After 111 Years, Postage Stamps Go Private:
… private printers will produce all the nation's stamps, a decision that U.S. Postal Service officials say will save tens of millions of dollars a year. The bureau will concentrate on printing currency, its other major product.
e.p.c. posted this at 09:03 GMT on 13-Jun-2005 . Archive Link
The Boxing Day tsunami raised interest in tsunamis and how cataclysmic their effects can be. The SF Chronicle has an article about how soil cores can help determine when a tsunamic occurred in the past and give some sense as to its magnitude: Ancient sands reveal traces of huge tsunamis / Layers in soil cores could help predict future disasters:
Typical evidence is a sheet of beach sand sandwiched between younger and older layers of ordinary soil, like a slice of ham between two slabs of sourdough.
e.p.c. posted this at 10:10 GMT on 13-Jun-2005 . Archive Link