Wacky Wednesday

Growing up my very favoritest part of the newspaper, after the Sunday funnies, (because who doesn't love the funnies in full color!) was a column that was published every Wednesday and was called "News of the Weird".  As you can imagine, the column was full of criminals who weren't quite intelligent enough to pull off their heist, idiots who apparently lacked common and sense and children who were trying to slowly kill their parents with their daring acts of craziness.  I loved when the column would include little known and just straight up ODD facts.  I have recently come across a few funky news stories or factual tid bits that I thought would be fun to share.

Not to be confused with high-brow literature... You will feel like you have lost a few brain cells after reading on, but hopefully you'll get a little belly laugh too.



The Undead Are Coming!
May is National Zombie Awareness Month. To help raise awareness, the Zombie Research Society is giving away one free copy of the children's book That’s Not Your Mommy each day of May. Apparently, "Mommy is a cautionary tale that teaches kids how to recognize a zombie outbreak in its earliest stage."

Breaking In or Out?
Chutzpah! Thieves usually pick out easy jobs, but occasionally they go bold -- for example, breaking into the prison at New Plymouth, New Zealand's North Island, in March (carrying off a large TV set).

Wisconsin Takes the Beer
Prevailing medical authority 20 years ago warned that few humans could survive blood-alcohol readings above .40 (percent), but in recent years, drivers have rather easily survived higher numbers (curiously, many from Wisconsin, such as the man in February in Madison, Wis., with a .559). (In 2007, an Oregon driver was found unconscious, but survived, with a .72 reading.) The plethora of high numbers might indicate mistaken medical teaching, or nonstandard machine measurements -- or an evolutionary hardiness in American drinkers.

Repo Man Meets Pastor
"I thought, 'Man, is this what Jesus would do?'" said Akron, Ohio, repo man Ken Falzini, after surviving a short, harrowing ride clinging to the hood of the Lexus he was trying to repossess from a local preacher in January.

Bishop Marc Neal of Akron's Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church, later charged with felony assault, told a reporter he thought it "disrespectful" for Falzini to try to repossess a preacher's car during Sunday services. Falzini said Neal was "laughing" during parts of the drive, which allegedly included sharp zig-zagging at speeds around 50 miles per hour in an attempt to dislodge Falzini from the hood.

Clearing the Air
Some advocates thought the government of Malawi's proposed environmental control legislation sounded broad enough to criminalize flatulence. The justice minister said the section about "fouling the air" should cover extreme flatus, but the country's solicitor general insisted that only commercial air pollution was punishable. The bill was proposed in January.