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Heat up your holidays with these steamy songs

By Rich Heldenfels
and Malcolm X Abram 
Beacon Journal staff writers

Let it steam, let it steam, let it steam.

It’s time for our annual consideration of holiday songs and this time around we’re in a sexy mood.

To be sure, most holiday tunes don’t go for that particular gusto. They celebrate religion, weather, shopping and family. But there are still those songs that allude not to stockings on the mantel but those held up by a garter belt, to gifts that can’t be wrapped (or must be wrapped verrrrry carefully), to items that Santa picked up at Ambiance.

And it’s not just us. There is, in fact, a CD collection called A Sexy Christmas (Aaron Neville, Toni Braxton and more). Mojo Nixon called his CD Horny Holidays.

In fact, there are three kinds of sexy songs at Christmas. One is the song that isn’t sexy to anyone but you, because you heard it at a crucial moment in your romantic life. The second is the song that, you’ll excuse the expression, can swing both ways, depending on the arrangement or the artist; Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, say, or I’ll Be Home for Christmas can be full of romantic longing or a different kind of longing entirely. READ MORE HERE

New Holiday Tradition: Buying Yourself a Gift

By Brad Tuttle | @bradrtuttle | December 12, 2011

Gift exchanges are so inefficient. Unless everyone’s picked out presents via gift registry, there’s a decent chance someone will receive an unwanted gift—which amounts to a waste of time and money. And if everyone’s picked out their own gifts in advance, and there’s not much surprise or thought involved, the idea of a gift exchange is something of a charade. Why not just have all parties buy gifts for themselves? In some ways, this appears to be happening already.

‘Tis the season of giving—to the person you love most (you!). Last year, surveys of holiday shoppers revealed a noticeable rise in “self-gifting.” Leading up to the 2010 holiday season, 57% of consumers said they’d expected to splurge on a personal gift for themselves. That’s up from 52% the year before. READ MORE HERE

Former Tuscola County deputy sentenced to 185 days in jail for having sex with female prisoner

Published: Monday, December 12, 2011, 11:56 AM

By Tom Gilchrist | The Saginaw News

CARO — A resigned Tuscola County Sheriff’s Department deputy accused of having sex with a female prisoner on the hood of his patrol unit was sentenced this morning to 185 days in jail, and to wear an electronic tether for another 180 days after his release.

Dale L. Tompkins, 41, pleaded no contest to felony charges of accepting a bribe and of voluntarily allowing a prisoner escape. Both counts are felonies punishable by up to 15 years behind bars and a $3,000 fine.

Tuscola County Circuit Judge Patrick R. Joslyn also placed Tompkins on probation for three years when sentencing him.

Prosecutors maintain Tompkins, while in uniform and on duty, accepted a female prisoner’s offer to engage in sex acts with him in exchange for her escape from his patrol car in July 2010.

Tuscola County Prosecutor Mark E. Reene called Tompkins’ conduct “outrageous.”

“It remains incomprehensible to me how (Tompkins) could think that this could possibly end well,” Reene said after the sentencing. READ MORE HERE

Calif. teen takes $100K national science prize

Associated Press

WASHINGTON — A high school student from California won a $100,000 scholarship Monday for research that created a tiny particle she likened to a "Swiss army knife of cancer treatments" because of its precision in targeting cancer tumors.

Angela Zhang, 17, of Cupertino, Calif., won top individual honors at the Siemens Foundation's annual high school science competition, which announced winners in Washington. Top team honors went to a pair of students from Oak Ridge, Tenn., for their research using gaming technology to analyze the motion involved in walking. Cassee Cain and Ziyuan Liu, both 17, will share a $100,000 scholarship.

Six individuals and six teams were competing for the awards, which are in their 13th year. Zhang, the only female individual finalist, said her research was in part motivated by her family. Her great grandfather had liver cancer and her grandfather died of lung cancer when she was in seventh grade.

"I asked, 'Why does this happen. Why does cancer cause death? What are we doing to fix this and what can I do to help,'" said the Monta Vista High School senior. READ MORE HERE

Sperm-donor kept wife in the dark

By David Fisher

5:30 AM Sunday Dec 11, 2011

A conservative Christian politician has a secret life as a sperm donor for lesbian couples - even though he has campaigned against gay marriage.

American politician Bill Johnson has spent most of this year in Christchurch helping run the earthquake recovery, all the while using the online persona "chchbill" to meet women who want help to get pregnant.

Under that persona, he has discussed making donations to at least nine women without the knowledge of his family in the US.

Three of the women are now pregnant, and Johnson has assisted another three with donations in the past month. It is believed he has been in communication with at least another three women to discuss sperm donation. READ MORE HERE

Mom Breaks Into Nearly 30 Homes After Dropping Kids Off At School

HENRICO COUNTY, Va. (CBS Washington) – Henrico County authorities say a mother broke into nearly 30 homes after dropping her kids off at school.

Police have charged Melissa Addison, 36, from Chesterfield, with breaking into and stealing from homes.

According to the report, Addison would drop her children off to school each morning and then travel to Henrico to break into homes.

Addison was arrested last Monday with information received from Chesterfield police. READ MORE HERE

Norwegians battle butter shortage in peak season

OSLO, Norway (AP) — High demand for butter used in traditional Norwegian Christmas dishes has caused a big shortage, leading the government to slash import duties on the cherished product.

Butter consumption has steadily increased in the Scandinavian country this year, partly because of the nation's increased popularity of low-carb but fat-rich diets. Growth in demand peaked at more than 30 percent last month, compared with November 2010.

That has caused empty shelves nationwide.

When Christiane Pevik goes to a grocery store the first thing she asks is if they have butter. Invariably, the answer is "no."

"It's really stupid because I just want to bake for Christmas," the 45-year-old housewife said at a supermarket outside the capital, Oslo. "But I guess it's no crisis really. I'm sure the butter will be back." READ MORE HERE