News of the Weird, July 31, 2011
Chuck Shepherd
by Chuck Shepherd
Copyright 2011 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.
Lead Story
* In January, a baby was born to Canadians Kathy Witterick and
David Stocker, but seven months later, they still have not revealed
to family or friends whether little "Storm" is a boy or a girl. The
couple are intending to raise Storm free of gender-specific cultural
stereotypes (i.e., such things as domesticity, aggressiveness,
preferences for arts or mathematics) because society tends to
overvalue "boy" norms. On a larger scale, in Stockholm, according
to a June Associated Press dispatch, the 33 Swedish pre-schoolers at
the Egalia school socialize in daily environments scrubbed of all
gender references. For example, boys and girls alike play with
kitchen toys and building materials, and when playing "family,"
parental roles are interchangeable. Critics say the children will be
left unprepared for the "real" world. [WRAL-TV (Raleigh, N.C.)-
AP, 6-26-2011]
The Entrepreneurial Spriit!
* Who Knew? "The sidewalks of 47th Street are literally paved with
gold," said one of New York City's gold wranglers, as he, down on
all fours and manipulating tweezers, picked specks of gold, silver,
and jewels that had fallen off of clothing and jewelry racks as they
were rolled from trucks into stores. The man told the New York
Post in June that he had recently earned $819 in redemptions for six
days' prospecting. [New York Post, 6-20-2011]
* New, on the News of the Weird Food Cart: (1) grasshopper tacos
(at San Francisco's La Oaxaquena Bakery, but pulled in June by
local health authorities, who were concerned that the Bakery was
importing Mexican insects rather than using American ones); (2)
cicada ice cream (at Sparky's Homemade in Columbia, Mo., but
also yanked off sale by local health authorities in June); (3) maggot-
melt sandwiches (which are just what you suspect--cheese and dead
maggots--at the California State Fair in July). [KGO-TV (San
Francisco), 6-7-2011] [Kansas City Star-AP, 6-7-2011]
[Sacramento Bee, 7-8-2011]
* In June, scientists at China's Agricultural University in Beijing
announced that they had produced human breast milk from
genetically modified dairy cows and expect supplies to be available
in supermarkets within three years. Employing technology once
used to produce the sheep "Dolly," researchers created a herd of 300
modified cows, which yielded milk that was reported as "sweeter"
and "stronger" than typical cow milk. [MSNBC-Reuters, 6-16-
2011]
Civilization in Decline
* Growing Up Early: (1) A loaded handgun fell from the pocket of
a kindergarten student in Houston, Tex., in April, firing a single
bullet that slightly wounded two classmates and the "shooter." (2)
Prosecutors in Grant County, Wis., filed first-degree sexual assault
charges recently against a 6-year-old boy, stemming from a game of
"doctor" that authorities say he pressured a 5-year-old girl into in
2010. (3) Lakewood, Colo., police, attempting to wrest control of a
sharpened stick that a second-grade boy was using to threaten
classmates and a teacher, gave him two shots of pepper spray. (The
boy had just finished shouting to police, "Get away from me you f- -
- ers.") [Houston Chronicle, 4-19-2011] [Wisconsin State Journal,
5-1-2011] [KUSA-TV (Denver), 4-4-2011]
* Tippecanoe County (Ind.) judge Loretta Rush, interviewed by the
Journal & Courier of Lafayette, Ind., in June, underscored parental
drug use as a major risk factor in a child's drifting into substance
abuse. "I had a case where a child was born with drugs in his
system," recalled Rush. "Both parents were using. We were
looking for [placing the child in any relative's home], but both sets
of grandparents were using. So [the] great-grandmother's in the
courtroom, and I had asked her if she would pass a drug screen, and
she said she would not . . .." [Journal & Courier, 6-8-2011]
Leading Economic Indicators
* In June, officials of California's Alvord Unified School District
announced that their brand-new, $105 million high school,
Hillcrest, would remain unused for the coming school year (and
perhaps beyond)--because the budget-strapped state does not have
$3 million to run the school for a year. (In any event, it costs $1
million per year just to maintain the building to prevent its
deterioration.) [USA Today, 6-21-2011]
* Full-Circle-Outsourcing: A Mumbai, India, company, Aegis
Communications, announced in May that it will hire about 10,000
new employees to work in its call centers fielding customer service
problems for U.S.-based companies. However, those jobs are not in
India. Aegis will outsource those jobs to Americans, at $12-$14 an
hour, at nine call centers in the United States. [Washington Post, 5-
20-2011]
People Different From Us
* Self-described Las Vegas "performer" Staysha Randall took 3,200
different piercings in her body during the same sitting on June 7th to
break the Guinness Book world record by 100 prickings. (Veteran
Las Vegas piercer Bill "Danger" Robinson did the honors.)
Coincidentally, on the very same day in Edinburgh, Scotland, the
woman with the most lifetime piercings (6,925) got married. Elaine
Davidson, 46, wore a full white ensemble that left bare only her
face, which was decorated green and sported 192 piercings. The
lucky guy is Davidson's longtime friend Douglas Watson, a balding,
60-something man with no piercings or tattoos. [Las Vegas
Weekly, 6-8-2011] [Daily Telegraph (London), 6-8-2011]
Recurring Themes
* News of the Weird has mentioned various overseas prisons where
crime kingpins serve time in relative comfort (through bribery or
fear), but according to a June New York Times dispatch,
Venezuela's San Antonio prison (which houses the country's drug
traffickers) is in a class of its own. San Antonio's four swimming
pools frequently host inmates' families and "guests," who lounge
with barbecue meals and liquor. Paid "bodyguards" pass the time
shucking oysters for alpha-dog-inmate Teofilo Rodriguez. DirecTV
dishes serve the cells. Drug-smuggling via guards is so prevalent
that Venezuelan locals actually visit the prison to buy the surplus
(which they carry out because guards only "search" them upon
entering). Rodriguez's enforcement is backed up by an openly-
displayed arsenal of guns. Said a Russian drug trafficker-inmate,
"This is the strangest place I've ever been." [New York Times, 6-4-
2011]
Armed and Clumsy (all-new!)
* People Who Accidentally Shot Themselves Recently: Sean
Murphy, 38, destroyed most of his finger trying to shoot off a
wart (South Yorkshire, England, June). A Secret Service agent
(assigned to Nancy Reagan) shot himself in the hip holstering his
gun (Ventura, Calif., February). A 17-year-old boy, playing with a
gun in bed, shot himself in the testicles (Orlando, February). A
training officer at the Ohio Peace Officer Academy shot himself in
the thigh (December). Sheriff Lorin Nelson of Bannock County,
Idaho, shot himself in the hand (December). Johnathan Hartman,
27, holstering his gun in his back pocket (after threatening his
girlfriend), shot himself in the butt (Billings, Mont., December). A
man trying to scratch his nose with a pellet gun shot himself in the
face (Amherst, Mass., November).
Yorkshire: [Yorkshire Post, 6-15-2011]
Ventura: [DailyCaller.com-AP, 2-5-2011]
Orlando: [Orlando Sentinel, 2-7-2011]
Ohio: [Plain Dealer (Cleveland), 12-22-2010]
Bannock: [KIFI-TV (Idaho Falls), 12-7-2010]
Billings: [Spokesman-Review (Spokane, Wash.), 12-17-2010]
Amherst: [Daily Hampshire Gazette (Northampton, Mass.), 11-17-
2010]
Undignified Deaths
* (1) A 24-year-old man, riding a party bus for a friend's bachelor
night in Detroit in June, was killed on Interstate 94 when he popped
open an emergency escape hatch on the bus's roof and peered out at
the sights. His head slammed into an overpass. (2) A 59-year-old
woman, who had borrowed a steam roller to help with maintenance
on a road near her home in Whatcom County, Wash., in June, lost
control of the vehicle, sending it into a ditch, where she was thrown
and fatally rolled upon. [WDIV-TV (Detroit), 6-20-2011] [Tacoma
News Tribune, 6-19-2011]
A News of the Weird Classic (January 2006)
* Cliches Come to Life (Bureaucrats' Edition): (1) In November
[2005] in Murfreesboro, Tenn., U.S. Department of Veterans
Affairs employees Joseph Haymond and Natalie Coker were
charged with taking kickbacks on the purchase of 100,000 rolls of
red tape (that is, red security tape used on packages of VA
medications). (2) According to a November [2005] Washington
Post profile of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the agency
has, since 1790, granted about 30,000 patents to people who have
submitted unique designs to improve upon, if not reinvent, wheels.
[Daily News Journal (Murfreesboro), 11-30-05] [Washington Post,
11-25-05]
Thanks This Week to Michael Ravnitzky, Clayton Roberts,
Lindsay Ball, Gary Levine, Sara Fredette, David Gardner, Peter
d'Errico, and Joel Walz, and to the News of the Weird Board of
Editorial Advisors.
* * * * *
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