Indianapolis, Indiana – Jeri Holland, 25, of the 3700 block of West 10th Street, said a man in a pick-up truck stole the basketball goal in front of her house at 6 p.m.

After backing his silver Chevrolet pick-up onto her property, the robber — about 5-feet, 10-inches tall, and 145-pounds — lifted the goal off the ground and threw it into the bed of the truck.

If I were the thieving kind I’m pretty sure that a basketball goal would be pretty far down the list of things I’d be after.  But hey, sometimes in the summertime I guess you just have to have your hoops.

LONDON — The strongest and most expensive beer ever created sold out within hours Friday, a Scottish brewery said, as they courted controversy by packaging the bottles inside the bodies of stuffed animals.

BrewDog, the self-described maverick brewery, presented the beer — which contains a record 55 percent alcohol — inside the bodies of dead squirrels and stoats.

Animal rights activists rushed to condemn the stunt.

“It’s pointless and it’s very negative to use dead animals when we should be celebrating live animals,” Advocates for Animals policy director Libby Anderson told BBC Scotland.

“This seems to be a perverse idea.”

BrewDog said the limited edition Belgian ale — made with juniper berries and dubbed “The End of History” — was also the costliest beer ever sold.

The squirrel bottles cost 700 pounds (1,000 dollars, 840 euros) each and the seven stoat bottles went for 500 pounds a pop.

All sold out within four hours of going on sale, BrewDog managing director James Watt told AFP.

Watt said the controversial drink was the last in a line of experimental brews, explaining: “For the final installment in the strong beer series, we wanted to create something epic, something monumental.”

He said there were no plans to come up with a beer to beat this record, insisting: “We’re quite happy at 55 percent.”

As for the taste, Watt described “The End of History” as a “complex” beer with a multitude of flavours including honey, mint and cinnamon.

He recommended sipping the drink “much like you would a malt whiskey”, served up in a spirit glass rather than a pint glass.

I can’t say that sounds appealing at all, but if that’s up your alley I’d love to hear about it.

MOSCOW (AFP) – Russian beachgoers got a shock when they saw a donkey soaring in the blue skies over the balmy beaches on the Sea of Azov in southern Russia last week, police said on Tuesday.

Attached to a parachute, the animal screamed in fear as it circled over heads of holidaymakers sunbathing on a beach in the Cossack village of Golubitskaya in the Krasnodar region.

A regional police spokeswoman said the donkey ended up in the skies as a result of an impromptu advertising campaign by several Russian entrepreneurs to attract beachgoers to their private beach.

Instead, they attracted the attention of regional police who learned of the flying donkey earlier this week and launched a probe.

“The donkey screamed and children cried,” regional police spokeswoman Larisa Tuchkova told AFP. “No-one had the brains to call police.”

Instead, she said, people reached for their cameras and bombarded a local newspaper with phone calls.

“It was put up so high into the sky that the children on the beach cried and asked their parents: “Why did they tie a doggy to a parachute?” the newspaper, Taman, said late last week.

“The donkey landed in an atrocious manner: it was dragged several metres along the water, after which the animal was pulled out half-alive onto the shore.”

The incident is stunning even for a country where animal cruelty is widespread and came as a shock to the locals, said Taman newspaper’s editor, Elena Iovleva.

“This has never happened before,” she told AFP.

The footage of the parachuting donkey was aired on national television Tuesday.

Wow. That’s funny & not funny at the same time. I’m not sure what to say other than if I saw a parachuting donkey calling the police would not be my first reaction either…and I’m not sure I’d even be able to find my camera to document the experience. Wow.

Thanks to my sister-in-law for sharing this oddity.

Officials with a child advocacy group are trying to retrieve some 1,000 plastic ducks that remain on the loose following a Fort Wayne duck race last month.

Stop Child Abuse & Neglect says 17,000 ducks were placed in the St. Joseph River for the annual fundraiser duck race on June 19, but were swept away by the current and only 15,000 were retrieved the same day.

Spokeswoman Jennifer Boen says about 1,000 of the rogue ducks have been recovered and some have been spotted as far away as Ohio.

The group says it’s working with the city water department to catch the remaining ducks. Officials also are taking boats downstream to search the riverbanks for runaways.

The group’s website says it doesn’t want to do anything to jeopardize the beauty of the river.

I’m thinking to only be missing 1,000 out of 17,000 isn’t too bad…those are numbers I can live with.

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) – Metro Police are looking for a man who gave a Broad Ripple security guard a hard time while stealing several boxes of condoms from grocery store.

Officers were called around 9:30 p.m. Tuesday to the Marsh supermarket located at 2350 Broad Ripple Avenue. The security guard told investigators he witnessed a man shoving several boxes of condoms down his pants.

The guard told police he initially followed the man to the prophylactic aisle because the man matched the description of the suspect in a previous condom theft at the Marsh.

Wow. Is a 45-year old man is either embarrassed to buy condoms or find himself a place that gives them away for free?

By making gold investing as easy as buying a candy bar from a vending machine, GOLD to go hopes to attract average buyers to the gold market.

Source: CNN Money

While women have quickly snapped into the increasing lines of shapewear, trebling sales in the past decade according to the market research NPD Group, Gavin Jones realized men wanted more than a male girdle or “mirdle” to trim the beer gut if they were to upgrade from their boxers or cotton briefs with fancy waistband.

In partnership with an American friend and former investment banker Corie Chung, Jones spent about a year and about $1.4 million of his own money researching and developing a new product line that was more mainstream than the compression wear around and came with health benefits.

Source: Reuters

David Hrobowski makes furniture out of popsicle sticks — thousands of them, glued together one by one to construct spiraling 3-foot-tall table legs, lampshades finished in the most improbable fringe. The 56-year-old antiques dealer calls them “riffsticks” — each stick like a short melodic note repeated over and over.

Source: LA Times.

34-year-old Bryan Berg placed the final card on today in what was the second time he’s broken the Guinness World Record for the largest house of freestanding playing cards.

He built China’s Venetian Macao Resort Hotel our of 218,792 cards.

The three by ten-and-a-half meter structure took 44 days to complete, and used 4,051 decks of cards. And no adhesives of any kind were used.

Source

(March 7) – At least six women in New Jersey who hoped to plump up their backsides have ended up hospitalized with infections, after a bogus doctor injected their derrieres with a mixture of silicone, petroleum jelly and, perhaps most hazardous, household caulk.

New Jersey health officials said the dangerous mixture had seriously damaging effects.

“What we’ve been hearing from the hospitals is that these women are presented with deep tissue infections and skin infections,” New Jersey Health Department epidemiologist Dr. Tina Tan told the New York Post. “Abscesses form in some cases.”

According to the Post report, health officials in New Jersey have warned New York authorities about the phony doctor, who could face criminal charges of practicing medicine without a license. The person reportedly “treated” women from hospitals in New Jersey.

Not only did the women suffer health setbacks in their attempt to gain shapely bottoms, the botched butt enhancements allegedly left them disfigured. A hospital source told the Post their backsides are so cratered and lumpy, they resemble “moonscapes.”

Source: AOL News

Howard County Sheriff’s Department deputy Matt Roberson tracked down a wanted fugitive through one of the most popular games on the Internet — World of Warcraft. And he got his man.

The sheriff’s department enlisted the aid of the U.S. Marshals this summer to track down a number of fugitives as part of Operation: Falcon, and Alfred Hightower was among those targeted. Unfortunately, authorities were unable to locate him. Roberson soon found out why. The suspect had skipped the country.

“I received information from a childhood friend, who tells me the guy is in Canada,” said Roberson. “I held onto the information in the back of my head. I spoke to the marshals and asked if we could confirm the guy’s location, would they help us get him? They indicated that they would.”

With the help of sheriff’s major Steve Rogers, Roberson began gathering information on Hightower through a number of sources. That is how they discovered that their suspect was a World of Warcraft fan.

“We received information that this guy was a regular player of an online game, which was referred to as ‘some warlock and witches’ game,” said Roberson. “None of that information was sound enough to pursue on its own, but putting everything we had together gave me enough evidence to send a subpoena to Blizzard Entertainment. I knew exactly what he was playing — World of Warcraft. I used to play it. It’s one of the largest online games in the world.”

Read more

After ten years like these, the remaining 990 in this millennium have gotta be at least a little less goofy, right?

Full story here.

An elderly man who went out to fetch a morning newspaper ended up driving nearly 400 miles after getting lost and taking a wrong turn onto a major Australian highway, police said on Wednesday. The man, 81-year-old Eric Steward, eventually stopped and asked for directions after driving for nine hours, from the New South Wales country town of Yass to Geelong in the southern Victoria state.

Steward, who did not know where he was, eventually approached a policeman at a petrol station and asked for help late Wednesday.

“This little old man came up to me saying he was lost. He handed me his mobile and asked if I could speak to his wife,” said Victorian Police Senior Constable Clayton Smith.

Steward, who was reunited with his family on Wednesday, said he took the wrong turn and just kept on going.

“I just went out on the road to have a drive, a nice peaceful drive,” he told reporters, adding he did not need a satellite navigation device as he’d only been lost once.

Source: Reuters

Goloski is promoting S&W’s breast cancer awareness pistol.
Source

SLIDELL, La. — Police say a naked man who appeared to be drunk or on drugs broke into a Louisiana home, cooked himself a meal and took a shower before leaving, wrapped only in a sheet.

Slidell Police Capt. Kevin Foltz says a video surveillance system at the home captured the naked man using a garden hose to shower outside the house around 1 a.m.

The in-the-buff burglar then tried knocking on the front door, police said. When there was no response, he went to the back of the house and wrapped himself in a trash bag, according to FOX 8.

The man allegedly broke several windows, entered the house and ransacked it before cooking himself a meal, having several drinks and showering again.

After all these years this sort of thing just doesn’t surprise me any more.  My hunch is that the man was drunk & high and might have some other “friends” talking to him as well.  From the outside this might seem funny, but in actuality it’s really sad and scary.  This guy is really lucky that he didn’t break into the wrong house.

Mullet Man

The mullet is alternately known as the Mississippi mud flap, the neck
blanket, the Kentucky waterfall, Achy Breaky hair, and the Camaro cut.

On a woman: Femmullet.

On a child: Child abuse.

Some 20 entrants, competing for a blue ribbon and an airbrushed
painting of one of cinema’s most popular mullet-wearers, Joe Dirt, had
their mullets measured by judges from the Iowa School of Beauty.

“We think it’s coming back,” school instructor Aimee Jarshaw said forebodingly.

“It always gets made fun of, but I think people secretly love the
mullet,” said John Jayne, 47, of Des Moines. “People take my picture.
Say it’s a hockey haircut.”

Source

A half hour into a Southwest flight, a man exposed himself to a female passenger. “Her scream apparently upset him, and he ended up punching her.”

Flight attendants and other passengers (then) wrestled with the 300-pound man, who flailed at flight attendants and broke away, stripped naked and was lying in the plane’s aisle as it made a return trip to Oakland to remove the man. The man was taken into custody without incident.

More…

Via the Telegraph:

The bus stop, in front of the Benrath Senior Centre in the western city of Düsseldorf, is an exact replica of a standard stop, with one small difference: buses never stop there.

The idea emerged after the centre was forced to rely on police to retrieve patients who wanted to return to their homes and families but had forgotten that in many cases neither existed any longer.

Now that’s what I call thinking outside of the box. I like it!

From corn ice cream to raw horse flesh ice cream.
Here are the top 10 worst:
Click here.

The BBC convinced 13 year old Scott Campbell to swap his iPod for a Walkman and use it for a week. The first shock came just from seeing the thing:

[My Dad] had told me it was big, but I hadn’t realised he meant THAT big. It was the size of a small book.

It gets worse from there. Wearing the 30 year old device on his belt (“it is certainly not pocket-sized, unless you have large pockets”) Scott felt embarrassed at the attentions of passersby as they stared and shouted insults.

Other problems included lack of a shuffle mode (“I managed to create an impromptu shuffle feature simply by holding down “rewind” and releasing it randomly”), terrible battery life (three hours), sound quality (we’d disagree — even a tape sounds better than the average MP3), and capacity (twelve tracks in your pocket!).

Scott had some operational troubles, too: “It took me three days to figure out that there was another side to the tape.” The ultimate insult comes at the end, though:

Did my dad, Alan, really ever think this was a credible piece of technology?

Ouch!



Source

drunk tractor driver

Kevin Whitesell, 31, of Terre Haute, IN was taken into custody for drunk driving. He was driving a tractor while towing his wrecked car and crashed both vehicles into a creek Friday morning.

Source and photos: Click Here.

Stopping driver’s license fraud is no laughing matter: Four states — including Indiana — are ordering people to wipe the grins off their faces in their license photos.

“Neutral facial expressions” are required at departments of motor vehicles (DMVs) in Arkansas, Indiana, Nevada and Virginia. That means you can’t smile, or smile very much. Other states may follow.

The serious poses are urged by DMVs that have installed high-tech software that compares a new license photo with others that have already been shot. When a new photo seems to match an existing one, the software sends alarms that someone may be trying to assume another driver’s identity.

Source: Indy Star -> Article

Via Channel 6 in Indy

GARY, Ind. — Church leaders visiting a former funeral home they recently bought in a tax sale stumbled upon a gruesome discovery — four unidentified bodies that had been left behind, perhaps for years, in the vacant building.

Lake County Coroner David J. Pastrick described the situation as “unbelievable.”

Leaders of the Northlake Church of Christ called authorities after finding a body bag on a table Sunday.

Pastrick and his staff investigated and found one body in the bag, another in a corrugated burial box and two in caskets.

“They are unidentifiable,” Pastrick said Tuesday of the remains.

Pastrick said the bodies may have been in the former Serenity Gardens Funeral Home since 2006, when the Indiana State Board of Funeral and Cemetery Services revoked the business license for owner Darryl Cammack.

Read the rest of the story.

Source

Honda demonstrated its prototype walking assist devices for the first time in the U.S. today. Intended to support walking for the elderly or people with weakened leg muscles, the devices are currently being tested in real-world conditions to evaluate their effectiveness. The company has applied for more than 130 patents for the devices which are based on the study of human walking along with research and development of technologies conducted for Honda’s advanced humanoid robot, ASIMO.

OAKLAND, Calif.—Relatives of Eunice Workman had no idea where the elderly woman had gone when they reported her missing seven years ago. They finally found her—under a pile of debris in her own home.
Workman’s daughters were cleaning out the two-story north Oakland home Wednesday when they discovered the body. Her remains were in a second-floor bedroom.

Workman had lived in the house for a decade before she went missing.

Authorities plan to conduct an autopsy to determine the cause of death.

Source…

A bear helped carry ammunition for Polish troops during World War II, and 99 other odd facts.
Read more

Some teenage drivers in Maryland are covering their car license plates with numbers belonging to teachers and others to fake out traffic cameras, a parent says.

The DailyTech Web site reported Monday the unidentified parent told the Montgomery County Sentinel a few young drivers in the county print authentic-looking numbers on glossy paper and tape them over their plates. They then race past the traffic cameras, which record the infraction and produce citations based on the fraudulent plate numbers.

They call the prank “pimping,” the parent told the newspaper, and teachers and fellow students are the most popular targets.

source

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

MONROE, Wash. – A man suspected of robbing an armored bank truck and making his getaway via inner tube on the Skykomish River is in custody.

source

Via Reuters…

The tower’s tilt of about four metres off the vertical has remained stable in recent years, after a big engineering project that ended in 2001 corrected its lean by about 40 centimetres from where it was in 1990 when the project began.

“Now we can say that the tower can rest easy for at least 300 years.”

So how many years does the Grand Canyon have left?

Wed Jan 30, 2008

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – German nudists will be able to start their holidays early by stripping off on the plane if they take up a new offer from an eastern German travel firm.

Travel agency OssiUrlaub.de said it would start taking bookings from Friday for a trial nudist day trip from the eastern German town of Erfurt to the popular Baltic Sea resort of Usedom, planned for July 5 and costing 499 euros ($735).

“It’s expensive, I know,” managing director Enrico Hess told Reuters by phone. “It’s because the plane’s very small. There’s no real reason why a flight in which one flies naked should be more expensive than any other.”

The 55 passengers will have to remain clothed until they board, and dress before disembarking, said Hess. The crew will remain clothed throughout the flight for safety reasons.

full story

Via the AP…

This joy ride was grounded from the start. A sheriff’s deputy arrested a man accused of getting into a small, private plane and doing figure-8′s on the grass. Authorities don’t believe Walker has any flying experience. Walker found the keys inside and started the plane, which eventually ended up nose-down in the grass.

I’m picturing a 3 Stooges episode taking place and only wish that there was video of this.  While the story doesn’t say, it’d be a good bet that drugs, alcohol and/or insanity played a role in this.  Luckily no one was hurt.

Police are trying to trace the owner of 65,400 euros (£44,000) mistakenly sent to a 16-year-old boy who bought a Playstation Two for £95 on eBay.

The cash arrived in a box at the house in Aylsham, Norfolk, with the games console, but minus two games.

Police are holding the money under the Proceeds of Crime Act while the matter is investigated.

An eBay spokesman said the parcel’s contents were “somewhat unusual” and it would help police with their inquiries.

The boy’s parents, who are not commenting, alerted police when the parcel arrived on 20 March.

Family claim Magistrates have given Norfolk Police until September to hold on to the money before the case comes up in court again.

But, if the money remains unclaimed the family could potentially apply for it to be returned to them under the Police Property Act.

Source: BBC news
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/norfolk/6903433.stm

Lulu is now offering printing on rolls of toilet paper.  Interesting idea, but not $90 for 4 rolls interesting.  And definitely not very cost effective unless you’re charging people to use your bathroom.

Posted on Amazon.com….quite a deal I must say!

A missing pair of pants has led to one big suit.

A customer got so steamed when a dry cleaner lost his trousers that he sued for $65 million. Two years later, he is still pressing his suit.

-AP

http://www.cnn.com/2007/LAW/05/03/missing.pants.ap/index.html?eref=rss_us 

85 tool, 110 function swiss army knife, $1,200. Macgyver, eat your heart out!

swiss army knife

You could be a bad parent, if you need this book: Baby Names for Dummies.

http://www.amazon.com/Baby-Names-Dummies-Margaret-Rose/dp/0764543407

How embarrassing…

NASHVILLE, Tenn., Dec 6 (Reuters Life!) – It may be one problem airline security officials never envisioned — a passenger lighting matches in flight to mask odors from her flatulence.

The woman’s actions resulted in an emergency landing on Monday in Nashville of an American Airlines flight bound for Dallas from Washington, D.C., said Lynne Lowrance, a spokeswoman for Nashville’s airport.

Other passengers reported the odor of burned matches, but the woman was not forthcoming when asked about it, Lowrance said on Wednesday.

“Of course, she was scared and embarrassed but all the passengers had to disembark, all the luggage had to be searched, a canine team was brought in, and about three hours were consumed in sorting out the situation,” she said.

The woman was not allowed back on the flight and barred from flying on American Airlines, Lowrance said.

If you love the idea of being a rock star but have no musical ability, apart from looking the part, then the air guitar shirt may be right up your alley.
Dr. Richard and his team have recently put the finishing touches on the prototype of their ‘Wearable Instrument Shirt’ (WIS), which enables its wearer to play an ‘air guitar’, allowing anyone to play the guitar like Jimmy Page or Robert Plant, but without having to go through the bother of years of practice.

Dr. Helmer said that wearers of the WIS could play it by simply moving one arm to pick chords and the other to strum the imaginary instrument’s strings.

Source: click here for more…

You have got to be kidding me…

[photo credit: of all the things to ban..., originally uploaded by Malingering.]

…but they’re not.

The ordinance calls for a maximum $1000 fine and/or six months in jail for use, possession, sale or distribution of Silly String in Hollywood from 12:01 a.m. on October 31 to 12:00 p.m. on November 1.

On a typical Halloween night, up to 100,000 people come to Hollywood Boulevard in search of something to do. Given the lack of a formal event, hundreds of illegal vendors flock to the street and sell Silly String which then becomes the sole source of entertainment for the night.

I knew things were “different” in California, but come on guys! I’m just waiting for the Hollywood Halloween Toilet Paper Ban.

A man accused of biting the head off his pet rooster was arrested Friday and faces up to a year in prison if convicted, an animal protection spokesman said.

A neighbor had complained about a dead rooster near his Manhattan apartment and agents found the body of the beheaded rooster on a fire escape, said Joe Pentangelo, spokesman for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The rooster’s head was not located.

Humberto Rodriguez, 52, told agents that he bit the rooster’s head off because he blamed it for injuring a pet pigeon that he also kept in the apartment, Pentangelo said.

Rodriguez is charged with animal cruelty and could face up to a year in prison if convicted. It is also illegal to possess a live rooster in New York City, Pentangelo said.

[Via the AP]

Tokyo, Japan (AHN) – In a demonstration flight for eager spectators on the ground, the first-ever manned plane run by traditional dry-cell batteries soared five meters above the ground. The plane was powered by 160 AA “Oxyride” batteries made by Japan’s Matsushita Electric Industrial Company.

Source…

CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) – A worker accidentally tripping a shut-off switch at a major Ontario plastics plant will cost Nova Chemicals Corp. $11 million in lost profit, the company said on Wednesday, because it won’t be able to fulfill some contracts because of the blunder.

Source

Massachusetts police are investigating the discovery of large quantities of drugs found inside merchandise from two Home Depot stores in Massachusetts, local police said Wednesday.

According to the Tewksbury Police Department, a contractor late last week discovered two 50 pound “bricks” of marijuana wrapped in plastic bags inside a bathroom vanity he had purchased at a Home Depot (Research) store in Tewksbury, said Chief of Detectives Lt. Dennis Peterson.

The estimated street value of the marijuana is around $145,000, Peterson said.

Similar incidents have occurred in other parts of the state. According to the Southwick Police Department, a plumber on Monday purchased a vanity in western Massachusetts in which he later found 3 kilograms of cocaine and around 40 pounds of marijuana, with a total estimated street value of $250,000.
…

Tewksbury Police and DEA officials conducted a search Tuesday of around 12 Home Depot stores statewide and found other bathroom vanities that contained drugs, Peterson said, though he would not elaborate on how many items were discovered.

In each incident being investigated by Tewksbury Police, all of the merchandise boxes originated from a Texas location and were distributed through one undisclosed Massachusetts warehouse, Peterson said.

“I’m sure the packages were being shipped to the distribution center and someone was supposed to intercept them,” Peterson said. “So that person either wasn’t on duty that day or the packages were marked wrong.”

Via CNN

ATHENS – A helicopter landed in the middle of the high security Athens Korydallos prison, picked up two prisoners and flew away in a Hollywood-style escape that has left Greek police stunned.

A criminal on the run hijacked the helicopter Sunday to get his brother out of prison, police said. Vassilis Paleokostas, 40, who was serving a 25-year sentence for kidnapping and bank robbery, and an Albanian convict escaped.

“The guards thought it was a surprise inspection by ministry officials and did nothing,” a police official said.

The helicopter pilot, who said he was forced at gunpoint to undertake the mission, flew the inmates to a nearby cemetery and they made their escape on motorbikes. Greek police have launched a manhunt for the convicts.

Source

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Sick and tired of souped-up cars with loud engines and pulsing music? Barry Manilow may be the answer.

Officials in one Sydney district have decided to pipe the American crooner’s music over loudspeakers in an attempt to rid streets and car parks of “car hoons” whose anti-social cars and loud music annoy residents and drive customers from businesses.

Following a successful experiment where Bing Crosby music was used to drive teenage loiterers out of an Australian shopping center several years ago, Rockdale councilors believe Manilow is so uncool it might just work.

Story here

GARY, Ind. – A male student who has worn women’s clothes to school all year was turned away from his high school prom because he was wearing a dress.

Kevin Logan, 18, went to the West Side High School prom on Friday in a slinky fuchsia gown and heels. He believes officials discriminated against him by not allowing him inside.

“I have no formal pictures, no memories, nothing. You only have one prom,” he said.

Logan, who is gay, received an $85 refund for his prom ticket Tuesday but was not satisfied.

Sylvester Rowan, assistant to Gary Schools Superintendent Mary Steele, said school policy bans males from wearing dresses. Excluding Logan from prom was based on “the dress code, not the student’s homosexuality. That’s his personal preference.”

more…

The Internet has always been a hotbed of wacky but harmless ideas. That’s not the case with the anti-tax movement: These money-saving schemes can cost you everything.

Each April, we remember Benjamin Franklin’s theory on the inevitability of death and taxes. But for those who believe that they can avoid paying income tax through clever loopholes, Franklin’s quote becomes just another government conspiracy.

Paul and Myrna Schuck once tried to convince an Alberta court that the postage stamps they had stuck to their clothes made them equivalent to royalty, and therefore not subject to taxation. Kent Hovind, an evangelist in a Creationist ministry, tried to avoid paying taxes by revoking his American citizenship, claiming to be “a natural sojourner” whose income belonged to God. In August, Royal LaMarr Hardy of Honolulu was sentenced to 13 years in jail for tax fraud and conspiracy. Since 1985, his so-called tax research foundation had convinced thousands of gullible people that filing taxes is
a voluntary decision.

Source

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Illusionist David Copperfield magically escaped getting robbed.

After his show at a West Palm Beach performing arts center Sunday, Copperfield was walking with two female assistants back to their tour bus when four teenagers pulled up in a black car, the police report said.

Two armed robbers allegedly got out of the car demanding the group’s belongings. An assistant handed over $400 from her pockets while the other gave up her purse with 200 euros, $100, her passport, plane tickets and a cellphone. Copperfield refused to empty his pockets, the report said.

Copperfield said he turned his pockets inside out to reveal nothing in them, even though he was carrying his passport, wallet and cell phone.

“Call it reverse pic-pocketing,” Copperfield told The Palm Beach Post for its Wednesday editions.

When the alleged robbers left in the car Copperfield read the license plate number to an assistant while she called 911.

Four teenagers were arrested shortly after and the assistants’ property recovered. They were charged with armed robbery and are being held without bond.

[Source: AP]

BEIJING – Chinese weather specialists used chemicals to engineer Beijing’s heaviest rainfall of the year, helping to relieve drought and rinse dust from China’s capital, the official Xinhua News Agency reported Friday.

Technicians with the Beijing Weather Modification Office fired seven rocket shells containing 163 cigarette-size sticks of silver iodide over the city’s skies on Thursday, Xinhua said.

The reaction that occurred brought as much as four-tenths of an inch of rain, the heaviest rainfall this year, helping to “alleviate drought, add soil moisture and remove dust from the air for better air quality,” Xinhua said.

Though unusual in many parts of the world, China has been tinkering with artificial rainmaking for decades, using it frequently in the drought-plagued north. Last month, another artificial rainfall was generated to clear Beijing after the city suffered some of the fiercest dust storms this decade.

[Source: AP]

A ferocious feline terrorized a quiet Fairfield neighborhood, to the point that residents are seeking help from the law to stop the so-called “Terrorist of Sunset Circle.”

“I was walking along the sidewalk when he sprang at me. I never saw it coming, but that’s how it often is. He comes at you from behind, springs and wraps himself around your legs, biting and scratching,” she said. “The last time I had three bites and eight scratches and I ended up at the walk-in clinic.

“The Avon lady was getting out of her car when Lewis attacked her from behind,” Kettman said. “She ended up going to the hospital.”

more…

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) – The Hell’s Angels Motorcycle Corp. is suing a division of Walt Disney, Buena Vista Motion Pictures and a film production company for infringing on its trademark in the development and production of “Wild Hogs,” a comedy about middle-aged bikers.

The motorcycle club says in the suit that it never approved Walt Disney Motion Picture Group’s use of its trademark, and that the film studio has repeatedly exploited the Hell’s Angels name as well as its trademark design featuring a helmeted, horned and feathered skull while publicizing the “Wild Hogs” movie.

Read story

OLDEN TOWNSHIP, Michigan (AP) — A man was shot and injured when his hunting partner mistook his elbow for a squirrel, authorities said.

Michigan State Police said George Arthur Sikkenga, 64, of Muskegon, Michigan was wounded Sunday morning in Golden Township, in Michigan’s west-central Lower Peninsula.

Sikkenga was wearing camouflage clothing except for an orange hat, which he had covered with a hood after sitting down behind a tree, The Muskegon Chronicle reported.

His clothed elbow was all of him that was visible when his friend, Gregory Scott Wood approached from behind the tree and fired his weapon, which the Ludington Daily News described as a .17-caliber rifle.

Sikkenga was transported to a local hospital, where he was treated and released.

Police were investigating the shooting.

See story.

Guy who makes art out of used bubble gum…something to chew on eh?

Gallery here…

SHERIDAN, Colorado (AP) — A couple planning to set off their own Super Bowl pyrotechnics accidentally blew up their own car while transporting a balloon filled with an explosive gas.

Norman Frey, 46, and his companion suffered busted eardrums in the explosion Sunday as they drove to a party for Super Bowl XL, according to the Arapahoe County sheriff.

The balloon had been filled with acetylene, a flammable gas used in welding, and it had rolled across the back seat, possibly causing static electricity that ignited the gas.

The explosion broke windows, bent doors outwards and pushed up the roof about a foot.

“Looking at the car closely, it’s amazing that these people weren’t killed,” Sheriff Grayson Robinson said.

Several people reported the explosion, but when a deputy arrived, Frey and the woman had abandoned the vehicle.

The license plate led them to Frey, who faces a felony charge of possession, use, or removal of explosives or incendiary devices. The woman will not be charged, authorities said.

[Via CNN]

PRINCETON, Minn., Jan. 31 (UPI) — Self-described vampire and Minnesota gubernatorial candidate Jonathan “The Impaler” Sharkey has been arrested on Indiana charges of stalking and escape.

Sharkey is wanted in Indianapolis on the charges on which bond has been set at $100,000, the Princeton (Minn.) Union-Eagle reported.

Princeton police said their search discovered the May 2005 warrants that led to Sharkey’s arrest Monday.

…

Specifics of the Indiana charges against Sharkey were not known immediately.

[see story]

Previous Story

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) – A Michigan environmental group is charging that at least part of the so-called “new car smell” is toxic, and that the interior of an automobile has dangerous levels of various chemicals.

The report, “Toxic at any speed,” comes from The Ecology Center, an Ann Arbor, Mich.-based group. It reports that PBDEs, used as fire retardants, and phthalates, used primarily to soften PVC plastics, are found in dangerous amounts in dust and windshield film samples.

It called for tougher regulations to phase out the use of the chemicals as well as voluntary moves by the auto manufacturers to stop using the products inside of new vehicles.

It also suggested that car owners take steps to reduce the release and breakdown of these chemicals by using solar reflectors, ventilating car interiors, and parking outside of sunlight whenever possible.

The group says that phthalates are partly responsible for the smell associated with new cars.

[read story]

NORTH VERNON, Ind. — Members of a southern Indiana church say they believe a wooden door there bears the image of Jesus.

People from across Indiana have come to the Reigning Light of the Healing Chapel in North Vernon to see the door. Congregation members say they can see a likeness of Jesus in the wood’s patterns.

Congregation members said the image is similar to that of the Shroud of Turin, a cloth that many throughout the world believe has a likeness of Jesus.

The church’s pastor, Charlotte Pahls, said she sees the image as a sign.

“I asked, ‘Why, Lord, a door?’ And he said, ‘I am the door. If anyone knock, I will come in and sup with them.’ “

[read story]

More than 30 manhole covers have been snatched from Marion County streets in the past week.

Authorities point to the high price of scrap metal as the incentive for thieves, but the missing covers leave caverns as much as 30 feet deep yawning in ambush for drivers and pedestrians.
A replacement can cost from $300 to $2,000, according to officials with the Department of Public Works. Crews are putting up barricades around any hole they find missing a cover and are telling area scrapyards to reject offers to buy a cover.

[read story]

Minnesota voters, who eight years ago elected a former professional wrestler as their governor, may find a self-proclaimed vampire on the ballot for the office this year.

“Politics is a cut-throat business,” said Jonathan “The Impaler” Sharkey, who said he plans to announce his bid for governor on Friday on the ticket of the Vampyres, Witches and Pagans Party.

Read Story.

An Ohio man who claims that he was humiliated by two other participants in an AOL chatroom has sued the two men for causing emotional distress and the ISP for failing to stop the alleged abuse.

Read the story.

TORONTO (Reuters) – A Toronto woman, not content with having merely a dusty demise, has become the first Canadian to donate her body for public display after she dies.

The 30-year-old mutual fund worker said the “Body Worlds” exhibition at the Ontario Science Center, which displays real human bodies, would fulfill her desire to have a posthumous purpose.

“I wanted to donate my body to science, but do something a little bit different, so this was perfect,” said Stephanie Chapu.

Read Full Story

TOKYO (Reuters) – Firemen in a small Japanese town were left red-faced after a party to mark the end of a fire awareness promotional event ended in a blaze that badly damaged their station.

The two-story, wooden fire station in Shimohetsugi, southern Japan, was extensively damaged by the Sunday blaze, a spokesman for the Oita prefectural fire department said.

No one was injured in the fire, which is thought to have been started either by a gas canister used for the firemen’s barbecue or by a kerosene heater.

“It’s very embarrassing that this should happen to people whose job it is to go and put out fires,” the spokesman said.

see story

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — With the help of his kids and neighbors, Billy Ray Powers built more than just a snowman — they’ve dubbed his 16-plus-foot-tall creation “Snowzilla.”

After using up all the snow in the family’s yard, they turned to neighbors’ yards and carried buckets on sleds. They hand-packed the snowman like an ice-cream cone.

“It’s solid ice,” he said. “I put the arms in with my power drill.”

It took a month to complete the project. It was too big to use buttons for its eyes, so Snowzilla gazes over the neighborhood from beer bottles.

[read story at CNN]

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – Forty drunken Santas rampaged through central Auckland, stealing from stores and assaulting security guards, the New Zealand Herald reported on Sunday, in a protest against the commercialization of Christmas.

Police said some of the Santas threw beer bottles, one tried to climb the mooring rope of a cruise ship and a security guard was punched during the fracas.

“They came in, said ‘Merry Christmas’ and then helped themselves,” convenience store staff member Changa Manakynda told the Herald, which reported the Santas also attacked a Christmas tree.

The event organizer, Alex Dyer, had warned the antics would only stop when someone was arrested, said the Herald, which linked the incident to “Santarchy.”

Santarchy (www.santarchy.com) and online encyclopedia wikipedia (www.wikipedia.org) record protests going back around 10 years in the United States, with participants marking Christmas in anti-commercial manner involving street theater, pranks and public drunkenness.

Police said identification was a key issue as they tried to sort out which of the 40 men and women had done what.

“With a number of people dressed in the same outfit, it was difficult for any witnesses to confirm the identity of who was doing what,” Senior Sergeant Matt Rogers told Reuters.

[via Reuters]

Also, see The Rigister.

TOKYO (Reuters) – An aging Japanese thief felt the gravity of his crime when the weight of his loot tripped him up during his attempted getaway.

The 70-year-old man walked into a post office in the city of Kawagoe, just north of Tokyo, late Friday and poured liquid over the floor, saying he would set off an explosion if he wasn’t given money.

A clerk filled a paper bag the man was carrying with coins worth some 250,000 yen ($2,000) and weighing 22 pounds. As the man ran off, the bag broke under the weight and he stumbled and fell as he tried to pick up the money.

Tsugio Chigira, deputy head of the Kawagoe police station, said the man told police he needed the money to pay back debts.

“He didn’t really want to be a robber, but felt he had no choice.”

[via Reuters]

BOSTON (Reuters) – Are diamonds really forever?

An anonymous gift-giver left a $15,000 diamond engagement ring to the owner of an unlocked car in western Massachusetts with a typed note hinting at a broken heart.

“Merry Christmas. Thank you for leaving your car door unlocked. Instead of stealing your car I gave you a present. Hopefully this will land in the hands of someone you love, for my love is gone now. Merry Christmas to you,” the note said.

The three-diamond ring with a white-gold band appeared on the seat of the man’s car at a train station in Westborough, about 30 miles west of Boston, on December 7, police said. Four days later, the man reported it to police.

[via Reuters]

Two Swiss women who spent a week at a Manhattan hotel have filed a lawsuit saying they had a lousy time trying to sleep there because they were bitten by bedbugs.

Ksenija Knezevic, of Zurich, and Marlies Barisic, of Kreuzlingen, both in their early 30s, say the bloodsucking insects began attacking the night they checked into the Hotel Pennsylvania in September.

…

“They were eaten alive,” Ebanks said Wednesday.

Read Story.

GERMANTOWN, Tenn. – A man wearing only socks was arrested along a busy street after witnesses said he fired a gun at afternoon traffic.

…

“I couldn’t believe it,” said Eddie Cox, who was driving home from the bank when he saw the naked gunman in this Memphis suburb.

Read story.

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania (AP) — A man arrested for running onto the field during the Philadelphia Eagles’ game against the Green Bay Packers on Sunday told police he was spreading his late mother’s ashes.

Read story.

VERSHIRE, Vt. – A Massachusetts man was shot while using the outhouse at his family’s camp by a boy who was target shooting.

Chris Flanagan, 41, of Holliston, Mass., was standing in the outhouse on Saturday morning when he was hit in the chest by a bullet that came through the door.

Police said the shot was fired from a .22-caliber rifle used by a young relative. They declined to give the relationship between the two.

[continue story...]

MOSTAR, Bosnia (Reuters) – Bosnia’s southern town of Mostar unveiled the world’s first statue of kung fu legend Bruce Lee on Saturday, paying homage to a childhood hero of all its divided ethnic groups.

The life-size 1.68 meter (5ft 7in) bronze statue is situated in Mostar’s central park, close to the former front line of Bosnia’s 1992-95 civil war. A decade after the conflict, Mostar’s Muslim and Croat inhabitants remain deeply split.

Unveiled by its initiators, Veselin Gatalo and Nino Raspudic of Mostar’s Urban Movement, the statue portrays the Chinese-American actor, who died 32 years ago, in a typical defensive fighting position.

“This does not mean that Bruce Lee will unite us, because people are different and cannot be united and we will always be Muslims, Serbs or Croats,” Gatalo said. “But one thing we all have in common is Bruce Lee.”

[continue story...]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A young woman robbed four banks in Washington’s suburbs without ever interrupting conversations her cell phone, a sheriff’s spokesman said on Friday.

In the most recent heist, the woman, with sunglasses casually pushed up on her dark hair and a mobile phone at her ear, walked up to a bank teller in Ashburn, Virginia, on November 4 and opened her purse to show a handgun and a note demanding cash, said Loudoun County sheriff’s spokesman Kraig Troxell.

“During the entire sequence, she was on her cell phone,” Troxell said by telephone. “When we compared it with other robberies that have occurred in the area, we determined she was involved in three other robberies. … In those cases, she was also on the cell phone.”

[continue story...]

BANJA LUKA, Bosnia (Reuters) – A hand grenade being used instead of a ball in a game of catch exploded early on Saturday killing three youths in this Bosnian town, police and news agencies said.

Two youths aged 19 and 20, one of them from neighboring Croatia, were killed instantly while a 20-year-old woman died on her way to hospital, police said. Her sister was slightly injured but two other youths suffered serious injuries.

[continue story...]

A British tourist described last night the horrifying moment when he realised his luxury cruise line was under gun and grenade attack from pirates, 100 miles off the coast of Somalia.

“I heard what sounded like a crack from outside [the ship] at 5.50am,” said Norman Fisher, 55, a solicitor from north London, one of 20 Britons on board the Seabourn Spirit which was carrying 312 passengers and crew.

“I looked out the window and saw a small boat with about five people in it, about 20 yards away. Two of them had rifles and one had some kind of rocket launcher. They were firing the rifle and then they fired the rocket launcher twice.”

Mr Fisher said that at least one rocket hit the Spirit, one of the most luxurious liners in the world. The rocket broke through the side of the liner into a passenger’s suite.

“The couple were in there at the time, so it was a bit of an unpleasant experience,” said Mr Fisher. “Fortunately they weren’t hurt, but you can just imagine what it would have been like if they had been standing up, because the cabin was very badly damaged.”

more…

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – A Dutch dentist who chopped off his finger and then faked a car crash before claiming 1.8 million euros ($2.2 million) from insurers was given a suspended sentence and fined by a court Thursday.

The man, aged 50, mutilated himself and crashed his car into a tree in Belgium in the hope of convincing insurers that the steering wheel had inflicted the injury, the court said.

However, the shape of the cut on his index finger, the level of anaesthetic in his blood and the absence of skid marks on the road suggested otherwise.

“It was not an accident but an amputation he carried out himself, or he had someone do it for him,” a court spokeswoman said.

The dentist was fined 25,000 euros and received a six-month suspended jail sentence with 240 hours community service.

[via Reuters]

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – A Colorado man who had a panic attack when he found he was glued to a toilet seat in a Home Depot restroom has sued the home improvement giant for negligence, saying staff ignored his plight.

Retired electrical engineer Bob Dougherty, 57, said on Thursday he was stuck in the stall with his pants down for about 20 minutes and that two years after the 2003 incident he was suffering from post-traumatic stress, which has triggered diabetes and heart complications.

“I have these nightmares every night where I am locked in this dark room, with no windows, no doors, no fresh air, no route for escape. I wake up in these cold sweats,” Dougherty said.

Spokesmen for Home Depot Inc. could not immediately be reached for comment.

[continue story...]

Scientists digging in a remote Indonesian cave have uncovered a jaw bone that they say adds more evidence that a tiny prehistoric Hobbit-like species once existed.

The jaw is from the ninth individual believed to have lived as recently as 12,000 years ago. The bones are in a wet cave on the on the island of Flores in the eastern limb of the Indonesian archipelago, near Australia.

More…

The naked swimmers were in the water for 14 hours and completed one length of the loch, before high swell and low temperatures forced them to reconsider.

The relay, organised by British Naturism, was scheduled to complete three lengths between Fort Augustus and Lochend, covering 69 miles.

British Naturism president Pat Thompson said the weather was “atrocious”.

The team, which included a writer, a policeman and a housewife, had hoped to raise more than £2,000 for Cancer Research UK.

[continue story...]

A long quest for booty from the Spanish colonial era appears to be culminating in Chile with the announcement by a group of adventurers that they have found an estimated 600 barrels of gold coins and Incan jewels on the remote Pacific island.

“The biggest treasure in history has been located,” said Fernando Uribe-Etxeverria, a lawyer for Wagner, the Chilean company leading the search. Mr Uribe-Etxeverria estimated the value of the buried treasure at US$10bn (£5.6bn).

[see story]

Perhaps you thought Hurricanes were natural and somewhat random events that have occurred for ages untold. True, but now Hurricanes are angrier, because you won’t stop buying cars and ride public transportation. This particular Hurricane was angry at Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour for not believing in Global Warming, so it decided to attack Louisiana and kill all the people that could not leave because they didn’t own cars and depended upon public transportation.

You see, hurricanes are now clear evidence of Global Warming. And if one hits you, it’s a Republican’s fault. The harsh winter many of us had last year was also clear evidence of Global Warming. As are…

…continue story

LONDON – Caged and barely clothed, eight men and women monkeyed around for the crowds Friday in an exhibit labeled “Humans” at the London Zoo.

“Warning: Humans in their Natural Environment” read the sign at the entrance to the exhibit, where the captives could be seen on a rock ledge in a bear enclosure, clad in bathing suits and pinned-on fig leaves. Some played with hula hoops, some waved.

Visitors stopped to point and laugh, and several children could be heard asking, “Why are there people in there?”

[see Yahoo!]

A Table View man has found a foot at the Milnerton lagoon.

Derick van Vuuren said he had found it while out walking.

“It was just floating around in the water,” he said after making the find on Sunday.

“The cops reckon it’s a shark attack victim. But there have been no attacks on the West Coast. The last attack I remember is the one in Simon’s Town. Perhaps it was the foot that went missing from the Salt River mortuary some time ago. But that one was sawn off, apparently. This one looked like it was chewed off.”

Police spokesperson Billy Jones said the foot had been severed above the ankle. An inquest docket had been opened.

[from IOL]

A man falls to his death while preparing one of Kansas City’s haunted houses for the Halloween season.

Police said they received a call last night that a man had fallen down an elevator shaft at the Catacombs. It is one of several haunted houses that are located in old warehouses and industrial buildings in an area west of downtown.

When police arrived, the man was dead. A police spokesman said the man’s death has been ruled an accident. His name has not been released by authorities.

[via WIBW]

POLICE in Mashonaland Central Province have warned traditional healers, mostly known as Tsikamutanda, that they risk being arrested for causing an upsurge in assault and murder cases in the province.

This comes after police received reports of several family members that were killing and assaulting each other after witch-hunting ceremonies conducted by traditional healers in the province.

[see allAfrica]

A US OUTFIT is offering a service that will allow bloggers to beam their online diaries into deep space.

[see The Inquirer]

The Icelandic tradition of believing in elves is so strong roads have been rerouted to avoid disturbing rocks where they might live, a report said.

Polls consistently show most residents of Iceland either believe in elves, or aren’t willing to rule out their existence.

[see WebIndia123]

A 40-year-old housewife, Jaya Majumdar, has allegedly been branded a witch and assaulted by her neighbours in Lake Gardens.

[see The Telegraph]

ODESSA, Sask. — A Saskatchewan family is trying to put their lives back together after a twister destroyed their farm, carrying away 30 lambs.

[see The Winnipeg Sun]

Raipur, July 11 : A 54-year-old widow was paraded naked and then clubbed to death after being branded a witch at the instance of a village panchayat in Chhattisgarh, police said Monday.

Around 35 villagers took part in the gruesome incident in Parsatolo village, 122 km from here, in Rajnandgaon district Sunday, police said. Thirty-one people, including the village head, on charges of killing her.

[via Webindia123.com]

PITTSBURGH (AP) – James Henry Smith was a zealous Pittsburgh Steelers fan in life, and even death could not keep him from his favorite spot: in a recliner, in front of a TV showing his beloved team in action.

Smith, 55, of Pittsburgh, died of prostate cancer Thursday. Because his death wasn’t unexpected, his family was able to plan for an unusual viewing Tuesday night.

The Samuel E. Coston Funeral Home erected a small stage in a viewing room, and arranged furniture on it much as it was in Smith’s home on game day Sundays.

[link]

Deakin University has set up Victoria’s first “dead pig farm” as part of a new project to study body decomposition.

Pigs break down at a similar rate to humans and will be used to test new methods for investigating suspicious deaths of people.

[via Geelong Info]

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A New York City school teacher apologized and resigned on Friday after admitting he pursued a career as a professional wrestler when he had told his boss he was on leave to care for a sick relative.

Matthew Kaye, a social studies teacher at Benjamin Cardozo High School in Queens, had his mother call in sick for him last Dec. 16.

[via Reuters]

MOSCOW (Reuters) – A Russian astrologist who says NASA has altered her horoscope by crashing a spacecraft into a comet is suing the U.S. space agency for damages of $300 million, local media reported Monday.

[via Reuters]

SONKAJARVI, Finland (Reuters) – Estonia reigned supreme once again in the wife-carrying world championship on Saturday, as Margo Uusorg sprinted home to win the Baltic country’s eighth straight title in the offbeat competition.

Forty couples from 10 countries gathered in the remote Finnish village of Sonkajarvi to complete a 253.5-meter-long obstacle course. A man must carry a woman, not necessarily his spouse, through a pool and across hurdles.

The few rules require a minimum weight of 49 kg (108 lb) for the “wife” and state that all contestants must have fun.

[via Reuters]

LONDON (Reuters) – The British government launched a series of tough anti-cigarette adverts Friday with the message that smoking is bad for your sex life because it makes men impotent and women ugly.

[via Reuters]

The state police and state fire marshal’s office are reminding sellers and consumers that the only legal fireworks in Connecticut are sparklers.

According to state law, sparklers are non-explosive, non-aerial devices that contain less than 100 grams of pyrotechnic mixture. They can only be used by people 16 years or older.

Novelty items such as party poppers, snakes, snappers, smoke devices and anything that emits a flame are not legal for private use in the state.

It is illegal to purchase, sell or possess fireworks, which are defined by law as “any combustible or explosive composition prepared for the purpose of producing a visible or audible effect by combustion, explosion, deflagration or detonation.” Violation of the law could lead to a fine of up to $100 or a sentence of up to 90 days, or both.

[via The Advocate]

I’m not moving to Connecticut any time soon. I love the law in Indiana…sign a piece of paper saying you’ll take them out of state or shoot them off at certain locations with firemen present and you’re good to go. Not that many people do that or that it’s even legal in our surrounding states, but hey, it’s “on the books” that way.

According to The Mirror, the words “Holy Ghost” will be dropped from religious lessons because they scare children, and the body and blood of Jesus Christ will not be described as Eucharist because it seems too cannibalistic.

[via NewKerala]

For $10,000 and a brighter future for her son, Kari Smith on Wednesday became a real life pop-up ad for a virtual casino.

…

“I really want to do this,” she said. “To everyone else, it seems like a stupid thing to do. To me, $10,000 is like $1 million. I only live once, and I’m doing it for my son.”

Brouse didn’t understand it, either.

In his 24 years, he’s turned away a lot of customers who want to get tattoos that can’t be covered up with clothing. He and his staff spent nearly seven hours Wednesday trying to talk Smith out of it.

Her resolve won out. The one thing Brouse could do with inch-tall letters in the prominent spot was to make them less so by keeping them as close to her hairline for those occasions when bangs or a hat might be the more appropriate message.

[via Deseret News & The Salt Lake Tribune]

What is wrong with people? I don’t think I’d do that for a billion dollars, let alone the chump change of ten grand. But I guess she always has a future in the carnival.

FARMLAND, Ind. — Seven women who usually gather to play cards plan to strip down for a calendar as part of the fight against plans to tear down Randolph County’s 128-year-old courthouse.

The women ranging in age from their early 70s to older than 90 will pose nude — with strategically placed miniature replicas of the courthouse in front of them — in the fund raiser for the Save the Courthouse Fund.

“I don’t know how we’re going to look, but we’re going to pose,” 85-year-old Garnita Amburn told The Star Press of Muncie for a story today.

[via The Indianapolis Star]

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The mourning parents of a traffic accident victim who visited their son’s grave near Antwerp Friday evening were shocked to find the local gravediggers enjoying their annual barbecue at the graveyard.

Workers at the cemetery in Merksem had music playing and their children were running around near the graves, De Morgen newspaper said Wednesday.

[via Reuters]

NEW DELHI – Women in an eastern Indian forest are stripping naked to distract police and to help a criminal gang avoid arrest while illegally chopping down trees, the Hindustan Times reported Tuesday.

[via Reuters]

A Halloween committee has been established for Coles County, which will try to bring in more business to the area during the spook season.

During the last six months the committee has been working hard trying to get local business’ support with the upcoming Halloween festival, according to Scott Kelly, a committee member.

“We are trying to get as many people involved as we can,” said Kelly. “Our goal is to make Coles County the Halloween capital of Illinois. Our job as a committee is to advertise the festival to as many people as we can.

“Currently, Arcola’s Broomcorn Festival is the largest Halloween festival around here,” said Kelly.

[via The Daily Eastern News]

John Fiedler, a stage and screen actor, who grew up in Wisconsin and won fame as the voice of Piglet in Walt Disney’s Winnie-the-Pooh films, died from cancer, according to his brother, James Fiedler.

He was 80.

Fiedler died Saturday in New York; a day after the death of Paul Winchell, 82, who created the lispy voice of Winnie the Pooh’s animated friend Tigger in the Disney films.

[via EiTB24]

It may not have the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, nor of the area called the Devil’s Sea by Japanese and Filipino seamen, also known for inexplicable disappearances.

But on a busy road in the shadow of the Pentland Hills lies the Covenanters’ Wood, an area that appears to possess the same magnetic characteristics. There have been eight road accidents in 12 months at exactly the same spot on the A720 Edinburgh bypass.

[via The Herald]

In Alaska, thousands of mysterious lakes are all the same shape and have grown steadily for thousands of years, the geological record shows. They are the fastest growing lakes known in the world.

Scientists have tried various ideas to explain the steady growth — the lakes expand up to 15 feet every year — and the lakes’ consistent shape and orientation, but no theory has held up.

[via MSNBC]

Orlando, Florida, U.S.A.

“It’s only natural that Charlie Carlson would write a book on Florida oddities, because he can spend all day telling tales of the bizarre.”

[via The Orlando Sentinel]

Once while in Dallas I had a couple ask me to take their picture on the “Grassy Knoll”, which I though was odd at the time. Maybe the area is prone to oddness…if you know of any other stories, let me know.

Anyway, yet another odd eBay purchase by the casino.

[via The Dallas Morning News]

“Shower Jesus” sold on eBay…to the usual winner of odd auctions.

[via The Post Gazette]