Cut in half by a train!
Alan Brooks
The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train wheel but
because the weight of the train prevents everthing leaking out of the top of
his/her body; he lives long enough for his relatives to come on down and
have a final conversation with him before the train has to be moved and he
instantly bleeds to death.
I've hunted around this newsgroup and checked the snopes2 site but I don't
see any references to it, but it has all the hallmarks of a fast-morphing
cultural meme. Somebody just posted this (on misc.writing.screenplays) as a
true story that happened in Toronto, but I also heard it a few weeks ago
about the New York Subway. Apparently there's something like this in the
Mel Gibson movie "Signs".
Anyway, can somebody point me to some history on this, or clue me in on the
fact that spinal-cord-severed people often spend their last few minutes
talking calmly to their family before the train is rolled off them?
Alan Brooks
(and yes, we m.w.s. regulars are slowly
creeping over to a.f.u. because m.w.s. is
overrun with trolls).
Alan Brooks
> The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train wheel
but
> because the weight of the train prevents everthing leaking out of the top
of
> his/her body; he lives long enough for his relatives to come on down and
> have a final conversation with him before the train has to be moved and he
> instantly bleeds to death.
D'oh!!
Just after I sent that previous note I found the reference at snopes (under
"The Last Kiss").
In a weird coincidence, the reason I found it is I was searching
www.snopes2.com for "brain" because I was looking up another story recently
promoted on the screenwriting newsgroup about an above-normal-intelligence
guy at University of Sheffield who had no brain, only a thin membrane of
brain tissue, lining his skull. If you're interested you can read about
this at http://www.enidreed.com/serv01.htm
Alan Brooks
M. J. Freeman
> The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train
> wheel but because the weight of the train prevents everthing
> leaking out of the top of his/her body; he lives long enough for
> his relatives to come on down and have a final conversation with
> him before the train has to be moved and he instantly bleeds to
> death.
This would seem a more reasonable tale if it was, say, a semi-tractor
trailer than a train. Meaning, from the gruesome tales my dad[1]
would tell of the rail yard, if you get run over by a train, you get
severed quite cleanly--there's no "being pinned". Also, trains don't
exactly stop on a dime. The chances of being caught under a wheel as
it crept to a stop are pretty low--unless you were doing it
intentionally. Or your name is Nell and Dudley's off on a bender.
Anyway, I've seen the same basic theme with a WWII gunner trapped in
the bottom-bubble of a flying fortress. E.g.:
In the preface of “One Last Look,” Rooney recalled, “I was there
when they came back from a raid deep in Germany, and one of the
pilots radioed in that he was going to have to make an emergency
landing. He had only two engines left and his hydraulic system was
gone. He couldn’t lower the wheels and there was something even
worse. The ball turret gunner was trapped in the plastic bubble
beneath the belly of the bomber.
“Later I talked with the crewmen who survived that landing.
Their friend in the ball turret had been calm, they said. They had
talked to him. He knew what they had to do. He understood. The B-17
slammed down on its belly and onto the ball turret with their comrade
trapped inside.” <http://rwebs.net/dispatch/output.asp?ArticleID=58>
Of course, that got turned into a TV pilot/movie by Spielberg, so
you've probably heard it before. <http://tinyurl.com/12mf>
Anyway, the original tale may be rather removed from the Pinned by
Train version you've been vectored. Good luck.
[1] this is my FATHER we're talking about
--
Michael J. Freeman (a.k.a., Pi)
mike_f...@mac.com_noSpam Cincinnati, OH
"Insanity runs in the family; it practically gallops"
Ellison, H. Thompson, D. Parker, Prince, SRV, Led Zep
Lee Ayrton
> The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train wheel but
> because the weight of the train prevents everthing leaking out of the top of
> his/her body; he lives long enough for his relatives to come on down and
> have a final conversation with him before the train has to be moved and he
> instantly bleeds to death.
>
> I've hunted around this newsgroup and checked the snopes2 site but I don't
We've done the subject here periodically. Here's a good start (but by no
means well weed-free or all-inclusive):
1. Google Search: train died cut OR crushed group:alt.folklore.urban
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&scoring=r&q=train+died+cut+OR+crushed+group%3Aalt.folklore.urban&btnG=Google+Search
Executive summary: Victim crushed, remains awake for last visit with
family/clergy. Dies when released. Stories abound with a variety of
settings -- train couplings, factory machinery, automobiles.
> true story that happened in Toronto, but I also heard it a few weeks ago
> about the New York Subway. Apparently there's something like this in the
> Mel Gibson movie "Signs".
It does appear, unabashedly, in "Signs". Among other screenwriting sins.
Lee "Like `Whatever you do, don't look in my pantry.' Duh." Ayrton
--
"It astounds me that even with the incandescent light of cluefulness
pervading the porch of AFU that so many gormless moths are twatting
their empty little heads against it."
Paul Sweeney ponders the infinite in AFU.
tim
Like many, there is a grain of truth behind this. Most people have seen
this grain of truth on the Emergency Room Documentary stories: Person is
shot (soon to be fatal injury) but rolls into the ER on a stretch, awake
and talking (usually yelling), then gets quite in a few minutes, stops
breathing, then dies.
Unlike TV cowboy movies, gunshot injuries to the chest are not instantly
fatal.
12-14 years ago, I occasionally worked in the ER where bridge jumprs
(Golden Gate Bridge) were brought. The older staff said about 1/2 were
brought in yelling, but soon expired from their injuries despite modern
medicine.
How does this cross reference with the "cut of the legs to safe his
life" UL ?
Is crushing someone under stones (as in the Crucible and in Salem witch
trials) a related story?
tim "more weight"
Timothy McDaniel
tim <bonsa...@netscape.net> wrote:
>Is crushing someone under stones (as in the Crucible and in Salem
>witch trials) a related story?
I would say not. "Pressing" to, er, press them to enter a plea goes
back well into the Middle Ages. Further, the modern version doesn't
depend on rocks, but works just as well with a train or car.
Tim "MAKE ROCKS FAST!!!!1!" McDaniel
--
Tim McDaniel, tm...@panix.com; tm...@us.ibm.com is my work address
John
I remember when I was kid, in the '50's, and a train (Chicago, and Great
Western) was stopped near the Ovaltine crossing , and people were
walking down the length of the train. Someone told us kids that a
switchman got squeezed by couplings between cars. They told us he was
still alive, although the train was coupled through him, and he was
talking to his family. They said that when the cars holding him are
uncoupled, he will die. We believed this for years, but probably the
train was stopped for some other reason and it made a good story to tell
kids.
fish...@conservatory.com
M. J. Freeman <mike_f...@mac.com_noSpam> wrote:
>This would seem a more reasonable tale if it was, say, a semi-tractor
>trailer than a train.
My understanding of the story was always that the man was crushed
between the linkage parts. Some of them look plenty big enough to
hold a person, and it seems plausible that someone working on the
tracks or on a boxcar could get crushed here. If you just got crushed
from the hips down, would you not live for a while? Now the stuff
about being conscoious and getting last rites before "They" pull the
train apart, killing the victim is all dramatic sugar, but the mode
of the accident sounds plausible to me.
>Anyway, the original tale may be rather removed from the Pinned by
>Train version you've been vectored. Good luck.
I first heard the story in 1967 from a tall talesman who had worked
around trains extensively. I've heard several other vectors since,
but they always involve the hookup and never the wheel.
Another similar story was that of a person who worked in an ice cream
factory. Sat down on the side of the vat, stuck legs into ice cream,
legs numb, stirring machine cuts off legs but victim does not feel it...
Perhaps some vorifying evidence could be acquired from industrial
hygiene training videos, the ones they show plant workers so they
get to see people who lost both hands on a press brake and so on.
James "scared safe" M.
--
M. J. Freeman
@slb2.atl.mindspring.net:
> In article <Xns926F839C440...@10.52.111.250>,
> M. J. Freeman <mike_f...@mac.com_noSpam> wrote:
>
>>This would seem a more reasonable tale if it was, say, a
>>semi-tractor trailer than a train.
>
> My understanding of the story was always that the man was crushed
> between the linkage parts [the coupling].
Yeah, that's more plausable. The particular story that started this
thread, however, said:
"The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train
wheel but because the weight of the train prevents everthing leaking
out of the top of his/her body..."
TMOliver
>
> Anyway, can somebody point me to some history on this, or
> clue me in on the fact that spinal-cord-severed people often
> spend their last few minutes talking calmly to their family
> before the train is rolled off them?
>
Several years back, an episode of "Homicide", a better than
average NBC TV policer set in sunny Balmer, was devoted to the
terminal travails of a guy crushed between train and platform,
only leaking slowly away....
TM "Crushed between bar and stool, Fell's Point, long time ago."
Oliver
Viv
>"Alan Brooks" <al...@sirius-software.com> iterated.....
>>
>> Anyway, can somebody point me to some history on this, or
>> clue me in on the fact that spinal-cord-severed people often
>> spend their last few minutes talking calmly to their family
>> before the train is rolled off them?
>>
>
>Several years back, an episode of "Homicide", a better than
>average NBC TV policer set in sunny Balmer, was devoted to the
>terminal travails of a guy crushed between train and platform,
>only leaking slowly away....
Another victim of Crush Syndrome which has starred in more and more
emergency-room dramas in recent years.
Executive summary: crushed tissue produces many toxins which are isolated
within the crushed body compartment. When the body part is released from
the crushing weight, these toxins are released into the general bloodstream
and quickly reach the heart, where they cause cardiac arrest of a
particularly difficult to resuscitate kind because the blood chemistry is so
suddenly abnormal.
The resident medicos will now point out which bits I've egregiously
oversimplified.
Vivienne Smythe
--
"Words were indeed insubstantial. They were as soft as water, but they were
also as powerful as water and now they were rushing over the audience,
eroding the levees of veracity and carrying away the past."
Terry Pratchett's Granny Weatherwax sees the need for www.urbanlegends.com
danny burstein
>Another victim of Crush Syndrome which has starred in more and more
>emergency-room dramas in recent years.
>Executive summary: crushed tissue produces many toxins which are isolated
>within the crushed body compartment. When the body part is released from
>the crushing weight, these toxins are released into the general bloodstream
>and quickly reach the heart, where they cause cardiac arrest of a
>particularly difficult to resuscitate kind because the blood chemistry is so
>suddenly abnormal.
Well, the cardiac stuff is pretty annoying. But the really obnoxious fun
occurs when the kidneys get involved.
AOL keyword:
Rhabdomyolysis
--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dan...@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
User3247
>
> The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train
> wheel ...
True story, not a train, but garbage compactor...
I actually went to school with this guy. A few months after he graduated
high school, he got drunk, picked a fight with way too many other kids, and
other kids threw him into a dumpster. Since he was overly inebriated, he
passed out in said dumpster, garbage truck comes next morning, garbage man
hears screams as he is working the compactor of the truck to crush
the garbage. It seems that the compactor crushed formerly drunk kid,
basically cutting him in half just above the waist. Although the guy wasn't
alive long enough for anyone to place a call to his family, he did talk to
the garbage men for a few minutes before expiring.
SOCCERNUMB
fuckwit yada yada yada know the morays of the froup yada yada...
There, now he doesn't need an AFU welcome...
Ooh, I almost forgot, yada yada yada Snopes yada yada yada
Sorry for the slip...
David Wnsemius
news:59r2mu0dkog79mj8d...@4ax.com:
> On Mon, 19 Aug 2002 21:42:09 GMT, TMOliver <olive(DEL)@calpha.com>
> uttered:
>>"Alan Brooks" <al...@sirius-software.com> iterated.....
>
>>>
>>> Anyway, can somebody point me to some history on this, or
>>> clue me in on the fact that spinal-cord-severed people often
>>> spend their last few minutes talking calmly to their family
>>> before the train is rolled off them?
>>>
>>
>>Several years back, an episode of "Homicide", a better than
>>average NBC TV policer set in sunny Balmer, was devoted to the
>>terminal travails of a guy crushed between train and platform,
>>only leaking slowly away....
>
> Another victim of Crush Syndrome which has starred in more and more
> emergency-room dramas in recent years.
>
> Executive summary: crushed tissue produces many toxins which are
> isolated within the crushed body compartment. When the body part is
> released from the crushing weight, these toxins are released into the
> general bloodstream and quickly reach the heart, where they cause
> cardiac arrest of a particularly difficult to resuscitate kind because
> the blood chemistry is so suddenly abnormal.
>
> The resident medicos will now point out which bits I've egregiously
> oversimplified.
>
A credible effort, certainly not egregious. The usual surgical-metabolic
explanation is that the distal tissues from the crush injury, the body
parts further from the heart, undergo anerobic metabolism and build up lots
of organic acids (lactic acid and free hemoglobin that plugs up kidneys but
doesn't kill immediately) in the distal blood that is not circulating,
which are then released upon removal of the obstruction. The term "toxin"
with its connotation of an immunologic mechanism is a item I would quibble
with. If you had just said "bad stuff" I would be more tolerant. Also, it
is not so much that the bad stuff is produced at the site, as at the viable
tissue away from the crush site, which is kind of ironic I suppose.
David " B+, be a little more metabolic next time, Viv" Winsemius.
John Gilmer
"Viv" <wy...@optusnet.com.au> wrote in message
news:59r2mu0dkog79mj8d...@4ax.com...
> On Mon, 19 Aug 2002 21:42:09 GMT, TMOliver <olive(DEL)@calpha.com>
uttered:
> >"Alan Brooks" <al...@sirius-software.com> iterated.....
>
> >>
> >> Anyway, can somebody point me to some history on this, or
> >> clue me in on the fact that spinal-cord-severed people often
> >> spend their last few minutes talking calmly to their family
> >> before the train is rolled off them?
> >>
> >
> >Several years back, an episode of "Homicide", a better than
> >average NBC TV policer set in sunny Balmer, was devoted to the
> >terminal travails of a guy crushed between train and platform,
> >only leaking slowly away....
>
> Another victim of Crush Syndrome which has starred in more and more
> emergency-room dramas in recent years.
>
> Executive summary: crushed tissue produces many toxins which are isolated
> within the crushed body compartment. When the body part is released from
> the crushing weight, these toxins are released into the general
bloodstream
> and quickly reach the heart, where they cause cardiac arrest of a
> particularly difficult to resuscitate kind because the blood chemistry is
so
> suddenly abnormal.
In the most recent BIG San Francisco Earthquake a LONG section of a two deck
freeway came down and many folks were killed inside their cars. After the
search for live people was called off another person was found barely alive.
"They" go him out and into a hospital but he died in the hospital.
TMOliver
> <fish...@conservatory.com> scribed in news:ajrmte$i$1
> @slb2.atl.mindspring.net:
>>
>> My understanding of the story was always that the man was
>> crushed between the linkage parts [the coupling].
>
> Yeah, that's more plausable. The particular story that
> started this thread, however, said:
>
> "The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a
> train wheel but because the weight of the train prevents
> everthing leaking out of the top of his/her body..."
>
>
Ahhhh, but the UL as it existed in my youth......
Victim of execution by hanging, long drop on short hempen rope,
neck broken and "dies", but haid is actually for a period of
oxygenation still alive, simply unable to tell you about it.....
We were told that one never looked directly into the eyes of a
hanged man for fear one might see the life still lurking within.
Terrible tales for little boys off alone at "Summer Camp"
(at 6 or 7, either a joyful escape or the horrible lonesomes,
exiled from hearth and home)
TM "best part wuz swimmin' nekkid" Oliver
tim
> Ahhhh, but the UL as it existed in my youth......
>
> Victim of execution by hanging, long drop on short hempen rope,
> neck broken and "dies", but haid is actually for a period of
> oxygenation still alive, simply unable to tell you about it.....
>
> We were told that one never looked directly into the eyes of a
> hanged man for fear one might see the life still lurking within.
>
> Terrible tales for little boys off alone at "Summer Camp"
> (at 6 or 7, either a joyful escape or the horrible lonesomes,
> exiled from hearth and home)
>
> TM "best part wuz swimmin' nekkid" Oliver
>
I've heard another UL about scientist asking guillitine victems to "try
and blink their eyes as many times as possible" during the french
revolution.
tim "cut on dotted line" c
Nathan Tenny
tim <bonsa...@netscape.net> wrote:
[quoting TMOliver]
>> Victim of execution by hanging, long drop on short hempen rope,
>> neck broken and "dies", but haid is actually for a period of
>> oxygenation still alive, simply unable to tell you about it.....
>>
>> We were told that one never looked directly into the eyes of a
>> hanged man for fear one might see the life still lurking within.
Ooo, I think that's a nice little punchline. As someone pointed out a
few years ago in a discussion of the guillotine version (see below), the
point clearly is the frisson of life-in-death, and all the biological
details are just inconveniences. "Don't look in the eyes of a hanged
man" does a great job of capturing that frisson.
>I've heard another UL about scientist asking guillitine victems to "try
>and blink their eyes as many times as possible" during the french
>revolution.
We've talked about that a few times, with an eye to whether there was any
possibility of consciousness after decapitation. No certain conclusion,
as I recall it, but much interesting discussion.
Though there seems to me to be an important difference between these fine
tales and the crushed-by-a-train version: "imperceptibly alive when you
think they're dead" is very different from "perceptibly alive when the
body is mortally wounded". The hanging and guillotining versions are pure
squicklore, mostly---though, now that I think of it, hasn't there been a
sort of "last kiss" version, in which the severed head mouths something
poignant and heartwrenching before the light goes out in its eyes?
A third member of the family, which I think is just a joke, is the bit
about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up his severed head
and kissed it. I want to say it's in _The Name of the Rose_, but I am
neither sure nor certain.
NT
--
Nathan Tenny | A foolish consistency
Qualcomm, Inc., San Diego, CA | recapitulates phylogeny.
<nten...@qualcomm.com> |
Burroughs Guy
> Just after I sent that previous note I found the reference at snopes
(under
> "The Last Kiss").
How about a URL? http://www.snopes.com/horrors/techno/lastkiss.htm
I am only familiar with that story as an episode of Homocide (as Snopes
mentions in passing). In that show, one of the cops says he had heard of
it happening in New York and other places, but this was the first time it
had happened in Baltimore. Not that cites within fiction are of
particular value. They're just as likely to cite good legends.
The Homocide episode was written plausibly. The victim was squeezed
between the train and the platform, kept alive until the train was moved.
I saw it on PBS not on [network]. It was a PBS show on the making of an
episode of Homocide.
Snopes doesn't label that legend true, false, or maybe. This is one of
those cases where if it were true someone would have the documentation.
Deborah Stevenson,,,
>A third member of the family, which I think is just a joke, is the bit
>about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up his severed head
>and kissed it. I want to say it's in _The Name of the Rose_, but I am
>neither sure nor certain.
Well, it is in a Straight Dope book, as a tidbit vectored to Cecil by his
credulous mother.
Deborah Stevenson
(stev...@alexia.lis.uiuc.edu)
Joe Myers
[snips[
> ... the bit
> about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up his severed head
> and kissed it.
With what?
Joe Myers
"Maybe I don't wanna know." |
Nathan Tenny
Joe Myers <very...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>"Nathan Tenny" <n_t_e_nn_y_@q_ual_c_o_m_m_.c_o_m> wrote
>[snips[
>
>> ... the bit
>> about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up his severed head
>> and kissed it.
>
>With what?
His colon, wearing lipstick. Obviously.
There's also Umberto Eco's bit about the collection of holy relics
including the skull of John the Baptist at the age of twelve---he used it
in _The Name of the Rose_, but it also gets a mention in the nonfiction
_Travels in Hyperreality_, in a context that leaves me suspecting that the
gag has a nonfictional antecedent.
Frank O'Donnell
cotse.net>, Burroughs Guy wrote:
>
> The Homocide episode was written plausibly. The victim was squeezed
> between the train and the platform, kept alive until the train was moved.
Played by fine actor Vincent D'Onofrio.
Rusty
--
"Mankind is vile! But people are wonderful."--Peter Devries
Maggie Newman
>
>Another similar story was that of a person who worked in an ice cream
>factory. Sat down on the side of the vat, stuck legs into ice cream,
>legs numb, stirring machine cuts off legs but victim does not feel it...
>
is new to me, and I love it. If only we could combine it with the
"worker falls into a vat of chocolate" story.
Maggie "too bad the Dove thread is upstream" Newman
John Hibbert
ru...@adams.patriot.net (Frank O'Donnell) wrote:
> In article<YmFydGljdXM=.4da6c1bc776eec477a6450892d193db3@1029863038.
> cotse.net>, Burroughs Guy wrote:
> >
> > The Homocide episode was written plausibly. The victim was squeezed
> > between the train and the platform, kept alive until the train was moved.
>
>
> Played by fine actor Vincent D'Onofrio.
...who is now on Homicide's sister show, Law & Order - Criminal Intent.
John "promote from within" Hibbert
--
R.I.P. "The World's Littlest Web Server!"
'Twas Murdered by administration.
Alan Barclay
Frank O'Donnell <ru...@adams.patriot.net> wrote:
>In article<YmFydGljdXM=.4da6c1bc776eec477a6450892d193db3@1029863038.
>cotse.net>, Burroughs Guy wrote:
>>
>> The Homocide episode was written plausibly. The victim was squeezed
>> between the train and the platform, kept alive until the train was moved.
>
>
>Played by fine actor Vincent D'Onofrio.
Was he playing the train or the platfrom?
Lee Ayrton
>
> The Homocide episode was written plausibly. The victim was squeezed
> between the train and the platform, kept alive until the train was moved.
> I saw it on PBS not on [network]. It was a PBS show on the making of an
> episode of Homocide.
It also appears in the mid-70s Merican TV show "Emergency!". Loading
dock/man/trailer truck. IIRC he survives, through the Miracle Of Modern
Emergency Medicine.
TeaLady
news:ajtsfp$5...@qualcomm.com:
> In article <3D627018...@netscape.net>,
> tim <bonsa...@netscape.net> wrote:
> [quoting TMOliver]
>>> Victim of execution by hanging, long drop on short hempen
>>> rope, neck broken and "dies", but haid is actually for a
>>> period of oxygenation still alive, simply unable to tell you
>>> about it.....
>>>
>>> We were told that one never looked directly into the eyes of
>>> a hanged man for fear one might see the life still lurking
>>> within.
>
>
> A third member of the family, which I think is just a joke, is
> the bit about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up
> his severed head and kissed it.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Kissed what ? With what ? My brane is too tired to see this one.
--
TeaLady (mari)
Sometimes I think I understand everything, then I regain
consciousness.
TeaLady
news:Xns9270CEE...@130.133.1.4:
> n_t_e_nn_y_@q_ual_c_o_m_m_.c_o_m (Nathan Tenny) wrote in
> news:ajtsfp$5...@qualcomm.com:
>
>> In article <3D627018...@netscape.net>, tim
>> <bonsa...@netscape.net> wrote: [quoting TMOliver]
>>
>> A third member of the family, which I think is just a joke, is
>> the bit about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up
>> his severed head and kissed it.
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
> Kissed what ? With what ? My brane is too tired to see this
> one.
>
Following up to myownself, never mind. Others have queried and
been answered.
Visual achieved, now to decide if that is a good thing.
Karen J. Cravens
news:Pine.GSO.4.43.02082...@sea.ntplx.net:
> It also appears in the mid-70s Merican TV show "Emergency!". Loading
> dock/man/trailer truck. IIRC he survives, through the Miracle Of
> Modern Emergency Medicine.
Did *anybody* ever die on "Emergency!"? I thought they all got Ringer's
Lactate and lived happily ever after.
--
Karen J. Cravens
Alan Brooks
> Alan Brooks wrote:
>
> > Just after I sent that previous note I found the reference at snopes
> (under
> > "The Last Kiss").
>
> How about a URL? http://www.snopes.com/horrors/techno/lastkiss.htm
I would have provided it but the search feature I used at snopes didn't give
me a meaningful URL. C'est la virtual vie.
Since I started this thread, a number of people back at my home newsgrope
(misc.writing.screenplays) have posted that they themselves tended a victim
of a similar accident (a former EMT) or that they were on patrol in Chicago
when such a thing happened (a current Chicago detective). Guess there are
enough stories of delayed-but-inevitable death to keep stoking this one.
Alan Brooks
Ulo Melton
wrote:
>Ahhhh, but the UL as it existed in my youth......
>
>Victim of execution by hanging, long drop on short hempen rope,
>neck broken and "dies", but haid is actually for a period of
>oxygenation still alive, simply unable to tell you about it.....
>
>We were told that one never looked directly into the eyes of a
>hanged man for fear one might see the life still lurking within.
Even given the fact that you're a Texan, how much opportunity would
you have ever had to heed that advice? Now, "Don't never look in the
eyes of a man what's just had his head near blowed off by a shotgun
what was grabbed from the rack in a pickup truck," that I could see.
>Terrible tales for little boys off alone at "Summer Camp"
>(at 6 or 7, either a joyful escape or the horrible lonesomes,
>exiled from hearth and home)
>
>TM "best part wuz swimmin' nekkid" Oliver
They didn't tell you about the snapping turtles, then?
--
Ulo Melton (melt...@sewergator.com)
http://www.sewergator.com - Your Pipeline To Adventure
Chris Clarke
melt...@sewergator.com (Ulo Melton) wrote:
>
> Even given the fact that you're a Texan, how much opportunity would
> you have ever had to heed that advice? Now, "Don't never look in the
> eyes of a man what's just had his head near blowed off by a shotgun
> what was grabbed from the rack in a pickup truck," that I could see.
"Don't never share needles with a guy who's been given a lethal
injection."
--
Chris Clarke | Editor, Faultline Magazine
www.faultline.org | California Environmental News and Information
Alan J Rosenthal
>> his severed head and kissed it.
> ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>Kissed what ?
His head.
>With what ?
Therein lies the inconsistency in the UL.
A surprising number of ULs have such inconsistencies.
-- aj "the truth is not thus constrained" r
Jim Segrave
Nathan Tenny <nten...@qualcomm.com> wrote:
>
>A third member of the family, which I think is just a joke, is the bit
>about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up his severed head
>and kissed it. I want to say it's in _The Name of the Rose_, but I am
>neither sure nor certain.
Kissed it? How? With what? It's hard enough to kiss your elbow, but
unless the martyr was beheaded lengthwise as it were, the only bits
suitable for kissing the severed head would be on the severed head
itself.
Or am I missing something?
John Schmitt
smne...@gsbfac.uchicago.edu (Maggie Newman) writes:
>I thought I knew a lot of industrial accident stories, but this
>is new to me, and I love it. If only we could combine it with the
>"worker falls into a vat of chocolate" story.
What about the brewery worker who fell into a vat of beer and
drowned? Rumour was that he had to get out six times to go to the
toilet.
John "beer with body" Schmitt
--
Most of what you read in the papers is lies. And I should know,
because a lot of the lies you see in the papers are mine.
- Max Clifford, publicist
Disclaimers apply
Crashj
> In article <ajtsfp$5...@qualcomm.com>,
> Nathan Tenny <nten...@qualcomm.com> wrote:
> >
> >A third member of the family, which I think is just a joke, is the bit
> >about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up his severed head
> >and kissed it.
<>
> unless the martyr was beheaded lengthwise as it were, the only bits
> suitable for kissing the severed head would be on the severed head
> itself.
> Or am I missing something?
Your head?
Crashj 'elephant of the obvious' Johnson
Bob Ward
wrote:
>-:In article <ajtsfp$5...@qualcomm.com>,
>-:Nathan Tenny <nten...@qualcomm.com> wrote:
>-:>
>-:>A third member of the family, which I think is just a joke, is the bit
>-:>about the martyr who, after being beheaded, picked up his severed head
>-:>and kissed it. I want to say it's in _The Name of the Rose_, but I am
>-:>neither sure nor certain.
>-:
>-:Kissed it? How? With what? It's hard enough to kiss your elbow, but
>-:unless the martyr was beheaded lengthwise as it were, the only bits
>-:suitable for kissing the severed head would be on the severed head
>-:itself.
>-:
>-:Or am I missing something?
>-:
Do you do as good a job of debunking jokes about talking animals?
--
This space left intentionally blank.
Bob Ward
(John Schmitt) wrote:
>-:In article <jix89.91$N4.2...@news.uchicago.edu>,
>-:smne...@gsbfac.uchicago.edu (Maggie Newman) writes:
>-:
>-:
>-:>I thought I knew a lot of industrial accident stories, but this
>-:>is new to me, and I love it. If only we could combine it with the
>-:>"worker falls into a vat of chocolate" story.
>-:
>-:What about the brewery worker who fell into a vat of beer and
>-:drowned? Rumour was that he had to get out six times to go to the
>-:toilet.
>-:
>-:John "beer with body" Schmitt
Nonono... it was a vat of whisky - and when they cremated him it took
three days to put out the flames.
TMOliver
From whence cometh the noted cautionary, what to do when there's
nothing left to do and the tornado is a'blowing through the next
pasture..."Put one's head betwixt one's legs and kiss one's ass
goodbye..."
TM "Mussolini's life passed before his eyes, upside down."
Oliver
Louise Bremner
> >-:What about the brewery worker who fell into a vat of beer and
> >-:drowned? Rumour was that he had to get out six times to go to the
> >-:toilet.
>
> Nonono... it was a vat of whisky - and when they cremated him it took
> three days to put out the flames.
Memory surfaces of a report in one of the more frivolous UK medical
magazines[1], something like 30 years ago[2], written by a coroner who
unlocked the morgue one morning and blessed his guardian angel who had
somehow stopped him from following his usual habit of lighting up first.
During the night, a corpse that had been fished out from an underground
petrol[3] tank had been delivered, and the air was thick with petrol
fumes. The report went on to detail the test he devised on the spot, to
determine death by drowning in petrol--something like: "Apply match to
sample of lung tissue, while standing as far back as possible."
[1] Probably the one that used to win awards regularly in the publishing
field, even though it was never on sale and was distributed only to
doctors, but can I remember the name of it?
[2] Maybe longer--it's been a long while since I read my father's mags.
[3] Substitute "gas" if appropriate.
________________________________________________________________________
Louise "what a way to go--or am I thinking of the beer?" Bremner
(log at gol dot com)
If you want a reply by e-mail, don't write to my Yahoo address!
Cindy Kandolf
Well, obviously: he picked up his head, held it between his knees, and
kissed his ass good-bye.
Equally obviously, I'm going to hell now.
- Cindy Kandolf, certified language mechanic, mamma flodnak
flodmail: thefl...@ivillage.com flodhome: Bærum, Norway
flodweb: http://www.flodnak.com/
Lee Ayrton
> > It also appears in the mid-70s Merican TV show "Emergency!". Loading
> > dock/man/trailer truck. IIRC he survives, through the Miracle Of
> > Modern Emergency Medicine.
>
> Did *anybody* ever die on "Emergency!"? I thought they all got Ringer's
> Lactate and lived happily ever after.
Occasionally the dead appeared (or, almost appeared, being mostly
off-camera) but most of them had expired before the paramedics arrived.
Every once in a blue moon a treated patient died in the show for Dramatic
Effect, either to tug on heartstrings or to show how constraining EMS can
cost lives.
Lee "D5W at KVO" Ayrton
Austin Bike
I'm about 90% sure that this was in an episode of "Taxicab Confessions" (or
possibly a documentary) but someone who worked in a rescue position was
discussing things they had seen. They described someone falling between the
train and the platform and getting "twisted in a knot". They were able to
bring down their relatives and a priest to say goodbye because as soon as
they pushed the train back from the platform, they guy would "unwind" and
die almost instantly.
Or, I could be wrong, really wrong.
My 2 cents.
Harry MF Teasley
> I'm about 90% sure that this was in an episode of "Taxicab Confessions" (or
> possibly a documentary) but someone who worked in a rescue position was
> discussing things they had seen. They described someone falling between the
> train and the platform and getting "twisted in a knot". They were able to
> bring down their relatives and a priest to say goodbye because as soon as
> they pushed the train back from the platform, they guy would "unwind" and
> die almost instantly.
I'm getting a mental image of an industrial accident involving a careless
worker winding the giant rubber band on the underside of a balsa wood
passenger train.
Harry "one .... more .... tur*AAAAGGGGGGGHHHHH!" tEASLEY
John Roth
Sounds like something I saw on one of the "Faces of Death" tapes.
When they moved the traincar away all of his insides fell out and he died.
In article <ak6nmf$rv5$1...@reader1.panix.com>, he...@panix.com says...
Tony Prochazka
"Austin Bike" <pep...@nowhere.com> wrote:
My experience is precisely the oppposite.
Years ago I and my housemate heard an almighty crash outside our abode.
Running outside (ghouls that we are), we found a crowd gathering around
a car, badly dinged-up, having sideswiped several parked vehicles before
coming to rest at kerbside. Underneath said automobile was an
unfortunate chappie, heavily knotted and apparently tightly impacted
between the rear axle, the inside wall of the rear wheel and the road.
He was clearly conscious but unable to speak, or even to breathe, and
was slowly turning blue.
Clear heads prevailed and a cry of "tyre jack!!" was raised, as my
flatmate, a doctor, rather effetely checked the victim's pulse and
uttered soothing words. The jack was procured and pressed into duty, the
car's rear was raised in no time and our victim's chest was suddenly
free to resume respiration. He inspired deeply, looked straight into my
flatmate's eyes and yelled lustily, "Begorrah! It's de Devil!"
- Tony Prochazka
--
"Topologically humans are donuts, except for those klein bottle variants with
their heads permanently up their asses." - Lon Stowell explains the anatomical
basis for never-ending threads.
Improbable
Alan Brooks wrote:
>
> The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train wheel but
<snip>
Oh yeah, I heard about that one. Destroyed the entire left side of his
body. Early reports said there wss nothing left of him, but he's all
right now.
keith lim
Yes, the lost half of his body was replaced with half a burlap sack
filled with leaves.
keith "but the leaves rot quickly & he'd rather have business cards" lim
--
keith lim keit...@pobox.com http://pobox.com/~keithlim/
MONKEYTEAM, LOOK OUT FOR GIANT FLOATING MONKEY HEAD WITH
DEADLY MENTAL POWERS!! --Scott McCloud, "Monkeytown"
<http://www.scottmccloud.com/comics/mi/mi-17/mi-17.html>
Alan Brooks
news:1fhjf2o.1le8id5x88t1vN%keit...@pobox.com...
> Improbable <nob...@FakeEmailAddr.net> wrote:
> > Alan Brooks wrote:
> > >
> > > The story goes that some guy (or woman) is cut in half by a train
wheel but
> > <snip>
> >
> > Oh yeah, I heard about that one. Destroyed the entire left side of his
> > body. Early reports said there wss nothing left of him, but he's all
> > right now.
>
> Yes, the lost half of his body was replaced with half a burlap sack
> filled with leaves.
>
> keith "but the leaves rot quickly & he'd rather have business cards" lim
I think you're all having me on, 'cause I heard it directly from somebody
who's brother was right there when it happend, and he said the burlap bag
was full of newspapers.
Alan Brooks
-- Mostly NYTimes "Home & Garden" sections.
TeaLady
news:akeq5q$p7q$1...@reader1.panix.com:
> "keith lim" <keit...@pobox.com> wrote in message
> news:1fhjf2o.1le8id5x88t1vN%keit...@pobox.com...
>>
>> Yes, the lost half of his body was replaced with half a burlap
>> sack filled with leaves.
>>
>> keith "but the leaves rot quickly & he'd rather have business
>> cards" lim
>
> I think you're all having me on, 'cause I heard it directly
> from somebody who's brother was right there when it happend,
> and he said the burlap bag was full of newspapers.
>
> Alan Brooks
>
> -- Mostly NYTimes "Home & Garden" sections.
No, my very own Uncle was there and he clearly saw them use a giant
plastic baggie colored like a pumpkin and filled with New Year's
confetti. And this is my Uncle we're talking about.
--
Tea"He might have had a wee nip or three"Lady (mari)
Sometimes I think I understand everything, then I regain
consciousness.
R H Draney
news:Xns9276F1D...@130.133.1.4:
> "Alan Brooks" <al...@sirius-software.com> wrote in
> news:akeq5q$p7q$1...@reader1.panix.com:
>
>> "keith lim" <keit...@pobox.com> wrote in message
>> news:1fhjf2o.1le8id5x88t1vN%keit...@pobox.com...
>>>
>>> Yes, the lost half of his body was replaced with half a burlap
>>> sack filled with leaves.
>>>
>>> keith "but the leaves rot quickly & he'd rather have business
>>> cards" lim
>>
>> I think you're all having me on, 'cause I heard it directly
>> from somebody who's brother was right there when it happend,
>> and he said the burlap bag was full of newspapers.
>>
>> -- Mostly NYTimes "Home & Garden" sections.
>
> No, my very own Uncle was there and he clearly saw them use a giant
> plastic baggie colored like a pumpkin and filled with New Year's
> confetti. And this is my Uncle we're talking about.
Your Uncle is mistaken...it *was* a burlap bag, to be sure, but
'tweren't newspapers, but old issues of National Geographic...and now
the poor fella has to notify the US Geological Survey every time he
leaves the state so they can adjust for the changing tilt of the North
American continent....
R H "they won't let him use the library because he makes the building
sink" Draney
TMOliver
>
> Your Uncle is mistaken...it *was* a burlap bag, to be sure,
> but 'tweren't newspapers, but old issues of National
> Geographic...and now the poor fella has to notify the US
> Geological Survey every time he leaves the state so they can
> adjust for the changing tilt of the North American
> continent....
>
"Oh, Lawdie, you don't hit a nerve...."
Back in an earlier life when for a time a large apartment
developmeent (sacattered single story buildings) largely
inhabited by the terminally elderly and mostly alone was under
my purview, a constant worry was their bad habit of passing on
without notifying management or neighbors.
Hot weather could quickly magnify this tendency into a matter of
gross and grotesque seriousness.
In connection with another thread here, Lysol/odor covering up,
of course the companies who supplied apartment houses always
offer a full range of disinfectant/deodorizers, some of which
were claimed to be able to remove all traces of a number of sets
of decaying remains from your carpet (without fading them).
But worst of all (and an obligatory purchase/inventory item) was
a product, kitty-litterish in appearance, which was absolutely
guarateed to absorb random or concentrated body fluids,
including sort of leaching'em up from surfaces they may have
been absorbed by.....
Now growing older, I'm demon-possessed by the fear of keeling
over alone, inside, in August during a power loss or AC failure.
Outside, arund here, it would mummify you in about 48 hours.
Inside....Well, simply think of a large exploding cantaloupe.
TM "In nothing did he grace life so much as in the wasting of
it." Oliver
fish...@conservatory.com
TMOliver <olive(DEL)@calpha.com> wrote:
>Now growing older, I'm demon-possessed by the fear of keeling
>over alone, inside, in August during a power loss or AC failure.
Elderly folks here in Arizona have an admirable habit of
not routinely croaking from the heat, which commonly reaches
45 degrees year round. I guess we just get a higher quality
of retirees.
James "but it's a dry heat" M.
--
R H Draney
news:akg0so$5ee$1...@slb5.atl.mindspring.net:
No bodies, thankfully, but a series of crews has just finished mucking
out the townhouse next to mine, which has been vacant (and apparently
filled with garbage) for several years now...I don't know if
TMOliver's cleanup substances would have helped speed the process, but
during the several weeks that they left all the windows open to let
the place air out, the stench was--er--significant whenever I went
outside...(fortunately, it's August, and it's Phoenix, which means
that nobody goes outside unless they have to)....
One evening I came home and noticed someone upstairs running what
sounded like a vacuum cleaner...I can only hope it was actually a
JATO-assisted steam disinfecting unit....r
Improbable
fish...@conservatory.com wrote:
>
> Elderly folks here in Arizona have an admirable habit of
> not routinely croaking from the heat, which commonly reaches
> 45 degrees year round. I guess we just get a higher quality
> of retirees.
>
> James "but it's a dry heat" M.
> --
Y'know this brings up another question. With the growth of online
banking, direct deposit, and automatic bill payment, it's probably
getting to the point where it will be possible for someone to die and
have their financial affairs take care of themselves indefinitely. Right
now the intersection between the technonerds who are likely to use these
services extensively and the folks in failing health who are likely to
expire abruptly is probably fairly small, but will grow larger as the
boomers grow older. Does anyone know if there have been any cases yet of
someone who ceased to be while their social security and pension checks
got deposited, rent and utilities got paid, for months afterward? Has
anyone made a load of money in the stock market after they died, as a
result of some well-planned program trading?
Nathan Tenny
Improbable <nob...@FakeEmailAddr.net> wrote:
>Y'know this brings up another question. With the growth of online
>banking, direct deposit, and automatic bill payment, it's probably
>getting to the point where it will be possible for someone to die and
>have their financial affairs take care of themselves indefinitely. Right
>now the intersection between the technonerds who are likely to use these
>services extensively and the folks in failing health who are likely to
>expire abruptly is probably fairly small, but will grow larger as the
>boomers grow older. Does anyone know if there have been any cases yet of
>someone who ceased to be while their social security and pension checks
>got deposited, rent and utilities got paid, for months afterward?
ISTR that, a year or two ago, we had a person-found-long-dead-at-home case
in which one of the reasons it took so long to find them was that their
bills were paid automatically. The landlord (sez my memory) finally looked
into the matter when the bank account that was paying the rent ran out.
Yeah, here we go:
<http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=uqdWPk%23E%23GA.207%40upnetnews05>
That's the article that started the thread. The CNN report to which a link
is given, alas, seems to have, well, expired, perhaps in front of its TV
with the Christmas tree blinking away.
>Has anyone made a load of money in the stock market after they died, as a
>result of some well-planned program trading?
Now there's a UL waiting to happen.
NT
--
Nathan Tenny | A foolish consistency
Qualcomm, Inc., San Diego, CA | recapitulates phylogeny.
<nten...@qualcomm.com> |
Hatunen
<nob...@FakeEmailAddr.net> wrote:
>Y'know this brings up another question. With the growth of online
>banking, direct deposit, and automatic bill payment, it's probably
>getting to the point where it will be possible for someone to die and
>have their financial affairs take care of themselves indefinitely.
Henry (HWM) can refer you to the recent news item from Finland about
the retired gentleman who died and rotted away in his flat for six
months before anyone noticed; his rent and bills were paid
automatically.
************ DAVE HATUNEN (hat...@cox.net) ***********
* Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow *
******* My typos are intentional copyright traps ******
Alan J Rosenthal
>Y'know this brings up another question. With the growth of online
>banking, direct deposit, and automatic bill payment, it's probably
>getting to the point where it will be possible for someone to die and
>have their financial affairs take care of themselves indefinitely. Right
>now the intersection between the technonerds who are likely to use these
>services extensively and the folks in failing health who are likely to
>expire abruptly is probably fairly small,
On the contrary, at least around here (I don't know what country
FakeEmailAddr.net is in), automatic bank this-and-that is extremely common
across all age groups, and furthermore, those more likely to forget to
make payments and such are encouraged to enrol in automatic bill payment to
avoid having their electricity cut off and all that. Hence the sightings
of this exact happening which several people have already posted about in
followups to your above-quoted message.
Janne Rinta-Mänty
> Henry (HWM) can refer you to the recent news item from Finland about
> the retired gentleman who died and rotted away in his flat for six
> months before anyone noticed; his rent and bills were paid
> automatically.
I'm not HWM, but anyway: It was six *years*. He was found in April
2000, only because they had to go in to put one of those fire alarm
things in his flat.
(I couldn't find the news article though, only one a few days later
(2000-04-19) that said that Kela (The Social Insurance Institution of
Finland) was going to get the six years' pension money back.)
--
Janne Rinta-Mänty
Michael J. Lowrey
Cases in the U.S. where a person dies and the family
neglects to inform pension funds, Social Security, etc. so
that those checks (or, nowadays, directly-deposited funds)
could keep flowing, are so common as no longer to be
noteworthy in the press except as crime news.
--
Michael J. Lowrey
can't afford to retire at present wage levels