Child Dials Police
to Report Grandma's Dumplings (Couldn't Resist This
One!)
LINZ, Austria (Reuters) 10/02/02- A four-year-old Austrian boy was so
disgusted by his grandmother's plum dumplings that he dialed emergency services
for help, Austrian state television ORF said on Tuesday.
When the startled policeman on the other end of the line in Linz, Upper
Austria, asked the young caller what he thought the police should do, the boy
was clueless, the report said.
The officer pleaded with the boy to give grandmother's plum dumplings (Zwetschkenknoedel)
another chance. He agreed and hung up. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Fleeing Miami
Robber Leaves Behind His Gold Teeth - 10/02/02
MIAMI (Reuters) - A man dubbed by authorities as the "bumbling bank robber"
had his two gold teeth knocked out as he ran into traffic and was hit by a van
while fleeing a heist, FBI agents in Miami said on Tuesday.
The suspect, who also may have shot himself accidentally, escaped in a
waiting get-away car but police recovered his teeth from the street and held
them as evidence, the FBI said.
The suspect walked into a Wachovia Bank branch in North Miami Beach on
Monday, pulled a gun from his pocket as he approached a teller and demanded that
she fill a bag with money, the FBI said.
The teller gave him an undisclosed sum of money and he turned to flee,
discharging the gun as he stuffed it back into his pocket, the FBI said.
"It is unknown at this time if the robber shot himself when the gun
discharged," the FBI said in a statement headlined "update on bumbling bank
robber."
The suspect ran out of the bank into the street and was hit by a white van
and dragged under it, authorities said. He managed to get up and run to a
waiting car that sped away, leaving his teeth behind, the investigators said.
Police and the FBI were looking for him at hospital emergency rooms and
medical centers. The suspect was described as a tall, thin black man in his late
20s to early 30s. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Underage Italian
'Bonnie and Clyde' Amass Toy Loot 10/03/02
ROME (Reuters) - A pair of Italian children have been dubbed the junior
Bonnie and Clyde after stealing more than $500 worth of soft toys from a
supermarket in one week.
The eight-year-old girl and 10-year-old boy confounded security staff at the
Upim supermarket in the northeastern town of Trieste for days, before police
were called in to put a stop to their thieving spree.
"Shoplifting is part of our daily routine in this business. But these
children were making off with such quantities of toys I was worried they were
being used by an adult, so that's why I called the police," Upim manager
Francesco Mialich told Reuters.
"As it turned out they were acting alone, or rather as a pair."
Police searched the apartments of the children's families and in the girl's
cupboard found a pile of loot, mainly stuffed animals and soft toys representing
popular cartoon characters.
Mialich said the children's parents had refunded the price of the toys and
thus no charges were being pressed.
Local media have compared the underage thieves with notorious bank robbers
Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, who terrorized parts of the southern United
States in the 1930s. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Car Presented by
Hitler to Nepal King Gathers Dust 10/04/02
KATHMANDU, Nepal (Reuters) - A 1939 Mercedes Benz presented to the king of
Nepal by Adolf Hitler is rusting at an engineering college in the capital
because there is no money to repair it, a local newspaper reported Thursday.
The Rising Nepal, a state-run newspaper, said the car given to the late King
Tribhuvan by the Nazi leader was one of only three of its kind left in the
world.
"Its doors are coming off, the inside of the bonnet (hood) is rusting and the
seats are torn," the newspaper said.
The car was carried by laborers over the Himalayan kingdom's southern plains
to the Kathmandu valley in 1940, a time when Nepal had no roads.
King Tribhuvan, grandfather of present King Gyanendra, died in the 1950s. He
used the car at a time when Nepal had no other motor transport.
Biswanath Khanal, chief of the Thapathali Engineering Campus where the
vintage car is parked, told Reuters: "We have not been able to recondition the
car and run it now for the lack of funds."
He said $5,500 was needed to replace old parts in the vehicle which was being
used as a model to train mechanics. "We are already working on a very low budget
and don't have that amount for the car," Khanal said.
A former Nepali prime minister once offered to buy the car, but the college
had no ownership documents to sell the vehicle, the newspaper said.
Nepal, wedged between China and India in the central Himalayas, opened up to
modern development in the 1950s and now has more than 9,000 miles of roads
crisscrossing the nation. There are now more than 200,000 vehicles, including
motorcycles, running in Nepal. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Indiana Housewife Goes on Strike
- 10/05/02
ALBANY, Ind. (AP) - An Indiana wife looking for a little more appreciation
went on strike at home - and found instant celebrity.
Kathy Thompson quit doing housework Sept. 25, refusing to do laundry, cook or
make the bed. She said she was tired of working, going to school and caring for
the house while her husband Gary went out fishing.
When her unconventional campaign made it into The Star Press of Muncie, calls
from around the world started pouring in, she said.
``It'll be something I can tell my grandkids,'' the 45-year-old said Friday.
Thompson has appeared on television shows including ``Inside Edition,''
``Good Morning, America'' and Indianapolis television stations. She was
expecting an interview with CNN, and a television crew from Germany was due
Saturday.
``I've got those women in Germany in an uproar,'' she said.
Friday, the booking chief for Dr. Phil McGraw, late of Oprah Winfrey's show
and now the star of his own daytime show, called from Los Angeles to ask a
newspaper staffer for help contacting Thompson.
Holding correspondence from a woman who had seen her story, Thompson read a
passage from the letter, asking that she keep her in her prayers.
Other women have driven past and honked.
Probably nobody has been more surprised by all this than her husband. ``He
thought it was pretty amazing,'' Thompson said. ``I think he was a little
shocked.''
While her story has taken on a life of its own, Thompson is quick to remind
people that it started as one woman's campaign for appreciation.
``Like I keep telling people,'' she said, ``This wasn't for publicity. This
is a personal thing.''
One thing is for sure; she is appreciated now.
But the roses and an offer of a Las Vegas vacation she received this week
came from the folks at Inside Edition, not her husband.
``He's going to buy those flowers and take me on vacation,'' she insisted. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Trivia about your mail
What does the USPS do with mail it can't deliver or return because of lack of
a return address?
If a piece of mail is improperly addressed and does not contain a return
address, it is sent to a dead letter office. Dead letter offices are located in
New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta, San Francisco, and St. Paul. There a USPS
employee will open the envelope. If no clues to the address of the sender or
receiver are found inside, and the enclosures are deemed to have "no significant
value," the letter is destroyed immediately.
Frank Brennan, of the USPS media relations division, explains that if the
enclosures are deemed to be of some value, the parties involved will have a
temporary reprieve: "This allows time for inquiries and claims to be filed.
After 90 days, all items that have not been claimed are auctioned off to the
public. Cash or items of monetary value that are found in the mail are placed
into a general fund. If it is not claimed after one year, it is rolled over into
a USPS account to be used as the USPS deems necessary."
And, of course, we can all count on the USPS making the best possible use of
any windfalls that come their way. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Doctoring Dollars Trivia:
According to "The Jobs Rated
Almanac", 8 out of 10 of the best- paying professional careers are in the realm
of medicine. The top ten are:
-
1. Surgeon 2. Orthodontist
-
3. Dentist 4. Psychiatrist
-
5. General practice physician 6.
Podiatrist
-
7. Attorney 8. Financial planner
-
9. Osteopath 10. Optometrist
If you sell
your body to a medical institute, can you buy it back before you die?
-
That was the
question before a Swedish court in 1910. A financially desperate man had
signed a contract with Stockholm's Caroline Institute promising to deliver his
body after his death in exchange for money now. A few years later he came into
some money and wanted to buy back rights to his body, but the school refused
to sell them. After some deliberation, the court backed the school's right to
do so ... and furthermore, that the man had to pay the school damages for
having two teeth extracted without permission.
Can you sell
your body parts on eBay?
Needles Blur in Speed Crochet
Stitch-Off - 10/07/02
By Akiko Mori
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Fast fingers and 32 years of practice gave American Lily
Chin an unofficial world title on Sunday -- queen of the speed crochet circuit.
In a duel of flashing needles and whirring wool, Chin, 40, beat her British
rival Susan Broscoe to win the first national U.S. speed crochet contest in New
York.
Chin, a New Yorker of Chinese descent, completed 92-1/2 double crochet
stitches in the allotted three minutes while Broscoe -- who holds the British
title for the pursuit -- trailed with 76-1/2.
"I think it is so thrilling," Chin said, adding that she expected her feat to
win her a listing in the Guinness book of records.
"My mother thought I would be less hyper if I took up knitting," she told
Reuters. "Now I can do this with my eyes closed."
Chin, author of "The Urban Knitter," a book aimed at the new generation of
hip young knitters, said her immigrant mother from China inspired her and her
sister to start knitting at the age of 8.
She has parlayed her passion for knitting and crochet into a successful
career as a designer and teacher.
Chin was influenced by her sister to turn knitting into a speed game, but her
Chinese heritage played little part in her career as a professional knitter, she
said.
"My designs are very structural, but that is because I have a math-science
background," Chin said. "People say there is an Asian influence in my work but
that is very subliminal."
Leslie Barber, Managing Editor for Vogue Knitting International that has more
than 400,000 subscribers, cited an increased appreciation for family time after
Sept. 11 as one of the reasons for the increased popularity of knitting.
"It is back to simpler days. It is very nurturing," Barber said. "It is huge
on college campuses too." (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Man May Stay in Apartment,
Pig Must Go - 10/07/02
MONTREAL (Reuters) - A tenant in a Montreal apartment building hasn't paid
his rent since July but it was his pet pig that got him in trouble.
Edgar, the pig, made too much noise and was probably too dirty, the neighbors
said, and Quebec's Real Estate Board agreed, ordering Jean-Francois Labrosse to
get rid of Edgar by Sunday, Montreal newspapers reported.
Labrosse, who's in his thirties, told reporters his Vietnamese pig is both
cleaner and more intelligent than dogs, and noted that Edgar was very nervous
ahead of Thursday's hearing.
"He cried out because he felt it. Pigs are very sensitive. I think he knew
something was going on."
The board ruled that Labrosse must not keep an animal in his apartment but
may bring over his mother's dog for visits sometimes.
Labrosse said he had invited his landlord for dinner to make peace. He did
not reveal what was on the menu. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Man Dies in His Own
Booby-Trapped House - 10/07/02
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - A Belgian man died of a gunshot wound after setting
booby-traps throughout his house using hunting rifles and explosives, the police
and local news reports said Sunday.
The 80-year-old former chemical engineer had apparently set the traps to
prevent his children from entering the house after a family dispute in the town
of Aiseau-Presles near Charleroi, south of Brussels, the local Belga news agency
said.
Police, who had worked from before dawn searching and dismantling the traps,
had yet to determine for sure whether the man died from self-inflicted wounds or
one of his own traps, it said.
"(The traps are in) the whole house," a police officer told the RTBF
television network. "It's very, very dangerous."
They were set to go off with the opening of a door or some other makeshift
trigger, the officer said. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Man Claims 14 Wives, 86 Children
10/08/02
HANOI (Reuters) - Keeping one family happy may be a challenge for most people
but one Vietnamese man claims to have successfully juggled living with 14 wives
and over 80 offspring.
Local newspapers have been reporting on the feats of retired bricklayer Tran
Viet Chu, born in 1927 in the central province of Thua Thien-Hue. He said he was
just unable to resist the ladies during his travels to far-flung construction
sites.
"Poor me, every time I see a voluptuously shaped woman I find no way to
resist my sensitive feeling. I seem to have been born with this flirtatious
tendency," Chu was quoted as telling the Cong An Nhan Dan (People's Public
Security) newspaper.
Local officials could not be immediately reached for comment.
The newspaper reported Saturday that Chu bedded down with at least one woman
everywhere he worked during his six decades of travels.
He now lives with some members of his unusually large family in the central
province of Quang Tri. The group manages to survive as each wife supports her
children while Chu meets his own needs.
While Chu admits he's lost count of the numerous branches of his family tree,
he told the newspaper he has at least 14 wives. The article said that based on
interviews with Chu and one of his sons, the former bricklayer has sired at
least 86 children, one of whom died in the Vietnam war.
It hasn't been easy to live with his fatal attraction, Chu acknowledged.
"I know doing so harasses my wives, my children in many ways, but a million
times I tried to break with the habits, a million times I failed."
The paper said half of Chu's wives were either widows or divorced, a sign of
his soft-hearted and compassionate character.
But the article did not address a weightier issue -- how Chu has managed to
accumulate a family of such scale. Polygamy is illegal in communist Vietnam,
which also orders its 80 million population to have no more than two children
per family. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Crime-Fighting Super Granny
Is a Fraud 10/08/02
ATHENS (Reuters) - A Greek grandmother, dubbed "super granny" after claiming
she had put two knife-wielding burglars to flight, turned out to be a fraud
Monday when police said she had made up the tale to get her husband's attention.
Maria Grepsiou, 66, became an instant heroine when she said Saturday that she
had disarmed one man and stabbed him with his knife after he and an accomplice
broke into her home near Serres in northern Greece.
"There were no robbers, there was no burglary or stabbing," a Serres police
official told reporters.
"The woman had made it all up because she wanted to convince her husband to
spend more time with her at home," he said.
The Greek media hailed Grepsiou as a super granny after she gave them a
graphic account of her encounter with two thugs wearing hoods.
"I grabbed his arm, pulled the knife from him and stabbed him in the gut,"
she said. "The two men were forced to flee."
But instead of blood, police found tomato sauce on her clothes. Grepsiou
later confessed to having made the story up to attract the attention of her
husband who was often away working on the farm or with friends at the local
coffee shop.
Grepsiou was charged with obstructing police work. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
'Frying Squad' Swoops
on Drivers in Fuel Scam (10/09/02)
LONDON (Reuters) - A Welsh police team dubbed "the Frying Squad" has been
formed to sniff out motorists who fuel their cars with cooking oil from fish and
chip shops in a bid to avoid paying high government fuel taxes.
Three Welsh motorists have already been caught and fined for using waste oil
from restaurants selling Britain's favorite deep-fried dish, the Times newspaper
reported Wednesday.
"I have halved my motoring costs since I started running my Subaru on cooking
oil," the paper quoted one of those stopped as saying.
"The car runs just as well and even smells a lot better than diesel."
The drivers were fined 500 pounds ($780) and warned that persistent offenders
may face up to seven years in jail. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Toilet Paper Novels Hit Stalls
(10/10/02)
FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Germans who like to read on the toilet no longer need
to take newspapers in with them, but can instead turn to novels and poems
printed onto toilet paper, a German publisher said on Wednesday.
"We want our books to be used. That's our philosophy," said Georges
Hemmerstoffer, head of the Klo-Verlag which publishes the toilet paper
literature. About half of all people liked to read on the toilet, he said.
Poems by German literary giants Heinrich Heine and Christian Morgenstern, as
well as tales and detective stories could be found on the toilet rolls,
Hemmerstoffer told Reuters at the Frankfurt book fair.
Each text was printed several times on one roll, so that readers could
actually use the paper and still leave behind some entertainment for the next
toilet visitor. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Mystery of Decomposed
Body Baffles Hospital (10/11/02)
PARIS (Reuters) - Was the hospital waiting list too long or did the patient
just get lost?
Questions are being asked at the Hotel Dieu hospital in Paris where a plumber
working in the basement last week came across a decomposed corpse wearing
hospital pajamas, Le Figaro newspaper reported on Thursday.
Hospital administrators are asking whether the corpse could be that of a
tramp who got into the hospital and donned pajamas for some creature comfort, or
a patient who absconded and was never found.
An autopsy is to be carried out to try to identify the macabre discovery.
But would-be patients at the hospital, located near Notre Dame Cathedral in
the heart of Paris, may be perplexed to hear a comment from a staff member who
preferred to remain anonymous.
"We lose about six or seven patients a year," he told Le Figaro. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Getting Rid Of Head Lice
A 26-year-old man in Madison, Wisconsin is in critical condition after he was
badly burned while trying to rid himself of head lice. The man rented a room at
a motel Saturday night and doused a towel with rubbing alcohol to get rid of the
lice, police said. He put the towel on his head, lit a cigarette and immediately
became engulfed in flames. Police said the man was being treated at University
Hospital for second- and third-degree burns over about 50% of his body.
Bystanders put out the fire. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Backpacker Finds Hiker's Wallet
A backpacker who found a leather wallet wedged between rocks on a slope in
the Sierra Nevada mountain range returned it - with $37 still inside - to the
hiker who lost it during a 1975 fall. "It was kind of a little archaeological
find," Glenn Rasmuson of San Diego said of the billfold he spotted last month
while hiking near Independence. He told the Daily News of Los Angeles he used
the Internet to locate the wallet's owner, San Fernando Valley resident Roy
Huff, from what remained of a faded membership card. Other ink on Huff's Social
Security card and his driver's license had been obliterated by the effects of
weather and sun. "It's not much to look at. It's a miracle it's still in one
piece," Huff said of the wallet Rasmuson mailed to him along with the $37 in
mangled U.S. currency and a 27-year-old dental appointment card. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Double Your Fun
A man from the Town of Sullivan was
charged with battery this month after he and a 21-year old woman battled over a
stick of chewing gum.
She alleged he threw the gum on the
ground and then pushed her, he countered that she had groped his pocket for it
and he pushed her away.
What a way to double your fun. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Zoo Keepers Eating Well (10/14/02)
Two zookeepers in a small northwest German town have been suspended and put
under police investigation for eating the zoo's animals, police said on Friday.
A police spokesman in Recklinghausen north of Cologne said the keepers in a
section of the zoo popular with small children had slaughtered and barbecued
five Tibetan mountain chickens and two Cameroonian sheep. "The animals were in
the 'pet' zoo where all the children would go to stroke them," the spokesman
said. Suspicious zoo managers called police after the animals went missing. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Bank
Robber Opens Savings Account In Same Bank He Robbed. (10/14/02)
What does a bank robber do with his dough? This one went back to the same
Queens branch later in the week to make a deposit, cops said yesterday.
Jack Schreiner, 30, of 85-02 89th Ave., allegedly stopped at the Chase
Manhattan Bank branch at 84-01 Jamaica Ave. in Woodhaven on Monday and passed a
note to a teller that read, "This is a holdup. I have a gun."
He demanded $50s and $100s, and the teller gave him $7,791, cops said. The
robber wore a baseball cap to shield his face and apparently took care not to
leave any fingerprints he demanded his note back before he fled.
On Friday, Schreiner returned to the branch and attempted to open a savings
account and a checking account, with deposits of $150 in each, police said.
A teller recognized him from the video footage of the holdup, and asked the
teller who had been robbed to look at him, police said. That teller identified
Schreiner as the thief.
The police were called, and Schreiner was arrested. He was charged with
robbery and released on $2,500 bail. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Preserving Your Friends (10/15/02)
A British artist kept the preserved body of a tramp at his studio for nearly
20 years, The Times newspaper says. The embalmed body of Edwin McKenzie was
discovered in the workshop of his former close friend Plymouth artist Robert
Lenkiewicz who himself died this summer. McKenzie had been preserved and hidden
in 1984. "I am satisfied he (McKenzie) died of natural causes and I am now
prepared to release the body," Plymouth coroner Nigel Meadows was quoted as
saying. "The practical difficulty is to whom." Lenkiewicz often used vagrants as
models for his paintings, which often carried an anti-establishment message. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Miss Captivity (10/16/02)
You've heard of Miss America and Miss Universe - now get ready for Miss
Captivity, a beauty pageant to find the hottest female inmate. TV producers in
Lithuania have finalized a deal with the countrys only female prison and have
already accepted applications from 36 prisoners for the Nov. 15 show. "The
prisoners are, after all, women first and foremost," said producer Arngask
Valiants. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Killer Wedgie (10/28/02)
LOWER SOUTHAMPTON, Pa. -- Authorities said a Bucks County man held a grudge
for months -- then tried to kill a friend who had given him a "wedgie."
After a hearing Thursday, a judge has ordered 19-year-old Daniel Strouss to
stand trial for allegedly shooting 19-year-old Eric Kassoway, of Langhorne, on
June 12.
Prosecutors said Strouss was upset that Kassoway had snuck up on him and
yanked up his underwear during a Phish concert last year.
Officials said Kassoway, who was shot in the arm and leg, nearly died from
blood loss.
Strouss' attorney, Al Cepparulo, said his client is going through therapy. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
We zigged when we should have
zagged (10/28/02)
Brother and sister Nancy Lee and Terry Lee Alexander were stopped by the
border guards as they tried to pass over the border between El Paso, Texas and
Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.
During a routine inspection border guards discovered 550,000 rounds of
ammunition in their trunk.
After this amazing discovery, they then complained that they had no idea how
they had ended up in Mexico.
They said they were traveling from their home in Arkansas to Montana and must
have made a wrong turn somewhere.
The cops detained them and their ammunition. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
He's drunker than me, offisher...
11/04/02
Police pulled over a weaving van, anticipating finding a drunk driver inside.
What they actually found were two very drunk suspects.
When the officer approached the car he saw an obviously drunk 20 year old in
the driver's seat with an even drunker 22 year old sitting in his lap, facing
the wrong way.
The two men were apparently trying to switch seats after pulling over in the
mistaken belief that the passenger was less drunk than the driver.
He wasn't. They were both arrested. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Wait Until Your Father Gets Home
11/05/02
A forty-one-year-old man robbed a Race Trac gas station in Cobb County,
Georgia, and was quickly apprehended. He entered a store and used as his
disguise (if you can call it that) a piece of cloth that covered only a portion
of his face. The man must not have kept up with his daughter's work schedule,
because she was the clerk on duty when he robbed the store. She reported him to
police, and he was arrested. In this case, Father doesn't know best. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
STUPID CRIMINALS! 12/01/02
While deciding to rob a pizza place two men went in, and was staking it out.
Feeling uncomfortable, they didn't want to look suspicious, so they filled out
job applications, then robbed the place...
Upon looking at the applications that they filled out, police said all the
information needed for the arrest was written down! (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Thieves locked out of
stolen car (12/07/02)
Three young women flagged
down a passing police officer and told him they had accidentally locked
themselves out of their car. As he was recording the license number of the car,
he noticed that the plate had been altered with a magic marker so that the
letter P had been changed to B. He ran a check of the license number and found
out the car had been stolen earlier that day. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Reindeer Gets Its
Tree Trimmed 12/23/02
Managers of a mall in Cape Town, South Africa received
numerous complaints from concerned parents about a plastic reindeer that was a
little too realistic.
Apparently, everything about the not-so-cuddly reindeer was
anatomically correct. EVERYthing.
A spokesman for the company that made the display, told a
local newspaper that the ornaments were "anatomically correct for an animal of
that size." He observed that "generally, we find it wiser to use sexless
reindeer.”
In response to complaints, managers removed the offending
“parts” leaving a gender neutral animal. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Santa Knocked Over
a Drugstore! 12/23/02
An armed Santa robbed a drug store in Virginia of the
painkiller OxyContin (also known as “hillbilly heroin”) last night.
"An individual dressed as Santa . . . beard, hat, the whole
works . . . just walked to the back of the store to the pharmacist, displayed
his weapon and asked for the OxyContin," said Chesterfield County police Captain
Mike Spraker.
"Once he got it, he ran from the store. We had K-9 [a
trail-sniffing dog and police officer trainer] right in the area, and they were
there within minutes."
However, the trail ended at a nearby apartment complex’s
parking lot. Police feel that the man got into a car and drove off.
"No reindeer or sleds were observed in the area," said
Spraker, who wanted any children hearing about the incident to know that "we
immediately contacted the North Pole and verified Santa was there. This Santa
was definitely an impostor." (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Bishop: Christmas is a chore!
12/23/02
England’s longest-serving bishop, Right Reverend Keith Sutton, delivered a
controversial Christmas message this past Sunday, describing Christmas as “the
most painful time of the year.”
Reverend Sutton, who is the Bishop of Lichfield, spoke of the story of Jesus
as "the story of a baby born to an unmarried mother from a religious family with
all the cultural and social pressures you can imagine.
"The shepherds, far from being the loveable characters in nativity plays,
were actually then on the fringes of society.
"And the wise men, in addition to bearing gifts, were on a mission from Herod
to discover the whereabouts of the baby Jesus so he could be killed."
"We all know that the superficial sentimental Christmas of the pop songs and
Christmas cards is false. How many of us really feel like that at Christmas? If
we are brutally honest Christmas is probably a real chore."
"For some it is the most painful time of the year. Loneliness, debt, fear,
feelings of rejection and even painful memories can all serve to make this a
difficult time for many." (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
New Book About Men 12/27/02
Jordan and Lindy Schweiger have written a book that can be
read in one sitting - in one moment, actually. "Everything Men Knew About Taking
Care of Themselves Before Women Came Along" is the name of the 96-page book. As
most women could guess, all of the pages are blank. The Schweigers - who publish
under the pseudonym Dr. Ever E. Mann - came up with the idea when they heard
about a similar blank work. The couple surveyed people at shopping malls in
Texas, where they lived at the time, to come up with a title for their book.
When they considered what to do with money from the sales, they realized they
wanted to help a charity. The result: 100 percent of the book's profits will go
to the Mid-Valley Women's Crisis Service in Salem, which provides assistance to
women and children who survive domestic violence. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
Holdup At The Bar-B-Que 12/21/02
Charles Demery, 32, walked into the Hickory Smoke Bar-B-Que restaurant in
Shreveport, Louisiana and ordered a rib plate to go. He paid for his meal and,
seeing all the cash in the register, decided to rob the place. He held his
folded sunglasses in his right hand and covered them with a bandana so the clerk
would think he had a gun. It worked. The frightened clerk handed over the cash
and Demery ran from the store. Unfortunately for him, he'd left his wallet on
the counter. The wallet contained several pieces of identification, including a
prison ID card.
Officers found him hiding in the attic of a nearby residence. He refused to
come down voluntarily. Gravity and a weak ceiling, however, resulted in a
crash-landing on the kitchen floor. Demery was arrested for first-degree
robbery. (TOP) (Back to Humor Index)
