Curses, foiled again While attending a party in Radnor, Pa., Ryan Letchford, 21, and Jeffrey Olson, 22, wandered into the apartment parking lot, spotted a police van, found it unlocked and entered it to take pictures of themselves pretending to be arrested. While drinking beer and spitting, they somehow managed to lock themselves in the van. When they failed to return to the party by 4 a.m., a friend went looking for them and found them inside the van. When he couldn’t open the door either, he called police, who notified Constable Mike Connor, to whom the van was assigned. “I came down and unlocked the doors, and ‘Dumb and Dumber’ pranced out of the van,” Connor said after charging Letchford and Olson with attempted theft of a motor vehicle, public drunkenness and criminal mischief. (Philadelphia Daily News) Sheriff’s deputies responding to a report of someone breaking into a home in Effingham County, Ga., at 4 a.m. found no intruders but then realized the two men at the home who reported the break-in were hallucinating. “They were so high,” sheriff’s official David Ehsanipoor said, “they called 911 on themselves.” Authorities did discover a methamphetamine lab at the home and arrested Brian Austin, 25, and Brian Johnson, 28. (Savannah Morning News)

Smoking hazards Despite “overwhelming evidence” that smoking during pregnancy is harmful to a developing child, researchers at England’s Southampton University reported that some pregnant women smoke because they want smaller babies for easier deliveries. Babies born to smoking mothers weigh an average of 11 ounces less than babies with non-smoking mothers. (Britain’s The Telegraph) A member of the Royal Australian Air Force taking part in a joint Australian-American military exercise suffered burns to his head, face, arms, chest and breathing passages after a portable toilet he was using exploded. “It’s believed the man was lighting a cigarette at the time,” a Department of Community Safety official reported. (Britain’s The Telegraph) Fire investigators determined that John Blanchard, 65, started a fire at a storage yard in Princeton, Calif., while smoking methamphetamine with a propane blowtorch next to a container of gunpowder. (San Francisco Chronicle)

Google this Searching the Internet is polluting the planet and contributing to global warming, according to scientists who blame the server industry’s dependence on coal-fired electricity to support its fast-growing network of data centers.

The Internet already consumes 2 to 3 percent of the world’s electricity, mostly to operate and cool banks of computers that conduct data searches. This figure is expected to double by 2020. Already, Apple, Google and Facebook are opening new “server farms” in North Carolina, whose electricity rates are among the nation’s lowest. Their combined estimated use is 200 to 240 megawatts, all of it provided by coal-burning plants. “We have to move from this fossil fuel fiesta,” Ottawa engineer and green information technology consultant Bill St. Arnaud warned. (The Montreal Gazette)

Compiled from the nation’s press by Roland Sweet. Authentication on demand.