The World

THURSDAY

A Texas law that would require voters to show photo identification before casting ballots was blocked in U.S. District Court, Judge David Tatel ruling the measure would likely curtail the ability of minorities to vote in the November 6 presidential election.

Joyce Coffey was arrested four times in 26 hours by police in her hometown of Epping, New Hampshire, three times for repeatedly blasting the AC/DC song “Highway to Hell” from her home stereo and once for hurling a frying pan at her nephew. The judge reportedly advised Coffey to purchase a pair of headphones.

NASA halted attempts to replace a power distributor on the International Space Station after spacewalking astronauts were repeatedly stymied by a jammed bolt.

A 100-year-old motorist lost control of his automobile as he backed out of his driveway near an elementary school in Los Angeles, injuring nine children and two adults.

FRIDAY

California lawmakers approved a bill to allow some young illegal immigrants who came to the United States as children to obtain driving licenses.

Thieves in Quebec nabbed a reservoir of maple syrup from a warehouse, making off with about 10 million pounds of the amber pancake topping.

The beloved 400-pound lava-rock gorilla statue of Carbondale, Penn., woman Patricia Rudalavage was returned after it had been stolen and taken into the mountains and used for target practice.

WEEKEND

Twenty-two short-finned pilot whales beached themselves along Florida’s Atlantic coast with 17 dead.

Evan Jensen, 18, brought a 6,000-gallon semi tanker into the North Dakota oil fields and started a business charging workers in the overpopulated, under-equipped region for showers.

British researchers found couples who have purple sheets have the most active sex lives. Those with grey sheets were the least amorous.

MONDAY

Hurricane Isaac washed ashore the 136-foot-long Monticello, a ship that burned and sank while trying to break a blockade during the Civil War, on a beach in Alabama.

The Black Bear Casino Resort near Duluth, Minn., created the largest bacon cheeseburger ever. Guinness Records officials recorded the burger, bun and toppings at 10-feet in diameter and 2,014 pounds. The burger contained 60 pounds of bacon, 50 pounds of lettuce, 50 pounds of sliced onions, 40 pounds of pickles, and 40 pounds of cheese and was served to casino guests. It was cooked in an outdoor oven heated by propane torches and 15-foot steel skillets.

Dutch police arrested and released without charge a 60-year-old homeless man who triggered an alarm after breaking into a music shop to play the piano and get some sleep.

William Bohlke, Mayor of Hollywood Park, Texas, was killed by an aggressive, 500-pound donkey while the popular politician was tending to his cattle.

TUESDAY

A pair of oversized chairs were placed next to the life-sized cutout of actor Clint Eastwood that has long overlooked a southern California freeway, a nod to Eastwood’s speech to an empty chair at last week’s Republican National Convention.

The U.N. reported 100,000 people fled war-torn Syria in August to seek refuge in neighboring countries. The report said more than 200,000 Syrians have fled to Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon and Turkey since civil war erupted last year.

A gunman shot and badly injured two people inside the Montreal theater in the wake of a narrow election win by Quebec separatists.

BNSF Railway expanded its capacity to transport 1 million barrels-per-day of shale oil from the Bakken formation in North Dakota and Montana.

A federal judge ordered Massachusetts officials pay for a convicted murderer’s sex change operation, ruling that the state had violated the inmate’s constitutional rights in denying the procedure.

U.S. health officials warned anyone who has stayed in Yosemite National Park tent cabins this summer that they may have been exposed to a deadly mouse-borne hantavirus.

First lady Michelle Obama acknowledged the change her husband Barack Obama championed in his White House campaign four years ago has proven difficult but urged voters to give him four more years to fix the struggling U.S. economy in her speech at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina.

WEDNESDAY

A book about the U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden by Matt Bissonnette, a former Navy SEAL who participated in the mission, contains classified information and the Pentagon is reviewing legal options.

Fire swept through a fireworks factory in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, killing at least 33 people and injuring dozens more.

Five suspected Islamist militants were killed in a U.S. drone attack in Yemen’s eastern province of Hadramout.

Compiled by Gazette staff from a variety

of sources.