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September 29, 2005, 1:03 PM CDT
Man Found Driving Ambulance With Dead Deer
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- A man reported missing from a Florida hospital was found in North Carolina dressed like a doctor and driving a stolen ambulance with a dead deer wedged in the back, authorities said.
Leon Holliman Jr., 37, was reported missing from a River Region Human Services facility in Jacksonville last month. The North Carolina State Highway Patrol found him driving the ambulance with the deer on Sunday.
"I don't know how the man got it up in there," said Sgt. Robert Pearson. "It was a six point buck."
It wasn't known where Holliman got the deer, which had been dead for some time, Pearson said.
Holliman was admitted to a North Carolina hospital for a psychiatric evaluation. Police said they would decide whether to charge Holliman after that evaluation is complete.
- The Associated Press
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Friday, May 13, 2005
Talking penis given the chop
A US court has apparently ended the television career of a talking penis. A three-judge panel of the Michigan Court of Appeals declared that the talking penis, nicknamed Dick Smart, telling "purportedly humorous" jokes on a local public access cable television channel constituted indecent exposure.
The court let stand a one-day jail sentence already served by the show's creator, Timothy Huffman. Wednesday's ruling contained a transcript of the three-minute segment that aired twice in 2000. It included the voice-over lines delivered in the style of the late comedian Rodney Dangerfield: "Hi, I'm Dick Smart. I am a comedian, yeah, stand up, ha".
Mr Huffman could not immediately be reached for comment but he told the Detroit Free Press newspaper he planned to appeal in defence of his right to freedom of speech.
- Reuters
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June 3, 2005
Restaurant uses toilet bowl theme
By WALLY SANTANA
KAOHSIUNG, Taiwan (AP)
-Taiwanese restaurateur Eric Wang has given new meaning to the traditional revellers' cry of bottoms up. His Marton eatery in the southern city of Kaohsiung delivers its food not on conventional plates and dishes, but in miniaturized Western and Asian style toilets, both the flush and non-flush variety.
For anyone missing the point, diners are encouraged to stir up mushy, earth-coloured offerings like curry chicken rice and chocolate ice cream to conjure up - well, the real thing. Located in a downtown area with a variety of competing eateries, Marton - the name means toilet in Chinese - attracts its customers through its some dazzling bathroom decor.
Walking in through an arched door, diners are greeted with a giant toilet bowl sitting between two urinals. White ceramic toilet sets comfortably accommodate their bottoms, and urinals grace the walls. Giggling helplessly, high school student Chen Yi-lin gulps down a chocolate ice-cream sundae served in a miniature Asian-style squat toilet, and admits that she is smitten.
"This is fun," she says.
Wang, 26, opened the Marton last year after a roadside prototype - a stand offering toilet-shaped ice cream cones - achieved runaway success.
Now, he says, he has moved decisively upmarket. "Diners come and walk away with the special experience," he said. "Many try to create more fun, stirring up curry and rice so it looks exactly like when you forget to flush the toilet. Then they gulp it down." For all its scatological excess, the Marton is following in the noblest tradition of Taiwanese novelty restaurants.
Other successful ventures have purposely confined scores of contented diners to coffins or jail cells, or exposed them to full-scale pictures of Chinese dictator Mao Zedong, Taiwan's political nemesis until his death in 1976.
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Friday, June 10, 2005
Woman caught trying to smuggle fish into Australia under her skirt.
SYDNEY, Australia (AP)
-There must have been something fishy about the way she walked. Customs officials said Monday they stopped a woman as she arrived Friday in Melbourne on a flight from Singapore, and found 51 live tropical fish allegedly hidden in a specially designed apron under her skirt.
"During the search, customs officers became suspicious after hearing 'flipping' noises coming from the vicinity of her waist," the Australian Customs Service said in a press release. "An examination revealed 15 plastic water-filled bags holding fish allegedly concealed inside a purpose-built apron."
The species of fish was not immediately known, but customs officials warned they could carry diseases that could decimate Australian fish if they escaped into local rivers.
Customs officers will charge the woman once they establish what species the fish are. If convicted of smuggling wildlife, she faces a fine of up to 110,000 Australian dollars - the equivalent of about $83,000 US-and could also get a prison sentence of up to 10 years.
© The Canadian Press 2005
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Chlamydia strikes penguin colony
Sat May 7, 2005 11:11 PM ET
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters)
- A mysterious outbreak of chlamydia, a bacterial infection which humans pass to each other through sex, has killed a dozen penguins at the San Francisco Zoo, a zoo spokeswoman said on Friday.
The illness turned the zoo's Magellanic penguin colony into a disease hot spot, sparking fatal respiratory distress and kidney failure that struck down 12 of the birds. The illness that befell the zoo's "Penguin Island" was not sexually transmitted, officials said.
"We suspect it could have something to do with the gulls and their droppings but it could have been something else," zoo spokeswoman Nancy Chan said. Fifty-five other penguins survived the outbreak, which zoo officials believe started in late February.
The outbreak was the second Penguin Island mystery to stump zoo officials in recent years. The zoo's penguins in December 2003 began swimming nonstop in circles after six new penguins were introduced to the colony. Normally the birds occasionally splash about in their pool. They went around and around until mid-February 2004.
"Even when the pool was drained they would walk around in circles," Chan said.
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Monday, May 9, 2005
Brazilian Town Declares Orgasm Day
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP)
-Sex rarely makes the news in Brazil's conservative Northeast — until a small town declared an official Orgasm Day on Monday. Espertantina Mayor Felipe Santolia endorsed the May 9 holiday, which he said was intended to improve relationships between married couples.
"We're celebrating orgasm in all its senses. There's even a panel discussion on premature ejaculation. But from what I've seen, women have more trouble achieving orgasm than men, especially in marriage," Santolia said by telephone from Esperantina, 1,300 miles north of Rio de Janeiro. Santolia said the remote town of 38,000 people has been unofficially celebrating orgasm day for years, but that the town's former mayor had vetoed a bill making it an official municipal holiday.
The city council passed a law Saturday creating the holiday. Santolia, who took office earlier this year, said he would sign the bill later Monday. "I'm 32, single and I have an open mind. Beside the theme is very much of the moment," he said.
Orgasm Day celebrations include a series of panel discussions by sexologists from across Brazil and a presentation of Eve Ensler's play "The Vagina Monologues." Santolia said the idea of celebrating Orgasm Day at first created a scandal in this poor region, known for its religious fervor. But he said residents gradually residents warmed to the idea.
"I've seen scientific studies that show when a woman is unloved, when her husband can bring her to orgasm, it affects all aspects of her life, her relationships with her children, at home, with the city and at work," Santolia said.
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Tue Apr 5, 2005 04:43 PM ET
New York delivery man stuck in lift for 3 days
NEW YORK (Reuters)
- A Chinese food delivery man has been found trapped in a broken elevator, more than three days after he was reported missing, police said. Ming Kung Chen, 35, who worked for the Happy Dragon restaurant in the Bronx, was reported missing late Friday when he did not return an hour after setting out on a delivery.
Police said he was found on Tuesday morning and was hospitalised with dehydration. Police were unable to question him immediately because he did not speak English.
Newspapers had reported the Chinese community feared that Chen, who is from Fuzhou province in China, might have been a victim of robbery or foul play by immigrant smugglers.
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April 6, 2005
Police raid strip club over 'art night'
A strip club in the United States that attempted to get around a ban on full nudity by giving patrons sketch pads for special "art nights" was cited for violating the city's nudity rules, officials said.
The citation was issued on Monday night to the Erotic City Gentleman's Club in Boise in Idaho. Boise allows full nudity for "serious artistic" expression only, so the club handed out pencils and sketch pads to patrons so they could sketch naked women. However, a police spokeswoman said officials concluded that patrons were not focused on art, so officers cited three dancers for violations of the city nudity ordinance.
"The case is being reviewed by the Boise city attorney for the possibility of future citations," spokeswoman Lynn Hightower said. Erotic City owner Chris Teague called the citations a violation of the civil rights of the dancers, as well as an "insult to the patrons". But the club would suspend "art night" until the matter was settled in court, he said.
- Reuters
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(03-30) SAN DIEGO, (AP) --
The hunt is on for a turd burglar.
Police in San Diego are searching for a gunman who swiped a bag of poop from a woman out walking her dog.
The woman told police that she was out walking her dog, Misty, on Monday night when a man in his 20s ran up behind her and grabbed the bag she was holding.
When the gunman discovered what was in it, he threw it down in disgust, pointed his gun at the 32-year-old woman and demanded money, San Diego police detective Gary Hassen said.
He then aimed his .22-caliber semiautomatic at Misty and pulled the trigger twice but the gun didn't fire, Hassen said. The robber ran to a waiting small, silver car and fled the scene, police said.
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(03-31) Harrisburg, Pa. (AP) --
Unusual noise complaints led police to a calf tethered in a small backyard in a city neighborhood. Officers confiscated the animal. Police said the family living at the home had bought the calf at auction and said they intended to slaughter it.
"They bought it to eat it," Police Chief Charles G. Kellar said. But Kellar said few places in the city would meet requirements of an ordinance that prohibits keeping a farm animal on less than about one and one-half acres, with at least a 1,600-square-foot pen, at least 100 feet from any road or property line.
"It's a residential area," Kellar said. "We certainly don't want people bringing cows home and butchering them in the back yard." Officers went to check Wednesday after neighbors complained that the calf had been mooing all night.
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(03-30) Red Lion, Pa. (AP) --
Minnie Stein had just one complaint on her 106th birthday. She was sure she was only 105. "She always thought that she was a year younger," Stein's daughter, Joan Gillespie, said on her mother's birthday Tuesday. But Gillespie said a birth certificate obtained from Harrisburg showed that her mother was born in 1899. "She was not happy about it at all!"
Stein struggles to hear and see. She makes her way around her small apartment, 26 steps up from the street, slowly but steadily and resists entreaties to move in with family members or into an assisted living home. "She won't hear of it," Gillespie said.
Stein has lived alone since her husband, Ervin Stein, died at age 52. She worked at a cigar factory until she was 70, has been in good health and said she didn't need dentures until she was about 103. She takes no medications and attributed her longevity to eating well and taking vitamins.
While Stein said she would have made some decisions differently in life, she wouldn't elaborate, preferring to talk about memories of a beautiful sunset, helping her father plant corn, and traveling across the Continental Divide. "One day when I was going along the road I just heard a bird singing so beautiful, and the air was so clean and so fresh," she said. "I will never forget it."
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(03-28) Hobart, Ind. (AP) --
While there's nothing special about U.S. Postal Service workers being terrorized by dogs, the size of one here is raising eyebrows. Mail carriers said they were recently unable to deliver mail to homes along a section of Guyer Street in this northwestern Indiana city because of a 4.5-pound Chihuahua named Bobo.
"The little Chihuahua was 10-foot tall when he was on the street," said Florence Page of the Hobart Humane Society, which picked up the dog twice for running loose. "It's kind of comical, you know, but after a while it's not any more." She said there were no reports of the dog actually biting anyone, however.
Police have nonetheless ticketed the dog's owner, Vicki Seber, twice in recent weeks for violating a city ordinance requiring pet owners to keep their animals restrained.
Hobart police officer Ron Schalk said he had no option but to cite Seber for allowing the dog to run loose. "The biggest thing I was concerned with is there were a lot of residents that week who couldn't get their mail," he said. "The little Chihuahua was running around being aggressive and trying to bite people's ankles."
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(03-24) SION, Switzerland (AP) --
Cows that lock horns in an annual test of strength in the Swiss Alps must face renewed doping tests, authorities have decided. "There are controls for racehorses and dogs, and there's no reason to do it differently for cows," Joseph Jaeger, chief veterinarian in the Valais state, said Thursday.
Valais' annual cow-fighting contest — known as "The Combat of the Queens" — pits powerfully built, black-hided animals from the Swiss Val d'Herens breed against each other. The grand final and earlier heats draw about 50,000 spectators, and a victory can add tens of thousands of dollars to a cow's value. Now officials will restart the controls, halted in 2002 after six years of nothing but negative tests, Jaeger said.
Cow fighting, which began in Valais in 1922, is based on the natural struggle between cows for dominance of the herd as they leave their winter stables and head to the Alpine pastures in the spring. During the largely bloodless fights, each cow tries to force the other to submit, using its head and horns. The contests often end without any physical contact between either cow, when one of the animals recognizes the superiority of the other.
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(03-24) MOUNT CARMEL, Tenn. (AP) --
A yearning for breakfast helped end a police chase. Jeffery Lynn Drinnon, 30, was arrested at the drive-through lane of a Hardee's restaurant about 5 a.m. Tuesday after leading police on a low-speed chase.
"He turned into Hardee's, pulls up to the drive-through and rolls the window down like he's going to order a biscuit before he goes to jail," Mount Carmel Assistant Police Chief Mike Campbell said. "They had the car surrounded with guns drawn at the drive-through at Hardee's, and he's wanting breakfast."
Police began chasing Drinnon after a market reported he drove away without paying for $7 of gasoline. Officers said they used blue lights and sirens to try to get Drinnon to pull over, but he kept going until he saw the restaurant. Drinnon was charged with driving under the influence, driving on a revoked license, evading arrest, resisting arrest and theft under $500. He was taken into custody before he could place his order.
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(03-18) Greenwich, Conn. (AP) --
A former Stamford police officer has been charged with lewd conduct involving a toy banana. Arthur Bertana, 62, who had been on probation for lewd conduct more than four years ago, was arrested Saturday after police said he placed a toy banana in his pants and flashed people.
Bertana was charged with breach of peace and interfering with a police officer. "Over a span of time, there were several reports of a subject wearing extremely tight pants with an obvious bulge stuffed down his pants," Sgt. Roger Petrone Jr. said Wednesday.
Bertana would allegedly greet passersby on the busy street while trying to draw attention, Petrone said. At times, he placed a bag in front of his pants, then moved it and show the bulge, he said.
"It was a yellow, plush, child's toy banana," Petrone said. "It had a smiley face on it." Bertana was released on a $5,000 bond for a March 21 appearance in Stamford Superior Court in Stamford.
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