Freelance Medical Writing

“I’ve killed him.” “Everything will be fine.” “He’s f***ing dead.” “Michael Myers is f***ing dead.” “You’re alright, you’re OK.” If you’ve believed any of these statements, then you’ve obviously never seen a “Halloween” film.

Yes, it’s deja vu all over again with this sequel to 2007′s $80 million-grossing reboot of the franchise that apparently is as hard to kill off as its central character. (For future Trivial Pursuit purposes, be advised that this is technically not a remake of the 1981 sequel to John Carpenter’s original classic.) The Dimension Films released opened Friday.

This edition, dubbed “the terrifying final chapter” in the ads (another line you probably shouldn’t take at face value), begins moments after the last one, with a bloody and clearly traumatized Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton) convinced that she has dispatched Michael Myers. Well, someone forgot to tell him, because after the police vehicle transporting him to the morgue crashes into an errant cow, he promptly revives and resumes his errant ways.

Fiore’s body was found early Aug. 15 in a blood-stained suitcase in a Buena Park trash bin by a person searching for recyclables. Her nose was broken, she was badly beaten and she was missing the last digit of all her fingers and her teeth — presumably to hamper efforts to identify her.

Police ultimately learned her name by tracking the serial number on her breast implants, but not until Jenkins had a three-day head start on his run for the border, police said.

Jenkins, the 32-year-old wealthy son of a prominent Calgary architect, was found Sunday in an isolated motel in Hope, British Columbia, where he had committed suicide. Police were just steps behind, but too late to find him alive.

A Russian trio performing Gypsy music with Madonna said Friday they were “pained” to see the pop star booed during her Bucharest concert for criticizing widespread discrimination against Gypsies.

Thousands of people applauded the trio’s performance with Madonna in Bucharest on Wednesday night during her worldwide “Sticky and Sweet” tour. But minutes later they booed and jeered the pop star when she said discrimination should end against eastern Europe’s Gypsies, also known as Roma.

In a press conference Friday in Bucharest, Vadim Kolpakov, the youngest member of Kolpakov Trio, said the public reaction was unexpected.

Cellist Yo-Yo Ma and tenor Placido Domingo are to perform at the funeral Mass for Sen. Edward Kennedy.

The Rev. Philip Dabney, associate pastor of Boston’s Mission Church, says Saturday’s service will be a “regular Catholic funeral,” with superb music.

In addition, a contingent from the Boston Symphony Orchestra and a soprano from New York’s Metropolitan Opera will appear.

Several clergy members will be on hand. The Rev. Donald Monan, chancellor of Boston College, will be the principal celebrant.

The Rev. Mark Hession of Our Lady of Victories Parish on Cape Cod will delivery the homily, and Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley will lead the final prayers of commendation.

Stung by provincial reluctance to hold elections for members of the Senate, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper on Thursday promised to name more Conservatives to Parliament’s upper house.

Harper said he will fill nine vacancies, to give his party 46 of the 105 seats in the Senate, which is designed to act as a chamber of “sober second thought” to the elected House of Commons. The main opposition Liberal Party has 53 seats.

“Until senators are elected, this government will ensure that we have in the Senate people who will work hard and will support the elected government of this country, and that includes passing our anti-crime legislation and passing our democratic reforms, which have been blocked in the Senate,” he told a news conference in Quebec City.

Thirty members of a militant Islamist sect who fled after the group’s recent armed uprising in north Nigeria that claimed at least 800 lives have been arrested, a police officer said Thursday.

The members of the Boko Haram group were arrested Wednesday outside Yola, Adamawa State capital, where they fled from Maiduguri, centre of last month’s uprising, following a military crackdown, the officer told AFP by telephone from Maiduguri, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“The 30 arrested young men were brought here yesterday (Wednesday) in two buses and 10 of them confessed that they received training in bomb-making in Afghanistan,” said the officer who is involved in the investigation of the suspects.

As of Thursday, Aug. 27, 2009, at least 4,335 members of the U.S. military had died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

The figure includes nine military civilians killed in action. At least 3,466 military personnel died as a result of hostile action, according to the military’s numbers.

The AP count is two fewer than the Defense Department’s tally, last updated Thursday at 10 a.m. EDT.

The British military has reported 179 deaths; Italy, 33; Ukraine, 18; Poland, 21; Bulgaria, 13; Spain, 11; Denmark, seven; El Salvador, five; Slovakia, four; Latvia and Georgia, three each; Estonia, Netherlands, Thailand and Romania, two each; and Australia, Hungary, Kazakhstan and South Korea, one death each.

Many Britons suspect the release of the Lockerbie bomber last week was connected to Britain’s oil interests in Libya, an opinion poll released on Friday said.

Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi was released from a Scottish prison on compassionate grounds and returned to his home in Libya, sparking anger from the US administration and US relatives of the victims.

Megrahi, who is dying of prostate cancer, was the only person convicted of the 1988 plane bombing over the town of Lockerbie which killed 270 people. Most of the victims of the attack were American.

It is difficult to measure the extent of Taliban control, and NATO officials publicly discount the possibility that Kandahar is about to fall to the militants.

Thousands of U.S. and Canadian troops are deployed throughout the province and around the city, which includes a major NATO base. NATO officials say the U.S. troop buildup in Afghanistan will enable them to send more troops into Kandahar.

“Because there’s one bombing, it doesn’t mean the situation is going down the tubes,” said Maj. Mario Couture, a spokesman for NATO in Kandahar province.