Weird News

[Tom Flapwell]

Jesus Molina: "Oh Dad Bees!"

Abba bees!

Eloi deborahim?

[Richard K Niner]

Jesus Molina: "Oh Dad Bees!"

Abba bees!

Eloi deborahim?

What's with the Hebrew?

[The Donmeister]

And why do people still talk of bees "biting"? How ignorant is that?

I have two points.
One: I think wasps actually do bite, so maybe they get confused between the two.
Two: Why did these people leave three million bees in their kitchen? How ignorant is that?

[CodeCat]

No, wasps sting too. It's the ants that bite.

[Tom Flapwell]

Jesus Molina: "Oh Dad Bees!"

Abba bees!

Eloi deborahim?

What's with the Hebrew?

Jesus, dude.

[VisibilityMissing]

Nothing could go wrong with this plan.

Dec 14, 10:12 PM EST

Nev. Politician: Let Teachers Carry Guns

LAS VEGAS (AP) -- A Nevada state senator and also-ran in this year's Republican primary for governor says the Legislature should consider letting teachers carry guns in classrooms to stem a rise in school violence.

"I would expect enough teachers would be interested so it would serve as a deterrent," said Sen. Bob Beers, R-Las Vegas. He said he's preparing a bill to introduce when state lawmakers convene in February.

While Beers said teachers would have to undergo firearm safety training, Las Vegas-area school officials said that allowing more weapons on campus would make schools less safe.

"The more people who have guns, the more likely it is that there will be a shootout," said Clark County school Superintendent Walt Rulffes. He told the Las Vegas Review-Journal he was aware of no studies supporting Beers' argument that schools would be safer if teachers carried guns.

School trustee Sheila Moulton said teachers might need more training to identify and deal with potentially violent students. But she rejected the idea of arming teachers.

"That is not the solution," Moulton said. "I'm not for putting guns in the classroom even when teachers are trained on how to use them."

Clark County school police carry weapons, and district high schools typically have two officers on campus during school hours. Some large middle schools also have armed police officers. The district is the fifth-largest in the nation, with more than 300,000 students at 325 campuses.

Beers cited reports of more than a dozen guns confiscated at Clark County school students so far this year, and several recent instances of gun violence on and off Las Vegas-area campuses.

"We have banned guns in schools in Nevada and most of the rest of the nation for the last 20 years," Beers said. "Part of the problem is a small percentage of the population is brought up without a knowledge of and respect for guns."

[Mostly Harmless!]

The more highly trained, armed people we have at school will reduce the chance of a shooting.

[The Donmeister]

The more highly trained, armed people we have at school will reduce the chance of a shooting.

Exactly! The more guns you have in an area, the less chance there is of being shot. Just compare Australia with the USA, and the trend becomes obvious.

[Rooster]

Yeah, I mean we don't allow the private ownership of handguns or semi-automatic weapons in the UK and we have a school shooting every day.

And wait a minute....yanks have cops ON school grounds? We don't even have a security guard.

[VisibilityMissing]

The noose is a family heirloom?

Crazy Illinois people . . .

Dec 16, 8:21 AM EST

Legal Flap Brews in Illinois Over Noose

By JIM SUHR
Associated Press Writer

BENTON, Ill. (AP) -- Folks in this hardscrabble town still cling to the legend of Charlie Birger, the bootlegging gangster who moments before meeting his maker on the gallows flippantly remarked how lovely the world was.

Nearly eight decades later, the noose used in Illinois' last public hanging has taken on an ugly life of its own.

Rebecca Cocke, granddaughter of the sheriff who supervised the 1928 execution, says the rope is a family heirloom her mother lent to the downtown jail museum 10 years ago. With her mother now suffering from Alzheimer's disease, Cocke - her legal guardian - is suing to get the rope back.

Not so fast, says the local preservation society chief.

Robert Rea wants a judge to determine whether Cocke, granddaughter of former Sheriff Jim Pritchard, is the rightful heir to the prized piece of rope, or whether it belongs to the county because Pritchard was on its payroll.

"We do not know who owns the rope," Rea said. "I'm just thankful I'm not a judge. It's an interesting case, to say the least."

Credit the enigmatic Birger with that.

Eclipsed on the national stage by legendary Chicago gangster Al Capone, Birger's Prohibition-era exploits nevertheless drew quite a following, with some likening him to a Robin Hood who bootlegged to fight a government bent on legislating morality.

He battled a rival gang led by the Shelton brothers using homemade armored vehicles. He even weathered the bombing of the Shady Rest, his log hideout stocked with rifles, submachine guns, ammunition and cases of canned goods.

"He was quite a character in a number of regards," said Lane Harvey, a history buff and lawyer who represents Cocke in the custody flap.

The law caught up to Birger in 1927, when he was condemned for arranging the killing of Joe Adams, the mayor of nearby West City.

On April 19, 1928, more than 5,000 spectators packed the jail courtyard to see Birger die. Children skipped school to watch him walk to the gallows and up the steps to the trap door, where he shook hands with executioner Phil Hanna.

"They've accused me of a lot of things I was never guilty of, but I was guilty of a lot of things of which they never accused me," media accounts quoted the former cowhand and Army veteran as saying. "So I guess we're about even."

Before his head was covered by a black hood - he declined a white one, saying he didn't want to be confused with the Ku Klux Klan - Birger grinned and said, "It's a beautiful world."

So went a colorful character.

At the jail museum, exhibits include the gavel the judge used to sentence Birger to death and a series of black-and-white photos showing the dead man walking, escorted by a rabbi up the gallows' 13 steps.

"Charlie Birger dies smiling," bellows a headline in a yellow, tattered edition of the Benton Evening News.

In an upstairs room where Birger gave an interview on the eve of his execution, there's a life-size cutout of the condemned man. Across the hall is the cell where he watched the gallows being built and, according to Rea, barked out to kids he saw climbing it: "Get off of it, that's mine."

In the cell are two of Birger's Thompson machine guns - dating to 1921 and, by Rea's account, valued at $135,000 - and a wicker basket similar to one used to carry away his corpse.

And there's that noose, lent in 1996 to the then-fledgling museum by the last surviving child of Sheriff Pritchard.

In a written agreement included with her daughter's pending lawsuit, Mary Louise Glover asked the museum to return the noose if the museum ever folded or if she requested it back.

Cocke said her mother once told her, "This will always be part of the family and always be part of your heritage."

But when Cocke requested in September that the noose be returned, Rea refused, the lawsuit says, and Cocke filed suit in Franklin County Circuit Court.

Cocke and her attorney consider the noose priceless.

"In a very odd sort of way, as you might understand, it's unique," Harvey said. "It's the only one of its kind and the only one of its kind there will ever be."

To Cocke, the noose's monetary value means nothing. "It's part of my family's heritage," she said. "If I let it go now, I'll never see it again."

For now, Rea isn't budging.

Like Birger's legend itself, he said, "We know the story of the noose will go on."

[VisibilityMissing]

In this holiday season, give the gift of whale vomit!

[quote]December 18, 2006

Please Let It Be Whale Vomit, Not Just Sea Junk

By COREY KILGANNON

MONTAUK, N.Y. — In this season of strange presents from relatives, Dorothy Ferreira got a doozy the other day from her 82-year-old sister in Waterloo, Iowa. It was ugly. It weighed four pounds. There was no receipt in the box.

Inside she found what looked like a gnarled, funky candle but could actually be a huge hunk of petrified whale vomit worth as much as $18,000.

“I called my sister and asked her, ‘What the heck did you send me?’ â€

[Tom Flapwell]

Mad for Plaid: Great Scot! More than 5,000 Scottish soldiers are having to share ceremonial kilts because defense chiefs have yet to finalize a contract to buy enough of the garments to go around, officials report. The men have just 320 kilts between them.

This may not sound all that weird, but you know where my mind went on "share... kilts"? Are they wide/stretchy enough for multiple guys? Will those guys be wearing underwear this time? (I know, ewwwwwwww.)

[VisibilityMissing]

But, did they leave a beer can in Jesus' place?

Who stole babby Jesus?

The Associated Press

December 19, 2006, 10:04 AM CST

Dozens of people looking for Jesus can find him at a church on Chicago's South Side.

Thirty-two plastic babby Jesus dolls were stolen last week from nativity scenes in people's front yards. Then on Saturday morning a woman found all the missing Jesuses lined up along the fence on her lawn and she gave them to St. Symphorosa Church.

The Rev. Marcel Pasciak said the woman was one of his parishioners at St. Symphorosa and "panicked" when she saw the dolls.

Fourteen of the dolls' rightful owners had claimed them by Tuesday morning.

Pasciak said he thinks teenagers took the babby Jesuses as a joke and not as a religious statement.

"Don't they look funny?" Pasciak said as residents came to claim their decorations. "We're putting Christ back into Christmas literally and metaphorically."

Not everyone took the thefts lightly.

"You put things out and it's to express your beliefs, to celebrate your faith with your community," said Carol Angiollo, whose babby Jesus was among those taken. "To have someone violate that is really disheartening."

People who called police to report a missing doll were directed to the church, said Chicago police spokesman Pat Camden.

"babby Jesus belongs in a nativity, not in evidence and recovered poverty, which is where they'll wind up if they're not claimed,'' he said.

Police haven't made any arrests.

[VisibilityMissing]

[quote]News Release

Science of Santa Claus: Jolly Old Elf Really Can Deliver Presents in One Night, Says NC State Engineer

Media Contacts:
Dr. Larry Silverberg, 919/515-5665
Mick Kulikowski, News Services, 919/515-3470

Dec. 6, 2006

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Don’t believe in Santa Claus?

If you’re skeptical of Santa’s abilities to deliver presents to millions of homes and children in just one night, North Carolina State University’s Dr. Larry Silverberg, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, can explain the plausible science and engineering principles that could allow the Jolly Old Elf to pull off the magical feat year after year.

With his cherubic smile and twinkling eyes, Santa may appear to be merely a jolly old soul but he and his North Pole elves have a lot going on under the funny-looking hats, Silverberg says. Their advanced knowledge of electromagnetic waves, the space/time continuum, nanotechnology, genetic engineering and computer science easily trumps the know-how of contemporary scientists.

Silverberg says that Santa has a personal pipeline to children’s thoughts – via a listening antenna that combines technologies currently used in cell phones and EKGs – which informs him that Mary in Miami hopes for a surfboard, while Michael from Minneapolis wants a snowboard. A sophisticated signal processing system filters the data, giving Santa clues on who wants what, where children live, and even who’s been bad or good. Later, all this information will be processed in an onboard sleigh guidance system, which will provide Santa with the most efficient delivery route.

Silverberg adds that letters to Santa via snail mail still get the job done, however.

Silverberg is not so naïve as to think that Santa and his reindeer can travel approximately 200 million square miles – making stops in some 80 million homes – in one night. Instead, he posits that Santa uses his knowledge of the space/time continuum to form what Silverberg calls “relativity clouds.â€

[Bocaj Claw]

It's amazing that he can do all this despite having died in December of the year 343. Science is truly a marvelous thing.