The! Biggest! News! of! the! Day! - Not Ericsson Warning, Genentech Earnings, Bernanke Comments, or Oil Surge

Here are some of the contenders for today's biggest...news...of...the...day...

• A warning from Ericsson (ERIC) that third-quarter profits would miss expectations...
• Earnings from Genentech (DNA) that were slightly better-than-expected...but revenues were light...
• Comments from Ben Bernanke that "that lenders and investors must bear responsibility for financial decisions that caused the subprime mortgage meltdown"...
• The surge in oil to record levels...
• Earnings from Johnson & Johnson (JNJ)...
• Speculation about whether Apple (AAPL) will open its iPhone to software developers...
• A drop in orders at D.R. Horton (DHI)...

While those are all stories worth watching, I think it is obviously clear that the biggest story is this - English 'pull own teeth' as dental service decays...yes you read that correctly - "Falling numbers of state dentists in England has led to some people taking extreme measures, including extracting their own teeth"...

In terms of a do-it-yourself attitude, there are few things I won't at least take a stab at. Things may not always (ever?) go as planned and I am not claiming professional results but I am usually more than ready to grab a drill (or go buy a new recip saw) and jump (fall,crash, stumble) into a new project. But DIY dentistry? That makes my skin crawl...

And this is coming from the guy who actually did ask his dentist if the little grinding bits he was using would fit in my Dremel...for the record I didn't see any dental bits on Dremel's site...though I did find which bits they would recommend for carving pumpkin...I think Halloween just got a lot more interesting...and messy...and potentially dangerous...