a famous ice hockey line for the Montreal Canadiens in the 1940s. It consisted of Elmer Lach at center, Toe Blake on left wing, and Maurice Richard on the right side. During their time together, they led the Canadiens to two Stanley Cup victories. During the 1944–45 NHL season, the three finished first (Lach), second (Richard), and third (Blake) in scoring for the league. They would also form the forward line for the first all-star team in that same season. Richard would be the first team all-star right wing for all but one year while with Blake and Lach.

This story starts slow with CNN not wanting to be as blunt as some public comments (below) But finally the skepticism comes out. He seems to be in very condition for such an ordeal. Can you really catch fish by dangling laundry in the sea? Now it develops that the Coast Guard is wondering too. They say the time line doesn’t quite hang together. On YouTube, the comments are poisonous. He is a liar say many and most add he could not be in such good shape after what he claims to have been through.

Final score in later post above.

A San Diego man has been sentenced to 18 years in prison for operating a “revenge porn” website and charging victims $350 to remove the images. Ex-boyfriends were encouraged to send in their compromising pictures of former girlfriends to the website You Got Posted. It is a statement  — a terrible one — about our time when so many men would do such a thing, but also about the delusional female culture that a woman can carelessly be photographed naked or something like it and never have to deal with the consequences of it becoming public. Naughty pictures online? It’s Mom’s rule vs the United Nations. (Mom is better).