2. A Dutch funeral home worker was fired after he lost a coffin, with a body inside, on the way to a funeral. The worker in question was in a hearse, driving the coffin to its final resting place, when the back of the hearse opened and the coffin fell out on the road. Oblivious to the situation, the worker drove on; a short while later a bus pulled alongside the hearse and the agitated bus driver told the worker he’d left his payload down the street. “I thought he made a joke,” said the puzzled funeral home worker. “But when I went back I saw it was indeed my coffin.” The funeral home canned the worker, citing his lack of respect for the dead.
3. An owner of a Haitian textile factory is recovering from injuries sustained while attempting to convince his workers that the factory was not cursed. Workers at the factory reported that the mother of a former coworker paid to have a curse placed on the factory by a voodoo priest because she felt her son had been wrongly fired. A number of workers refused to enter the factory afterward, so the owner invited them to follow him around the factory. As the owner walked down stairs to the factory floor, he tripped and fell, fracturing an arm and his jaw and suffering a gash to his temple that required several stitches. While still maintaining there was no curse, the owner offered to pay a voodoo priest to lift the curse so his workers would feel comfortable returning to work.
Which one is really stupid?
Answer page 311.
Source: Ananova
NOW FOR THE IN-FLIGHT ENTERTAINMENT
Streaking—running about in a public place sans clothing—is not something we recommend that you do. The whole point of streaking is to make people look, and far too many of us have let ourselves get to the point where when we’re naked, people want to look away, which defeats the whole purpose.
But if you must streak, here are some ground rules:
First, have an escape route.
Second, don’t streak somewhere you’re going to have to explain yourself later.
Third, leave ’em wanting more. Nothing’s worse than a streaker who has overstayed his welcome.
“Sid” managed to break all three of these ground rules—with unfortunate results. The place he chose for his streak was the aisle of a Singapore Airlines airplane, on a flight between Perth, Australia, and Singapore. As you may know, airplanes in midflight are notoriously stingy with paths for egress. And coincidentally, Sid’s day job was as a flight steward for Singapore Airlines. At the time, he was off duty, but he was still on company grounds. And you can bet if he doesn’t lose his job over this one, it’s going to make some awkward moments with his coworkers.
He Didn’t Even Give Us Peanuts
Finally, and not to put too fine a point on it, Sid went a little bonkers while he was running around naked.
First he splashed wine on other passengers, then he began prancing through the aisles. “He wasn’t even wearing underwear. He was shouting, and tossing credit cards and photos out of his wallet all over the plane,” a passenger told the Straits Times newspaper of Singapore.
It was a heck of a show, but all shows have to come to an end, and after a bit of hide and seek with the cabin staff (whose path to Sid was blocked by food carts. Ha! Now they know what it’s like!), they managed to grab him, cover him with blankets and convince him that it wasn’t a clothes-optional flight. Shortly after the flight landed in Singapore, Sid was hustled off to the hospital. See—he should have planned that escape route a little more carefully.
Sources: Straits Times, Reuters
GIVE THIS GUY A CELL PHONE
What happens when an FBI agent loses his gun at a major U.S. airport? Now we know. In October 2003, an FBI agent at Denver Airport misplaced his traveling bag, complete with gun and credentials, while he took a phone call. After he realized he’d lost the bag, the entire B concourse of the airport was shut down for 30 minutes while they searched for it. This delayed a dozen flights and kept passengers from entering and leaving the concourse. They eventually found the bag in the restaurant where the agent ate earlier. Well, of course. Stuff like that’s always in the last place you look.
Source: Associated Press
TIPS FOR STUPID CRIMINALS
Because just when you think they couldn’t get any stupider, really, they do.
ARMED AND NOT DANGEROUS Today’s tip: Your finger is not a gun.
We shouldn’t have to point this one out, but apparently we do. In June 2003, “Seth” walked into a pharmacy in Neillsville, Wisconsin, with a mask on, made a thumb-and-finger gun with one gloved hand, and tried to convince the pharmacist that he was about to be robbed. Unfortunately for Seth, what the pharmacist thought was going on was that some profoundly delusional nutcase in a mask was making an ass of himself in his store.
The pharmacist came out from behind the counter, wrestled Seth to the ground, and ripped off his mask. Seth managed to skulk away but was arrested by the police shortly thereafter. It should be noted that Seth did not try his finger gun maneuver on the cops when they came to get him.
So there’s still hope for Seth. Not much, just a little.
Sources: Associated Press, The Smoking Gun
DUI DOUBLE TROUBLE
We don’t really have anything against the drunk and foolish, but we do think, as a rule, that they shouldn’t be allowed to operate machinery that moves from place to place. Furthermore, we strongly believe that those of us in charge of keeping the drunk and foolish off the road (i.e., police) should probably err on the side of caution when assessing the ability of the drunk and foolish to be mobile.
Our belief in this is only reinforced by this story, from the far northern country of Norway, in which officers came across a woman weaving over the roads one night. Our officers apprehended the woman, who cheerfully admitted to being drunk—and with a blood alcohol count of 1.7, “drunk” is a polite way of putting it. They took her down to the station, confiscated her license, and then (this being Norway, we guess), released her.
All Boozed Up and No Place to Go
Apparently, her place of residence was not ready for occupancy, so she asked if she could “crash” in her car. The police, taking pity on her, gave her back her keys—but they also disconnected the ignition distributor of her car, figuring that would keep her in one place until she could sleep it off.
Silly, trusting, naive Norwegian police. Several hours later the cops spotted someone weaving drunkenly down the road, and who should it be but, you guessed it, our sleepy-headed drunken gal. This time, she was stopped with a big ol’ bottle of beer between her knees and a blood alcohol level of 1.8—even higher than the first time she was stopped. The woman was drunk, but she was not so drunk she couldn’t reconnect the wires to her distributor and haul ass down the road. Our lesson: don’t trust the drunken and foolish, or you’ll end up looking foolish yourself.
This second time, we assume (and pray), they gave her someplace to sleep inside the police station. Hopefully with some bars. And without the keys.
Sources: Bergens Tidende, Aftenposten
SKUNKED!
Sure, playing with roadkill may seem like a good idea. But here’s why it’s not. Four Massachusetts teens ended up getting rabies shots after three of them decided to pull a prank on a fourth, and dragged a dead skunk into their pal’s car. After they all had a good laugh, they chucked the skunk’s corpse back into the woods. It was all fun and games until someone remembered skunks can carry rabies, and the police were dispatched to retrieve the skunk for testing. The body was too decomposed for accurate testing, and you know what that means: shots for everyone! (Well, except for the skunk.) So, kids, leave the roadkill alone. It’s just that many fewer injections down the road.
Source: The Boston Channel.com
DUMB, FOR GOODNESS’ SAKE
As much fun as it is to mock those who do stupid things, every once in a while someone does something dumb for understandable��nay, even noble—reasons. Such a person is “Nigel,” a mail carrier from Gloucester, England.
Nigel’s cr
ime was discovered when the tenant of one of Nigel’s rental properties went up into the attic of his home and found massive piles of mail stored there. Further investigation disclosed that it wasn’t just any kind of mail. It was the most dreaded of all mail—no, not your bills—junk mail.
Nearly 4,000 pieces of junk mail, to be precise.
The Mail Must Not Go Through
Confronted with the incriminating evidence, Nigel confessed to storing the junk mail, opening some to confirm it was indeed junk mail, and even burning some of it (for which he was duly charged with stealing, opening, and burning mail). But he had a good reason. He said that due to the volume of junk mail he had to deliver, he simply couldn’t deliver it all on time; his mailbag was just too heavy for him to haul around. So he sorted out all the junk mail, stowed it in the attic, and delivered the rest of the mail instead.
“He believed he could deliver the letters later, but then he reached the point of no return,” said Nigel’s solicitor. “He found the burden of dealing with so much junk mail too much to bear.”
Well, and who could blame him? It’s bad enough getting it. One suspects if they polled the people on Nigel’s route as to whether or not they really missed all the junk mail, they might have decided that instead of firing Nigel (which they did), they ought to give him a medal instead. But for all that, even well-intentioned junk-mail theft is mail theft, and Nigel could very well be stamped undeliverable while he spends some time behind bars.
Source: Gloucester Echo
THEY NEVER HAD A CHANCE!
In October 2003, Californians chose superstar Arnold Schwarzenegger to be their new governor in a special recall election, out of a field of more than 130 candidates. Schwarzenegger reeled in almost 3,750,000 votes. But you ask: how did diminutive former child star and fellow candidate Gary Coleman do? Here are his numbers and those of some other “notables”:
Gary Coleman: 12,690 votes
Larry Flynt (Hustler publisher): 15,464
Mary “Mary Carey” Cook (adult film actress): 10,114
Gallagher (comedian): 4,864
Angelyne (professional blonde): 2,262
The lowest vote getter? West Hollywood businessman Todd Lewis, with 172.
Source: CNN
TIPS FOR STUPID CRIMINALS
Because we like to see them get all indignant about the fact that we think they’re stupid.
EXCUSE ME, BUT DO YOU KNOW WHERE I CAN BUY A GUN?
Today’s tip: Don’t tell strangers that you’ve just escaped from prison.
Inmate “Ben” planned his escape from the Nebraska State Penitentiary meticulously. Having just been sentenced to 18 to 22 years for robbery, Ben managed to get hold of handcuff keys and made a daring escape from the prison parking lot as he was being transferred into the big house. After springing himself from the cuffs, he raced through the parking lot to a car planted there by friends. The car had keys in the ignition and a change of clothes. Off he sped to freedom, or what passes for freedom when you’re the object of an intensive statewide manhunt.
So high marks to Ben for the initial escape. But of course this makes the next thing he did even more incomprehensible. After four days of successfully eluding police, Ben marched up to two complete strangers on a street in Lincoln, Nebraska, and asked them if they could help him get a gun, since he was a recent escapee from prison. The only possible explanation for this sort of behavior is that perhaps Ben thought that, being a minor local celebrity—what with his picture in the paper and all—complete strangers would be so dazzled by his roguish persona that they would be willing to risk a little prison time themselves to help an escaped felon secure a lethal weapon.
However, in this case, the strangers were not impressed with Ben’s claim to fame and asked him to prove it. Ben wandered off to find a newspaper with his name and picture in it. Meanwhile, our total strangers, motivated no doubt by the desire to remove a dangerous criminal from the streets (and also to partake of the $2,500 reward that was being offered for information leading to Ben’s arrest) took advantage of his absence to call the local law enforcement. When Ben returned, the boys in blue bagged him and hauled him away.
The obligatory comment from law enforcement regarding the intelligence of the criminal, via Lt. Mark Funkhauser of the Nebraska State Patrol: “We’re not dealing with Harry Houdini here.” No, indeedy.
Source: Omaha World-Herald
OOPS, I DID IT AGAIN
Pop diva Britney Spears might want to watch her step in Maryland: the state’s first lady is gunning for her. Kendel Ehrlich, wife of Governor Robert Ehrlich, was commenting on Spears’s apparently less-than-savory influence on American youth when she opined “Really, if I had an opportunity to shoot Britney Spears, I think I would.” She was at a conference on domestic violence. Did Mrs. Ehrlich release a press statement the next day, sheepishly acknowledging she would not, in fact, hit Britney, baby, one more time? Oh, my, yes.
Source: STLToday.com
ANOTHER ONE FOR THE “EXPECTING TOO MUCH FROM FERMENTED POTATOES” FILE
In the first half of 2003, everyone was a little spooked by the SARS virus. It was like a common cold genetically spliced with the Terminator, and for a while there it seemed like you could get it simply by thinking about it. Since China appeared to be the epicenter of the contagion, a number of people looked at citizens of that country as potential carriers.
This explains why six Russian men in Blagoveshchensk were twitchy about the Chinese workers at a nearby construction site. Our heroes assumed that the Chinese workers were Far East versions of Typhoid Mary, just waiting to slip the dreaded SARS past their delicate Russian immunological systems. But our Russians a had a plan. They had heard Russian scientists say that vodka could ward off the SARS virus. And by golly, they were going to get themselves immunized as soon as possible.
A Vodka Tonic
The funny thing is, this wasn’t just one of those hopeful Russian folktales about the healing power of vodka, another on the list of the potent potable’s many magical qualities. Russian scientists really did suggest a belt of vodka to ward off SARS. According to the Ananova news service, researchers at Moscow’s Medical Academy suggested in May 2003 that 10 centiliters of vodka (that’s a double shot) administered daily, should be more than enough to keep the virus at bay. This is on top of vodka’s other medically significant qualities, such as making you smarter, wittier, stronger, and more attractive.
The problem for our six Russian friends was that while they did, in fact, self-administer the suggested daily double shot, they drank a little more as well, just to be sure SARS couldn’t get the slightest toehold. A week later, after constant self-medication, our boys landed in the hospital with severe alcohol poisoning, from which they would take a week to recover. So while they didn’t have SARS, they got to feel almost as bad as if they had.
Remember: vodka—use only as directed.
Source: Ananova
SMOKIN’ AND DRINKIN’
Cities and states across the United States are banning smoking in bars. But in south Florida, one bar is ready for smokers who don’t want to leave the bar for their nicotine fix: the nicotini. The South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported that Larry Wald, the owner of the Cathode Ray Club, invented the drink by soaking tobacco leaves in vodka. The drink, which costs anywhere between $3 for a shot and $5.50 for a cocktail, is also available in menthol and in a Kahlua-flavored version known as the “Black Lung.” Drink up!
Source: South Florida Sun-Sentinel
THE REALLY STUPID QUIZ: THE ROCKY ROAD TO LOVE
Say “I Do” to another Really Stupid Quiz! One of these is the real deal; two of these should be left at the altar. Which is which?
1. A wedding in Odessa, Texas, was abruptly canceled midceremony after the bridegroom attempted to change the wedding vows without his bride’s permission. The bride, Cynthia Gates, had removed the admonition “to obey” from the vows, but groom Charles Curtis secretly asked the minister to reinsert it.
“When she heard ‘obey’ her eyes got real wide, her face turned red, and she started yelling at Chuck,” the maid of honor said. “It was a mess.” Gates took the wedding limousine to the apartment the couple shared, and threw Curtis’s belongings into the street. Police later called to the scene by Curtis refused to intervene. “She’s the lease holder,” an officer at the scene said. “She has the right to kick him out.”
2. An Iraqi man is getting married with a little help from deposed dictator Saddam Hussein. When the city of Baghdad fell to U.S. forces, our man entered one of Hussein’s palaces and helped himself to one of the beds he found there. The bed, made of mahogany, was so large that it took the man four trips to carry it to his home across the street. His fiancée was so impressed with the bed that she agreed to marry him. “I’m very happy,” he said. “Fate has finally been good to me and Saddam’s bed has helped me become a better man.” He also took a pair of slippers and an end table.
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