News of the Weird, August 17, 2008
Chuck Shepherd
by Chuck Shepherd
Lead Story
* Martha Padgett gave birth to quadruplets in Riverside, Calif., in
July, but she only did half the work. The other two babies were
born to her partner, Karen Wesolowski, using Padgett's eggs and
the same sperm donor, and whose two came along 22 hours after
Padgett's two. The women carried two fertilized eggs each only
because they had failed five times before with in-vitro fertilization
and just wanted to improve the odds of having at least one child
between them. [Daily Telegraph (London), 7-30-08]
Latest Religious Messages
* "Someone's getting a new spinal cord tonight!" yelled Canadian
tent-revival preacher Todd Bentley in July during his crusade in
Lakeland, Fla. (also telecast on GodTV and the Internet), according
to an Associated Press observer. Miracles are "popping like
popcorn," he promised, punctuating each hands-on salvation with
an Emeril-type "Bam!" His unorthodoxy extends to sometimes
roughing up the afflicted, he admits, because that's what God tells
him to do, e.g., kneeing a "cancer patient" in the stomach, banging
a crippled woman's leg on a platform. Anyone in need of healing
should, Bentley shouts often, "come and get some!" [Naples Daily
News-AP, 7-10-08] (Update: Bentley just announced that he has
separated from his wife and will end his Lakeland crusade this
weekend. [Tampa Tribune, 8-13-08])
* The most popular UK Hindu temple east of London appears to be
the spare bedroom of Sushila Karia and her husband Dhirajlal in a
quiet, residential neighborhood in the resort town of Clacton-on-
Sea. On holy days, the line of pilgrims extends down the hall and
stairs, through the living room, out the door and across the lawn,
according to a May report in London's Daily Mail. The temple,
inaugurated 29 years ago to save Hindus the 90-mile round trip to
London, contains 17 marble gods that were specially blessed for
the occasion by priests in India. [Daily Mail (London), 5-29-08]
Cultural Diversity
* France's Council of State turned down an otherwise-acceptable
petition for citizenship by a French Moroccan woman in July, on
the ground that her total submission to her husband makes her
"insufficient[ly]" "assimilat[ed]" into the country's ethos of gender
equality. The 32-year-old Muslim veils her entire body in public
except for a narrow slit for the eyes and, for example, rejects the
idea of voting, in that such matters should be left entirely to the
discretion of her husband and male relatives. [International Herald
Tribune-Reuters, 7-11-08]
* "The days of the ceramics trade here are numbered," lamented
Francisco Figueriredo, 68, and the specific ceramics trade of his
region (Portugal's Caldas da Rainha) happens to be ornamental
penises. For more than 30 years, Figueriredo and his wife have
been two of a small number of craftspeople who have shaped and
molded various models for export (e.g., mugs with penis
extensions, penis-shaped bottles, ceramic soccer figures with
penises peeking out from under flags). A July Reuters dispatch
attributed the decline to a general loss in the provocativeness of
public sexual displays. [Reuters, 7-4-08]
* The government of France announced that, starting next year, it
will regulate the booming business of country-western line
dancing, by, among other measures, requiring licenses of teachers,
after 200 hours' instruction. Inexplicably, at least 100,000 people
in the country line dance weekly, and the popularity is growing,
according to a May dispatch in The Times of London. A French
Dance Federation official said he guesses the preference of line
dancing over square dancing is the French preference for no
physical contact. [The Times (London), 5-31-08]
* Questionable Judgments: (1) Dr. Frederick Lobati, 47, was
charged last year with felony abuse of his daughter in Ozark, Mo.,
but in June 2008 offered the defense that, being of African
heritage, he was merely applying a "konk" (a bare-knuckle punch),
which is an acceptable punishment in his culture. (2) In June, the
High Court in Johannesburg granted the request by a Chinese civil
rights organization to switch Chinese South Africans from
"caucasian" (as they were during apartheid) to "black" (which
would allow them to better qualify for government benefits).
[Springfield News-Leader, 6-24-08] [BBC News, 6-18-08]
Scenes of the Surreal
* (1) The president of Japan's Osakana Planning Company told
attendees of the Japanese Seafood Show in July that his tuna makes
superior sushi because his company administers acupuncture to
each fish prior to its death, in order to reduce stress. (2) A Welsh
oil painting, "Newport Nudes," which was mothballed 60 years ago
for being too brazen for public display because the model is naked,
drew fresh criticism when reintroduced in July at a public gallery
in Wales but this time only because the naked model is holding a
cigarette. [The Times (London), 7-25-08] [The Times (London), 7-
23-08]
Schemes
* Boston fire inspector Albert Arroyo, on tax-free disability since
March ("totally and permanently disabled," wrote his physician)
from an unwitnessed on-the-job injury, apparently heroically
overcame his condition and six weeks later finished 8th in the 2008
Pro Natural American bodybuilding championship. Said his
lawyer, James Dilday, time in the gym was actually a way for
Arroyo to get his mind off his depression at being forced to take
early retirement at age 46. (A Boston Globe investigation in
January found 102 firefighters with mostly-questionable job
injuries, taking full retirement, with some manipulating paperwork
to retire at a higher grade than when they were "injured.") [Boston
Globe, 7-14-08]
The Weirdo-Australian Community
* Rodney McLagan, 48, acknowledged that a few pornographic
images of children might have been among the 31,000 that he had
downloaded from the Internet but that he has never had a sexual
interest in children. Rather, almost all of the images are of adults
having sex with animals. As his lawyer pointed out in court in
Hobart, Australia, in July, McLagan has such low self-esteem that
he considers himself, too, a "beast." Included in the sex collection
were dogs, ponies, snakes, tigers, and, in one case, an octopus.
[Mercury (Hobart), 7-4-08]
Least Competent Criminals
* In June, police in Spokane, Wash., arrested Calvin Robinson, 19,
who had set up inside the lockable family restroom at a mall
because he needed an electrical outlet to run the color printer he
had just bought for $100 (in real money) in order to make
counterfeit $10 bills. Police recovered a sheet of uncut, poorly-
made copies, which Robinson said he had intended to use to buy
"90 dollars" worth of marijuana. [Spokesman-Review (Spokane),
6-6-08]
Update
* In 2001, News of the Weird noted Hong Kong jeweler Lam Sai-
wing's monument to excess, the solid-gold bathroom (including
flushable toilet), built as a tribute to Vladimir Lenin's critique of
capitalism's wastefulness. ("[W]e shall use gold," wrote Lenin,
"for the purpose of building public lavatories in the streets of some
of the largest cities in the world.") Lam later added more fixtures,
furniture, and statues to his display, using a total of six tons of 24-
carat gold. However, the world economy is different now, as Lam
noted in a July Wall Street Journal profile, with gold that cost
around $200 an ounce in 1999 now valued at nearly $900. He has
decided to begin melting down the entire structure except for the
toilet, that is. "I don't care if gold hits $10,000 an ounce," he said.
"I'm not melting [that] down." [Wall Street Journal, 7-7-08]
The Jesus and Virgin Mary World Tour (all new!)
* Recent Playdates: Salt Lake City, July (image of Jesus in a three-
gallon container of spumoni at an ice cream shop); Salinas, Calif.,
July (image of Mary in the floor drain of a restaurant undergoing
renovation); Monterey, Calif., May (image of Mary in the leg
wound of a biker who slid 50 feet along the pavement when he lost
control of his motorcycle); Darlington, England, April (image of
Jesus in the foil wrapping on a bottle of cider served at the Tanners
Hall pub); Lorain, Ohio, April (image of Jesus in a woman's
ultrasound picture); Iowa City, Iowa, May (joint appearance of
Jesus and Mary on a plastic bag used to bring home groceries from
Wal-Mart).
Salt Lake City: [KSL-TV (Salt Lake City), 7-10-08]
Salinas: [KGTV (San Diego), 7-28-08]
Monterey: [WLBZ-TV (Bangor, Maine), 5-7-08]
Darlington: [Daily Mail (London), 5-1-08]
Lorain: [WBRC-TV (Birmingham, Ala.), 4-28-08]
Iowa City: [Iowa City Press-Citizen, 5-22-08]
Thanks This Week to Rick Matz and Sam Gaines, and to
the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.
* * * * *
Visit Chuck Shepherd daily at
http://www.WeirdUniverse.net (or www.NewsoftheWeird.com) or
mail Weir...@earthlink.net / P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL
33629.