FETCH!
Eight-year-old Olivia Parkinson of West Midlands, England, wondered why her usually springy springer spaniel puppy Barney was moving so slowly. A visit to the vet revealed that Barney had been eating everything he played “fetch” with. In his stomach were six fist-size rocks, five twigs, and whole apples. “I could never understand why when we played fetch, he would return empty-mouthed,” Olivia said. “Now I know.”
Orville Wright numbered his chickens’ eggs so he could eat them in the order they were laid.
APOCALYPSE? NAH.
The Cuban Missile Crisis wasn’t the only time the United States and the Soviet Union stood on the brink of nuclear war. Here are a few more times that the world nearly plunged into World War III by accident.
CRISIS BEARLY AVERTED
Late on the night of October 25, 1962, a guard at an Air Force base in Minnesota spotted a dark figure climbing the fence surrounding the base. The guard shot and killed the mysterious figure. The fence was wired to detect intruders, and as the culprit fell, it set off an alarm. But the fence was incorrectly wired, and the alarm set off a second alarm hundreds of miles away at an Air National Guard base in Wisconsin. F-106 fighter jets armed with nuclear missiles immediately prepared to take off toward the Soviet Union in response to the intrusion. But the nuclear strike was quickly called off after an investigation determined the identity of the fence-climbing spy: It was a bear.
INDIAN SUMMER NUCLEAR WINTER
In the 1990s, hostilities between India and Pakistan escalated over mutual claims of ownership of the Kashmir region. Both countries conducted nuclear tests in “sabre-rattling” moves. Then, on June 6, 2002, a 32-foot-wide asteroid entered the Earth’s atmosphere, breaking up and exploding in a fiery ball over the Mediterranean Sea between Libya and Greece. Just before the explosion—a blast that registered at 26 kilotons, slightly more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki during World War II—the asteroid flew directly over India and Pakistan. Scientists estimate that if it had landed in either country, it would have looked—and felt—exactly like an unprovoked first strike, and may have prompted the other country to attack.
THEY WOULDN’T BOMB US, WOULD THEY?
Just before 1:00 a.m. on September 26, 1983, Soviet defense computers received a message that American-launched intercontinental ballistic missiles had been detected in the sky, and were on their way to Moscow. Col. Stanislav Petrov was the officer in charge at the Serpukhov-15 bunker outside of Moscow, where it was his job to monitor the early-warning satellite network. In case of attack, he would notify his superiors, who would immediately launch a nuclear counterattack on the United States. But the computers registered only one missile launched from the U.S. Petrov reasoned that the message was a false alarm—if the Americans were attacking, they’d launch many missiles, not just one. He was right. The “missile plumes” observed by radar turned out to be glare from the Sun. (Despite acting correctly, Petrov was demoted.)
Tony Blair’s schoolmaster called him “the most difficult boy I ever had to deal with.”
ROCKET TO RUSSIA
On January 25, 1995, a team of Norwegian and American scientists launched a research rocket off the northwest coast of Norway. It contained equipment to collect data on the aurora borealis, or northern lights. The rocket was noticed by radar operators at the Olengorsk early-warning station in Russia, who mistakenly identified the small, unarmed rocket as a submarine-launched nuclear Trident missile headed for Moscow. The news was sent to Russian president Boris Yeltsin, who, for a moment, was ready to hit the “launch nukes” button. Fortunately, minutes later, the radar operators noticed that the “missile” was heading away from Russia, and determined that it wasn’t really a threat. The rocket collected its data and landed safely on an Arctic island a half hour later. Ironically, the scientists had notified the Russian government of the rocket launch weeks in advance, but the information had not made its way to the early-warning radar operators or Yeltsin.
THIS IS ONLY A TEST
On November 9, 1979, computers at three American military control centers (the Pentagon, the Pentagon’s emergency site in Maryland, and the Aerospace Defense Command in Colorado) all displayed the same grim news: Soviet nuclear missiles were on their way. Officers immediately put missile launch sites on alert and ten fighter jets took off to patrol the skies and shoot down anything suspicious. However, before launching a counterstrike, officers at the three bases decided to back up the information they’d received. Satellite data and radar across the country showed no signs of Soviet missiles in the air. It turns out that a training tape of attack scenarios had been placed into the computer running the military’s early-warning system.
Pumpkins were once recommended for removing freckles and curing snake bites.
I WAS MARILYN MONROE
Do you believe in reincarnation? According to a recent poll, 25 percent of Americans do. Wouldn’t it be fascinating if the spirit of a dead celebrity was inhabiting you?
SOME LIKE IT NOT
Ever since the age of five, Sherrie Lea Laird says she has endured unwanted and troubling memories—memories that she says aren’t hers. At first, Laird didn’t know who they belonged to, but as the years passed on, they seemed to bear a striking resemblance to those of Marilyn Monroe, who died in 1962—just a few months before Laird was born.
Laird grew up to become the lead singer of a popular Canadian rock band called Pandamonia. But the disturbing memories persisted. She claimed to friends that she could feel the sadness Monroe felt when John F. Kennedy ended their relationship, and even experienced the heart palpitations from the accidental drug overdose that killed Monroe (Laird claims her “memory” debunks all theories of murder or suicide). The memories became so unbearable that in 1998 Laird sought professional help. She was pointed in the direction of a Malibu, California, psychiatrist named Adrian Finkelstein. Perhaps he’d have the answers she was looking for.
YOU ARE GETTING SLEEEEEEPY
For nearly 20 years, Finkelstein has been a leading practitioner of “past-life regression” therapy; he hypnotizes his patients to help them channel the souls that inhabit them. Finkelstein took Laird’s case, and over seven years conducted hundreds of hours of hypnosis and interviews. Finkelstein believed Laird, but knew he needed proof before anyone else would, too. So before each session, Finkelstein did exhaustive research about details of Monroe’s life, then quizzed the deeply hypnotized Laird about them. She was spot-on every time, he says. Speaking under hypnosis as “Marilyn,” Laird answered questions that only the real Marilyn would have known, including details of her relationship with JFK. (According to Laird, he told Monroe state secrets about Cuba, and she first had sex with him in a car.) In addition, Finkelstein showed her photographs of Monroe’s relatives, and Laird was able to identify each one and provide more details than even Finkelstein knew.
In Summerside, Prince Edward Island, it is illegal to either borrow or lend water.
Laird believes that her own 21-year-old daughter is the reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe’s mother, Gladys Baker, who died a few days before Laird’s daughter was born. Finkelstein’s theory: Monroe and Baker are seeking an opportunity to heal their relationship through Laird and her daughter.
MEET THE NEW MARILYN
Finkelstein released his findings in the May 2005 edition of Malibu Surfside News: “I established through research that Sherrie Lea Laird is the reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe.” The announcement was big news in both the Hollywood gossip magazines and the spiritual community. Even the Los Angeles Times ran a front-page story about it, with the headline, “MARILYN LIVES!”
Skeptics claim that the whole “investigation” is nothing more than a publicity stunt to further the careers of both the psychiatrist and the rock star. If so, it worked. Laird’s story has been told in the press and on television; Finkelstein wrote a book about the case, entitled Marilyn Monroe Returns: The Healing of a Soul. Both have made the rounds on the talk-show
circuit.
The American Psychiatric Association refuses to make an official comment on the merits of past-life regression, and believes that reincarnation is a religious matter. But some in the medical community believe that Laird is a sick woman and that Finkelstein is making matters worse by enabling her. Bethany Marshall, a psychologist who often appears on cable TV news shows, claims Laird suffers from a “delusional disorder.” Laird quickly brushes these comments off. “Ask my friends—I’m quite normal. This is not a delusional thing; it’s spiritual.”
MORE “PROOF”
• One of today’s leading “medium channelers,” Kevin Ryerson, has announced to the spiritual community that after reviewing Finkelstein’s video tapes, and then channeling a 3,000-year-old Egyptian spirit known as Ahtun-Re, that the Egyptian god has confirmed that “Sherrie Lea Laird—and only Laird—is the reincarnation of Marilyn Monroe.”
• The astrology association Star IQ also conducted an investigation. Michael WolfStar, one of their premier astrologers, released their findings. “Marilyn’s Pluto and North Node are conjunct, while Sherrie Lea’s Sun and North Node are conjunct, and all four are found together in the middle of Cancer. It’s as if Marilyn’s death (Pluto) gave rise to Sherrie Lea’s personal identity (Sun).” (We’re not sure what this means, either.)
According to poll results, 20% of Americans believe it would be okay to clone extinct species.
CANDLES IN THE WIND
Through all of the hoopla (and her 15 minutes of fame), Laird maintains that the reincarnation is real, and something she never asked for. Feeling Marilyn Monroe’s deep sadness all of her life, she says, has taken its toll on her. So why the appearances on talk shows? “It’s just a case to bring more attention to reincarnation,” she said on the gossip show Showbiz Tonight. “The message is so much bigger than Marilyn Monroe. She was just a woman.”
* * *
PRIVATE MATTERS
• In 2006, 23-year-old Yarislav Ernst of Glivich, Poland, found out he had a malignant tumor on his tongue. He had a large section of it removed by doctors who then replaced it with tissue from another part of his body. “We removed the tumor and made sure that no malignant cells remained,” said Dr. Stanislav Poltorek, the chief oncological surgeon. “Then we collected skin, fat and nerve tissue from his buttocks and put it all together to form a new tongue, which we later sewed into his mouth.” The butt-tongue, he said, was working fine.
• In August 2003, Valdemar Lopes de Moraes of Monte Claros, Brazil, walked into a medical clinic to get treated for an earache. A few hours later he walked out—with a vasectomy. What happened? The nurses called Aldemar (for a vasectomy), and Valdemar thought he’d been called. “The strangest thing,” said the clinic manager, “is that he asked no questions when the doctor started preparations in the area which had so little to do with his ear. He later explained that he thought it was an ear inflammation that got down to his testicles.”
The 1st time Norma Jean Mortensen signed an autograph as Marilyn Monroe, she spelled it “Marylin.”
WEIRD AMERICA
Home of the free, land of the strange.
NO THANKS, I’LL GET IT MYSELF
In 2006, 3-year-old Robert Moore of Antigo, Wisconsin, spotted a Spongebob SquarePants doll in a grocery store’s “claw” style vending machine. His grandmother, Fredricka Bierdemann, gave him a dollar to try to get the toy, but he failed. She turned her back to Robert, fishing through her purse for another dollar and when she turned back around, he was gone. Then she spotted him: He was inside the vending machine, surrounded by stuffed animals. He’d reached an arm through the bottom of the machine and then managed to crawl all the way in. The fire department got him out. “He was having a ball in there, hugging all the stuffed animals,” Bierdemann said. “But I was shaking like a leaf.”
A LOT OF DOUGH
Panera Bread, a sandwich store in the White City Shopping Center in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, has a clause in its lease that forbids the mall from renting to another sandwich shop. When Qdoba Mexican Grill opened in the mall, Panera tried to stop them, saying that Qdoba’s most popular menu item—burritos—are actually sandwiches because they are made of bread (a tortilla) and filling (meat and beans). The dispute went to court. After testimony from a federal agriculture official and a professional chef, Qdoba won, with the judge ruling that a burrito is a burrito, and not a sandwich.
HOLY STAR WARS
John Wilkinson and Charlotte Law, who call themselves “Umada” and “Yunyun,” lobbied the United Nations to recognize their faith as an official religion. Their faith: Jedi, based on the Star Wars movies. According to Wilkinson and Law, more than half a million people in English-speaking countries identify themselves as Jedi Knights. “Like the U.N., we are peacekeepers and we feel we have the basic right to be recognized by the national and international community.” The two also want the U.N. to rename the International Day for Tolerance to Interstellar Day of Tolerance.
When jazz great Louis Armstrong got his first Christmas tree at the age of 40, he liked it so much that he took it on tour with him.
DEAR GOD
Bill Lacovara of Ventnor, New Jersey, was fishing with his son near Atlantic City in 2006, when a plastic shopping bag floated by. Lacorva retrieved it. Inside he found several brown-paper wrapped packages containing more than 300 unopened letters to Reverend Grady Cooper, a Jersey City minister who died in 2004. The letters were prayer requests, ranging from the humorous (a man who wanted to win the lottery twice) to the sad (an unwed mother asking God to make her child’s father marry her). The letters date as far back as 1973. Who dumped them is a mystery, but Lacorva told reporters that he plans to sell them on eBay.
THANKSGIVING REVENGE
On Thanksgiving in 2006, Sandy and Bill Cobbs were cooking their holiday meal in their Bloomington, Minnesota, home. Suddenly, they heard the sound of smashing glass coming from the dining room. A wild turkey had broken in. It tore around the house, ultimately causing $10,000 in damage to the carpet, windows, and walls. Strangely, the same thing had happened to the Cobbs on Christmas two years earlier. They’d been at their daughter’s home across town when a neighbor called to tell them there was a giant hole in their dining room window—a turkey had run through it. “Everybody thinks it’s funny,” says Sandy Cobbs, “but it’s not.”
HOW VOODOO YOU PLEAD?
The Miami-Dade County Courthouse has established a Voodoo Squad. Its purpose: to clean up the leftovers from voodoo ceremonies. Florida has a large Caribbean population, many of whom believe voodoo rituals can influence a family member’s court case. The Voodoo Squad reports cleaning up sacrificed goats and chickens as well as corn kernels (said to speed up a trial), eggs (which collapse a case), and cakes (which make a judge more lenient).
NOW THAT’S USING YOUR HEAD
In 1995, 37-year-old Peter Jonson of New York was shot in the head by a stray bullet from a gang dispute. He didn’t go to a hospital because he didn’t have insurance and feared having to pay off a massive medical bill. So he walked home, found a pair of pliers, and removed the bullet himself.
MADE IN JAPAN
On page 19, we told you about the Japanese obsession with strange products known as chindogu. But those products are designed to be weird; these products are real. And really weird.
SLIM MOUTH PIECE. This product is designed to “work on flaccid facial muscles” to get “a firm mouth and a slim face line!” You hook a small plastic spring-loaded device
into either side of the mouth, and say “oh-oh-oh” and “e-e-e-e” to contract and release the spring. Then, according to the ads, “you can get beautiful and forever facial muscles!”
SMALL FACE IN THE BATH. Called Ofuro de Kogao in Japanese, this item is for Japanese people striving for what is called the ideal face: a chiisai kao, or “small face.” It’s a rubber mask that you wear while bathing that will, supposedly, shrink your face.
PERSONAL KARAOKE. It has earphones and a plastic cone
that fits over your mouth so you can sing your favorite songs out loud without annoying people nearby.
SAUCE-DISPENSING CHOPSTICKS. These hollow plastic chopsticks dispense your favorite condiment onto the food as you eat. You can fill them with soy sauce or whatever you choose and not have to worry about having to deal with that messy soy sauce bottle. (Except when you fill up the chopsticks.)
WATER SALAD. It’s a salad-flavored soft drink made by Coca-Cola. Honest.
THE HEAD BATH CAP. You know how you sometimes you want to take a bath, but not on your whole body—just on your head? Well, you’re in luck. Just fasten the Head Bath Cap around your head just above your eyes and give fill it up with warm water and enjoy a nice “head bath.” And, according to the ads, the water from the Head Bath Cap actually seeps into the pores in your scalp…stimulating hair growth!
One glass of milk can give a person a .02 blood alcohol concentration on a Breathalyzer test.
WELCOME TO COLLEGE!
(NOW GET UNDRESSED), PT. II
Here’s the second installment of our story about a very odd college custom that—thankfully—has been gone a long, long time. (Part I is on page 93.)
GOING PUBLIC
Photographing naked young males was never a problem in the 1940s: In those more innocent days, there was nothing particularly unseemly about a man photographing younger men in the buff. Young men were already used to the idea of stripping down in front of draft boards and athletic coaches; doing it again for William Sheldon wasn’t that big a deal. Sheldon was even able to publish hundreds of photos of Harvard freshmen in a book titled The Atlas of Men, which explained his theories about an inborn link between behavior and body types.
Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Wonderful World of Odd Page 27