News of the Weird (October 18, 2015)

News of the Weird
Weirdnuz.M445, October 18, 2015
Copyright 2015 by Chuck Shepherd. All rights reserved.

Lead Story

“Tag” Banned; “Rover, Red Rover” in Jeopardy: Two suburban-Minneapolis elementary schools this fall hired a consulting firm to advise officials on kids’ recess, and the leading recommendations (promoting “safety” and “inclusiveness”) were elimination of “contact” games in favor of, for example, hopscotch. Some parents objected; “recess,” they said, should be more freestyle, unstructured. (More consultants’ advice: de-emphasize refereed “rules” games in favor of monitors who simply praise effort.) One Minnesota principal noted improvement--fewer fights and nurse visits now--but as one parent said, her child feels that recess is no longer really “playing.” [Star Tribune, 10-5-2015] [Mercer Island Reporter, 9-24-2015]

Bright Ideas

Unapparent Problem, Solved: Vladimir Laurent (an insurance executive in Coral Springs, Fla.) received his U.S. patent on September 29th and can proceed mass-producing “The Shield”--his brainstorm to keep men’s genitalia from dragging on the inside of toilet bowls while they’re seated. Laurent told the South Florida Business Journal that his device was something he “needed, personally” (though aware that not all males experience the sensation). “The Shield” is basically a cup attached to the bowl by suction but which allows movement via a ball-and-socket joint. [South Florida Business Journal, 9-30-2015]

Latest Human Rights

Kentucky’s government ethics law bars gifts from lobbyists to legislators, but state Sen. John Schickel filed a federal lawsuit in September claiming that he has a Constitutional (First Amendment) right to receive them. (The laws were passed after the FBI found several Kentucky politicians selling their votes.) And in May, officials of the American Gaming (gambling) Association and the Association of Club Executives complained to the Pentagon that a threatened prohibition of the use of government credit cards at casinos and strip clubs violated card users’ Constitutional rights, in that protected activities (such as business strategy meetings) take place at those venues. [TheIntercept.com, 9-24-2015] [Government Executive, 5-21-2015]

Can’t Possibly Be True

Florida Justice: Orville “Lee” Wollard, now 60, was convicted of aggravated assault in 2008 after he fired one “warning shot” into a wall of his home during an argument with his daughter’s boyfriend. Believing his shot defused a dangerous situation (the boyfriend had once angrily ripped sutures from Wollard’s stomach), Wollard had declined a plea offer of probation and gone to trial, where he lost and faced a law written with a 20-year minimum sentence. Florida has since amended the law to give judges discretion about the crime and the sentence, but Gov. Rick Scott and the state’s clemency board have refused to help Wollard, who must serve 13 more years for a crime he perhaps would not even be charged with today. [Miami Herald, 9-30-2015]

Inexplicable

Christopher Hiscock, 33, got only a year’s probation after his guilty plea for trespassing on a ranch in Kamloops, British Columbia, in September--because it was a trespass with panache. Since no one had been home, Hiscock fed the cats, prepared a meal, shaved and showered, took meat out of the freezer to thaw, made some coffee, started a fire in the fireplace, did some laundry, put out hay for the horses, and even wrote some touchingly personal notes in the resident’s diary (“Today was my first full day at the ranch.” “I have to remind myself to just relax and take my time.”) In court, he apologized. “I made a lot of mistakes.” “Beautiful ranch. Gorgeous. I was driving [by] and I just turned in. Beautiful place.” [Kamloops This Week via National Post, 9-30-2015]

New! Amazing! Awesome!

Low-benefit (but Internet-connected!) devices now on sale (from February MacLife magazine): HAPIfork (Bluetooth-connected, alerts you if you’re eating too fast); iKettle (heat water at different temperatures for different drinks, controlled by phone); an LG washing machine that lets you start washing while away (provided, of course, that you’ve already loaded the washer); Kolibree “smart toothbrush” (tracks and graphs “brushing habits”). Also highlighted was the Satis “smart toilet,” which remotely flushes, raises and lowers the seat, and engages the bidet--features MacLife touts mainly as good for “terrorizing guests.” [MacLife, February 2015] (not online)

The Job of the Researcher

Scientists have somehow determined that rats dream about where they want to go in the future. Dr. Hugo Spiers of University College London (and colleagues) inferred as much in a recent eLife article based on how neurons in the rodent brain’s hippocampus fire up in certain patterns. They discovered similar patterns when a rat is asleep just before conquering a food “maze” as when he awakens and actually gets to the food (as if it plotted by dream). (Buried Lede: Rats have dreams.) [New Scientist, 6-26-2015]

Latest Religious Messages

The Power of Prayer: (1) Two men with handguns walked through an open door of a Philadelphia home in July and demanded drugs and cash from the three women inside, threatening pistol-whippings. According to a Philly.com report, a 55-year-old woman in the home immediately burst into loud prayer, causing the gunmen to flee empty-handed. (2) Police in Bellevue, Ohio, initially believed that texting behind the wheel was what caused Marilyn Perry, 62, to crash and badly injure another driver. However, in July, she and her lawyer convinced a judge that she was “looking down” as she drove only because she was praying over “personal problems.” [Philly.com, 7-12-2015] [WJW-TV (Cleveland), 7-21-2015]

Perspective

A year-long investigation by Global Post revealed in September that at least five U.S. or European Catholic priests disciplined for sex abuse have surfaced in South America, ministering unstigmatized in impoverished parishes. In Paraguay, Ecuador, and Peru (all with softer law enforcement and media scrutiny than in the U.S., and where priests enjoy greater respect), dioceses have accepted notorious priests from Scranton, Pa., Minneapolis, and Jackson, Miss., and Catholic facilities in Brazil and Colombia now employ shamed sex-abusers from Belgium and San Antonio, Tex. (The Belgian priest had been allowed to start an orphanage for street kids.) Global Post claims the Vatican declined “repeated” phone calls for comment. [Global Post via USA Today, 9-17-2015]

People With Issues

(1) Miami-Dade (Fla.) police arrested Eddy Juan, 52, two weeks after someone matching his description was reported at a library at Florida International University, crawling under tables and sniffing women’s feet. He was charged with violating a previous sex-offender registration. (2) In what was originally a domestic-disturbance case, Britain’s Cambridge Magistrates’ Court handed Nelson Nazare, 45, a six-week suspended sentence in September--for the photo on his seized cellphone of a man having sex with a large fish (plus two woman-dog sex photos). [South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 9-15-2015] [Cambridge News, 9-3-2015]

The Aristocrats!

Let the Punishment Fit the Crime: (1) In September, convicted flasher Mark Thompson, 48, of Wimbledon, England, was given a four-month suspended jail term and also banned from wearing shorts on public transportation (since his modus operandi involved “adjusting” them while seated). (2) The Coventry, England, Magistrates Court sentenced Christopher Johnson, 46, in September for outraging public decency. He received a three-year “Criminal Behavior Order” and was banned from going anywhere that has a slide (after his arrest for simulating a sex act on one). [Wimbledon Guardian, 9-23-2015] [Coventry Telegraph, 9-21-2015]

Least Competent Criminals

Paul Neaverson, 61, was convicted in September in England’s Maidstone Crown Court for a robbery his own lawyer called “ridiculous.” He had gone to a NatWest bank in Rainham, pointed a knife at a cashier, and demanded that money be placed “on the table” or “into his account” at NatWest, according to the police report. Earlier, he had walked out of an HSBC bank when the teller balked at his robbery demand. He was sentenced to two years in prison. [KentOnline, 9-9-2015]

A News of the Weird Classic (October 2009)

The mayor of the Paris suburb of Levallois-Perret, faced with an overcrowded highway D909 through town, "solved" the problem (according to a September 2009 BBC News dispatch) by making the street one-way, sending traffic speedily into the adjacent town of Clichy-la-Garenne. That city's mayor (a political rival of the Levallois-Perret mayor) reacted by making his portion of D909 one-way back toward Levallois-Perret, thus “stranding” all D909 motorists, from either direction, at the city limit. Other officials are working to resolve the impasse. [BBC News, 9-1-2009]

Thanks This Week to Pete Randall and Alex Boese, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.

Posted By: Chuck - Mon Oct 19, 2015 - Comments (4)
Category:

Joe Smallbone, Eccentric

Joe Smallbone (1911-1985) was an eccentric who lived in Fenton, Michigan. He reportedly never bathed, and was always covered in soot because of the wood-burning stove in his house. He was a hoarder and visitors to his house would have to navigate a narrow path through the stuff. However, he was also a self-taught electronics genius, and everyone in town would bring him their radios and TVs to fix.

Joe Smallbone

There was only one photo ever taken of Smallbone, at the 50th reunion of his high school class. Someone cleaned him up to attend it.

Despite his oddness, the townsfolk accepted him as their local strange character. And his legend lives on today with a song and video about him created by musician Bonnie Whitehurst.

More info from the Tri-County Times: ‘A legend in his own time’ and Fenton grad’s video on Joe Smallbone going viral?

Posted By: Alex - Sun Oct 18, 2015 - Comments (5)
Category: Eccentrics

Shadows of Paragon:  Silentium

It's been way too long since we examined any Death Metal here. Or maybe, after you hear this, you'll say, "It's been just long enough, if not too soon!"

Turn your sound almost off first. Seriously. Don't be fooled by the melodic opener.

Why would anyone listen to this stuff voluntarily? Could your life really be so horrible that this music was uplifting?

Info on band.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Oct 18, 2015 - Comments (10)
Category: Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Music, Europe, Cacophony, Dissonance, White Noise and Other Sonic Assaults

Carve That Pumpkin!

There's more than one way to carve a pumpkin.

Posted By: Alex - Sat Oct 17, 2015 - Comments (6)
Category: Guns, Holidays

Palm Pistol

Coming in December the Palm Pistol. Its a 38 caliber single shot handgun made like a T-shaped screwdriver. The pistol was specially designed for people with poor hand strength from arthritis or disabilities. Or really anyone who finds a conventional gun difficult to fire. The trigger is a simple thumb push with the recoil dissipated into the palm. Great for defense but with only one shot accuracy would seem to be crucial as there may not be time to reload.

Posted By: Alex - Sat Oct 17, 2015 - Comments (13)
Category: Disabilities, Guns, Inventions

Funeral Traffic Control

1948: Chicago's Mt. Carmel cemetery sought FCC approval so that it could operate a two-way radio system to direct funeral processions, so as to avoid traffic jams in the cemetery.

I wonder if they had to build a traffic control tower as well?

Freeport Journal-Standard - Apr 14, 1948

Posted By: Alex - Sat Oct 17, 2015 - Comments (3)
Category: Death, Jobs and Occupations, 1940s

Follies of the Madmen #262

Posted By: Paul - Sat Oct 17, 2015 - Comments (9)
Category: Annoying Things, Business, Advertising, Products, Death, Insects and Spiders, 1960s, Australia

Launched in a sea of beer

In 1968, the General Dynamics shipyard in Quincy, Massachusetts denied the rumor that it was going to launch the USS Milwaukee by floating it out in a "sea of beer," but company officials admitted they had been considering the idea. They figured that it would "add distinction and excitement to the float-out."

They calculated that it would have required 68 million quarts of beer to achieve the float-out, and abandoned the idea because "we just couldn't figure out what to do with 68 million non-returnable empties."

USS Milwaukee

Related: The Banana-Launched Ship, 1941

Posted By: Alex - Fri Oct 16, 2015 - Comments (3)
Category: Inebriation and Intoxicants, 1960s

Westinghouse Soundwaves

It's been 65 years! Where is my home version of an ultrasonic washing machine, dammit!

Posted By: Paul - Fri Oct 16, 2015 - Comments (10)
Category: Domestic, Technology, 1950s

Mail-Order Foliage

The website shipfoliage.com, created by Kyle Waring, will ship hand-picked New England leaves to U.S. customers. For $19.99 you get three leaves — 1 red, 1 yellow, and 1 mixed-color. The site's "foliage experts" make sure that only perfect leaves are shipped.

$19.99 seems like a lot for three leaves. For instance, that's not enough leaves to decorate a Thanksgiving table (which I imagine could be one reason people might want leaves). Also, I'm pretty sure you can buy fake leaves that look pretty convincing at most craft stores.

Posted By: Alex - Thu Oct 15, 2015 - Comments (13)
Category: Business, Strange Websites, Postal Services