Weird But True

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Chicken and rice ends thief's toilet trauma
KOLKATA, India (Reuters) - Dozens of bananas failed to do
the trick but an Indian thief has finally produced a gold
necklace he had snatched and then swallowed after police fed
him a hearty meal of chicken, rice and local bread.
Sheikh Mohsin, 35, grabbed the 45,000-rupee ($1,115)
necklace from a woman in the eastern city of Kolkata Friday and
popped it into his mouth when cornered by police.
Officers then fed him 40 bananas over a few hours believing
they would act as a purgative, and sat back and waited for
results.
Mohsin passed an uncomfortable night in jail, but not the
piece of jewelry.
Police said Sunday he was then given more substantial fare.

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Pencil removed from woman's head after 55 years
BERLIN (Reuters) - A 59-year-old German woman has had most
of a pencil removed from inside her head after suffering nearly
her whole life with the headaches and nosebleeds it caused,
Bild newspaper reported Monday.
Margret Wegner fell over carrying the pencil in her hand
when she was four.
"The pencil went right through my skin -- and disappeared
into my head," Wegner told the newspaper.
It narrowly missed vital parts of her brain. At the time no
one dared operate, but now technology has improved sufficiently
for doctors to be able to remove it.
Most of the pencil, some three inches long, was taken out
in an operation at a private Berlin clinic, but the tip had
grown in so firmly that it was impossible to remove.

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ELMIRA, N.Y. (AP) - A woman who was quick with the bargains at
her rummage sale mistakenly accepted 50 cents for a ceramic turtle
with the ashes of her husband's previous wife inside.
Now, Anita Lewis is desperately searching for the buyer who said
she planned to use the urn as a cookie jar.
Lewis said she had hauled items into her yard early Saturday
while her husband slept. The buyer quickly selected the large
turtle container, despite being unable to get the lid open.
Her husband's previous wife collected turtles. "We have lots of turtles," Anita Lewis said. "It didn't even
register that this was the one (containing the ashes)."

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Monkey Business

TUPELO, Miss. (AP) - A curious monkey who somehow managed to
free himself from his pen in the Tupelo Buffalo Park and Zoo and
was on the lam for days was finally recaptured Monday.
Oliver was apprehended at Tupelo Stone & Masonry, the Northeast
Mississippi Daily Journal reported, six days after leading park
staff on a chase through the park's trail system before eventually
eluding them.
Several days after the monkey's July 31 escape, an anonymous
businessman offered a reward for the white-faced capuchin's capture
and return. Motorist Mike Fair, who helped end the search for
Oliver, got the reward.
"I think it's great," said Fair, of Mooreville.
The reward included a weekend stay at the Tupelo Hilton Garden
Inn and special tours of the Elvis Presley Birthplace and Museum
and the Tupelo Automobile Museum. The reward also included one of
Oliver's favorite foods - a case of bananas.
"But the bananas - I don't know about that," said Fair. "I'll
just end up giving them to the monkey, I guess."
It wasn't the first time Oliver, 9, had escaped from the zoo.
About six years ago the monkey escaped and ran amok on the grounds
of Tupelo Country Club before being captured and returned to the
zoo.
Within minutes of returning home after his latest adventure,
Oliver feasted on grapes, marshmallows, monkey biscuits and
bananas, and then took a long nap.

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Military captain battles 'malodorous working conditions' at Fla.
Air Force base
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) - War stinks, apparently even behind the lines.
That's the gist of a military e-mail uncovered by the Tampa
Tribune concerning toilet troubles at U.S. Central Command at
MacDill Air Force Base. The bottom line: A small restroom facility
near the command's Joint Intelligence Center doesn't have adequate
ventilation, resulting in - as Navy Capt. Samuel J. Cox put it -
"malodorous working conditions."
Cox posted written orders directing workers to take their
serious bathroom business to more capable facilities unless it was
an emergency. When the signs were removed, Cox pointed out in a
lighthearted e-mail that ignoring the directive technically
violated the Uniform Code of Military Justice. As for civilian
contractors, Cox wrote, "I can make you wish you'd gone down the
hall to the big bathrooms to do your business."
Central Command oversees military operations in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Command spokesman Maj. David Huxsoll confirmed the
intelligence center's restroom woes.
"If you're asking if the memo is legitimate, yes it is,"
Huxsoll said Monday. "That was the captain's humorous attempt to
deal with it."
Huxsoll said there are no plans to court-martial restroom
offenders caught in the act.

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Thai police who break rules to sport Hello Kitty armbands as
punishment
AP Photo NY112
BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) - Thai police officers who break rules
will be forced to wear hot pink armbands featuring "Hello Kitty,"
the Japanese icon of cute, as a mark of shame, a senior officer
said Monday.
Police officers caught littering, parking in a prohibited area,
or arriving late - among other misdemeanors - will be forced to
stay in the division office and wear the armband all day, said
Police Col. Pongpat Chayaphan. The officers won't wear the armband
in public.
The striking armband features Hello Kitty sitting atop two
hearts.
"Simple warnings no longer work. This new twist is expected to
make them feel guilt and shame and prevent them from repeating the
offense, no matter how minor," said Pongpat, acting chief of the
Crime Suppression Division in Bangkok.
"(Hello) Kitty is a cute icon for young girls. It's not
something macho police officers want covering their biceps,"
Pongpat said.
He said police caught breaking the law will be subject the same
fines and penalties as any other members of the public.
"We want to make sure that we do not condone small offenses,"
Pongpat said, adding that the CSD believed that getting tough on
petty misdemeanors would lead to fewer cases of more serious
offenses including abuse of power and mistreatment of the public by
police officers.
Hello Kitty, invented by Sanrio Co. in 1974, has been popular
for years with children and young women. The celebrity cat adorns
everything from diamond-studded jewelry, Fender guitars and digital
cameras to lunch boxes, T-shirts and stationery.

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Teen gets minors scrapes, bruises in six-story fall
MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. (AP) - A Georgia teen who fell six stories
from a hotel balcony trying to help a fellow tourist suffered just
bruises and scrapes in his harrowing fall.
Matthew Savage was reaching up to the balcony one floor up to
grab a bathing suit that had fluttered down from the 11th floor
when he felt himself tumble over the railing.
The Gainesville, Ga., 17-year-old hit other balconies on his way
down and slammed onto a slanted rooftop covering the Tropical
Winds' lazy river. He slid off that roof into the bushes.
"I just closed my eyes," Savage said Saturday, nursing scrapes
and bruises on his back and legs.
After he landed in the bushes, he got up and started walking
back to his room. But paramedics strapped him to a board and flew
him to nearby hospital for an examination. He said a full body scan
and other tests showed he was OK.
"This was a 'God is real' event," his sister, Mandy Baker,
said.
Tracy Weeks, of Raleigh, N.C., said her son's swimsuit seemed in
reach of the balcony below, so she asked Savage to reach for it.
"This has been the worst nightmare of my life," she said. "I
couldn't sleep.
"Somebody was looking out for this child."

[MalahatTwo7]

We have quite a few folks working down in MacDill AFB, with the Joint Intelligence Center in support of operations in Afghanistan etc. Wondering if I should give a call and "confirm"??? LOL

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Tail of survival?

Crocodile falls 12 floors in escape bid
MOSCOW, Aug 8 (Reuters) - A crocodile survived a fall from
the 12th floor of a Russian apartment block after making an
escape bid through a window, emergency services said on
Wednesday.
Diving out of the window has become a habit for the
crocodile, called Khenar, with concerned neighbours saying it
was the third time he had used that method to flee, Moskovsky
Komsomolets daily reported.
The crocodile lost one tooth in the latest fall but was
otherwise unscathed, said a spokeswoman for the emergencies
ministry in the Nizhny Novgorod region of central Russia.
"It seems the owner was not at home when the crocodile came
out of the window," she said.
Emergency services put the crocodile in a local aquarium to
recover from his fall. Within a few hours his concerned owner
came to pick him up and the crocodile was last seen lying on the
back seat of his owner's car.

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Monkey see...monkey did!

NEW YORK (AP) - A man smuggled a monkey onto an airplane
Tuesday, stashing the furry fist-size primate under his hat until
passengers spotted it perched on his ponytail, an airline official
said.
The monkey escapade began in Lima, Peru, late Monday, when the
man boarded a flight to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., said Spirit Airlines
spokeswoman Alison Russell. After landing Tuesday morning, the man
waited several hours before catching a connecting flight to
LaGuardia Airport.
During the flight, people around the man noticed that the
marmoset, which normally lives in forests and eats fruit and
insects, had emerged from underneath his hat, Russell said.
"Other passengers asked the man if he knew he had a monkey on
him," she said.
The monkey spent the remainder of the flight in the man's seat
and behaved well, said Russell, who didn't know how it skirted
customs and security.
Airport police were waiting for the man and his monkey when the
plane landed about 3 p.m., and the man was taken away for
questioning. It was unclear whether he would face any criminal
charges.
The city's animal control agency said the monkey appeared
healthy. But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was
planning to take it for disease testing and keep it quarantined for
31 days, CDC spokesman Tom Skinner said.
If the monkey is healthy, it could wind up in a zoo.
"It is kind of a spirited monkey," Russell said. "That will
be the nickname of the monkey: Spirit."

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Hmmmm. is this true?

London (Reuters) - As many as 11 million British motorists
are unable to read a basic road map, according to a survey
released Monday.
The poll revealed over three quarters of British drivers
were unable to identify the motorway map symbol, while only one
percent of motorists would pass the Cub Scout Map Reader badge
test.
"It's pretty embarrassing the majority of Cub Scouts have
better map-reading skills than the majority of the adult
population," said Colin Batabyal, head of underwriting and
business development at eSure, which carried out the survey.
Sixteen percent of British drivers have become so heavily
reliant on satellite navigation systems that they have given up
keeping a map in their car.
"It's time for motorists to take a refresher in map-reading
skills," said Scott Sinclair of national mapping agency
Ordnance Survey. "Technology is great but the batteries won't
run out on a paper map.

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vomeronasal, vomeronasal, vomeronasal three times fast

Female mice just a sniff away from male sex drive
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Female mice became sexually
voracious and tried to mate like males after scientists
disabled a small sensory organ, casting fresh light on how
gender-specific behavior develops in animals.
The difference seems to lie in how male and female mice use
the vomeronasal organ to process pheromones, said Catherine
Dulac, the Harvard biologist who led the research published in
the journal Nature Sunday.
Pheromones are chemical signals that many animals,
including humans, use to communicate socially and sexually.
The vomeronasal organ, found in the noses of some animals
but not in people or higher primates, is a key processing
center for pheromones.
Scientists had long attributed aggressive male mating
tactics to a testosterone-induced hard-wiring of male brains.

[MalahatTwo7]

Hmmm.. .He said. She said......


Exotic Dancer Revives Client During Show
Dancer, Customer Differ On Who Offered Pills

POSTED: 5:41 pm EDT August 3, 2007

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. -- An exotic dancer is credited with reviving a client who passed out during a private strip show early Friday morning, police said.

Karnesha Nantz, 25, was hired early Friday morning to perform a personal show for Daniel Karpinski, 46, at Karpinski's home on the 400 block of Southeast Evans Avenue in Port St. Lucie, police said.

According to a police report, while Nantz was dancing, she turned and faced away from Karpinski for approximately 20 seconds. When she turned around again to face him, Karpinski was slumped down on the couch and was having trouble breathing, police said.

Nantz called 911 and began to administer CPR on Karpinski because he was not conscious or breathing. Paramedics arrived at the home and were able to revive the 46-year-old to the point where he was able to breathe on his own but unable to speak. He was transported to St. Lucie Medical Center, where he was listed in stable condition.

According to a police report, Nantz said Karpinski offered her prescription narcotics on several occasions while she was dancing for him. Police said they located a bottle of prescription oxycodone at the scene with Karpinski's name on it.

Robert Vega, with the Port St. Lucie Police Department, told West Palm Beach television station WPBF that Karpinski told police that Nantz offered him an unknown pill wrapped in a towel. He said he took the pill on his own free will and afterward did not remember anything until he woke up in the hospital, police said.

Distributed by Internet Broadcasting.

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SnakeBit

Bite from beheaded rattlesnake sends rural Washington man to
hospital
PROSSER, Wash. (AP) - Turns out, even beheaded rattlesnakes can
be dangerous.
That's what 53-year-old Danny Anderson learned as he was feeding
his horses Monday night, when a 5-foot rattler slithered onto his
central Washington property, about 50 miles southeast of Yakima.
Anderson and his 27-year-old son, Benjamin, pinned the snake
with an irrigation pipe and cut off its head with a shovel. A few
more strikes to the head left it sitting under a pickup truck.
"When I reached down to pick up the head, it raised around and
did a backflip almost, and bit my finger," Anderson said. "I had
to shake my hand real hard to get it to let loose."
His wife insisted they go to the hospital, and by the time they
arrived at Prosser Memorial Hospital 10 minutes later, Anderson's
tongue was swollen and the venom was spreading. He then was taken
by ambulance 30 miles to a Richland hospital to get the full series
of six shots he needed.
The snake head ended up in the bed of his pickup, and Anderson
landed in the hospital until Wednesday afternoon.
Mike Livingston, a Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife
biologist, said the area where the Anderson's live is near prime
snake habitat. But he said he had never heard of anyone being bit
by a decapitated snake before.
"That's really surprising but that's an important thing to tell
people," he said. "It may have been just a reflex on the part of
the snake."
If another rattlesnake comes along, Anderson said he'll likely
try to kill it again, but said he'll grab a shovel and bury it
right there.
"It still gives me the creeps to think that son-of-a-gun could
do that," he said.

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Poachers accidentally flag their presence
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Vietnamese fishermen flying a
Malaysian flag as a decoy while sailing in Malaysia's
northeastern waters gave the game away by mistakenly flying it
upside down.
This is an unusual mistake, because "Stripes of Glory" as
the flag is known at home, carries a blue rectangle in its top
left corner emblazoned with a yellow crescent and star, while
red-and-white stripes alternate on the rest.
Local fishermen became suspicious, and tipped off fishing
authorities, who detained 13 crewmen after seizing 500 kg
(1,102 lb) of stingrays, valued at 6,000 ringgit ($1,737),
along with a fake fishing license, the Star newspaper reported.
"We believe the fishermen were in our waters since Sunday,"
it quoted Munir Mohamad Nawi, a fisheries official in the
northeastern state of Terengganu, as saying.
The Vietnamese are expected to be charged with encroachment
under the fisheries act, and face a maximum fine of 100,000
ringgit, or two years' jail, or both, if convicted.