THE WEEK Nov 15: Falling down!

Satellite falls to Earth

A European science satellite the size of a car plunged toward Earth on Wednesday, leaving many ill-informed citizens of the world worried about impending destruction. In turns out, however, occurrences like this aren't all that rare. Most of the satellite disintegrated as it traveled through the atmosphere, but portions of it landed in the southern Atlantic Ocean. Thankfully, there were no human casualties, however The Week was able to obtain exclusive footage from the ocean floor near the crash site.

In the spotlight is overrated

Miley Cyrus needs to clean up her act. At the European Music Awards, the attention-craved pop star spanked a midget during her performance and then lit and smoked a marijuana joint on stage. Actor Sacha Baron Cohen, however, proved why he deserves celebrity status during an acceptance speech at the Brittannia Awards ceremony.

Drug cartels on social media

In what started as an informative piece by the Canadian media company Vice, a Phoneix, Arizona, television station has turned into an overly dramatic story about Mexican drug cartels using social media sites like Facebook and Twitter to recruit new members. The pictures are so risky, one "social media expert" interviewed for the story said that if she were a drug cartel member, she would not put up those photos. This story is stupid for a number of reasons, but mainly because social media is actually being used to solve crimes. Plus, we've all known that criminals aren't the smartest people around. In case you need evidence, we found some.

This wacky world!

A Moscow judge said there would be no punishment for a man who stapled his testicles to the pavement in an act of protest.

A man named Batman bin Suparman was arrested in Singapore for theft and drug use. That's one hero your kids should not be looking up to.

A Chinese man gave what could be the most extravagant engagement gift of the year. He delivered 8.88 million yuan to his future wife's parents.

A white, anti-gay politician in the United States tricked voters into believing he was black to win votes in the demographic. The scum bag ended up winning the election.

Buzz word

Disintegrate (verb) -- to be completely destroyed by breaking into lots of small parts

1. The satellite disintegrated as it passed through Earth's atmosphere.

2. The building disintegrated by a controlled demolition to make room for a new basketball stadium.

（中国日报网英语点津 Helen 编辑）