Word: poison
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...most obscure and technical areas of his vocabulary. As overbearing and unnecessary as his lexical tendencies can be, if they’re at home anywhere, it’s in the narrative monologue of a Sri Lankan sailor, Loxodrome, “whose commission is to de-poison sea snakes / to somehow bottle their arteries in clouds... [his] command / to capture them as beasts / whose colour is aurulent and xanthic.” Throughout, the atmosphere is ethereal; yet the narrator’s fantastical adventures and dream-like reflections are more artificial than inspired, more plodding than lyrical...
...most persistent Halloween bogeyman is tainted candy from strangers. The parental panic may stem from around 1964, when a woman handed out dog biscuits, steel-wool pads and ant poison (clearly marked with a skull-and-crossbones logo) to teenagers she deemed too old to be trick-or-treating. The horror story refuses to die down. "In recent years, there have been reports of people with twisted minds putting razor blades and poison in taffy apples and Halloween candy," Ann Landers wrote in 1995. (See the top 25 horror movies of all time...
...were the reports true? For all the anecdotal evidence, the notion that psychotic strangers pose a danger to children has been repeatedly debunked. Only two children are known to have been killed by poisoned Halloween loot. In both cases, the perpetrators were family members who tried to exploit the trick-or-treating urban legend to throw police off their trail. Plenty of parents call poison centers to report concerns related to Halloween, says Gail Banach, director of education at the Upstate New York Poison Center in Syracuse, but overall complaints don't spike. And other experts agree that the concern...
...even though candy doesn't pose much of a threat, trick-or-treating does carry safety hazards. According to the American College of Emergency Physicians, common Halloween injuries include eye wounds from sharp objects and burns from flammable costumes. The Poison Center's Banach notes that kids can have allergic reactions to face paint or makeup. "We always recommend that if you're using that kind of product, you test it out on a patch of skin before you put it all over your child to be the Incredible Hulk," she says. (Read "Paranormal Activity: A Horror Phenomenon...
...other opportunities because people can no longer work in Israel. We used to have 100 small boats in use for fishing. Now we have 400." The new fishermen are putting added strain on an ecosystem already in peril, with some resorting to unconventional methods, such as dynamite or poison to kill the fish. "This is even more dangerous than the sewage," says al-Hissi...