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Fifty per cent of Britons won't walk under one. Would you? Do you touch wood? Psychologist Bruce Hood believes even the most rational among us are more superstitious than we'd like to admit.The house at 25 Cromwell Street, Gloucester, is no longer there. In October 1996 the city council ordered the removal of all physical traces of the Wests' home where young girls were raped, tortured and murdered by Fred and Rosemary. Fred had used his builder's skills to conceal the bodies at the three-storey family home. Nick, a fiftysomething landlord who owned other houses in the street, told me the council had removed every last brick. These were crushed into dust and scattered across a landfill site in unmarked locations. Why do we demolish and remove houses associated with appalling murders? The same happened to the Oxford Apartments in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where Jeffrey Dahmer lived, and the house where Ian Huntley murdered the two little girls in Soham. Dahmer's place is now a car park and

Kaiser Permanente reported Friday that its nonprofit hospital and health plan operations posted healthier first-quarter financial results this year than last in many respects. Significantly, quarterly net income jumped 72 percent, from $250 million in the first quarter of 2008 to $430 million this time around.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. employers cut 539,000 jobs last month, the fewest since October, according to government data on Friday that signaled the economy's steep decline might be easing and gave the stock market a boost.

Madrid - Champions Cup finalists Barcelona announced on Friday evening that veteran striker Thierry Henry will be out of action for around two weeks. Henry, 31, suffered a badly bruised right knee in Barca's historic 6-2 win away to Real Madrid last ...

Last year it seemed as if the proud wine growers of Bordeaux might actually have to share the financial pain the rest of us were going through. After a wet summer with little sunshine, even the Bordelais -- who like to think their reds are the global benchmark for quality -- were conceding that the 2008 vintage might not be one for the history books. Everyone else hoped that after an overpriced 2007 vintage, Bordeaux prices, which have been mounting steadily over recent vintages, might descend from the stratosphere, aided by weaker global demand.

Graduating from small roles in family films to a starring role in a highly rated Nickelodeon sitcom and its big screen spin-off, Atlanta native Kenan Thompson has made a quick show business ascent. From his beginnings as the title star of 'The Gingerbread

Officials at the University of California, Berkeley, confirmed today that hackers broke into their databases in October and accessed data until last month. The data includes social security numbers and non-treatment medical information going back as far as 1999. - Hackers broke into databases at the University of California, Berkeley, and got access to student and alumni records, the university admitted today. According to school officials, the data theft began Oct. 9 and went undetected until early April, when campus administrators performing routine main...

(Telecompaper) Brazilian mobile operator Vivo Participacoes' net service revenue reached BRL 3.6 billion, up by 21.4 percent over the same quarter last year. EBITDA jumped by 25.2 percent to BRL 1.2 billion, with the EBITDA margin reaching 29.9 percent in the quarter, up by 1.0 percentage points versus the same period last year. The net profit for the quarter amounted to BRL 123.5 million, growing 26.5 percent compared with the same quarter in 2008. The operator reached 45.6 million customers at the end of March, adding some 696,000 customers in the first quarter. The number GSM/UMTS users increased to more than 33.3 million and its mobile data and VAS revenue grew 29 percent year-on year to 12.1 percent of the net service revenue. Vivo's ARPU decreased by 8.5 percent to BRL 27 compared with the first quarter of 2008. Vivo is a joint-venture between Telefonica and Portugal Telecom.

The social security Administration has released the list of popular baby names for last year. Check out the top 100 list of baby names given last year which includes...

Little Emma and Jacob, Barack and Miley are gaining on you. In the race for top baby names, the social security Administration announced Friday that in 2008 Emma was the No. 1 girls name and Jacob topped the boys list....