GI JOE. Authorities at Los Angeles International Airport confiscated a semiautomatic rifle, but not from a GI…from a GI Joe action figure. Seems the action figure was packing heat—a tiny plastic replica rifle—that technically fell under the ban on carrying weapon replicas onto a plane. The English woman who was carrying the doll was surprised that the officials were taking it so seriously. “Security examined the toy as if it was going to shoot them,” she said.
A FROZEN TURKEY. Most people put a change of clothes and a few personal items in their hand luggage. In December 2010, one passenger packed in a 10 lb. frozen turkey. The man was headed to Malaga, Spain, for Christmas and was worried that he would not be able to buy a turkey for Christmas dinner. Too bad: the frozen bird showed up in a scan of his hand luggage and was confiscated by security. It seems perishable goods cannot be transported abroad without permission. Deprived of his Christmas treat, the man reportedly said, “Why are you making a fuss—will it thaw at thirty thousand feet?”
WHAT’S THAT IN YOUR HAIR?
These people give new meaning to the phrase “bad hair day.”
HAT GAG
Lady Gaga made a name for herself as the queen of celebrity style strangeness. And her hair is no exception. She wore a meat dress to the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards. But it’s the slab of raw sirloin she wore as a hat that really makes us shudder. For those who wonder how Gaga’s hair smelled at the end, the outfit’s designer, Franc Fernandez, claimed it probably wasn’t that bad. “It’s actually very clean meat,” said Fernandez. “It had a sweet smell. It hadn’t been sitting out for more than five hours.”
ELVIS HAS LEFT THE . . . HAIR
Actor Russell Brand prefers his animal fashion accessories to be alive. In his hair: a mouse. “Elvis—that was his name,” Brand said in an interview with the BBC. “He lived there for about a month.” According to Brand, he bought Elvis with the intention of keeping him in his hair indefinitely. “I just thought it would be nice to have him there,” he said. The only time Brand ran into problems was at night. “He had a Tupperware box he occupied when I had to sleep.”
FEATHERS AND FINS
When celebs like Hilary Duff, Ke$ha, Miley Cyrus, and Steven Tyler from American Idol started wearing feather extensions in their hair, they started a trend. That affected… the fly-fishing industry. Here’s the thing: women started going to fly-fishing shops to find feathers. “It takes years and years and years to develop chickens to grow these feathers,” said the assistant manager of one shop. “Now, instead of ending up on a fly, they’re going into women’s hair.” Regular customers can find themselves out of luck when a store’s entire stock of chicken feathers has ended up in women’s hair. “A lot of people are peeved about it,” said the manager. (But we’re guessing the fish are pleased.)
MO-HAWKING HEALTH FOOD
Gasmy Joseph—nicknamed Mohawk—from Pompano Beach, Florida, found a way to earn cash with his Mohawk hairdo. It all started when a buddy asked Gaz to spray-paint a message on his hair to spread the word about his birthday party. Now, Gaz sells ad space on his high-standing hair. His clients include Deliver Lean, a health-food catering company. The company paid Gaz to spray-paint its logo on his Mohawk and walk around at Miami Heat and Florida Panthers games. “It’s been tremendous marketing,” said the company’s founder. “It’s great exposure, and it’s never been done before.”
•••
WHO’S HAUNTING WHO?
Some say ghosts are dead people who don’t know they’re dead. They’re still hanging around the same old places, so how could they be dead? It’s not logical… but this puzzle is.
FOUR FRIENDS have accepted a challenge to spend the night in the creepy old Miller Mansion. Craig, Tyler, Jake, and Drew will win a big reward if they can endure the night, but each must stay alone in a bedroom until dawn. And the Miller Mansion is haunted… by four seriously angry ghosts. It’s past midnight, and the ghosts—Henry, Patrick, Lucy, and the Butler—want to see and be seen. Use these 10 clues to figure out which ghost is haunting each boy.
1.The Butler was serving dinner in 1877 when little Henry said his first word: “vomit.”
2.Jake’s room is the only room in the attic.
3.Lucy and Henry were twins.
4.In 1893, 10-year-old Patrick was killed by poison.
5.Craig did not choose the gray room.
6.The ghost in the red room can be heard crying for his cat.
7.The oldest ghost was stabbed to death in 1939 in the yellow room, which he haunts.
8.The youngest ghost throws books in the gray room, which is across the hall from the blue room.
9.The ghost in Drew’s room died peacefully, but she’s been restless ever since.
10.The Butler never goes higher than the second floor.
Need a hint? First figure out which ghost is the oldest and which is the youngest. Where does that lead you?
Need another hint? Make a chart like the one below. List the four boys, then the four room colors. Make a second chart for the ghosts and the rooms. As you read clues, X out the boxes that the clues rule out. (We’ve filled in Clue 5 to get you started.
Answers on page 285.
VILLAINESSES
Sometimes movie bad guys aren’t guys at all!
VILLAINESS: Cruella de Vil, 101 Dalmatians (1961)
HOW BAD IS SHE? Subtract the la from Cruella, you get cruel, and de + vil = devil. Rich and spoiled, this cruel devil loves her collection of fur coats more than anything. In the movie, she’s on a single-minded mission to obtain fur for a black-and-white-spotted coat. Only one animal has white fur with black spots: the Dalmatian. Cruella’s dastardly plan? Kidnap and skin Dalmatian puppies to make the coat.
VILLAINESS: Ursula, The Little Mermaid (1989)
HOW BAD IS SHE? This movie “bad girl” is a half-octopus half-human sea witch who’s been cast out of the undersea kingdom by the mermaid’s father, King Triton. Ursula wants revenge and she gets it by making a devilish bargain with the mermaid. Ursula will transform Ariel into a human for three days. If she can win the heart of the human prince she loves, all will be well. But if not? Ariel will become Ursula’s slave. To seal the bargain, the mermaid must hand over her beautiful singing voice. The tricky Ursula then uses Ariel’s voice to snag the prince herself. When her scheme is uncovered, Ursula conjures up a storm at sea to kill Ariel and her prince. But her villainy backfires—she’s impaled by the ship’s bow and then electrocuted by lightning. (Ouch!)
VILLAINESS: Miss Trunchbull, Matilda (1996)
HOW BAD IS SHE? In the original book by Roald Dahl and in the movie, Miss Trunchbull—the headmistress of Crunchem Hall—is a former Olympic athlete. The hulking tyrant uses her shot-put, javelin, and hammer-throw skills to hurl students over fences and out of classroom windows. For the tiniest offense, she also locks them in “the chokey,” a dark closet lined with nails and broken glass. For bigger offenses, she gets cruelly creative. To punish a boy for stealing food, she forces him to eat an enormous chocolate cake in front of the entire school. Trunchbull’s motto? “Use the rod, beat the child!”
VILLAINESS: The Other Mother, Coraline (2009)
HOW BAD IS SHE? Coraline and her neglectful parents move into a sprawling old house. One rainy day, she finds a locked door that leads to a distorted-mirror version of her own house. There, she meets “Other Mother” and “Other Father.” They look just like her parents, except for the big black button eyes sewn to their faces. Coraline enjoys all the attention they give her until… Other Mother tells Coraline that to stay with them, she’ll need button eyes sewn into her face, too.
•••
Q: What happened when the ghost got lost in the fog?
A: He was mist.
RUN, MUMMY, RUN!
It’s a ghoulish race to the finish line!
WHAT YOU NEED: A big pack of toilet-paper rolls (one roll for each player), a bag for recycling paper, designated Start and Finish lines, and teams of two people ea
ch.
1.The game begins when the official shouts, “Run, Mummy! Run!”
2.One player on each team stands with arms at sides and feet together, while the other player quickly wraps him from head to toe in toilet paper so he looks exactly like a mummy. (Caution: don’t wrap so tightly that the mummy can’t hop.)
3.Once wrapped, the mummy must hop all the way to the finish line, cross it, and then return to where he started.
4.That mummy breaks out of the mummy wrap and now wraps his teammate in toilet paper.
5.The second mummy hops to the finish line, turns, and hops back.
6.The first team to have both mummies return home, scoop up all their mummy wrappings, and stuff them into the recycling bag wins.
FINGER FOODS
These treats will change your view of finger foods forever.
CHEESY FINGERS
WHAT YOU’LL NEED: A bag of your favorite flavor of string cheese, sliced almonds, softened cream cheese, and a butter knife
WHAT TO DO: If wrapped, unwrap each string cheese “finger.” Cut each one in half so you end up with two kid-sized “fingers.” Use the flat side of a butter knife to press knuckle marks into each finger. Then use a bit of cream cheese to attach a sliced-almond “fingernail” at the tip of each finger. Serve and eat!
BLOODY FINGER BONES
WHAT YOU’LL NEED: Store-bought breadstick dough, marinara sauce, garlic salt, Parmesan cheese, nonstick cooking spray, cookie sheet
WHAT TO DO: Spray the cookie sheet with nonstick spray. Pull apart the breadsticks and space them out on the sheet. Flatten out the ends of each one, then roll up the ends to form “knuckles.” Sprinkle each fingerbone with garlic salt and Parmesan cheese, then bake as directed on the package. While they cool, warm the marinara sauce in a microwave. Then dip your finger bones in the marinara “blood” and chow down.
SNAKES IN THE TOILET!
Heard of snakes on a plane? Well, some New Yorkers are having an even worse problem.
CORN ON THE JOB
Early one morning, a Bronx man shuffled into his bathroom. As he approached the toilet, something moved. He took a step closer and saw a huge white-and-yellow snake with beady red eyes coiled just where he needed to sit. He sprang into action—running out of the bathroom, jumping on top of his kitchen table, and screaming with fear. Then he called 9-1-1. Two minutes later, he called again. The police finally arrived and bagged a corn snake, which is a species of rat snake. Before corn snakes started hanging out in Bronx toilets, they used to hang out in corn silos, waiting to chow down on rats that hung out in the corn. A corn snake is harmless to humans—it might bite your bottom if you sat on it, which would sting a little.
KING IN THE THRONE
Allen Shepard found a different species hissing inside his Staten Island toilet: a brown-and-white-striped California Kingsnake. The snake slithered onto the rim of the toilet and prepared to strike. Shepard called a plumber, grabbed a broom, and beat at the snake, which coiled itself around the broom and held on for dear life. When the plumber arrived and took over the tug-of-war, he had to back all the way out of the bathroom to pull the 4-foot-long Kingsnake out of Shepard’s toilet. He tucked the snake into a cooler and took it to the Humane Society. Now, Shepard never goes to the bathroom without checking the toilet, the sink, the bathtub, and then the toilet again. And no one ever has to tell him to put the seat down!
PYTHON IN THE PIPES
Late one night, Nadege Brunacci from Brooklyn found a monstrous python peering up from the depths of her toilet. She slammed down the lid and put a heavy box on it. Then she started calling every agency she could think of to come and get the snake. Many didn’t believe her, and the ones who did said, “We don’t do snakes.” It’s no wonder: Pythons strike their prey and then suffocate it in their coils. The bigger a python gets, the more dangerous it is to humans. Finally, the fire department came to Brunacci’s rescue. By then, the python had retreated back into the pipes, and plumbers had to tear apart the downstairs neighbor’s pipes to capture the enormous (7-foot-long!) reptile. Now, Brunacci looks over her shoulder at the toilet whenever she brushes her teeth. And if she has to go potty in the middle of the night, she uses her daughter’s potty-chair rather than risk another late-night encounter with a slithery serpent.
A CHILLIN’ TALE
An Uncle John’s Eerily Twisted Tale
I’VE ALWAYS BEEN one of those people who knows exactly what she likes. Favorite food: cheesecake. Favorite color: grayish-blue. Favorite pastime? Duh, that’s easy. I like to hang out. Preferably in the family room on the burgundy chair. But really, I’m not picky. I have what you’d call a preternatural ability (just learned that word from the Discovery Channel) to get comfortable just about anywhere.
I’m used to getting a lot of flak for doing what I do best. I’ve even been called lazy. But honestly, I don’t see it that way. I mean, if you ask me, I just know how to relax. That’s a skill most people don’t have. And, really, what’s the point of running around like crazy all your life?
If you’re going to be as idle as someone like me, there are two important rules: One, don’t hesitate to use any object or person to help you get more comfortable. Even a fire hydrant has worked for me in a pinch. And two, don’t engage in arguments about your “laziness” with your parents. A solid “WHATEVER” will usually irrirate them so much they’ll leave you alone.
I’m pretty sure it was breaking rule number two that landed me in trouble. My mom asked why I was too lazy to clean my own room, and I told her I wasn’t lazy. I just had a “low energy level.” Mom told her Reiki instructor what I’d said, and she recommended that we go to this weird apothecary shop for one of their special teas. The gaunt man behind the counter listened to my mom go on and on about how I never seem to get up from the couch, how I watch too much TV, the usual. Then he pierced me with his bulging black eyes (seriously, they were solid black like an ant’s or something), and said, “What is it that you want?”
I shrugged. “I just want to chill. Is that so bad?”
The old man blinked, once, twice, and then he started zig-zagging from shelf to shelf grabbing bottles and emptying their contents into a small golden bowl. Dried flowers that smelled musty and sweet. Crumbling pieces of cinnamon-scented bark. A gooey paste that looked like something that had oozed out of an old wound. Finally, he ground the whole mess together with a marble pestle and poured boiling water from a teapot over it.
“A tea to give you exactly what you want,” he said, holding out the golden bowl.
I looked at my mom to see if she was serious about this baloney. She just stood there, grinning and looking excited. I decided that if drinking some wacko tea would get me back to my burgundy chair, then it would be worth it. I held my nose (literally) and chugged it down.
When we got to the car, I wasn’t sure if I was actually feeling weird or just thinking I felt weird. Of course my mom started asking me over and over again, “How do you feel?” which made the short trip home feel like it took a week. “Tired,” is all I told her, which couldn’t have been further from the truth. In fact, I’d never felt more energetic. I now knew exactly what it meant to have butterflies in your stomach.
But by the time we pulled into the driveway, the butterflies wanted to burst free. I made a beeline for the chair, clenching my teeth so I wouldn’t spew. The velvety fabric felt cool when I collapsed into it, like deep morning earth. I sank down and waited for the butterfly flurry to pass. And finally, it did.
I felt fine now—stiff, but fine. And thirsty. Suddenly, water seemed like the most amazing thing on the planet. For some reason, I kicked off my shoes and wiggled my toes into the carpet. Something wet and full of life-giving energy seeped into my toes, into my legs, and up, up, up through my entire body. Ahh! I opened my eyes and looked down at my feet. “MOM!!!!!” My toes hadn’t just sunk into the carpet. They’d turned into gnarly roots that went right down through the floor into the earth itself.
My mother came running, then she screamed and rushed for the phone. She dialed a number, then listened, her eyes going wider by the moment. When she hung up, she looked like she was trying to keep from sobbing, being sick, or fainting. “That man. From the store. He-he said, ‘I brewed a tea that would give her exactly what she wanted. That is all.”
And so I sit in the burgundy chair, just chilling… and I’ll be sitting here for my entire (tree-long) life.
THE END
NATURE’S BEASTS
Sure, they have claws that can rip out your throat and venom that can drop you in your tracks. But are nature’s scariest creatures really dangerous to humans? You decide.
BEAST: Grizzly bear
SCIENTIFIC NAME: Ursus arctos horribilis
LIVES IN: North America
FEAR FACTORS: These bears can be massive, standing up to 8 feet tall and weighing in at 800 pounds or more. They are at the top of nature’s food chain and have no problem gobbling down large animals such as moose or bison. And grizzlies can run. They’ve been clocked at up to 30 mph chasing prey. They have excellent hearing and a killer sense of smell.
THE TRUTH: Grizzlies do feast on other animals, but they mostly eat nuts, berries, leaves, and roots. As for humans? Not so much. Still—like humans—grizzlies are omnivores: they’ll eat just about anything, from pine nuts to cutworm moths to fish and “winter kill” carrion: animals that die during the winter. Humans who interfere with a mother bear tending cubs are asking for trouble. Otherwise, grizzlies tend to be shy and will keep their distance—unless you leave food out where their clever grizzly noses can find it.
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