News of the Weird (June 7, 2015)
News of the Weird
Weirdnuz.M426, June 7, 2015
Copyright 2015 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.
Lead Story
“Meals” 2.0: Silicon Valley code-writers and engineers work long hours--with apparently little time for “food” as we know it. Eating is “time wasted,” in the words of celebrity inventor Elon Musk, and normal meals a “marketing façade,” said another Valley bigwig. The New York Times reported in May that techies are eagerly scarfing down generic (but nutrient-laden) liquids like “Schmilk” and “People Chow,” largely for ease of preparation, to speed their return to work. (The Times food editor described one product as “oat flour” washed down with “the worst glass of milk ever” (“pancake batter,” according to a Times reporter). (That supermarket staple “Ensure”? According to the food editor, it’s “fine wine” compared to Schmilk.) [New York Times, 5-25-2015]
Distracted Americans
Air travelers last year left $675,000 in (obviously) spare change in airport screening bins (reported the Transportation Security Administration in April). Of the cars reported stolen in 2014, 44,828 were with keys left inside them (according to an April National Insurance Crime Bureau release). American credit-card holders fail to claim “about $4 billion” in earned “rewards” each year (according to CardHub.com’s 2015 Credit Card Rewards Report). [Time magazine, 4-7-2015] [Bloomberg Business, 4-27-2015] [CardHub.com/edu/credit-card-rewards-study/]
Our Least Hardy Generation
(1) Nursing student Jennifer Burbella filed a lawsuit against Misericordia University (near Scranton, Pa.) for not helping her enough to pass a required course that she failed twice. The professional caregiver-to-be complained of stress so severe that she needed a distraction-free room, and extra time, for the exam but claims she deserved even further special treatment. (2) Four Columbia University students complained in May that courses in Greek mythology and Roman poetry need “trigger” warnings--advance notice to super-sensitive students that history may include narratives of “disturbing” events (that have somehow been studied without such warnings for centuries). [Fox News, 5-13-2015] [Washington Post, 5-14-2015]
In March, following the departure of Zayn Malik from the British band “One Direction,” an executive with the Peninsula employment law firm in Manchester told London’s Daily Telegraph that he had received “hundreds” of calls from employers seeking advice about workers who were requesting “compassionate” leave because Malik’s resignation had left them distraught. (Also, a spokeswoman for the charity Young Minds told the Telegraph she was concerned about Malik fans self-harming.) [Daily Telegraph, 3-27-2015]
Bright Ideas
Among recent inventions not expected to draw venture-capital interest (reported by Popular Science in June): (1) a Canadian software engineer’s machine that unspools toilet paper exactly three squares at a time (but please keep fingers away from the cleaver!); (2) a Japanese shoulder-mounted tomato-feeder that provides nourishment to marathoners without their needing to catch tomatoes provided by supporters; (3) Google software engineer Maurice Bos’s whiteboard-mounted clock that writes down the exact time, with a marker, at five-minute intervals (after erasing the previous time). [Popular Science, June 2015]
Fine Points of the Law
Britain’s Home Office, judging requests for asylum by immigrants threatened with deportation but who fear oppressive treatment if returned to their home countries, recently turned down asylum for Nigerian lesbian activist Aderonke Apata, 47, apparently because the Office doubted her orientation. Though Apata had submitted testimonials (and even photographs) “proving” her homosexuality, the Home Office was skeptical because she had children from a previous heterosexual relationship. On the other hand, an immigration court in England ruled in April that a Libyan man, identified only as “HU,” could not be deported since he is a career criminal and a chronic drunk who would be so unlikely to reform his drinking that he would surely face a lifetime of prison in Libya. [Daily Telegraph, 3-4-2015] [Daily Telegraph, 4-27-2015]
The Continuing Crisis
If Only There Were Somewhere He Could Have Turned For Moral Guidance: Suspended Catholic Monsignor Kevin Wallin, 63, was sentenced in May to more than five years in prison for running a meth distribution ring from Bridgeport, Conn., where he also operated a sex shop to launder the drug profits. (Though he faced a 10-year sentence, he had a history of charity work and submitted more than 80 letters of support from high-ranking clergy.) [Associated Press via WTIC-TV (Hartford), 5-7-2015]
People Different From Us
Walter Merrick, 66, was charged with aggravated assault in the New Orleans suburb of Harvey, La., in March after an altercation with neighbor Clarence Sturdivant, 64, over the comparative merits of Busch and Budweiser beers. (Bud-man Sturdivant fired the only shot, but a sheriff’s deputy said Merrick was the aggressor--since he had offered Sturdivant only a Busch.) (In Tulsa, Okla., in April, police found two blood-splattered men in an apartment parking lot at 1 a.m., the result of a dual stabbing spree with broken beer bottles--over whether Android phones are superior to iPhones.) [Reuters, 5-13-2015] [KTUL-TV (Tulsa), 4-17-2015]
Pointless
Holly Solomon, 31, pleaded guilty in April to aggravated assault with her Jeep--against her then-husband--and has been sentenced to 3-1/2 years in prison. The crime occurred in a suburb of Phoenix, Ariz., in November 2012, days after President Obama’s re-election, as Solomon ran down her spouse because she was angry that he had neglected to vote for Mitt Romney as expected. However, his no-show did not affect the outcome, as Romney easily won the state’s 11 electoral votes without him. [Reuters, 5-21-2015]
Least Competent Criminals
Short-Attention-Span Thieves: (1) Alvaro Ortega, 34, was arrested for taking a uniformed police officer’s cell phone in the East Coast Catering deli in Bayonne, N.J., on May 18th. The sleuthing was easy, in that Ortega was the only other person in the deli at the time and sheepishly admitted the theft. (2) Seattle’s KIRO-TV reported in May that a Seattle couple, holding a Powerball ticket worth $1 million, still has it despite being theft victims. Someone smashed open a window in their car on May 14th and stole, among other items, a pair of sunglasses that was resting atop the lottery ticket, but left it undisturbed. [The Jersey Journal, 5-21-2015] [KIRO-TV, 5-27-2015]
The Pervo-American Community
Footnotes: (1) Rusty Sills, 56, previously an “underwear bandit” in West Des Moines, Iowa, was arrested in Pinellas Park, Fla., in March and charged with stealing women’s shoes--sometimes “replacing” them with shoes he no longer fancied. (Police found about 100 pairs at his home.) (2) James Dowdy, 43, on parole for an earlier sock theft, was arrested once again in Belleville, Ill., after police received reports of socks missing in burglaries. Authorities said Dowdy had been involved in “other types of sock-related incidents [and] using socks in an inappropriate and obscene manner,” but details were not reported. (Found in a search of Dowdy’s home were notebooks of children’s name, ages, and type of socks worn.) [WFTS-TV (Tampa), 3-16-2015] [Belleville News-Democrat, 5-20-2015]
Is This a Great Country or What?
Faced with a government fee accepted by most real estate investors who view it as a routine cost of doing business, wealthy Arizona investor Wayne Howard balked. Instead of the ordinary filing-fee rate of $50 for registering a property deed, he demanded that all 2,922 of his deeds be recorded for $500, and when the Pinal County treasurer turned him down, he told the official he would simply use his pull in the legislature to change the law and get his discount (99.6 percent per deed) that way. (He almost succeeded. The bill passed the state Senate and was favored in the House, but after the Arizona Republic newspaper exposed Howard’s imperial move, it failed, 30-28.) [Arizona Republic, 3-18-2015]
A News of the Weird Classic (March 2011)
Tombstone, Ariz., which was the site of the legendary 1881 "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" (commemorated in a 1957 movie), is about 70 miles from the Tucson shopping center where U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and others were shot in January [2011]. A Los Angeles Times dispatch later that month noted that the "Wild West" of 1881 Tombstone had far stricter gun control than 2011 Arizona. The historic gunfight occurred when the marshal (Virgil Earp, brother of Wyatt) tried to enforce the town's no-carry law against local thugs. Today, however, with few restrictions and no licenses required, virtually any Arizonan 18 or older can carry a handgun openly. [Los Angeles Times, 1-23-2011]
Thanks This Week to Gerald Davidson and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.
Weirdnuz.M426, June 7, 2015
Copyright 2015 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.
Lead Story
“Meals” 2.0: Silicon Valley code-writers and engineers work long hours--with apparently little time for “food” as we know it. Eating is “time wasted,” in the words of celebrity inventor Elon Musk, and normal meals a “marketing façade,” said another Valley bigwig. The New York Times reported in May that techies are eagerly scarfing down generic (but nutrient-laden) liquids like “Schmilk” and “People Chow,” largely for ease of preparation, to speed their return to work. (The Times food editor described one product as “oat flour” washed down with “the worst glass of milk ever” (“pancake batter,” according to a Times reporter). (That supermarket staple “Ensure”? According to the food editor, it’s “fine wine” compared to Schmilk.) [New York Times, 5-25-2015]
Distracted Americans
Air travelers last year left $675,000 in (obviously) spare change in airport screening bins (reported the Transportation Security Administration in April). Of the cars reported stolen in 2014, 44,828 were with keys left inside them (according to an April National Insurance Crime Bureau release). American credit-card holders fail to claim “about $4 billion” in earned “rewards” each year (according to CardHub.com’s 2015 Credit Card Rewards Report). [Time magazine, 4-7-2015] [Bloomberg Business, 4-27-2015] [CardHub.com/edu/credit-card-rewards-study/]
Our Least Hardy Generation
(1) Nursing student Jennifer Burbella filed a lawsuit against Misericordia University (near Scranton, Pa.) for not helping her enough to pass a required course that she failed twice. The professional caregiver-to-be complained of stress so severe that she needed a distraction-free room, and extra time, for the exam but claims she deserved even further special treatment. (2) Four Columbia University students complained in May that courses in Greek mythology and Roman poetry need “trigger” warnings--advance notice to super-sensitive students that history may include narratives of “disturbing” events (that have somehow been studied without such warnings for centuries). [Fox News, 5-13-2015] [Washington Post, 5-14-2015]
In March, following the departure of Zayn Malik from the British band “One Direction,” an executive with the Peninsula employment law firm in Manchester told London’s Daily Telegraph that he had received “hundreds” of calls from employers seeking advice about workers who were requesting “compassionate” leave because Malik’s resignation had left them distraught. (Also, a spokeswoman for the charity Young Minds told the Telegraph she was concerned about Malik fans self-harming.) [Daily Telegraph, 3-27-2015]
Bright Ideas
Among recent inventions not expected to draw venture-capital interest (reported by Popular Science in June): (1) a Canadian software engineer’s machine that unspools toilet paper exactly three squares at a time (but please keep fingers away from the cleaver!); (2) a Japanese shoulder-mounted tomato-feeder that provides nourishment to marathoners without their needing to catch tomatoes provided by supporters; (3) Google software engineer Maurice Bos’s whiteboard-mounted clock that writes down the exact time, with a marker, at five-minute intervals (after erasing the previous time). [Popular Science, June 2015]
Fine Points of the Law
Britain’s Home Office, judging requests for asylum by immigrants threatened with deportation but who fear oppressive treatment if returned to their home countries, recently turned down asylum for Nigerian lesbian activist Aderonke Apata, 47, apparently because the Office doubted her orientation. Though Apata had submitted testimonials (and even photographs) “proving” her homosexuality, the Home Office was skeptical because she had children from a previous heterosexual relationship. On the other hand, an immigration court in England ruled in April that a Libyan man, identified only as “HU,” could not be deported since he is a career criminal and a chronic drunk who would be so unlikely to reform his drinking that he would surely face a lifetime of prison in Libya. [Daily Telegraph, 3-4-2015] [Daily Telegraph, 4-27-2015]
The Continuing Crisis
If Only There Were Somewhere He Could Have Turned For Moral Guidance: Suspended Catholic Monsignor Kevin Wallin, 63, was sentenced in May to more than five years in prison for running a meth distribution ring from Bridgeport, Conn., where he also operated a sex shop to launder the drug profits. (Though he faced a 10-year sentence, he had a history of charity work and submitted more than 80 letters of support from high-ranking clergy.) [Associated Press via WTIC-TV (Hartford), 5-7-2015]
People Different From Us
Walter Merrick, 66, was charged with aggravated assault in the New Orleans suburb of Harvey, La., in March after an altercation with neighbor Clarence Sturdivant, 64, over the comparative merits of Busch and Budweiser beers. (Bud-man Sturdivant fired the only shot, but a sheriff’s deputy said Merrick was the aggressor--since he had offered Sturdivant only a Busch.) (In Tulsa, Okla., in April, police found two blood-splattered men in an apartment parking lot at 1 a.m., the result of a dual stabbing spree with broken beer bottles--over whether Android phones are superior to iPhones.) [Reuters, 5-13-2015] [KTUL-TV (Tulsa), 4-17-2015]
Pointless
Holly Solomon, 31, pleaded guilty in April to aggravated assault with her Jeep--against her then-husband--and has been sentenced to 3-1/2 years in prison. The crime occurred in a suburb of Phoenix, Ariz., in November 2012, days after President Obama’s re-election, as Solomon ran down her spouse because she was angry that he had neglected to vote for Mitt Romney as expected. However, his no-show did not affect the outcome, as Romney easily won the state’s 11 electoral votes without him. [Reuters, 5-21-2015]
Least Competent Criminals
Short-Attention-Span Thieves: (1) Alvaro Ortega, 34, was arrested for taking a uniformed police officer’s cell phone in the East Coast Catering deli in Bayonne, N.J., on May 18th. The sleuthing was easy, in that Ortega was the only other person in the deli at the time and sheepishly admitted the theft. (2) Seattle’s KIRO-TV reported in May that a Seattle couple, holding a Powerball ticket worth $1 million, still has it despite being theft victims. Someone smashed open a window in their car on May 14th and stole, among other items, a pair of sunglasses that was resting atop the lottery ticket, but left it undisturbed. [The Jersey Journal, 5-21-2015] [KIRO-TV, 5-27-2015]
The Pervo-American Community
Footnotes: (1) Rusty Sills, 56, previously an “underwear bandit” in West Des Moines, Iowa, was arrested in Pinellas Park, Fla., in March and charged with stealing women’s shoes--sometimes “replacing” them with shoes he no longer fancied. (Police found about 100 pairs at his home.) (2) James Dowdy, 43, on parole for an earlier sock theft, was arrested once again in Belleville, Ill., after police received reports of socks missing in burglaries. Authorities said Dowdy had been involved in “other types of sock-related incidents [and] using socks in an inappropriate and obscene manner,” but details were not reported. (Found in a search of Dowdy’s home were notebooks of children’s name, ages, and type of socks worn.) [WFTS-TV (Tampa), 3-16-2015] [Belleville News-Democrat, 5-20-2015]
Is This a Great Country or What?
Faced with a government fee accepted by most real estate investors who view it as a routine cost of doing business, wealthy Arizona investor Wayne Howard balked. Instead of the ordinary filing-fee rate of $50 for registering a property deed, he demanded that all 2,922 of his deeds be recorded for $500, and when the Pinal County treasurer turned him down, he told the official he would simply use his pull in the legislature to change the law and get his discount (99.6 percent per deed) that way. (He almost succeeded. The bill passed the state Senate and was favored in the House, but after the Arizona Republic newspaper exposed Howard’s imperial move, it failed, 30-28.) [Arizona Republic, 3-18-2015]
A News of the Weird Classic (March 2011)
Tombstone, Ariz., which was the site of the legendary 1881 "Gunfight at the O.K. Corral" (commemorated in a 1957 movie), is about 70 miles from the Tucson shopping center where U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and others were shot in January [2011]. A Los Angeles Times dispatch later that month noted that the "Wild West" of 1881 Tombstone had far stricter gun control than 2011 Arizona. The historic gunfight occurred when the marshal (Virgil Earp, brother of Wyatt) tried to enforce the town's no-carry law against local thugs. Today, however, with few restrictions and no licenses required, virtually any Arizonan 18 or older can carry a handgun openly. [Los Angeles Times, 1-23-2011]
Thanks This Week to Gerald Davidson and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.
Comments
Meals 2.0 Sounds to me like coders are getting pretty pussified. Back in my day we'd just open their door a crack, throw in a bag of chips and a Coke ever couple of hours or so.
$675,000 in Spare Change Something about 'spare change' you need help with, Chuck?
Trigger Warnings Better let the seminary's know they're next on the list.
Malik Fans I'd fire any a$$h()le that even mentioned this sh1T!
EU's (UK included) SERIOUSLY needs to get their 'immigration' situation in hand. All either of them need to do is cross a border and they've got a 99.999% chance of NEVER even getting looked at for deportation again.
Monsignor Kevin Sorry, again, Chuck, what's weird about some church official acting like they're just running a business? Rome has been #1 in crime for millennia.
Beer vs Phones The beer fight I don't understand (1 sip & taste buds are dead) but anyone dumb enough to pay iPrices deserves everything that comes his way. My 10" tablet costs less than a third of an iPad, does EXACTLY the same thing, and came with a healthy software package.
Holly Solomon Good girl! I bet she's've gotten off scot free if the jerk had voted for Obummer.
Powerball Ticket Millions come and go but you've only got one pair of eyes.
James Dowdy Sailors have been using sox in inappropriate and obscene manners for oodles and oodles of years. (Good sailors can even switch hands and pickup a stroke).
$50 Fee Greed got in the way here. Had Howard pushed for FREE FILING I bet it would have passed. I mean, what the @$@# are property taxes being use for anyhow?
BTW, Chuck, I want to be thanked one of these weeks in your column. I know I've not given you any leads for quite some time but I do read your column religiously and by not mentioning me your depriving me of seeing my name in print and that's hurtful and could send me into a deep depression. Plus you should really have a disclaimer at the head of your column letting us know that we may NOT ever see our names under your by-line. Just so we know not to set our expectations too high. 😉
Also, thanks again for a great week!
$675,000 in Spare Change Something about 'spare change' you need help with, Chuck?
Trigger Warnings Better let the seminary's know they're next on the list.
Malik Fans I'd fire any a$$h()le that even mentioned this sh1T!
EU's (UK included) SERIOUSLY needs to get their 'immigration' situation in hand. All either of them need to do is cross a border and they've got a 99.999% chance of NEVER even getting looked at for deportation again.
Monsignor Kevin Sorry, again, Chuck, what's weird about some church official acting like they're just running a business? Rome has been #1 in crime for millennia.
Beer vs Phones The beer fight I don't understand (1 sip & taste buds are dead) but anyone dumb enough to pay iPrices deserves everything that comes his way. My 10" tablet costs less than a third of an iPad, does EXACTLY the same thing, and came with a healthy software package.
Holly Solomon Good girl! I bet she's've gotten off scot free if the jerk had voted for Obummer.
Powerball Ticket Millions come and go but you've only got one pair of eyes.
James Dowdy Sailors have been using sox in inappropriate and obscene manners for oodles and oodles of years. (Good sailors can even switch hands and pickup a stroke).
$50 Fee Greed got in the way here. Had Howard pushed for FREE FILING I bet it would have passed. I mean, what the @$@# are property taxes being use for anyhow?
BTW, Chuck, I want to be thanked one of these weeks in your column. I know I've not given you any leads for quite some time but I do read your column religiously and by not mentioning me your depriving me of seeing my name in print and that's hurtful and could send me into a deep depression. Plus you should really have a disclaimer at the head of your column letting us know that we may NOT ever see our names under your by-line. Just so we know not to set our expectations too high. 😉
Also, thanks again for a great week!
Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 06/08/15 at 05:17 AM
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