jikDew Shine From Mountain Dew Looks Like Booze, But Isn’tde

4 4 4 4

(Promo photo via Brand Eating)

Back when high fructose corn syrup hadn’t yet been invented, the phrase “Mountain Dew” meant something very different. While that name now reminds us of a highly caffeinated soft drink, originally it referred to homemade corn-based booze, or moonshine. Mountain Dew’s new limited-edition product is supposed to evoke moonshine while removing corn from the beverage altogether.

The beverage comes in four-packs of glass bottles, and is clear and vaguely citrus-flavored. So it’s malt liquor, then? No. It’s Mountain Dew. Its trademarked name is Mountain Dew Dew Shine, but it contains no alcohol despite being named after two different classic homemade intoxicants. (Yes. “Dew dew.” We had the same thought.)

What we don’t know yet is whether this sort of Mountain Dew will contain caffeine. If it follows the pattern of the previous Mountain Dew “heritage” flavor, Johnson City Gold, in 2012, it will be caffeinated. Dew Shine is packaged like a craft-style soda, and sues cane sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup.

The beverage goes on sale later this month. We do not know how it tastes mixed with whiskey, which was the original purpose of the soft drink invented in Johnson City, Tennessee that eventually became the Mountain Dew that we know and either love or hate today.

New Mountain Dew “DewShine” to Hit Shelves Later This Month [Brand Eating]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

jikL.L. Bean Plans To Triple Its Retail Locations By 2020de

4 4 4 4

(Zeus Ocean Storm)

Shh… can you hear that? If you listen very, very closely, it’s the grumbling of lumbersexuals and other hipsters across the land, groaning over the fact that their L.L. Bean duck boots are hopelessly backordered. And winter is almost over! Have no fear, in the future it could be easier to ensure your feet are properly clad in rubber-toed boots before you take a photo of them somewhere interesting, as the retailer is aiming to open a slew of new stores in the next five years.

While other retailers are shutting down, the company formerly known as that outdoorsy store whose catalog you’ve seen show up around your house over the years is set to seriously expand its number of retail locations by 2020 amid continued growth, reports the Associated Press.

L.L. Bean currently has 26 retail locations and 10 outlet stores in the United States, and has plans to open four more stores this year. By 2020, it wants to triple that number to “at least 100″ stores President and CEO Chris McCormick told workers in a memo Wednesday.

The rubber-bottomed, leather-topped boots that first debuted as the “Maine hunting shoe” in 1912 have been essential to L.L. Bean’s success, with the company producing 450,000 pairs over the past year. That wasn’t enough last year: With a waiting list of 100,000 people trying to get a pair of those boots, some fans took to eBay, willing to pay doubled prices just to get a pair.

To try to accommodate the increase in demand, the company is installing a second injection-molding machine this spring and hiring dozens more workers to churn out the popular boots.

Though that friend who always posts photos of his boot-clad feet will still be able to brag about his “vintage” (read: parent bought them in the ’80s) pair, so that will be still be annoying even if everyone else has them, too.

Catalog retailer L.L. Bean to triple stores by 2020 [Associated Press]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

jikPolice Officer Chases Shoplifting Suspect Into River, Then Rescues Himde

4 4 4 4

(Ben Roffelsen)

Back in July, we shared the tragic story of a man being pursued for shoplifting from a mall in Maryland who hid in a drainage pond and drowned. A shoplifter in New Hampshire was saved from a similar fate by a police officer who is also a veteran of the Marines…but she was also the officer who pursued him to the river.

The man is accused of stealing over $2,000 in merchandise from the Macy’s store at the Pheasant Lane Mall in Nashua, New Hampshire. The local police officer pursued the suspect away from the mall and to train tracks near the river, which was partly frozen over. He fell in, and was fully underwater, appearing to be “under distress,” according to the officer.

She followed him into the water, hauling him to safety. Members of the local fire and rescue squad were there to greet them…and then the shoplifting suspect was arrested. He has been charged with felony theft.

Nashua police officer rescues shoplifting suspect from icy river waters [Union Leader]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

jikD.C. Court Issues Temporary Order Prohibiting Man From Smoking In His Home After Neighbors Suede

4 4 4 4

(WJLA.com)

No home is an island, especially when it shares walls with other houses. As such, a Superior Court judge in Washington, D.C. has issued a temporary order banning a man from smoking inside his home, after his neighbors filed a lawsuit claiming that the fumes were harmful to their health.

The court order says no one inside the home can smoke anything — from tobacco to marijuana — in the Northeast D.C. home that the man’s family has owned for 50 years, reports WJLA.com.

“We were floored,” the man’s sister says, saying she’s shocked that a lawsuit could dictate what the family does in its own home.

New neighbors who moved in next door claimed in a civil lawsuit seeking $500,000 in damages that they’re being harmed by smoke that they say comes in through a hole in their basement, specifically noting that they have one child and another on the way who could be affected adversely from the fumes. They say in court fillings that they tried to work with the man and his sister but filed the suit when mediation attempts failed.

“I think it’s an excellent precedent to start, so people can realize you can’t just ignore your neighbor,” real estate attorney and Washington Post columnist Benny Kass told WJLA, calling the decision “surprising.” “Your home is no longer your castle.”

But the family seems to view the injunction as a slippery slope, and have vowed to keep fighting the decision.

“If this judge has done this, who will be next? What other neighbor will be next?” the sister asked.

D.C. man can’t smoke in own home due to temporary, precedent-setting court order [WJLA]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

jikFDA Warns That Chantix May Decrease Users’ Alcohol Tolerancede

4 4 4 4

Smokers using the prescription drug Chantix (varenicline) to help them through the quitting process may want to sip their beers slowly, as this week the FDA approved new warnings that the drug can change the way users react to alcohol.

“Until patients know how Chantix affects their ability to tolerate alcohol, they should decrease the amount of alcohol they drink,” warns the FDA, which also issued a secondary Chantix-related warning that “Patients who have a seizure while taking Chantix should stop the medicine and seek medical attention immediately.”

According to the FDA, a review of data from Chantix maker Pfizer and of incidents in the agency’s Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS) database found that “Some patients experienced decreased tolerance to alcohol, including increased drunkenness, unusual or aggressive behavior, or they had no memory of things that happened.”

Since 2006, the FDA knows of 11 cases of decreased tolerance to alcohol and 37 instances of alcohol-related aggressive behavior in Chantix patients.

In the tolerance instances, the patients said they did not consume an excessive almost of alcohol and that they had, before Chantix, been able to drink the same amount without adverse effects.

One patient was arrested following a motor vehicle accident, while a second “experienced a significant facial injury.”

In the cases involving aggressive behavior, patients said they had not consumed enough alcohol to explain their actions.

“In more than half of these cases, the patients described their behavior as a significant change from their behavior prior to Chantix treatment,” writes the FDA, which says that 22 of the 37 cases involved harm to a person or property.

There were also reports of amnesia following alcohol ingestion in patients taking Chantix. Nearly half of the aggressive behavior cases reported no memory or impaired memory of their experience.

The agency also looked at Chantix users who experienced seizures without any prior history of seizure or whose seizure disorders had previously been well-controlled.

“In most of these cases, the seizures occurred within the first month of starting Chantix,” reports the FDA, which says the median time to seizure onset was 2-3 weeks after beginning treatment with the drug.

The agency is also in the process of reviewing studies claiming to dispel previously issued warnings about Chantix that patients may experience adverse neuropsychiatric side effects including suicidal thoughts. Research recently provided to the FDA finds no increased risk of these side effects, but the agency contends that the studies only look at certain types of neuropsychiatric side effects, namely those that require hospitalization.

Later this year, Pfizer is expected to submit the results of a large clinical safety trial of Chantix.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

jikWoman Wants To Back Out Of Buying House Saddled With $400K Debt, Blaming Winning Bid On Diet Pillsde

4 4 4 4

(frankieleon)

Feeling like maybe you shouldn’t have splurged on that shirt when you’ve already got a bunch like it already in your closet is one thing, but deciding you’d rather not own a home you purchased is an entirely other category of buyer’s remorse. A Florida woman is blaming her winning bid on a home that comes with a $400,000 debt on it on diet pills, saying they caused her to become confused.

The woman says in court documents filed by her attorney this week that she had been confused after taking “judgement-altering” weight-loss medication containing phentermine, reports the Orlando Sentinel, and made a mistake when she bid about $100,000 on a home during a public auction on Feb. 19.

The money she bid would only go toward paying off a debt owned to the homeowner association of $15,929 for overdue fines and fees, but there’s also a $400,000 lien on the house from Chase Mortgage.

The documents say the medication she started taking shortly before the process impaired her and “caused her to make mistakes and alter her judgment.”

She claims that after submitting the winning bid for the foreclosed home through the Orange County court auction process, she immediately realized she’d messed up and hired an attorney to help her back out of the purchase.

But filings in the case question whether the phentermine could’ve caused her to make such a big mistake, saying that side effects of the medication include dizziness and difficulty sleeping, but not impairment of judgement.

The homeowner’s association — which wants the sale to close so it can recoup that fee money owed — responded to the woman’s filing by noting that “lack of knowledge, however, or lack of due diligence is not a mistake,” reports ABC News.

“Phentermine is an appetite suppressant,” the homeowner’s association states. “‘Altering judgment’ is not listed as an adverse reaction or a side effect to taking Phentermine under the Physicians’ Desk Reference and Web MD.”

Realauction.com runs the online auctions for the county’s courts, and warns bidders that they’re on their own when it comes to researching the homes’ value, title defects, liens, mortgages or any other debt.

Plus, as the company’s CEO Lloyd McClendon points out to ABC News, the woman placed $120,000 in her deposit escrow account on Nov. 2, 2014 so she could bid on any house. She also entered her account and routing numbers for the electronic check, something he says “something very difficult to do by someone affected by prescription medication.”

“The diet pill seems like a convenient excuse for not doing their research before bidding,” McClendon said.

The woman’s lawyer says that though she was responsible for research, she “had not discovered the mortgage before the sale.” He adds that she never would’ve bid on foreclosure sale if she hadn’t been confused by the medication.

Homebuyer claims diet pills caused auction mistake [Orlando Sentinel]

Florida Woman Claims Diet Pills Led to Home Purchase She Regrets [ABC News]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

jikMan Arrested After TSA Finds 200 Credit Cards Hidden In Duffel Bagde

4 4 4 4

(frankieleon)

The Transportation Security Administration keeps a long list of items travelers aren’t permitted to fly with including guns, knives, daggers, and box cutters. While the agency doesn’t explicitly tell consumers they can’t bring along stolen merchandise, like say 200 credit cards, if agents find the pilfered items you’ll likely be arrested. Just ask a New York man who suffered that very fate earlier this week.

The Sun-Sentinel reports that a 25-year-old New York man was arrested at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on Sunday after TSA agents found several stacks of credit cards in his duffel bag.

According to a police report, during security screening at the airport an X-ray monitor showed an unknown mass inside the mans bag, prompting TSA to conduct a physical search of the luggage.

At that point that a security screener found four stacks of credit cards tucked-away inside four different shoes at the bottom of the bag.

In all, the Broward Sheriff’s Office said they found 136 blank credit cards with logos of various banks and 62 cards with two different listed account holders and various account numbers.

The Sun-Sentinel reports that at first the man told authorities he had no idea how the credit cards got in his bag, but eventually changed his story, saying he was paid $200 by a cousin to bring the cards to New York.

The man was arrested on one count of trafficking in counterfeit credit cards and one count of falsely making credit cards.

NYC man arrested at airport after credit cards found in luggage [Sun-Sentinel]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist