Putin vs. Ukraine, Gambler Sues Casino, Winklevii in Space!

Ukraine revolts, Putin Revolting.

What began as a series of small demonstrations against a government intent on quelling protest soon turned into a full-on revolution in the Ukraine, a situation Russian autocrat Vladimir Putin has exploited in his desire to return the Russian borders to their Soviet Empire-era glory.

Not that big of a deal, only the makings for a Third World War.

Gambler Bets on long-shot lawsuit. Odds are he craps out.

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People with a propensity to gamble have probably all experienced one of those “oh shit” moments, during which the realization that they’ve just lost more than they can afford to lose suddenly dawns. But you can beg and plead with a pit boss till you’re blue in the face – there’s no such thing as a returns department at a casino.

That’s not stopping 52-year-old Mark Johnson, who is actually suing the casino at which he lost $500,000 during Super Bowl weekend. Johnson is claiming the Grant casino in Las Vegas continued to serve him drinks and allow him to gamble even though he was visibly intoxicated.

But before you go blowing a gasket about tort reform, Mr. Johnson’s lawsuit is not actually as crazy as it sounds, if, in fact, his story turns out to be true.

Nevada has very specific laws prohibiting casinos from allowing visibly drunk patrons to gamble and receive complimentary drinks. These laws hearken back to the less above-board era in Las Vegas’ history during which casinos would routinely fleece patrons by giving them endless free liquor and encouraging them to continue gambling.

This is exactly what Johnson claims happened, and if evidence proves him right, he may just get his money back, and the casino in question might be in a bit of legal trouble themselves.

Winkelvii In Space!

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The Winkelvoss twins, that loveable twosome who kind of got screwed out of the whole Facebook thing, are back in the news, and this time they’re not even suing anybody! Instead, Cameron and Tyler have announced that they have purchased tickets for a round-trip flight to space on the soon-to-launch Virgin Galactic space tourism company.

To make the story even juicier, the Winkelvii claim they purchased their tickets with BitCoins! Crypto-awesome, dudes!

Mysterious words from the past trend online: “customer service.”

What could it mean?

Google trends has noticed an odd set of words trending more and more on its popular search engine: “customer service.” So far very little is known about the meaning and origin of the phrase, but as near as linguists have been able to guess, “customer service” refers to an ancient trade ritual in which the person paying the money was somehow not purposefully inconvenienced, misinformed, or ignored during the course of the transaction.

We’re as confused as you are, but this chart clearly shows searches for this odd term increasing sharply in recent years. Surely with this many people searching for the meaning, someone is bound to figure it out sooner or later.