In Oakland, Calif., Gerald the turkey has been an institution for some time, regularly queueing up with carpool riders near Morcom Rose Garden. But lately, Gerald has grown grumpy and started attacking park visitors, prompting complaints to Oakland Animal Services. “I swear I was getting flashbacks to the velociraptor scenes in ‘Jurassic Park’ as he was ‘cooing’ at me, sizing me up,” one said. Others said Gerald charged them, clawing and pecking as they tried to run. In response, the city closed the rose garden at the end of May and asked people not to feed Gerald or any other wildlife, as it “may have contributed to the male turkey becoming more aggressive. Animal control officers are also trying to “train him to revert to natural behaviors,” but have had limited success keeping him socially distanced from people.
Just A Precaution
Saying that “extra precautions are justifiable and understandable where the president is concerned,” Russian spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that anyone meeting Vladimir Putin at his house outside Moscow or in the Kremlin must pass through a disinfection tunnel that showers visitors with a “disinfecting aerosol” and a bath of ultraviolet light. The tunnels can also use facial recognition software and take the visitor’s temperature. Peskov said, “They were installed when the epidemic was in full swing.” He would not say whether Putin has used the tunnels himself.
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
A 66-year-old woman in Ewing, N.J., gave $1 to a man begging in a drugstore parking lot and became the victim of a carjacking. Ewing police said Tomasz Dymek, 31, of Queens, “was not satisfied with the dollar, so he forced his way into the victim’s vehicle and drove from the lot, sitting on top of her in the driver’s seat.” Witnesses alerted police, who followed Dymek into Fairless Hills, Penn., where the car broke down and officers arrested him.
Complaint Department
Car buyer Da Tong Yang of Richmond, B.C., became so frustrated with his local Mercedes-Benz dealership that he flew to the company’s headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany, to seek help. Yang bought his wife, Guifang Huo, a brand-new S550 in 2017, partially because he believed the $155,000 car to be one of the safest vehicles available. But a year later, the couple claimed, the steering wheel locked, causing the car to nearly crash into a concrete wall. Mercedes-Benz said an “internal electrical issue” was at fault and assured the couple it was fixed. Yang wasn’t convinced, demanded his money back or a replacement car, then sued the company when it declined. The case has languished in court, prompting Yang’s trip to Stuttgart in early June “to find justice, not only for him but also for other drivers.” Despite his personal appearance, litigation is still underway.
Bright Idea
Bradley Bell, head writer for The Bold and the Beautiful, told the New York Post the show is experimenting with using blowup dolls in love scenes as the daytime soap, in hiatus since March, resumed taping on June 17. Challenged to adhere to COVID-19 protocols, Bell said, “We put our heads together trying to figure out a way to make these scenes work without breaking the 8-foot distancing rule. And we brought out a doll we used years ago as a corpse.” The result, he said, “was very convincing … We’ll be using her with hair and makeup as a stand-in to match some of our leading ladies.” The show has also recruited some of the actors’ spouses as body doubles. “We’ve had stunt doubles before,” Bell said, “but this is the first time we’ve had kissing doubles.”
The Litigious Society
The Tampa Bay Times reports that Kris Hedstrom of Odessa, Fla., filed suit against her neighbor, Heather Dayner, demanding a paternity test for the five goats she purchased from Dayner or a full refund. Hedstrom bought the five Nigerian Dwarf goats — Bella, Gigi, Rosie, Zelda and Margoat — for $900. Hedstrom expected to register them with the American Dairy Goat Assoc. Registered goats have a higher value than nonregistered goats. But the ADGA denied Hedstrom’s application because Dayner is not a member of the organization. Dayner now accuses Hedstrom of trespassing on her farm and harassing her with calls to the police. “She’s been a nightmare of a neighbor,” Dayner said.
GOING FOR A SWIM … AT BASS PRO SHOP
TikTok user Kevin Wise said he was looking for his 15 minutes of fame when he jumped into a fish tank at the Bass Pro Shop in Bossier City, La. “I said that if I got 2,000 likes, I would jump in the tank,” Wise said. “I got way more than that and didn’t want to be a liar.” Shopper Treasure McGraw recorded video of Wise swimming around in the tank before he climbed out and ran through the store, soaking wet. “We heard a big splash, and I thought it was one of the fish,” McGraw said. Initially, Bass Pro Shops said it would not press charges, but later, the company filed a complaint with the Bossier City Police Department, noting that it had to empty the 13,000-gallon tank and clean it after Wise’s swim. Wise wouldn’t recommend the stunt to others. “Don’t do spur-of-the-moment crap like I do,” he warned.
Aw, Snap!
A police officer in West Yorkshire, England, shared the thoughts of many after being called to the scene of a wreck involving a $300,000 Lamborghini that lasted only 20 minutes on the road before it was totaled. “It’s only a car,” the officer tweeted, but he “could have cried.” The car suffered a mechanical failure during its virgin drive and came to a stop in the outside land of the M1 motorway, where it was rear-ended by a van. The driver of the van suffered minor head injuries in the crash. It was not clear whether the Lamborghini driver was hurt in the crash.
Questionable Judgments
— Two Ryanair pilots recorded themselves getting silly with a rubber chicken in the cockpit of a Boeing 737-800. In the video, thought to be recorded as passengers boarded the plane in Birmingham, England, the first officer and pilot trade off using the chicken to operate the airplane’s throttle and making it squeak while mugging for the camera. Other crew members laugh in the background. A spokesperson for Ryanair commented: “These pictures and videos show crew on the ground in a parked aircraft with the engines shut down. While the images are unprofessional, the actions in them posed no risk and safety was never compromised… Nevertheless we are investigating the matter further.”
— Merseyside Police responding to the scene of a crash in Huyton, England, arrived in time to witness a woman finishing off a glass of wine. A white Mercedes had plowed into a parked Ford Focus, with both cars sustaining significant damage. Photographs from the scene showed that the Mercedes contained an empty wine bottle on the floor of the passenger seat, along with a wine glass, and another full bottle in a storage compartment. Police announced the arrest of two women on suspicion of unauthorized taking of a motor vehicle and drunk driving.
Creme De La Weird
Koji Ishii of Tokyo feels compelled to document every lost glove he sees on the streets of his city. He photographs and records details about each one, whether they’re stuck in drains or washed up on a beach. But he never touches or removes them. In a period of more than 15 years, he’s curated more than 5,000 stray gloves, including children’s mittens, heavy workingman’s gloves and lacy ladies’ accessories. “I live with the constant fear that there might be a glove right around the corner,” Ishii said. He even gets off buses before his stop if he sees a glove on the ground. For him, the attraction is thinking about how the glove got there and who once wore it. “Lone gloves are a constantly changing, dynamic phenomena,” he said.
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