Welcome to Wednesday's Morning Rush! Keep the page refreshed through the morning for the latest news. Email joshua.butler@illawarramercury.com.au to give a news tip or report an accident
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8.30am: and that's a wrap from me this morning! Have a great day, and pick up a copy of the Mercury on your travels!
8.20am: I'm not sure what Jimmy Fallon is doing but I like it
8.15am: the ARIA Awards are on tonight. As always, the big questions are already flying; who will get too drunk to stand or speak? Which presenter will wear the worst outfit, or make the corniest joke? Who will spark a surprise social media hashtag like #PharrellsHat ? And yeah, I guess, who will win?
Chet Faker and Sia are tipped as big winners. The likes of 5 Seconds Of Summer, Dan Sultan, Hilltop Hoods and Mr Faker himself will perform. TV coverage of the actual awards starts from 7.30pm
8.10am: the Santa Claus Pub Crawl celebrates its 21st birthday on December 13, and has announced a bunch of new additions including a discount wristband ticket system, northern and southern suburbs shuttle buses, and free breath testing sites for those wanting to drive home. Get more details here.
8.05am: headlines, one last time
* staff at Bulli Hospital are gearing up for a fight to defend a fellow staff member suspended after an altercation with an elderly patient
* the Illawarra has again missed out on infrastructure funding, this time being largely snubbed for attention by the state government's controversial selloff of poles and wires
* the men who attempted to kidnap teenager April-lee Gillen are Illawarra locals, police believe
8am: coming into the last bit of our time together, let's go over our big need-to-knows one more time
WEATHER: sunny and a top of 23 degrees predicted today, but we're probably getting some rain this afternoon.
TRAFFIC: roads look good, no accidents reported
TRAINS: good service on the South Coast line, no trackwork
7.55am: you want cats playing ping pong? YEP WE GOT SOME OF THOSE
7.50am: it has been revealed Phil Hughes was wearing an older-model helmet when struck by a cricket ball yesterday. The batsman was hit behind the ear, in an area the helmet cannot protect.
7.45am: oh, and here's Cumberbatch and co-star Martin Freeman looking decidedly dapper in a new promo shot.
7.40am: NOT A DRILL PEOPLE. Benedict Cumberbatch's "Sherlock" is getting another run, and they're already working on a Christmas special. Bad news: it's for Christmas 2015. Still, delayed Sherlock is better than no Sherlock...
7.35am: the Corrective Services department has said officers are justified in using firearms to prevent an escape, in the wake of two shots being fired in an attempted escape from Wollongong Hospital on Saturday
7.30am: check out the world's most expensive gingerbread house - "a pastry chef is willing to recreate your own home as an edible gingerbread house that replaces jellybeans and fruit jellies with sea pearls and a ruby, for the princely sum of nearly $78,000," reports New York Daily News.
Just in time for the holidays!
7.25am: Darren Wilson, the police officer who shot dead Michael Brown, "has a clear conscience" according to a US TV host who just interviewed him.
7.20am: bad grammar is the bane of any journo's existence.
Forget 'Christmas season,' this chart should be used year-round. YOU DON'T NEED AN APOSTROPHE 'S' FOR A PLURAL.
7.15am: the cricketing community has rallied around Sean Abbott, the young NSW bowler who struck Phil Hughes in the head with the delivery that sent him to hospital. Hughes is still reportedly in an induced coma and critical condition
7.10am: more carnage from Ferguson, with Buzzfeed reporter Jim Dalrymple on the scene to give these pics of burnt-out cars after overnight protests. I'll be returning to Ferguson and the nationwide protests all morning
7.05am: Mercury headlines:
* staff at Bulli Hospital are gearing up for a fight to defend a fellow staff member suspended after an altercation with an elderly patient
* the Illawarra has again missed out on infrastructure funding, this time being largely snubbed for attention by the state government's controversial selloff of poles and wires
* the men who attempted to kidnap teenager April-lee Gillen are Illawarra locals, police believe
7am: top of the hour, let's recap:
WEATHER: It's getting a bit brighter in Wollongong, with highs of 23 degrees predicted. We're in for some showers in the afternoon
TRAFFIC: all good on the roads, no accidents
TRAINS: good service on the South Coast line, no trackwork
6.55am: Vladimir Putin released a tiger into the wild, and it's apparently killing a bunch of goats in China. If that's not the weirdest headline you read today, well, you're existing on a weirder level of internet than me.
6.50am: apparently one of the biggest regrets (and rightfully so) people have, is marrying the wrong person. A study found 18 per cent of middle-aged people thought they had married wrong.
6.45am: for the first time, the chairman of Trio Capital opens up about in today's Mercury on how he felt when he realised he had been duped by a liar - "you could have opened up the floor and I would have just fallen straight through it," says David Andrews.
6.40am: back to Ferguson, the mother and father of gunned-down teen Michael Brown have addressed a gathering crowd of protestors, his father telling the crowd to "burn this b**** down."
(WARNING: GRAPHIC LANGUAGE)
6.35am: Towradgi mum Debra is on the search for a truckie who helped her boy Cruz through a bout of severe dehydration on Friday - a post on Facebook asking for info on the man has gotten 30,000 shares since Sunday!
6.30am: protests over the acquittal of a police officer who killed a black teenager in St Louis are erupting across the USA. There's some incredible images emerging from the protests in Ferguson, where the teen died.
6.25am: planning your next holiday already? Some of the biggest and best music festivals on the planet, the Reading and Leeds festivals in the UK, have just released the first part of their lineups for their August shows. Metallica will headline both festivals, with Jamie T, Refused and Manchester Orchestra also on the bills. Check more info here, and start booking!
6.20am: everyone knows the story of Peter Pan, but does anyone know where he came from? There's a new origin story for the famous scamp, with 'Pan' starring Hugh Jackman. The film's trailer just dropped - the full movie is out next June.
6.15am: the SMH is reporting Wollongong ALP members are being put under pressure to support Noreen Hay and not her pre-selection challenger Paul Scully, with claims of "a lot of threats, lots of head office dirty tricks"
6.10am: and some national headlines to get you out of bed:
* cricketer Phil Hughes remains in an induced coma and critical condition in hospital, after being struck in the head by a bouncer while playing yesterday
* the woman who dumped her baby in a Sydney drain was allowed to leave hospital so soon after her birth by a policy supporting new mothers to return home quickly
* despite what has been described as "word games" by the PM, Malcolm Turnbull has confirmed changes to the ABC's budget are indeed a "cut"
6.05am: here are your morning Mercury headlines:
* staff at Bulli Hospital are gearing up for a fight to defend a fellow staff member suspended after an altercation with an elderly patient
* the Illawarra has again missed out on infrastructure funding, this time being largely snubbed for attention by the state government's controversial selloff of poles and wires
* the men who attempted to kidnap teenager April-lee Gillen are Illawarra locals, police believe
6am: happy Hump Day! Wednesday, the third day, the middle of the week, the start of the slide into the weekend - let's do this!
WEATHER: It's a grey old day in the Gong today, with highs of just 23 degrees predicted. It might get a bit sunnier later on, but we're in for some showers in the afternoon
TRAFFIC: all looks good on the region's roads, no accidents reported
TRAINS: good service on the South Coast line, no trackwork