NY Attitude And A Ship Of Fools
Gregory Reddick, 54, and his employer, SJQ Sightseeing Tours, filed a lawsuit in June against New York City for “harassing” them and hampering their ability to rip off tourists. Specifically, interfered with their “right” to sell tickets for $200 or more for trips on the Staten Island Ferry — which is actually free to ride. Reddick was wearing an (unauthorized) “Authorized Ticket Agent” jacket when he was arrested. According to a New York Post account, he believes he operates legally because he misunderstands a technicality in a 2013 court case. Prosecutors, who described the waterfront tourist-exploitation scene as “the wild west,” found Reddick with seven dates of birth, five aliases and six Social Security numbers.
Recurring Themes
— Occasionally one spouse runs for office against the other. That is the case in Bremerton, Wash., where incumbent council member Roy Runyon is being challenged by his wife, Kim Faulkner. Both were mum as to the reasons. Said Runyon: “We’re different people. She might have a different approach.”
— India’s media reported in April yet another baby with a birth defect who is being treated as a representation of Hindu holiness. A four-armed, four-legged child (medical explanation: remains of an underdeveloped conjoined twin) is being worshipped as the reincarnation of the multi-limbed Lord Ganesha. Pilgrims journey from all over India to the birthplace, Dumri-Isri in Jharkhand state. In a nod to modernity, one witness told a reporter that initially he had thought a photograph of the child was “Photoshopped,” but now has seen the baby with his own eyes.
Another Human Right
In April, London’s Daily Mail spotted Anna Broom of Gillingham declaring that despite the various disorders that keep her from working, she imagines a first-class wedding with champagne, a horse-drawn carriage and a honeymoon in Mexico — all at government expense. She says that is her “human right.” She told a reporter that a small ceremony at a government office would not boost her confidence, but that her “dream” wedding would be just the thing to get her back on a job search.
What Cannibals Can Teach Us
Researchers studying the cannibalistic Fore tribe of Papua New Guinea reported in a June journal article that they have identified the “prion” resistance gene that appears to offer complete protection against mad cow disease and other neurodegenerative conditions such as dementia and Parkinson’s. The tribe used to dine on relatives’ brains at funerals; it has since abandoned the practice. The old habit caused a 1950s epidemic that wiped out 2 percent of the tribe annually. According to the lead researcher, survivors, who have the specific resistance gene, demonstrated “a striking example of Darwinian evolution in humans.”
Updates
— News of the Weird has remarked on modern, over-the-top versions of the centuries-old tradition in China of making funerals entertaining, to attract mourners and signify that the deceased did not die “faceless.” In the recent past, festive song-and-dance acts were hired. In the competition for attendees, some families took to hiring strippers to perform. In April, the Chinese Ministry of Culture, previously somewhat tolerant because of sensitivity for the families, formally denounced the practice and began detaining the traveling performers.
— Backyard firing ranges are legal in Florida. In March a Florida House committee voted to keep it that way, shooting down legislation to outlaw them in urban and residential areas. Firing on private property is legal except if one is shooting over a public right-of-way or an occupied dwelling. “Negligent” gunfire, though illegal, is only a misdemeanor. In 2014, one Florida legislator, originally from Alaska, said even in that liberty-conscious state, residents in urban Anchorage do not have the rights that Floridians have.
— Convicted “satanic cult” day care operators Dan and Fran Keller were finally “unconvicted” by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in May — 23 years after being found guilty based on toddlers’ fantastic testimony. Still, the judges could not bring themselves to rule the Kellers “not guilty.” The Kellers spent 22 years behind bars.
— The South Pacific islanders on the Vanuatu island of Tanna believe that 2016 will be the year when the man they worship as a god — Britain’s Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh — will finally visit them. One highly regarded islander told a London Daily Telegraph correspondent in New Zealand that the cult is starved for a visit, since Philip’s only contact since the 1940s has been via gifts — the most treasured, an autographed photo. Legendary Vanuatuan “Chief Jack” is convinced that Philip is a descendant of island royalty.
Biologists Have To Be Fast
Researchers learned from 2010 reports of a new monkey species in Myanmar with a nose so recessed that it habitually collects rainfall and constantly sneezes. According to a National Geographic dispatch, by the time scientists arrived to investigate, natives had eaten the monkey. (The sneezing alerts hunters.) Similarly, researchers studying a rare species of Vietnamese lizard learned of a sighting in 2010. A two-man team from La Sierra University in Riverside, Calif., rushed to Ba Ria-Vung Tau province. However, on arrival they found the lizards being routinely served in several restaurants’ lunch buffets.
Can’t Possibly Be True
— Doctors at a hospital in Dongyang, China, removed 420 kidney stones from a single patient in June. One of the surgeons told reporters that a soy-heavy diet of tofu was probably to blame. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the most stones removed from one kidney during surgery was 172,155. The surgery took place in India in 2009.
— In May, the Museum of Modern Arts in Krakow, Poland, began showing a video of naked men and women entering a room and playing a game of tag. At the end of the film it is revealed that the room was in a building in a gas-chamber facility in Auschwitz. The idea, apparently, was to bring three affected nations (Poland, Germany and Israel) together. Among the sponsors of the exhibit was the Israeli embassy in Warsaw. A similar project opened in Tartu, Estonia, in February, but was closed almost immediately after objections from Jewish-advocacy organizations.
— Chinese students are geniuses when it comes to using technology to cheat on exams. The government’s newest anti-cheating weapon was employed recently in the city of Luoyang during the crucial university entrance tests. The weapon is a six-propeller drone that can hover above a cavernous exam hall, trying to pinpoint the locations where ace test-takers are radio-transmitting correct answers to their clients, whose tiny earbuds are worn deep in ear canals. Cheating students also use beverage-bottle cameras, eyeglasses that can scan and transmit images and fingerprint film to fool fingerprint scanners.
— France’s La Provence reported that at least one enterprising drug dealer in Marseilles had begun distributing “loyalty cards” to its best customers, offering a 10-euro discount on future sales after the customer’s card was full (all 10 squares stamped). Said one buyer, “I thought I was hallucinating. I thought I was at a pizzeria or something.” The card also expressed thanks for the patronage and reminded the customer of operating hours (11 am to midnight).
Rehab Will Be Difficult
Laquanda Newby, 25, was charged with three counts of child abuse on June 7 at the county courthouse in Richmond, Va., after police spotted her car with two children locked inside it on a day when the temperature reached the 90s. Newby had parked at the courthouse that day in order to attend her hearing on charges that on May 26, she had locked her kids in a hot car while she was out on errands.
Compelling Explanations
— Luis Cruz, 46, sought a pre-trial release in Springfield, Mass., even though he had been charged with heroin distribution and his rap sheet was 52 pages long. His court-appointed lawyer, Anna Levine, was not deterred, arguing that bail was not necessary to assure that her client would appear for trial because none of the 52 pages contained an arrest for failure to appear. Said Levine, “It’s a 52-page record for showing up.”
— “It was just one of those spur-of-the-moment crazy things,” explained John Paul Jones Jr., after he drove his pickup truck through his living room in Senoia, Ga. He told a reporter that he had been on the phone with his wife and gotten angry, and “one thing led to another.” Fortunately, Jones is a contractor, and has been out of work for a while; he figures he can keep busy fixing his mess. The house “needed some work,” he said.
Teachers Just Wanna Have Fun
Some parents of students in Encinal High School in Alameda, Calif., demanded an investigation after they learned from a counselor at an after-school program that students had been “assigned” an extra-credit project of rummaging through their parents’ bedrooms looking for sex toys and bringing in a “selfie” of themselves holding one. Administrators told parents the “assignment” was not a requirement of the course but could not ascertain how many students actually presented show-and-tells to the class.
Least Competent Criminals
— Nashville, Tenn., police arrested Mashara Mefford and charged her with breaking into one of their marked cruisers. She was discovered by an officer after she had locked herself inside and couldn’t figure out how the locks worked.
— Dene Temple and Stephen Fidler pleaded guilty and were sentenced in June for burglarizing the Sichuan Garden Chinese restaurant in Brighton, England. Police caught the men trying to hide in the walk-in freezer. There was “no doubt,” said a supervising officer, that the men would have frozen to death if they had not been spotted by police.
Blow Against The Empire
In June 2011 Bank of America (BA) had the tables turned in after the company wrongfully harassed an alleged mortgage scofflaw in Naples, Fla. BA had attempted to foreclose on homeowners Warren and Maureen Nyerges even though the couple had bought their house with cash that was paid directly to BA. It took BA a year and a half to understand its mistake. Finally the Nyergeses sued and won a judgment for expenses of $2,534, which BA contemptuously ignored. The Nyerges obtained a seizure order, and two sheriff’s deputies, with a moving truck, arrived at the local BA branch on June 3 to load $2,534 worth of furniture and computers from the bank’s offices and lobby. After an hour on the phone with higher-ups, the local BA manager wrote a check for $2,534.
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