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Topic Starter Topic: News of the Weird: May 27, 2021

Just another Earthling
Just another Earthling
Joined: 20 Jul 2001
Posts: 12925
PostPosted: 05-31-2021 05:26 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Of note, I had to again contact the regular site regards the whereabouts of the column. Found it here I think.


News of the Weird: May 27, 2021


The Entrepreneurial Spirit

When Damien Desrocher, 28, decided to "return to nature" in December, it meant leaving his job as an air force computer technician and moving to the northern French town of Wahagnies, where he started raising snails. But they're not for eating, Reuters reported. Desrocher harvests "slime" from the snails and uses it to make bars of soap. A single snail will yield about 2 grams of slime. Desrocher needs about 80 grams of slime to make 15 100-gram soap bars. "It's all in the dexterity of how you tickle," he said as he demonstrated the harvesting technique. "I only touch it with my finger, you see it's not violent, it's simple." Desrocher said snail mucus contains molecules of collagen and elastin, which have anti-aging and skin-healing properties.


Silent But Deadly

In North Carolina, large stands of wetland forests along the coast have died, giving the areas an apocalyptic appearance, CNET reported. Salt water from rising seas and storm surges is causing the destruction of tens of thousands of acres. Researchers at North Carolina State University are studying the "ghost forests" to measure their environmental impact, which includes emitting greenhouse gases -- carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide -- that they call "tree farts." Graduate student Melinda Martinez acknowledged that the trees don't emit as much as the soils, but, she said, "Even the smallest fart counts."


Put a Ring on It

Avid snorkeler Susan Prior of Norfolk Island, Australia, often sees small mullet fish with rings around their middles -- usually plastic rings from juice and milk bottles, she said, according to the New York Post. "Mullet snuffle through the sand looking for food, making it so easy for a ring or a hair tie to flip over their noses and get stuck," she wrote in a blog post. But in early May, Prior, who also takes underwater photos, captured a snap of a mullet fish sporting a gold wedding band. Prior remembered that she had seen a social media post about a lost wedding ring in the bay, but she couldn't catch up to the fish to retrieve the item. She did, however, remind others to snip any plastic rings before putting them in the trash so that the fish aren't "slowly strangled."


No Good Deed

After Bryan Thayer, 34, finished up at his bar and grill in Metairie, Louisiana, on May 8, he stopped off at the City Bar, where he and a friend bought a drink for another patron, Andrew Nierman, 32. The first drink they bought spilled on Nierman, so they furnished him with a replacement. But Nierman evidently wasn't satisfied with that. "He grabbed my head and (bit) a chunk out of my nose," Thayer told The Times-Picayune, then ran out and jumped in a car. Thayer, who was holding his nose together, and other witnesses ran outside and flagged down a deputy, who stopped Nierman. He admitted to biting Thayer but said he'd been "accosted" by him. Doctors patched up Thayer's nose, but he said his injuries will preclude him from working at his own bar for a time.


Oops

Three neighbors of Cara Louise, 28, of Bedfordshire, England, became alarmed on May 12 when they noticed what appeared to be a corpse wrapped in trash bags and duct tape lying in Louise's yard. While Louise was picking up her 5-year-old from school, seven police officers descended on her home. When she returned, she provided an explanation: "The prop in the garden was part of our theme" for Halloween, she said, but she had neglected to dispose of the fake corpse after the autumn holiday. "He" was kept behind her trash bins, but she moved him as she worked in the yard and forgot to put him away. "I have a tip for all parents who go all-out at Halloween like myself -- dispose of props or put them away safely," Louise told the Daily Mail. Laughing with officers, she wondered who might have such short legs, and an officer responded, "You might have cut them." "I was so embarrassed I couldn't believe people thought I was capable of it," she said.


Bright Idea

Ever stepped off a curb unexpectedly or run into a pole while looking down at your phone? Minwook Paeng, an industrial design student at London's Royal College of Art and Imperial College, has invented a device that will alert you to obstacles in your path: the Third Eye. A small translucent case shaped something like an eye affixes to the forehead with a thin gel pad, DeZeen reported, and "the black component that looks like a pupil is an ultrasonic sensor for sensing distance," Paeng explained. When the gyroscope senses the head angled downward, the plastic "eyelid" opens and warns the wearer of obstacles in their path with a buzzer. Paeng believes humans are evolving into "phono sapiens," developing "turtle neck syndrome" and a curved pinky finger from holding our phones. "I hope that the act of ironically pointing out what we are doing with our smartphones can help people take time for self-reflection," Paeng mused.


What's in a Name?

Sorry, Josh, but you've missed your chance to become the ultimate Josh -- that distinction has gone to 4-year-old Josh Vinson Jr., who won a paper Burger King crown, a champion's belt and a tiny trophy at the #JoshFight in Lincoln, Nebraska, on April 24. Josh Swain, 22, a student from Tucson, Arizona, conceived the viral event, which started with an epic Rock Paper Scissors battle and included pool noodles. Swain was apparently unprepared for the turnout: "I did not expect people to be as adamant about this as they are right now," he told KLKN-TV. Participants and spectators brought food items to donate to the Lincoln Food Bank.


Ewwww!

Ana Cardenas of El Paso, Texas, woke up around 4 a.m. on May 11 and felt something dripping on her face, KTSM-TV reported. When she turned on the light, she was horrified to see that it was blood. Blood was coming in where her ceiling fan was attached to the ceiling, and the fan had spattered it all around the room. Cardenas called 911, and officers determined that the man living in the apartment above hers had died. "The firefighters knocked down his door and the body was laying exactly where my fan is underneath," Cardenas said. "He had carpet but the blood seeped through to my ceiling." Police said the man had died of natural causes and had been deceased for five to six days. Cardenas stayed at a hotel for a few nights but now has to replace her damaged belongings. She said she was traumatized by the incident: "It was awful, an awful impact."


Awesome!

On May 11, police in South Euclid, Ohio, responded to the Walmart store there after a confrontation between Maneka Garner, 25, and Precious Jackson, 36. The two women, who once lived in the same duplex, apparently have been feuding for some time, as Jackson had previously taken out a protection order against Garner. When they met in the potato chip aisle of the Walmart, The Smoking Gun reported, Garner pulled down Jackson's mask and tried to spit on her, then reached into Jackson's cart and picked up a 10-pound log of ground beef, which she used to strike Jackson "a couple of times in the face," police said. In their report, they identified the meat as a "blunt object." Police said Garner has a history of violent behavior; she pleaded not guilty to assault and violating a temporary protective order.

Source acknowledgement. News of the Weird by the Editors at Andrews McMeel Syndication



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Cool #9
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PostPosted: 05-31-2021 10:33 PM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


The ceiling fan one is straight out of a horror movie :eek:




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Just another Earthling
Just another Earthling
Joined: 20 Jul 2001
Posts: 12925
PostPosted: 06-02-2021 06:34 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Eraser wrote:
The ceiling fan one is straight out of a horror movie :eek:


Apologies. That article was from a week ago and found on another site :smirk:
I contacted the original host and here is the proper offering.


News of the Weird May 28th, 2021

LEAD STORY -- Wait, What?

The Tail Company, based in the United Kingdom, is starting production of its newest offering, miTail -- a Bluetooth-enabled animatronic tail that wearers can control with a phone app, Nerdist reported on May 13. For example, a wearer might want to express emotions such as "frustrated and tense" or "calm and relaxed." Other moves include the Short Wag, the Happy Wag and the Erect Tremble. The company plans to start delivering the Kickstarter-supported products in August. [Nerdist, 5/13/2021]

Oh, Canada

Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Porcupine Plain, Saskatchewan, had a mystery on their hands on May 7 when someone reported a load of fenceposts missing, RCMP reported on its website. Officers opened an investigation, but the "bucktooth bandits" were quickly identified: "The stolen goods were located in a beaver dam," said Constable Conrad Rickards. "A beaver -- or beavers -- helped themselves to the stash of posts and used them to help build a dam. I tried locating said beavers but they were GOA (gone on arrival)." [RCMP, 5/11/2021]


Don't Go There

-- A papier-mache statue of a stegosaurus, placed outside the Cubic Building in a suburb of Barcelona, Spain, had an odorous secret, The Washington Post reported. On May 22, a father and son who were admiring the statue noticed a foul stench coming from it and peered into a crack in the dinosaur's leg. There they saw the body of a man. The 39-year-old was reported missing just hours before he was discovered; the local police said they don't suspect foul play. Instead, they believe the man dropped his phone in the statue's leg and tried to retrieve it, becoming stuck headfirst. He may have been in the statue for a couple of days, authorities said. [Washington Post, 5/25/2021]

-- Staff at the El Paso Zoo in Texas are preparing to press charges against a woman who jumped into a spider monkey exhibit on May 22 and fed Flamin' Hot Cheetos to the animals, the El Paso Times reported. Zookeepers found out about the stunt through Instagram, where someone posted video of the woman underneath a waterfall, with the monkeys just feet away. "This young lady decided to hop a fence, climb through some bushes, drop down into a 4-feet-deep moat, walk across the moat and then try to feed the spider monkeys," zoo director Joe Montisano said. "It was stupid. She's very fortunate that it didn't have a worse outcome for her or the animals." While the woman hasn't been named, her employer, Lovett Law Firm, recognized her and she was fired from her job there. [El Paso Times, 5/25/2021]


Police Report

Two teenagers on their way home from a graduation party in the early hours of May 23 made the night even more memorable when their car crashed into the roof of a home in Eureka, Missouri, outside St. Louis. Authorities told KSDK-TV that the driver lost control, rolled down an embankment, flipped over a fence and crashed front-end first into the master bathroom of the home. Startlingly, there were no injuries from the crash; the two teens escaped through the master bedroom, and two occupants of the home, who were sleeping at the time, were unharmed. [KSDK, 5/24/2021]


Bright Ideas

-- On May 25, New York City councilwoman Helen Rosenthal virtually attended a finance committee meeting, commenting on school classroom sizes and education funding, as she shifted her focus back and forth between the camera and ... the road. She was driving her car during the meeting, the New York Post reported. During her time as a council member, she has advocated for improving bike lanes and expanding speed camera use, but since 2013, the license plate registered to her car has received 62 traffic violations, including three tickets for speeding in a school zone, all in 2020. [NY Post, 5/25/2021]

-- Adele Belizaire, 54, was held in the Pinellas County (Florida) jail after a stunt she pulled to "blow off steam" on May 11, The Smoking Gun reported. Belizaire, frustrated with her loss of nearly $400 playing slot machines at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Tampa, called the casino on her cellphone that evening from her hotel in Clearwater Beach and said, "I left a bomb in your casino." What she failed to remember was that as a member of the casino's Player's Club, her phone number was on file. In her confession, she admitted that she has "anger issues." [The Smoking Gun, 5/13/2021]


Compelling Explanation

When Lee Bowman's neighbors in Sioux City, Iowa, failed to mow his lawn by the afternoon of May 23, after he had asked them to, he visited their home to complain, then tried to peel a registration sticker off one of their vehicle license plates. Some time later, however, police and firefighters were called to the neighbors' home, which was on fire. Investigators found a pile of sticks and plywood piled against the side of the house and evidence that gas had been used to start the fire. Bowman, 53, told police that he had seen the fire burning but didn't call 911 because it wasn't any of his business. But the Sioux City Journal reported that the kindling came from Bowman's home. The fire caused an estimated $3,000 damage to the home, and the family requested a no-contact order from the court. Meanwhile, Bowman was held at the Woodbury County Jail on suspicion of arson. [Sioux City Journal, 5/24/2021]


Precocious

Kashe Quest, 2, of Los Angeles has been accepted into Mensa, the high-IQ society. FOX11-TV reported on May 26 that she is the youngest member in the group's history. "At about 17, 18 months, she had recognized all the alphabet, numbers, colors and shapes," said her mother, Sukhjit Athwal. Quest can identify all 50 states by shape and location on a map, is learning Spanish and sign language, and can identify elements on the periodic table. Quest's IQ is measured at 146; the average American's is 100. Athwal admits that Quest "is still a normal 2-year-old where we have negotiations, we have tantrums ... We're kind of going at her pace and we want to just make sure that she is youthful for as long as she can be." [Fox11, 5/26/2021]


Sign of the Times

During the pandemic, demand for port-a-potties in Maine increased. Customers were renting them for longer periods, and factories that make them ran into manufacturing issues, WGME-TV reported. As a result, South Portland is experiencing a critical deficit of the outdoor toilets. Supplier Royal Flush said they're waiting for another shipment that was supposed to arrive in April, and new customers will have to take a back seat to returning customers until the backlog is resolved, probably in late June. [WGME-TV, 5/24/2021]


Hand-Tossed

On May 23, when the 20-year-old daughter of Vero Beach, Florida, resident Tyler Worden, 41, declined her father's invitation to eat the pizza he had brought to her home, the elder Worden became angry and "turned around and threw a slice of pizza at her, striking her in the face," according to the arrest affidavit filed by the Indian River Sheriff's Office. After Worden refused to leave, his daughter called the police, who noted the pizza toppings strewn across the entryway, the tomato sauce on the left side of the woman's face and the strong scent of alcohol on Worden's breath. The pizza hurler was placed under arrest on charges of battery. [Latin Times, 5/27/2021]

Source acknowledgement. News of the Weird by the Editors at Andrews McMeel Syndication



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FuddyDuddy
FuddyDuddy
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PostPosted: 06-03-2021 03:02 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Thanks for the update and share Whiskey 7, entertaining and interesting read, as usual :)



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