The Knoxville, Tenn., Police Dept. recently reminded motorists that all vehicles need working headlights for night driving. Included was a recent department photo of the car of a Sweetwater, Tenn., motorist who was ticketed twice on the same evening for using “headlights” that were only flashlights tied to his bumper with bungee cords.
It Was A Bad Idea To Lose The Eyebrows
In yet another chilling episode of body modification, Henry Damon, 37, a married father of two, appeared at the Caracas International Tattoo Expo as “Red Skull” (the archenemy of Captain America). Damon showed off his subdermal forehead implants, which replace his eyebrows with prominent ridges. And admirers marveled at the fact that half his nose had been removed. Damon did not explain how he had obtained his deep red color. For the record, Damon’s plastic surgeon called him “a physically and intellectually healthy person.”
War Is Hell
— A recent YouTube compilation of footage gleaned from ISIS promotion videos showed jihadists accidentally killing themselves. Several fighters in a group photo appeared to be blown up when one of them detonated a captured bomb. One man was killed when he tried to reload a mortar launcher too quickly.
— London’s Daily Telegraph reported in January that the “Darkshadow” jihadists from Tunisia and Ivory Coast, who had proclaimed their website-hacking would disrupt international travel, wound up taking down a site which contained nothing but bus timetables in Bristol, England. Darkshadow’s English translator also misspelled Muslim as “Muslum.”
— ISIS’ recent executions of a Jordanian pilot and two Japanese citizens were met with starkly different reactions. In Jordan, King Abdullah II led his nation in a call for bloody revenge. In Japan (according to a February Associated Press dispatch from Tokyo), feelings were mixed because of “meiwaku” — Japan’s cultural feeling that the dead victims (and their families) were “causing trouble” by placing themselves in harm’s way. Said one man cited by the AP, “In the old days, their parents would have had to commit hara-kiri to apologize.” In fact, both victims’ families did repeatedly apologize for inconveniencing the government, which had warned citizens to stay away from the war zone.
Weird Science
Scientists at the University of California at Irvine announced that they had figured out how to “unboil” a hen’s egg. After boiling, the egg’s proteins become “tangled.” But the scientists’ device can “untangle” them, allowing the egg white to return to its previous state. The researchers’ paper promises dramatically reduced costs in several applications, from cancer treatments to food production, in which untanglings might take “thousands” of times longer.
Police Report
Anneliese Young, 82, was arrested at a CVS pharmacy in Augusta, Ga., after store security allegedly caught her shoplifting a container of “Sexiest Fantasies” body spray. According to the packaging, the scent “provides a burst of sensuality … as addictive and seductive as the woman who wears it; a scent that is sure to drive any man wild.”
Bright Ideas
— The Jeju Island Korean restaurant in Zhengzhou, China, staged a promotion to pick up lunch tabs for the 50 “most handsome” people who dine at the venue every day. Judges were by a panel of cosmetic surgeons. Diners were evaluated in terms of “quality of” eyes, noses, mouths and, especially, foreheads, which were considered best if they were “protruding.”
— The owner of the Kingsland Vegetarian Restaurant in Canberra, Australia, apologized for the cockroach infestation that earned him a $16,000 fine. He explained that for moral reasons he could not bring himself to exterminate living things. He came up with far less convincing explanations for the restaurant’s highly publicized dirty toilets, grease back-ups and lack of food storage space.
Perspective
Among the participants at this year’s Davos, Switzerland, gathering of billionaires and important people was property developer Jeff Greene, 60, who owns mansions in New York, Malibu and Palm Springs. His Beverly Hills estate is on the market for $195 million. Greene scored big with overvalued sub-prime mortgages before the 2008 Great Recession. Shortly after landing at Davos, he gave Bloomberg Business his take on the symptoms of current economic turmoil. He said he had capitalized on that turmoil in order to get part of his wealth. In short, he had exploited people’s desire for houses they couldn’t afford. “America’s lifestyle expectations are far too high,” Greene explained, “and need to be adjusted so we have less things and a smaller, better existence.”
Least Competent Criminals
— Donald Harrison, 22, was wanted for assault in Ambridge, Penn. He made police aware of his whereabouts when he posted a “selfie” on Facebook from a Greyhound bus with the notation, “It’s Time to Leave Pa.” He was picked up at a stop in nearby Youngstown, Ohio.
— Police in Houston arrested Dorian Walker-Gaines, 20, and Dillian Thompson, 22, after they posted Facebook selfies of themselves holding wads of $100 bills. They took the photos on an iPad they’d stolen on Jan. 8. The photos automatically uploaded to the victim’s iCloud account. Incidentally, Walker-Gaines had the word “BRILLIANT” tattooed across his chest.
Recurring Themes
— A mummified monk in Mongolia became the latest religious figure whose followers insist he isn’t dead but is living in a meditative trance. Barry Kerzin, among whose patients is the Dalai Lama, called the state “tukdam.” Scientists attribute the monk’s preservation to Mongolia’s cold weather.
— The Smoking Gun website reported that Steven Anderson’s arrest in Fargo, N.D., was only the third time someone operating a Zamboni had been charged with DUI. Anderson, 27, was arrested while he erratically resurfaced the ice between periods of a girls’ high school hockey game.
New Right
The Utah Court of Appeals ruled in February that Barbara Bagley has a legal right to sue herself for the negligent driving on her part that caused the death of her husband. Typically, in U.S. courts, a party cannot profit from its own negligence. But Bagley is the official “representative” administering her husband’s estate and has a duty to claim debts owed to the husband. Those debts would include “wrongful death” damages from a careless driver. Of course, if Bagley’s lawsuit is successful, the monetary award would become part of the husband’s estate, a portion of which will likely go to her.
Metal Head
Las Vegas performer Staysha Randall took 3,200 different piercings in her body during one sitting on June 7, 2011, to break the Guinness Book world record by 100 piercings. Veteran Las Vegas piercer Bill “Danger” Robinson did the honors. Coincidentally, on the same day in Edinburgh, Scotland, the woman with the most lifetime piercings (6,925) got married. Elaine Davidson, 46, wore a full white ensemble that left bare only her face, which was colored green and bore 192 of the piercings. The lucky guy was Davidson’s longtime friend Douglas Watson, a balding, 60-something man with no piercings or tattoos.
The Continuing Crisis
— In February. the U.N. Conference on Disarmament met to determine whether meetings should be open to the general public. The representative from Belarus expressed alarm because of potential problems for the security staff. “What if,” he asked “there were topless ladies screaming from the public gallery throwing bottles of mayonnaise?” The Mexican delegate pointed out that some U.N. meetings were already open to the public, but as yet there had been no mayonnaise-droppings.
— Police in the Dutch town of Haarlem, near Amsterdam, raided an urban marijuana farm after a recent snowfall. In photographs of the neighborhood, all the yards and roofs of houses are blanketed in white except for a certain portion of the roof of one home, on which the snow had completely melted. Police, deducing that the attic was likely an illegal marijuana greenhouse, made arrests.
— If you’re in pain, shouting “Owww!” has measurable therapeutic value. Writing recently in the Journal of Pain, researchers from the National University of Singapore hypothesize that the muscle movements in vocalizing somehow divert or confuse pain signals in the brain. Of subjects who plunged their hands into extremely cold water, those who were allowed to vocalize kept their hands immersed for up to three minutes longer than those who were silent. The “oww” sound is similar in many languages, and is instinctive from birth.
Historical Weirdness
— For a brief period in 1951 and 1952, an educational kit called the Gilbert Atomic Energy Lab was for sale in the United States even though it came with testable samples of four types of uranium ore and three different radiation sources (alpha, beta, gamma). A surviving copy of the kit was on display recently at the Ulster Museum in Belfast, Northern Ireland. However, the radioactive materials had to be removed before the kit could be shipped to Belfast. The kit failed to sell well in the 1950s; kids preferred the company’s erector sets.
— In February, the Kansas Humanities Council posted a description of a 1925 baseball game in Wichita in which the professional, all-black Wichita Monrovians took on members of the local Ku Klux Klan. Historians guessed that the KKK risked the embarrassment of defeat only because it needed the exposure to overcome declining enrollment. The Monrovians (champions of the “Colored Western League” the year before) won, 10-8. The Klan shut down in Kansas two years later.
The Wheels Of Justice Get Stuck
A motorist hit three bicycling teenagers in Innisfil, Ontario, in 2012, killing one and putting another in a wheelchair. The motorist is suing the victims for $1.35 million for the “emotional trauma” the incident caused her. She alleges the victims “were incompetent bicyclists” and “did not apply their brakes properly.” The boys wore reflective jackets and had no alcohol in their systems. But the driver, Sharlene Simon, admitted to having had at least one drink and to speeding. Her husband, who was following her in another car, is a police officer. Simon was neither charged nor breath-tested in the incident.
Weird News Classic
In May, 2011, Oklahoma inmate Eric Torpy was reported to be having second thoughts when he was six years into his 33-year sentence for armed robbery. His original sentence was 30 years. But he told the judge that if he was “going down,” it would be in “Larry Bird’s jersey.” Bird’s number was 33. Judge Ray Elliott accommodated Torpy by giving him 33 years, not 30. Said Torpy to the reporter, “I’m pretty sure (Bird) thinks I’m an idiot.”
The Unhoneymoon
A Saratoga Springs, N.Y., resort has begun accepting husbands and wives for a relaxed weekend that includes a divorce. This business will bring to America a concept already being used to make money in six European cities. The Gideon Putnam Resort and Spa charges $5,000 for a couple to check in on a Friday, married, but leave on Sunday single.
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