A Chinese zookeeper has been suspended for denying food to Yong Ba, the elderly giant panda who birthed the National Zoo's Tian Tian (otherwise known as our beloved Butterstick's aloof father/sperm-donor). The keeper and a souvenir shop were involved in a scheme that forced 25-year-old Yong Ba to pose for photos with visitors. After she did (and after the tourists ponied up 10 yuan, or about $1.50), the elderly panda would get a piece of apple on a stick. Otherwise, according to media reports, she was fed only two plates of milk and three buns. Someone, identified by Chinese media as a "netizen," posted photos of Yong Ba's condition and predicament on a popular online forum, launching an investigation. Chinese officials assert that the sole panda at Shenzhen Safari Park in the Sichuan province is healthy, despite having to bang on the door of her pen for food.

Roughly 12 years ago, City Paper wrote a story about "Frances and the Working Girls," a radio show starring a buxom woman (that would be Frances above) and mostly lady correspondents. It was sort of like the Daily Show, but on AM radio and with boobs. Sadly (I think?) it went off the air about two years later. Its home, WRC-AM 980, is also no longer with us (neither, it would seem, is the story in our somewhat lacking digital archives for 1996). Recently, I caught up with one of the correspondents from the show, Jane Hautanen, who also goes by Jane Doe (that's her behind Frances).

Hautanen, who lives between Woodley and Cleveland Parks, still works in radio (part-time with the "True Oldies" show on WMAL and with another station), and supplements a lack of lucrative radio jobs by being a licensed massage therapist. She's also a prolific blogger. She's also really into guinea pigs.

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Jeepers. The AP is reporting that a 25-year-old Virginia Beach woman was strangled to death by her pet python:

Police said Amanda Ruth Black's husband came home around 11:30 p.m. Tuesday and found her lying in a bedroom. The snake's cage was open.

Black was pronounced dead at the scene. A preliminary medical examiner's report indicates she died of asphyxiation.

Police said Black was trying to give the 13-foot tiger python medicine when the incident happened.

Animal control officers found the snake in the bedroom and are holding it at their office.

Maybe there is a reason there isn't a magazine called Snake Fancy. Apparently, pythons can kill. I always thought snakes were kinda cool as long I did not have to keep one.