[654] in Humor
HUMOR: More News of the Weird
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Andrew A. Bennett)
Mon Jan 9 20:54:33 1995
To: humor@MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 09 Jan 1995 20:51:30 EST
From: "Andrew A. Bennett" <abennett@MIT.EDU>
Date: Tue, 10 Jan 1995 01:34:18 +0000 (GMT)
From: Espacionaute Spiff domine! <MATOSSIAN@aries.colorado.edu>
Date: Fri, 06 Jan 1995 15:07:23 -0500
From: bostic@CS.Berkeley.EDU (Keith Bostic)
Forwarded-by: notw-request@nine.org (NotW List Admin)
WEIRDNUZ.359 (News of the Weird, December 23, 1994)
by Chuck Shepherd
LEAD STORY
* Police in Kewanee, Ill., charged "model citizen" Roger Harlow in October
with 81 counts of burglary. The insurance agent, and part-time Sunday
school teacher, was accused of entering the homes of friends and
townspeople over a 10-year period when he knew they would be away and
stealing about 1,000 valuables. According to police, Harlow once was late
to a golfing foursome because he stopped off to burglarize the homes of
the other golfers, and once he excused himself midway during a lunch date,
allegedly dashed away to burglarize his companion's home, and returned as
the main course was being served. He also allegedly stole from
hospitalized friends' homes during hospital visiting hours. [Quad City
Times-Kewanee Star Courier, 11-20-94]
COULDN'T POSSIBLY BE TRUE
* In October, before a meeting of "alternative" physicians in Greensboro,
N.C., Dr. Robert Willner, who believes that AIDS is not caused by HIV
but rather by the drug AZT (a widely-prescribed AIDS retardant), twice
defiantly drew blood from an HIV-infected man and injected it into his
own hand. [Washington Post, 11-1-94]
* In Holland, Mich., in August, a 16-year-old girl was hit by a
ricocheting .38-calibre bullet from a nearby gang fight but suffered only
a bruise on her sternum because the bullet bounced off of a metal clasp
on the front of her brassiere. [Edmonton Journal-AP, 8-27-94]
* In September, as a response to the Irish Republican Army's cease-fire
in Northern Ireland, British Prime Minister John Major suspended a
long-standing anti-IRA media policy. Since 1969, voices of IRA leaders
have not been permitted on British radio and television--even on
newscasts. Thus, for nearly 25 years, the British Broadcasting
Corporation has shown news films of IRA leaders but has had to hire actors
to supply the voices. [St. Petersburg Times, 9-25-94]
* In September, research supported by a British juice company found that
50,000 people in Great Britain seek hospital treatment every year from
injuries incurred while struggling to open milk and juice cartons. [The
Medical Post, 9-13-94]
* In September, Brian Bucz, 29, told police in Chicago that he had stolen
$272,000 from his employer so far in 1994 and that $261,000 of it had
already been spent--entirely on private "table dances" and other services
at the strip club The Dollhouse. He said he visited the club an average
of three times a week, which meant that he would have had to drop about
$3,000 per visit on liquor and entertainment. [Chicago Sun Times, 9-28-94]
* Latest Men Bite Dogs stories: In August, an assault suspect in Simi
Valley, Calif., was charged with biting a police dog. A month earlier,
in Auckland, New Zealand, another suspect was charged with biting off part
of the ear of a police dog. In August, in Kelowna, British Columbia, a
man was convicted of biting his pet pit bull and sentenced to 40 hours of
community service. But in Bytow, Poland, in July, a dog stepped on his
master's shotgun, engaging the trigger, and sent about 60 pellets into
the man's body. [Syracuse Herald-Journal-LADN, 8-17-94; The Dominion,
7-7-94; Toronto Star-CP, 8-18-94; Japan Times-AP, 7-6-94]
UH-OH
* In August, Margaret Jean Burke was cited by police in North Haven, N.
Y., for driving while intoxicated after a crash involving a car driven by
Bruce T. Davis. Davis, a lawyer, operates the New York City-area personal
injury service advertised widely on television, 1-800-LAWYERS. Said
Davis, "[Burke] certainly hit the wrong person." [Hampton Chronicle,
8-11-94]
* In June the crematorium at the Meadow Lawn Memorial Park in San Antonio,
Tex., was destroyed by a fire that broke out when workers began cremating
a body that weighed more than 300 pounds. The facility's owner said that
the fat in the body caused an unusually high temperature, which caused
the ordinary crematorium fire to rage out of control. [San Antonio
Express-News, 6-24-94]
* In October in Rio de Janeiro, student Jose Costa brawled with the owner
of a pit bull, Alexandre de Andrade, before police broke up the fight.
The incident began when Costa, in the midst of a night drinking with
friends, started to urinate against a tree and accidentally sprayed the
dog, which was also urinating against the tree. [[Bangkok Post, Oct94]]
* The latest case of a rodent emerging from a toilet occurred in Ada,
Okla., in September, when a squirrel climbed out just after Charlene
Netherton was finishing up. And in July, a tourist spent eight days at
a hospital in Thailand recovering from an outhouse incident in Cambodia:
A pig, which was rummaging around in the pit, bit the man as he was
seated. [Ada Evening News, 9-27-94] [[Bangkok Post, Jul94]]
* In March the Tennessee Health Department recommended a fine and
additional sanctions against physician Mary Spaniard, who, said the
Department, permitted her husband, who is also her office manager, to
perform an unsupervised ultrasound test on a female patient in 1992. The
test requires that the machine's probe be inserted into the patient's
vagina. [Nashville Banner, 3-8-94]
CREME DE LA WEIRD
* Acting on parents' complaints, the Israeli army announced in July that
a paratroop commander, Capt. Shai Engler, would be court-martialed for
repeatedly biting newly-assigned men on the buttocks. Subordinates of
Engler would prepare the transferees by bringing them into Engler's tent
and pulling their pants down. Said Engler, in defense, "The goal was,
among other things, to test the sergeants' cheek muscles, and to make sure
they would get [moving]." [Edmonton Journal, 7-15-94]
I DON'T THINK SO
* According to the club pro at the Pyongyang, North Korea, golf course
frequented by Kim Jong Il, the country's "Dear Leader" shot a 34 on a
recent round of 18 holes, including five holes-in-one. [Mainichi Daily
News-AFP Jiji, 10-16-94]
Copyright, 1994, Universal Press Syndicate. All rights reserved.
Released for the personal entertainment of readers. No commercial
use may be made of the material, or of the name "News of the Weird."
