News of the Weird: Only in Wasilla

Radio Wagon Flyer from a pickup. Yep.

From AP:

Fred Keller and Judy Foster [of Wasilla, Alaska] worked on the vehicle for 11 months, using the base of a 1976 Mazda B1600 pickup truck.
The couple got the idea for their to-scale replica of the beloved childhood wagon after visiting a car show in summer 2009 in Oregon, and seeing another Radio Flyer, albeit that one on a hot rod.
"We said, 'We could use the Mazda for that,'" Foster, 67, said of the pickup which had sat undriven for about five years at their home. "We came home from our Portland trip, and about a day after, he was tearing the Mazda apart. No changing my mind."

News of the Weird: When Jon Beat Me to It

News of the Weird Thursdays is MY BEAT! Yet, here I stand, once again being scooped by the Daily Show. If it weren't for the Daily Show, I'd be big time newspaper tycoon now. But watch, and be amazed:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
News of the Weird - Mark McGwire, Game Change & Sarah Palin
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Click here if the video doesn't show/work.

And don't say I didn't warn you. It's CRAAAAAZY!

News of the Weird - BATMAN'S DEAD!!!

Holy Crap, Batman is DEAD!!!!

Or, rather, Bruce Wayne is dead, but Batman lives on in the form of his first protege, Dick Grayson, aka, Nightwing, aka the original Robin. The young, brash, brilliant but hopelessly infantile incarnation of Robin is now played by Bruce Wayne's son and Ra's al Ghul's grandson...

Yes. Weird.

But hang on to your cowls, men and women (mostly men. actually, mostly guys). The lead-up to this is quite the ride, or at least different from what fans from the 70's & 80's (as I am) are used to.

So, there was a Crisis (the second, apparently middle one) wherein, from what I gather (yeah, I'm not feeling too world's greatest detective myself right now...) the greatest heroes (the trinity of Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman) all disappear - at least from fighting. Somewhere in the ensuing year (in the weekly series turned four-book series 52), Bruce Wayne kills Batman.

But that doesn't last long...

Batman was supposed to die (and many thought he did) psychologically and physically in the series "Batman RIP", written by Grant Morrison. Herein, he's tortured by a man posing to be his father who had apparently faked his own death (and, in the process, killed Ms. Wayne). Kidnapped by "Thomas Wayne's" gang of villains, Batman once again goes missing and is presumed dead. But, Batman being Batman, he didn't.

Is your interest piqued yet? To be honest, mine is...

However, Batman's triumph is short-lived. He is then batnapped (Batnap? Get it? Bat - like Cat... oh, forget it) by super evil, supervillain Darkseid who is in the process of destroying the entire multiverse (as a tie-in from the first Crisis, Crisis on Infinite Earths, which I read as a kid in the 80's and blew my friggin' mind on... dude.). Bats himself gets out of the trap that Darksie has planted for him only to end up in this confrontation:

The gun that the Big Bat points at the New God is armed with the bullet that can kill New Gods, as it is also the one that Darkseid used on Orion, who, if you don't know (and why don't you?) is (was) Darkseid's son and the bane of his existence. Which brings us back to Jack Kirby, father of the modern comic book era along with Stan Lee, his once partner. Kirby went to DC and created the New Gods, blending ancient myths into what was only considered the new-mythology of the comics universe. He also seems to be the homage of this Final Crisis., a classic myth in its own rite - akin to the weirdness in any of those Homeric or Herkales epics.

Anyway, back to the main event: While the bullet grazing Darkseid starts his end (and in the process, the universe's, of course), Darkseid uses his lazer beam eyes (ok, they're not lazer beams. They're like tracking beams of infinite deaths) to smoke Batman. Superman shows up at the scene from the future (where he fights an evil version of Superboy) too late to save his bestest friend.

The end.

Or is it?

Read but beware for spoilers:

Just Press Play: Jan 14th, the Day Batman Died

Grant Morrison interviews, pts 1 & 2

News of the Weird = The Conservative Bible Project

According to Conservapedia's Conservative Bible Project Page:

Liberal bias has become the single biggest distortion in modern Bible translations...
As of 2009, there is no fully conservative translation of the Bible which satisfies the following ten guidelines:

1. Framework against Liberal Bias: providing a strong framework that enables a thought-for-thought translation without corruption by liberal bias
2. Not Emasculated: avoiding unisex, "gender inclusive" language, and other feminist distortions; preserve many references to the unborn child (the NIV deletes these)
3. Not Dumbed Down: not dumbing down the reading level, or diluting the intellectual force and logic of Christianity; the NIV is written at only the 7th grade level
4. Utilize Powerful Conservative Terms: using powerful new conservative terms to capture better the original intent; Defective translations use the word "comrade" three times as often as "volunteer"; similarly, updating words that have a change in meaning, such as "word", "peace", and "miracle".
5. Combat Harmful Addiction: combating addiction by using modern terms for it, such as "gamble" rather than "cast lots"; using modern political terms, such as "register" rather than "enroll" for the census
6. Accept the Logic of Hell: applying logic with its full force and effect, as in not denying or downplaying the very real existence of Hell or the Devil.
7. Express Free Market Parables; explaining the numerous economic parables with their full free-market meaning
8. Exclude Later-Inserted Inauthentic Passages: excluding the interpolated passages that liberals commonly put their own spin on, such as the adulteress story
9. Credit Open-Mindedness of Disciples: crediting open-mindedness, often found in youngsters like the eyewitnesses Mark and John, the authors of two of the Gospels
10. Prefer Conciseness over Liberal Wordiness: preferring conciseness to the liberal style of high word-to-substance ratio; avoid compound negatives and unnecessary ambiguities; prefer concise, consistent use of the word "Lord" rather than "Jehovah" or "Yahweh" or "Lord God."

Thus, a project has begun among members of Conservapedia to translate the Bible in accordance with these principles. The translated Bible can be found here...

First Example - Liberal-Promoted FalsehoodThe earliest, most authentic manuscripts of the Gospel According to Luke lack this verse fragment set forth at the start of Luke 23:34:

Jesus said, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."

Is this a corruption of the original, perhaps promoted by liberals without regard to its authenticity? This does not appear in any other Gospel, and the simple fact is that some of the persecutors of Jesus did know what they were doing. This quotation is a favorite of liberals, although it does not appear in the earliest and best manuscripts of the Gospel of Luke. It should not appear in a conservative Bible, because in point of fact Jesus might never had said it at all...

The committee in charge of updating the bestselling version, the NIV, is dominated by professors and higher-educated participants who can be expected to be liberal and feministin outlook. As a result, the revision and replacement of the NIV will be influenced more by political correctness and other liberal distortions than by genuine examination of the oldest manuscripts. As a result of these political influences, it becomes desirable to develop a conservative translation that can serve, at a minimum, as a bulwark against the liberal manipulation of meaning in future versions.

You can't make this stuff up. As Slactivist argues, this is like a parody of parody. You can't even lampoon it, because what else is left to say?

The good news is that, really, they can't change the Bible from what it is fundamentally. The Beatitudes are largely still in place and stand in opposition to power-worship that many of these seem to consider 'conservative principles'. So maybe, just maybe someone's eyes will open to the unmistakable beauty that is God's word and will see it as their duty to heal rather than hurt, to actively love rather than worry about appearing weak. Maybe the heavens will open and they will experience a revelation, an apocalypse.

Hopefully, prayerfully.

News of the Weird: Charmin' WC Edition

From today's Chicago Reader (p. 78):

Proctor & Gamble announced in October that it will once again open public restrooms in New York City's Times Square for the holiday season as a promotion for Charmin toilet tissue. Earlier this month, as part of it's "Enjoy the Go" campaign, the firm conducted auditions for five "Charmin Ambassadors" who'll be paid $10,000 each to blog about their experience at restrooms from November 23 through December 3. "Charmin only asks that candidates should enjoy going to the bathroom so much - whether it be to catch up on reading or just enjoy some 'me time' - they never want to leave," said the press release.

Boy, I love me some 'me time.' Especially if I get rewarded handsomely for it.

But still, I think my bathroom is public enough...

News of the Weird - Firin' Synapses and Mad Doctor Love

After a longer than long hiatus, it is good to return to the old News of the Weird files again. Let's get started:

Over a decade of experiments on patients awaiting brain surgery for severe epilepsy, researchers at UCLA have found that the brain's 100 billion neurons include some so specialized that they respond only to a single stimulus, the Wall Street Journal reported... Researchers have identified single neurons that fire only in response to Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, Halle Berry, Mother Teresa, the Beatles, Michael Jordan, Oprah Winfrey, Luke Skywalker, and Jennifer Aniston (but not when pictured with Brad Pitt). Last year researchers found a neuron in one patient that would spring to life only when presented with a clip of the The Simpsons. Such neurons, they say, fire whether the concept is presented through pictures or words. And while monitoring a new patient, Dr. Quian Quiroga found a neuron that responded only to him.

And you can see why here. Mee-ow!

From the WSJ article:

The research team reported that a single human neuron could recognize a personality through pictures, text or the sound of a name -- no matter how that person was presented...
Each neuron appeared to join together pieces of sensory information into a single mental impression. The researchers believe these cells are evidence that it only takes a simple circuit of neurons to encode an idea, perception or memory.

Okay, so it's not weird, but I do find it utterly fascinating. I know The Simpsons have been a great stimulus personally. Jennifer Anniston... not so much. (No comment on Halle Berry, though.)

From "News of the Weird", uncredited editor/writer. October 29th, 2009 edition of the Chicago Reader, p. 81.

Boys don't cry

I know that there's other, more important stuff in the news today. Like Derek Webb releasing his sh*t-filled record online today only to have complications with the ordering process. And Facebook is acting mighty peculiar - maybe because they're so busy turning our status updates over to the robots and general stalking populace.

But I got caught up in just how naive this couple is. Parents of a 2 1/2 year old child are being purposefully ambiguous about the sex of their child. They dress "Pop" up in both boys' and girls' clothing (jeans and dresses, which, incidentally, my 2 year old girl wears) and have sported the child in traditional hairstyles of both genders.

Why? Well, they believe that gender is a social construct, according to The Local (Sweden's News in English, according to the virtual masthead). Further:

“We want Pop to grow up more freely and avoid being forced into a specific gender mould from the outset,” Pop’s mother said. “It's cruel to bring a child into the world with a blue or pink stamp on their forehead.”

The child's parents said so long as they keep Pop’s gender a secret, he or she will be able to avoid preconceived notions of how people should be treated if male or female.

I will not argue that gender is not a social construct, just that it isn't fully. Nobody forces a boy to like a Tonka truck or to be more aggressive in his pursuits -- sometimes ostracizing girls - like my infinitely curious child- in the process of protecting their GI Joes, as I noticed at a Reading for Tots on Monday morn. Or ostracizing nearly everybody else in declaring their Alpha-ness as I noticed in my childhood - being quite the Zed kid. Neither my wife nor I are crazy about phones, so it strikes me as a bit odd on first view to see how much Joss loves to take just about anything (including plates, cups, stuffed monkeys and the loose cell phone) to pretend talking on it. As curious as she is about objects, she's much more interested in people and in social circumstances. It wasn't our expectations -- or others' -- that forced that on her.


What is it? I'm not sure. It doesn't sound like anybody's exactly sure. Some very heterosexual girls prefer playing with cars and straight boys would prefer to wear dresses if they get the chance (as many married men have been caught doing while the wife's away).

Psychologists differ on the overall effect of this experiment, but I'm left wondering why the same people who believe that gender is primarily 'learned' do not believe also that sexual identity is learned, but rather primarily biological.

Just sayin'...

Oh, yeah, and then there's the whole Xianjiang-China civil strife thing.

And some influential pop star died.

News of the Weird - In Hizzoner

In honor of the dishonored, here comes a two-fer:

Voters in tiny Sodaville, Oregon, population 290, elected Thomas Brady Harrington, 33, mayor in November, despite a criminal rap sheet that included robbery, eluding a police officer, illegal firearms possession, reckless endangerment, and assorted other charges. One resident trying t explain the outcome suggested that voters might have confused Harrington with his father , local businessman Thomas L. Harrington.

By the way, according to the Lebanon-Express, he took on the incumbent mayor and whooped her behind! A whopping 79-66 votes. Yes, it does make Wasilla look still silly, but still... read on.
Further news from the Express details that Harrington became interested in local politics when he found out that a previous city recorder embezzled $30,000.*

In Massachusetts in November, a Suffolk County judge turned down a compensation claim by Robert Aldrich, described by prosecutors as a career criminal, for income lost during "wrongful" incarceration after he'd been illegally arrested for burglary. The judge said she'd been able to find any "income" Aldrich migh have earned during his six months in jail aside from home-improvement work he admittedly kept "off the books" to avoid paying taxes, but a prosecution spokesman summed it up more bluntly: "The defendant is a career B & E (breaking and entering) man seeking compensation for burglaries he couldn't commit while locked up."

According to The Boston Globe, Aldrich the judge may have allowed Mr. Aldrich to make some collection on his "lost" under-the-table dealings, if she had believed that he was making as much as he was claiming. The problem may have been, however, that Aldrich was claiming $4000 per month for a total of sixty-seven thousand dollars. Furthermore, although previous judges had ruled his arrest as 'wrong', she looked over the evidence in the cases provided and had no doubt that he had committed the burglaries.
Natch.

via Chuck Shepherd in "News of the Weird" from Chicago Reader, December 11, 2008 edition, p. 79. (btw, notice how in previous editions of my NotW I would list the page around 100? 88 pages total, this time. Papers are shrinking...)

*The faux-journalist in me says that I should report that he didn't mean it that way, that he seems troubled by the ineptitude of the council and how it has not been looking for solutions for its monies- or water-shortages. But if you want that, that's why we give you the source...

News of the Weird: Instant Karma edition

Gabriel Nathan Shwartz, a 29 year old Young Republican is interviewed at the RNC, where he is a delegate for Colorado.

This from the interview:

LinkTV: What is your vision for change under a John McCain administration?

Shwartz: Less taxes and more war.

L: So, where should the United States bomb next

S: Iran, baby.

L: Why should the US bomb Iran.

S: To protect Israel...

L: So, what would a war with Iran look like.

S: Hopefully, just bomb the hell out of them from the sky. No troops.

L: Are you worried about the escalating costs of the Iraqi and Afghanistan wars? How would we pay for the costs of a war in Iran?

S: We should plant a flag. Take the oil. Take the money. We deserve reimbursement.



While still in the Land o' Lakes, Mr. Shwartz meets a girl in a bar. They go up to his room, she mixes some drinks, yadda, yadda, yadda, she makes off with $120,000 (or his estimate, $50,000) worth in cash and belongings.

And no, I didn't yadda, yadda, yadda out the best parts.

More of story in Pioneer Press.
h/t to Huffington Post

News of the Weird: Welcome Back Cutter edition

I wanted to roll out the ol' NotW last week, but the pickin's were slimmer than the chances of an Alaskan denying global warming (even Palin didn't deny it. She merely refuted the cause of it. She can't possibly be in any lobbyists' pockets). This week, however, we got the run of the litter, as absolutely nobody on earth says. So, hopefully we can do a few this week to make up for past sins (and we got a LOT of making up to do).

According to one knife-wielding participant, it was "anything goes" at a Gathering of the Pack competition... sponsored by the Dog Brothers fight club of Los Angeles. A Reuters reporter described two men without padding beating each other with heavy sticks and another two who fought with electrically charged knives. The knife duel ended when one of the fighters slipped a hand free from a wrestling hold and allegedly planted a 1,000-volt charge on his opponent. Said one fruit-and-veggie-store manager from Canada, "I've never felt better than when I'm doing this."

From the Reuters article itself:

"This is like the ultimate. You've got striking, you've got grappling, you've got weapons, anything goes," said Matt Booe, a karate instructor hoping to fight with hefty, blunted knives at a recent gathering in Burbank, just north of Los Angeles.

"It gives you the idea of really finding out what martial arts are like, not just doing pretty forms."

Seems like Dog Brothers fight club broke the first rule of Dog Brothers fight club.

Article from Chuck Shepherd. "News of the Weird", Chicago Reader. Sept 11, 2008, p. 135.

News of the Weird - Returns

File this under the category, "These One's Are for You, Mr. American President"

1)

Chad Hudgens filed a lawsuit in January against his former employer, a sales firm in Provo, Utah, charging that as part of a motivational "team-building exercise" his coworkers waterboarded him. According to a Washington Post article, Hudgen's supervisor told sales staff, "You saw how hard Chad fought for air right there. I want you to go back inside and fight that hard to make sales."

From the Post:

Hudgens's lawsuit... suggests the testosterone-poisoned setting of the David Mamet play "Glengarry Glen Ross." Hudgens alleged that if the 10-person sales team went a day without a sale, members had to work the next day standing up; [the supervisor] took away their chairs. The team leader also threatened to draw a mustache in permanent marker on the face of sales people for "negativity," Hudgens said. [Their boss] kept on his desk a piece of wood, "the 2-by-4 of motivation," he said.

Who was his boss? This guy?


2)

Brigadier General Zuhair Abada Mraweh, traffic commander for Baghdad's Rusafah district - where car bombs and kidnappings remain pressing concerns, according to the New York Times - announced in April that his officers would soon begin issuing tickets to drivers who failed to use their seat belts. The fine for noncompliance is 15,000 dinars, or roughly $12.50.

From the International Herald Tribune:

"It is part of the healing process of this country and of Baghdad to enforce the law, law by law," said [B.G. Mraweh].

"The citizens are learning the laws step by step," said Mraweh, sitting in his office in the Karada neighborhood. "We have applied all the laws concerning traffic, so it's time for the seat belt law to be practiced."...

Mraweh said that the seat belt legislation — which applies only to drivers, not passengers — was in effect during the government of Saddam Hussein. After the Americans invaded in 2003, a high import tax on automobiles was lifted, flooding Iraq with enthusiastic new drivers. He said that there were no dependable statistics on traffic accidents, but that enforcing the law would reduce them by 70 percent. [My guess is that the key phrase here is traffic accidents.]

Mraweh is passionate about traffic control. He is particularly irked by the driving behavior by the employees of security companies like Blackwater, who sometimes throw water bottles at people walking down the street or shoot their guns in the air to clear the road, he said.

But primarily, Mraweh sees his job as a way to piece together his shattered country.

"If everyone says there are killings, there are massacres, then I will stay powerless at home and this will disable the country," he said. "But if the grocer goes to work, the merchant goes to work, I go to work, even you go to work, there will be no more killing, and the criminal will be afraid and he will go back to his den like a mouse"

Original stories cribbed and wrote verbatim from News of the Weird, posted in the Chicago Reader in the June 5th, 2008 edition, p. 109 (I believe. It's late. It's hot. It's bedtime.)

News of the Weird 13 (Unlucky? You decide.)

While driving home from a night out at a bar in January, 51-year-old Pat Dykstra of Fox Lake, Wisconsin, was persuaded by her boyfriend that she might be too drunk to drive (by his own admission he was in no condition to take over), so she did what she apparently thought was the sensible thing; without leaving the road, she called 911 and explained the situation, providing her name, a description of the vehicle, their location, and the time they'd likely make it home. Sheriff's deputies arrived at the house not long after the couple did and gave Dykstra a breath test; sure enough, she was well over the legal limit and soon faced a $740 fine and the possible loss of her license.*

This story leaves me just a bit conflicted. On the one hand, I hate drunken driving with a passion. On the other, I like honesty. So, let me weigh the balance here:

Yeah... she's dumb.

But wait... there's more! ("More?" you ask. "How can there possibly be better news than this? Is everything all right in Fox Lake?")

Apparently, Ms. Dykstra drunk-dialed 911.

The call came in at 12:29 a.m. Sunday on the county 911 line as a hang-up call from a cell phone, [Sheriff Todd] Nehls said.

Dispatchers used a reverse 911 directory and called the phone, which was answered by a woman who identified herself as Patricia Dykstra, 51. She said her boyfriend made her call, because "somebody seems to think I can't drive home straight. "

Well, she can't think straight. But who says you need judgment to drive? Ha-ha, that's just ludicrous.

When the dispatcher asked her why, she said, "He seems to think I'm too intoxicated to drive. "

During a relatively pleasant conversation with the dispatcher -- a recording of which Nehls released Monday -- Dykstra gave her name, location and vehicle description before saying she should probably hang up because "I don 't like being on the phone while driving. "

Asked by the dispatcher if she had too much to drink, she said "I don 't think so, ma'am. "

And if you thought that that was a deal, well, hold on to your seats, folks!

She said she was almost home and gave the intersection. Throughout the 3 -minute call, however, the dispatcher did not suggest the woman pull over. Nehls said the dispatcher assumed the woman had already stopped, although her last advice to Dykstra was, "So Pat, drive carefully, OK?"

Yeah. That and the woman said that she's "driving"!

One last piece to close the deal here, folks:

Sheriff Todd Nehls says Dykstra did the right thing by calling them. “I think a judge will look at her and say 'you know what, you stepped up to the plate. You did the right thing.' I think it’s commendable,” he said.

She did??

*"News of the Weird", Chuck Shepherd; The Chicago Reader; March 13, 2008; p. 133.

News of the Weird (dozen) - Too much freedom?

Scott Gomez filed a lawsuit in January against authorities in Pueblo County, Colorado, alleging (among other things) that they failed to take precautions to prevent him from breaking out of the county jail. Gomez claims he injured himself in January 2007 when he fell 40 feet while trying to climb down one of the building's exterior walls. The suit contends that the facility was easy to get out of, but they "did next to nothing to ensure that the jail was secure and that the Plaintiff could not escape." *

It couldn't have been that easy, no? I mean, dude had to scale down at least one four story building. That would be my argument.

From the police blotter:

On January 10, 2007 at approximately 11:30 P.M., two inmates escaped the custody of Pueblo County Jail. Medical personnel working in the jail reported to security that they had heard a loud “thud” on the outside of the building.

Sergeant Mark Lightcap immediately responded to the outside of the facility and apprehended an injured Scott Anthony Gomez DOB 03/22/1985. Sergeant Lightcap then preceded obtaining medical assistance for the injured Gomez and activating security procedures in the jail.

Gomez, as you may recall, was one of the two men that previously escaped through the ventilation system of the Pueblo County Jail and was being held on escape, parole violations and aggravated robbery...

The alleged escape route includes an area of the jail that is currently under reconstruction efforts. The entire ceiling area in all secured areas of the jail is being fortified to prevent escapes. This particular area of the jail was identified by security and maintenance as needing repairs...

Preliminary investigative effort indicates the inmates removed a vent screen from the shower area and climbed through utility and venting areas to the roof.

*"News of the Weird" reported by Chuck Shepherd; Chicago Reader, p. 101; Feb 14, 2008.

News of the Weird 11 - Jiminy!

According to a January Los Angeles Times dispatch, residents of Beijing remain fascinated by competitions involving crickets. Cricket fights, in which a pair of the insects square off in a terrariumlike ring and use their mandibles and forelimbs to throw each other aroung, attract enough gambling interest that top fighters may sell for as much as $10,000.

Something tells me that Mike Vick got into the wrong sport.

First rule of Cricket Fight Club: There is no Cricket Fight Club.

"When you wish upon a bout..."

"Got the Eye of the Gryllidae / It's a rhythm of life..."

I could go all night, people!

But wait, there's more:

Contests for singing crickets - the lougest entrants, measured close up, can hit 106 decibels, or nearly the volume of a lawn mower heard from a few feet away - aren't as lucrative but are taken seriously enough that doping has become an issue [editor's note: This despite this typical warning, "Don't let your cricket take drugs. Anybody caught cheating will be disqualified."]: some handlers have been known to administer drugs causing their crickets' wings to vibrate more slowly, resulting in a deeper-pitched song.

So that's why Barry Manilow has been hitting those notes.

Under oath, in front of members of the House Committee on Steroids Abuse among Lawn Bugs, Jiminy - with assistance from his lawyers - testifies that he did not receive injections for any sort of illegal steroid or hormone.

And lastly...

Barry Bug.

Kevin Eubanks, everybody!

"News of the Weird" compiled by Chuck Shepherd, The Chicago Reader, February 14, 2008; p. 101.

News of the Weird 10 - Holy Food and Ornaments!

From News of the Weird:

[P]laces an image of Jesus is said to have turned up: knothole in wooden fence (Lodi, CA, August); kitchen cabinet door (Manchester, CT, August); smudge of driveway sealant on garage door (Forest, VA, August); bath room towel (Houston, October); pancake (Port Saint Lucie, FL, November); chest X-ray (Homestead, FL, December); potato (Marion County, FL, January); another potato (Houston, January); slab of granite (Tampa, January).

O-Kay.

So, 1) what's up with Houston? 2) What's up with Florida? Has Jesus and/or his divine image moved on up to the Sunshine State? Is there some political statement going on here? Or is it just that Jesus, like all other 2000 year-olds, has decided to settle into Sunnydale Retirement Village?

News of the Weird 9 - That's Gotta Hurt Dept.

All this family and political talk has made me itchy. Let's get it on:

Earlier this month in Grand Rapids, Michigan, an alleged shoplifter was hospitalized with non-life-threatening puncture wounds to his abdomen. Department store security guards confronted the 26-year-old man, who tried to run away; in the ensuing struggle he fell on the $300 worth of hunting knives that were tucked into his waistband.*

Poor guy must not have had a mother to tell him that he shouldn't run with sharp objects.

Report here.

*Chuck Shepherd, "News of the Weird", Chicago Reader, January 31, 2008.

News of the Weird 8 - Say What?*

An example of how political correctness runs amok:

[In 2002,] a deaf female couple... used sperm from a donor with a family history of deafness to conceive and give birth to a hearing-disabled son; they explained that they wanted the baby to be deaf like themselves and their older child. This past December the London Times wrote on controversial genetic-screening legislation then making its way through the UK's House of Lords. As drafted, the law would bar parents from using screening to deliberately select an embryo with a disability. The chairperson of the British Deaf Association said, "If hearing and other people are allowed to choose embryos that will be 'like them,' sharing the same characteristics, language and culture, then we believe that deaf people should have the same right."

Chuck Shepherd, Chicago Reader, 1/24/08 p. 99.

One, whatever happened to the practice of adopting? I know it's expensive and a red-tape nightmare, but we should work on that system, instead of artificially creating babies when too many that are alive already are neglected (and yes, my wife and I have talked about the possibility of adopting. It's not a yet, but it is an open door that we've been considering).

Two, I know, understand and sympathize that many hearing-impaired have built a large and tight-knit community amongst themselves. I'm not against that preference - although I believe that we could all benefit from more positive interaction and integration with all types of people. What I find troubling is this belief that we should choose a deficit (and I'm sorry, it is a deficit. Just like my severe near-sightedness) for a baby in order to make it a part of your family.

As a limited metaphor, my baby is MUCH more attractive than I am or ever was. I would never think of uglifying her to make her more relatable to me.

Now, for a good politically-correct idea, how about No Name-Calling Week? (h/t to YPulse)

*Cheap joke, I know. Sorry.

News of the Weird 7 - Clive Owens They Ain't

Arthur Cheney, 64, was pulled over and arrested on Highway 70 near Marysville, California, in December. His Mercedes matched the description of a car linked to a string of 16 bank robberies, and in the vehicle's center console officers found a Post-It note reading "Robbery - 100s and 50s only." Also in December, police said they'd arrested 26-year-old Orlando Taylor as he approached a bank in downtown Brooklyn; a special task force had been assembled to stop him after he'd allegedly robbed the two banks on that block a total of four times in the previous four days.*

One: The man stole from 16 banks before he got caught. In the same car! I'm not quite sure if he's dim or brilliant or just a lucky S. O. B. (But, with a last name like Cheney, you can't go wrong.)

Two: Two banks. One block. Four times. Four days. Is five in five days really all that necessary, Orlando?
And who was this special elite team made up of? I can only imagine a tough, cigar-chomping leader who loves it when a plan comes together. A handsome man who has multiple fake identities and can read phone numbers from the sound of the dialing. A no-nonsense beef of a mechanic with aerophobia and a zany and crazy pilot who comes to the rescue at just the right time. I also imagine that this team shoots randomly toward people, possibly blowing up cars but never hitting any one.

Hmmm....


* Chuck Shepherd, "News of the Weird", The Chicago Reader, January 17, 2008

News of the Weird - 6? More squirrels attack

As if to further prove the points of NotW vol. 4:

A parked car belonging to Lindsey Millar of Bayonne, New Jersey, burst into flames one October afternoon; authorities reportedly concluded that a squirrel had gnawed through the insulation on overhead power lines, caught on fire, and fallen close enough to the car to ignite it as well.

I'm telling you people. The squirrels are going kamikaze on us. Although, to be quite honest, it sounds like something from the A-Team.

Bonus News of the Weird - Teachers in the Rubber Room

Because of the sensitivity of this post, I'm just gonna let this one speak for itself:

Several New York papers reported this year on the more than 700 public-school teachers being paid full salary to sit idly in [one of thirteen] facilities known informally as "rubber rooms" and do nothing until an arbitration board can review accusations of misconduct against them. The board of education won't permit the teachers to interact with students while charges are pending (even for offenses as trivial as buying a potted plant for the classroom without the principal's approval), but union contracts prevent them from doing administrative work, and the overloaded arbitrators convene at most once a week, so accused teachers wind up spending months or even years reading, writing, watching TV, knitting, practicing their putting, etc., at an estimated cost of up to $40 million.

Chuck Shepherd, Chicago Reader, November 15, 2007.

I will say that this NYTimes article, by education writer and journalism professor Samuel G. Freedman, is worth reading. Some excerpts:

The room in question was about 1,100 square feet and on blueprints submitted to the Fire Department was designed to hold 26 people. On this day, it contained upward of 75. It had no windows, no land phone, no Internet access, no wall decorations, not even a clock. Any personal belongings left overnight were removed by custodians.

Some of the occupants faced criminal charges like assault, while others had been brought up by city education officials for termination due to incompetence or other causes. Still more, including Mr. Valtchev, had not yet received a formal letter specifying any allegation. Until their cases are resolved, which can take years, all are required to spend the 181 days of the school year in the rubber room.

And although the teachers there receive their full salaries, the stale, spartan conditions and the absence of any physical or intellectual stimulation provide a ceaseless reminder that in some respects they are guilty until proved innocent.

“There is a spirit of the K.G.B. about it,” Mr. Valtchev said in an interview on Monday. “Their main strategy is to destabilize the person, reduce his self-respect...

“Even in the penal system,” said Ms. Cohen, a veteran of more than 240 days in the rubber room, “they permit rehabilitation.”