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A tiny spider species has triggered a Mazda recall - and there's nothing itsy-bitsy about it.

The yellow sac spider has been nesting in the fuel hoses of certain Mazda6 cars, causing clogs that could lead to fuel leaks and fires.

Mazda announced Friday that it was recalling more than 65,000 cars in the U.S., Canada and Mexico to address the puzzling problem.

The spider is a common household insect but employees of the Japanese automaker are clueless as to why the tiny arachnids chose their brand.

"We really don't know how they're getting in," said Mazda spokesman Jeremy Barnes. "This is a really strange case."

One floated theory is that the spiders are attracted to the smell of gasoline, but though that explanation gets chuckles, bug experts say there is not much science behind it.

"I think gas would kill them if they came in contact with it, and if they were attracted to it we would have found out years ago," said Rick Vetter, a Long Island native and University of California, Riverside researcher who is one of the nation's most prominent entomologists

"I do a lot of myth busting regarding spiders, and it's really amazing the amount of insanity that gets generated about these things," he said.

University of Nebraska-Lincoln entomologist Barb Ogg agrees.

"It doesn't make any sense to me. They like to spend their time in little tight spaces, so I think it's more likely related to how [the fuel system] constructed," she said.

The spiders have been weaving small sacs in rubber hoses attached to the cars' fuel tank system, blocking ventilation and causing pressure that could lead to cracks, gas leaks and in the worst-case scenario a fire.

The company reports there have been no serious incidents related to the bizarre spider infestations.

It was unclear why the eight-legged pests were partial to the Mazda6 - the only model affected - over other models or automakers.

This particular spider is about the size of a dime and weaves a small sac instead of a large web a la Charlotte of "Charlotte's Web" fame.

Mazda launched the recall after dealers around the country reported more than 20 cases of the nesting spiders in Mazda6 models released in 2009 and 2010.

The company said it will notify owners of affected cars this month. Dealers will inspect and clean out the fuel lines if necessary.

Mazda said it may never solve the mystery of the fuel line-dwelling spiders.

Cracking a joke on the Mazda's popular commercial jingle, Barnes siad, "Perhaps yellow sac spiders like to go Zoom-Zoom?"

It would be legal for an Iowa business owner who cites religious beliefs to refuse to provide jobs, housing, goods or services to people involved in a marriage that violates his or her religious convictions, according to a bill an Iowa House subcommittee will consider on Wednesday.

House Study Bill 50, called the Religious Conscience Protection Act, would allow a person, business or organization such as a charity or fraternal group to deny services without fear of facing a civil claim or lawsuit if they think doing so would validate or recognize same-sex relationships.

The same-sex exclusion is by itself constitutionally troubling, several legal scholars and civil rights activists said.

However, the bill is so broad that it would legalize a wide spectrum of other discriminatory acts, they said. They raised questions about whether services could be denied if, say, a Christian were married to a Jew or if a woman who is 60 married a man who is half her age and the couple could not procreate.

Confirming what a few have reported this evening: in an action unprecedented in Internet history, the Egyptian government appears to have ordered service providers to shut down all international connections to the Internet. Critical European-Asian fiber-optic routes through Egypt appear to be unaffected for now. But every Egyptian provider, every business, bank, Internet cafe, website, school, embassy, and government office that relied on the big four Egyptian ISPs for their Internet connectivity is now cut off from the rest of the world. Link Egypt, Vodafone/Raya, Telecom Egypt, Etisalat Misr, and all their customers and partners are, for the moment, off the air.

At 22:34 UTC (00:34am local time), Renesys observed the virtually simultaneous withdrawal of all routes to Egyptian networks in the Internet's global routing table. Approximately 3,500 individual BGP routes were withdrawn, leaving no valid paths by which the rest of the world could continue to exchange Internet traffic with Egypt's service providers. Virtually all of Egypt's Internet addresses are now unreachable, worldwide.

MORRO BAY, Calif. (AP) — Jack LaLanne, the fitness guru who inspired television viewers to trim down and pump iron for decades before exercise became a national obsession, died Sunday. He was 96.

LaLanne died of respiratory failure due to pneumonia Sunday afternoon at his home in Morro Bay on California's central coast, his longtime agent Rick Hersh said.

Lalanne ate healthy and exercised every day of his life up until the end, Hersh said.

"I have not only lost my husband and a great American icon, but the best friend and most loving partner anyone could ever hope for," Elaine LaLanne, Lalanne's wife of 51 years and a frequent partner in his television appearances, said in a written statement.

LaLanne (pronounced lah-LAYN') credited a sudden interest in fitness with transforming his life as a teen, and he worked tirelessly over the next eight decades to transform others' lives, too.

"The only way you can hurt the body is not use it," LaLanne said. "Inactivity is the killer and, remember, it's never too late."

His workout show was a television staple from the 1950s to the '70s. LaLanne and his dog Happy encouraged kids to wake their mothers and drag them in front of the television set. He developed exercises that used no special equipment, just a chair and a towel.

He also founded a chain of fitness studios that bore his name and in recent years touted the value of raw fruit and vegetables as he helped market a machine called Jack LaLanne's Power Juicer.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by two sons, Dan and Jon, and a daughter, Yvonne.
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Huang Yuanfan, 84, of Ziyuan, China, is the latest person to report an unusual growth protruding from the head. His horn began growing two years ago and has reached a length of 3 inches...