JAWS

A hunt is under way for a shark that killed a 21-year-old man in Australia as police praised the courage of two surfers who brought his body back to shore.

The victim was in the water off Bunker Bay, a popular tourist spot on Australia's west coast, when the shark attacked on Sunday, biting him so badly the lower half of his body was torn away, police said.

Local reports said a Great White Shark, up to 4.5 metres long (14.7 feet), was thought to be responsible, with a plane and boats scouring the coastline to find it with the beach remaining closed.

Sergeant Craig Anderson from Dunsborough police told reporters it was "perfect shark conditions".

"It was dark and gloomy water, overcast skies, light rain falling, there was whale action in the bay and some seals about," he said.

There's one i-Born every minute

Ashley McDowell, from Spartanburg County, South Carolina, was picking up food at a McDonald's on Monday night when two men approached her in the parking lot.

According to the sheriff's office 22-year-old Ms McDowell said the men showed her an iPad and told her that they had bought the tablet computers in bulk and were reselling them for US$300 each.

Ms McDowell evidently jumped at the chance to snag a cut-rate iPad but explained that she had only US$180 ($211).

The men decided to sell her one iPad at that price, she told police.

She handed them the money and then waited to open the FedEx box supposedly containing the iPad until she got home - where she found she had not bought a shiny new Apple tablet, but a "piece of wood painted black with an Apple logo", the police report said.

The so-called "screen" was filled with mock iPad icons for email, photos and Safari - all held down with black tape.

Ms McDowell told police that the swindlers were driving "a white Impala with no rims and no tint".

One of the guys, she noted, had "a gold tooth".

Clearly not one of the McDowells from "Coming to America" ... who would never be caught at McDonald's!

Happy Birthday Mom!

Happy 75, sorry I'm not in the USA to celebrate it with you.

Nice to be home

We got a hot, sunny Saturday in Amsterdam ... and sure enough it didn't last, the rain is back on Sunday, but here's video from yesterday!

Another airport day

Waiting to leave Moscow .... not the most pleasant experience ever at this airport.  Terminal F -- lousy food choices at the gates, incredibly noisy in every place that offers food/coffee with boomboxes blaring dance music, no convenient power outlets.  Looking forward to escaping.

Red Square Day

Now we're talking ...

In Soviet Russia ... oh wait there isn't one

GUM department store ... now I know what Mall of the Emirates in Dubai was copying

Tolstoy statue, Lenin Library

Sorry Lenin ... capitalism won

"Arbad" music/art street ... long and very cool

Moscow Metro ... loooooong escalator down deep ... cool light fixtures in all the stations ... LOUD trains

A few Moscow pictures

I haven't really been out to do any tourist-y things and my hotel's neighborhood is not great for pedestrian exploring. My week has mostly been 8 hours of lecturing and coming back to the hotel to crash, exhausted. But a few pics:

Morning rush hour

View from my hotel room

Everybody has to have a Space Needle!

My hard-working students

Beautiful Soviet-era architecture ... makes you feel like you're in New Jersey

There is no escaping American brands