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Subject: MORE REAL NEWS OF THE WEIRD LEAD STORIES * In November, ecology activists in Chile issued an alert that two-foot-long mutant rats were attacking livestock in Santiago. At about the same time, residents of Brooksville, Fla., were complaining about the sudden public appearances of three-foot-long, 14-lb. nutria rats (vegetarian rodents once imported from South America for their fur). And two weeks later, the New York Times reported on the recent work of Louisiana professor Robert A. Thomas, hired with a $2 million federal grant to contain that state's nutria rat population, largely by trying to convince the public that nutrias are tasty. * Bobbittization News: In December, Alan Hall, 48, reported to police in Fairfield, Calif., that he had been Bobbittized by a woman in revenge for Hall's having killed a friend of hers 14 years ago. (Hall served time for voluntary manslaughter.) Then, two days later, Hall admitted that there was no other woman and that he had done it himself for unstated reasons. The incident took place only three weeks after Danish surgeon Joern Ege Siana reported outfitting a world-record 5.7-inch penis extension on a 42-year-old man, and only two days after the former Lorena Bobbitt, herself, was charged in Manassas, Va., with punching her mother in a family squabble. SCHEMES * In November, dentist W. Stephen Randall, 41, was charged with 26 drug-related counts in Bristol, Conn. According to the prosecutor, Randall had a drug habit and in various ways managed to appropriate patients' prescriptions. In one instance he made a rare house call on a patient, but while in the house, he raided the patient's medicine chest of valium and other drugs, and in another case, he copped a root-canal patient's painkiller and left her instead over-the-counter acetaminophen. * In June, Lake Zurich High School teacher Douglas Petrovitch, 28, was indicted in Waukegan, Ill., on six counts related to a scheme of awarding some students good grades if they would allow him to shoplift at stores in which they worked after school. In two instances, said the grand jury, Petrovitch arranged with students to pay about $100 for merchandise worth about $1,000. * Police in Edmond, Okla., issued an arrest warrant in July for Edward M. Jennings, 37, as the man who toured flea markets, pawn shops, and swap meets over the last two years attempting to sell his homemade box, rigged with computer parts, as an "atomic bomb" for $1 million. Because Jennings was on the lam, he was unavailable to tell why he thought someone at a flea market might have $1 million to spend on an atomic bomb. * In December, an industrial tribunal in Bristol, England, took under consideration the case of whether the 1996 firing of Gavin Rogers-Ball, 30, a member of the Wells Cathedral Choir, was justified. The chief complaint against him was that he had bribed a schoolboy in the choir to feign illness on a long bus ride during a tour of Germany--so that the driver would have to stop, which would enable Rogers-Ball to take a cigarette break. A 10-year-old boy induced himself to vomit in the back of the bus and thus collected the award, and his mother says she does not want the boy to grow up thinking this behavior is acceptable. FAMILY VALUES * Thomas Tillman pleaded guilty in September in Tampa, Fla., for whipping his son and stepson with a water-soaked leather strap and videotaping the beating. Tillman said he made the tape so that the boys could one day show it to their own kids as an aid in disciplining them. * Brian Cook, 29, was charged with aggravated burglary in Springfield, Tenn., in November after trying to rob his grandmother, Sue Denning, 64. Denning grabbed an antique clothes iron and hit Cook in the head, sending him staggering from the home. * The New York Times reported in October on the secret life of a 25-year-old British-born daughter of Pakistani immigrants living in Bradford, England, who has changed residences 19 times in the last five years just to avoid death threats from her own father and brother, who are angry that she refused at age 16 to accept a family-arranged marriage. The woman said that in her last conversation with her brother, he had promised to track her down and kill her "slowly." * In November, John Michael Harris, 17, escaped from a Wetherby, England, correctional institution, and police warned he might be dangerous, though his mother June called him a "good boy" and blamed "the system [for letting] him down." Harris is known in the press as "Blip Boy," because his 17-page criminal record, with 103 convictions since age 9, has by itself noticeably increased the juvenile crime rate. UH-OH * In September in Cormierville, New Brunswick, Kevin Bastarache peeled an orange and saw an inch-long, orange-colored Pacific tree frog leap out at him. A local zoo official, familiar with the species, said the frog must have entered the orange through a tiny hole and then survived on the juices. The frogs are found from California to Canada and are harmless, and in fact are sometimes kept as pets. * The Times of London reported in July that a telephone had gone on sale in England with a built-in stress-linked lie detector and a retail price of about $4,500. The manufacturer said the most promising sales market is executives, who would use the device to gather business information. In a test, a Times reporter called a used-car dealer, who consistently registered a high (probably lying) reading but also phoned a notorious London nightclub owner to talk about his public claim that he had had sex with more than 2,000 woman--and found the man scored low (probably truthful). * In November, two professors from Wilkes University, Wilkes-Barre, Pa., announced that, based on their study of 10 journalists at the local Times Leader newspaper, having Muzak on in the background at work not only reduced stress but slightly improved the journalists' immune systems. * In August, just after a Hudson Foods processing plant in Nebraska was closed down based on a highly publicized federal investigation that found e-coli bacteria contamination in ground beef, the company suffered another crisis. Hudson's Noel, Mo., poultry-processing plant became the first U. S. firm to be fined ($300,000) by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for causing workers anxiety by providing insufficient restroom breaks. ******************** 2) Computer Industry Acronyms ------------------------------------------------------------------- --- PCMCIA - People Can't Memorize Computer Industry Acronyms PENTIUM - Produces Erroneous Numbers Through Incorrect Understanding of Mathematics WWW - World Wide Wait COBOL - Completely Obsolete Business Oriented Language CD-ROM - Consumer Device - Rendered Obsolete in Months OS/2 - Obsolete Soon, Too. MIPS - Meaningless Indication of Processor Speed WINDOWS - Will Install Needless Data On Whole System MICROSOFT - Most Intelligent Customers Realize Our Software Only Fools Teenagers LISP - Lots of Infuriating & Silly Parenthesis RISC - Reduced Into Silly Code SCSI - System Can't See It DOS - Defective Operating System BASIC - Bill's Attempt to Seize Industry Control IBM - I Blame Microsoft DEC - Do Expect Cuts ------------------------------------------------------------------- One night after the big fight Mike Tyson was a bit depressed so he decided to get a prostitute to cheer him up. Afterwards, they were laying in bed having a smoke. The prostitute said "Well Mike, how's it all going?" "How's it all going?" he asked. "My life's a disaster. I was born to an under-privileged family, had a hard up-bringing, was thrown in jail for rape, now I'm on parole and I've hit a cop, my wife left me for beating her up, I have to pay maintenance for my kids, I've lost two world title fights, I've disgraced myself and my sport, they want to ban me for life and they won't pay me my money. Nothing could make my life any worse." "Oh, that's so sad!" the prostitute said. "I'll say one thing to cheer you up. You're a much better lover than Magic Johnson!" ******************************** Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, and Al Gore were in an airplane that crashed. They're up in heaven, and God's sitting on the great white throne. God addresses Al first. "Al, what do you believe in?" Al replies, "Well, I believe that the combustion engine is evil and that we need to save the world from CFCs and that if any more freon is used,the whole earth will become a greenhouse and we'll all die." God thinks for a second and says "Okay, I can live with that. Come and sit at my left." God then addresses Bill Clinton. "Bill, what do you believe in?" Bill Clinton replies, "Well, I believe in power to the people. I think people should be able to make their own choices about things and that no one should ever be able to tell someone else what to do. I also believe in feeling people's pain." God thinks for a second and says "Okay, that sounds good. Come and sit at my right." God then address Bill Gates. "Bill Gates, what do you believe?" Bill Gates said, "I believe you're in my chair." ************************* Subject: [Fwd: The Medical Institution (fwd)] A collection of documentation statements actually found on patient's charts during a recent review of medical records. These statements were written by various health care professionals including (we are afraid) a doctor or two at several major hospitals. The lab test indicated abnormal lover function. The baby was delivered, the cord clamped and cut, and handed to the pediatrician, who breathed and cried immediately. Exam of genitalia reveals that he is circus sized. The skin was moist and dry. Rectal exam revealed a normal size thyroid. The patient had waffles for breakfast and anorexia for lunch. She stated that she had been constipated for most of her life until 1989 when she got a divorce. Between you and me, we ought to be able to get this lady pregnant. The patient was in his usual state of good health until his airplane ran out of gas and crashed. I saw your patient today, who is still under our car for physical therapy. The patient lives at home with his mother, father, and pet turtle, who is presently enrolled in day care three times a week. Bleeding started in the rectal area and continued all the way to Los Angeles. Both breasts are equal and reactive to light and accommodation. She is numb from her toes down. Exam of genitalia was completely negative except for the right foot. While in the emergency room, she was examined, X-rated and sent home. The patient was to have a bowel resection. However, he took a job as a stockbroker instead. The patient suffers from occasional, constant, infrequent headaches. Coming from Detroit, this man has no children. Examination reveals a well-developed male lying in bed with his family in no distress. Patient was alert and unresponsive. When she fainted, her eyes rolled around the room. ************************

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