The Old Eighteen

At least it wasn't a double-wide

Queen Laura of the House of Bush may be occupying herself with visiting the troops in Afghanistan, but that doesn't mean she actually wants to have anything to do with them:

First Lady Laura Bush isn't the sort of woman to slum it when she's on official business - even when she's on a no-frills troop carrier.

When flying across Afghanistan to visit troops, the US president's wife was cocooned in her own private luxury trailer which had been towed on board the aircraft.

With wood panelling, plush grey carpet, comfy leather seats and, most importantly, thick window shades, Mrs Bush could forget she was anywhere near the War on Terror being played out below the clouds.

While travelling she could have been entertained by her TV and DVD player, hosted cocktail parties or, alternatively, she could have a nap in a choice of two beds.

::

(via Wonkette)

Mr. Hankey makes an appearance in Athens

Apparently in Athens, Texas, taking a crap can get you charged with disorderly conduct for "creat[ing] a noxious odor by chemical means."  Of course, it helps if you're doing so in the back seat of a police car, but I wonder if the law can be applied elsewhere.  I hope not - I pinched one off this morning that could get me life without parole...

::

(via Grits for Breakfast)

Nominations for the 2008 Darwin Awards are now open

If I were going to go to the trouble of making a list of things not to scratch my back with, "loaded revolver" would be at or near the top of that list:

A Fort Worth man trying to scratch an itch on his back used a revolver and accidentally shot himself.

Jorge Espinal, 44, was drinking beer and playing poker around 3 a.m. Sunday in his home in the 3500 block of Montague Street, when he got up from the table and walked into another room, said Fort Worth police Lt. Kenneth Dean.

“He told officers he had an itch on his back and grabbed the first thing he could get a hold of, which was a revolver,” Lt. Dean said. “The gun went off."

Mr. Espinal went back and told his buddies that he shot himself. “They didn’t believe him until they saw the blood coming down his back,” Lt. Dean said.

Mr. Espinal was taken to an area hospital, where he was treated and released with non-life-threatening injuries.

I guess it's a good thing he wasn't scratching his balls.

Speaking of beating a dead horse...

From The Page:

YOU CAN'T MAKE THIS UP:

Hillary Clinton enthusiastically picked a filly named Eight Belles to win the Kentucky Derby and compared herself to the horse. Eight Belles finished second. The winner was the favorite, Big Brown. Eight Belles collapsed immediately after crossing the finish line, and was euthanized shortly thereafter.

And to top it all off, Eight Belles was the only filly in the race.  Now, if you'll excuse me, my irony-meter exploded and I have to go get a new one...

::

(via Poll Dancing)

So you think you had a bad day

At least you've never been attacked by a bee tornado:

A giant cloud of thousands of bees mysteriously appeared and began to swirl in a "tornado pattern" around a Central Florida Mexican restaurant.

Customers at Oxie's restaurant located near Highway 17-92 and Plymouth Avenue in DeLand said they noticed a cloud in the sky and thought it was raining. They then realized, the cloud was a swarm of bees.

"A lot of people said it was bees and ran to their cars," restaurant owner Oxie Ochiana said. "It was scary. I was panicking. I didn't know what to do."

Witnesses said the bees began to swirl like a tornado and menace customers Thursday.

"I looked and it was like a tornado of bees just all around our parking lot, swarming," said restaurant worker Marie Olson.

And you thought the weather in Texas sucked!

::

(via Letters from Texas)

Gee, I wonder why the truck rolled over?

Maybe because it had 60 people in it?  You think?

PHOENIX – A pickup jammed with as many as 60 people crashed and rolled in a remote area of central Arizona on Sunday morning, killing four men.

Investigators believe the people on board were illegal immigrants, said Vanessa White, a Pinal County sheriff's office spokeswoman.

Ms. White said 27 people were taken to hospitals in Phoenix and Tucson.

She said that after the accident 20 to 30 people fled on foot into the desert and have not been located.

Now that's what I call impressive.  I don't think I could fit 60 people in my fucking apartment, much less the bed of a pickup truck.

"Yes, officer, I'd like to report a missing penis..."

It's amazing, the lengths that some people will go to just to explain away their (ahem) shortcomings:

Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men's penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft.

Reports of so-called penis snatching are not uncommon in West Africa, where belief in traditional religions and witchcraft remains widespread, and where ritual killings to obtain blood or body parts still occur.

Rumours of penis theft began circulating last week in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo's sprawling capital of some 8 million inhabitants. They quickly dominated radio call-in shows, with listeners advised to beware of fellow passengers in communal taxis wearing gold rings.

Purported victims, 14 of whom were also detained by police, claimed that sorcerers simply touched them to make their genitals shrink or disappear, in what some residents said was an attempt to extort cash with the promise of a cure.

[...] "It's real. Just yesterday here, there was a man who was a victim. We saw. What was left was tiny," said 29-year-old Alain Kalala, who sells phone credits near a Kinshasa police station.

Oooh, burn!

::

(via McBlogger)

"It Is What Masturbating Is"

I'm not sure what's more bizarre about this story - the fact that a defense lawyer thought it would be wise or appropriate to make the jerking-off gesture while standing at the bench in front of a judge, or the fact that he got sentenced to 90 days in jail for doing it.

So you think you're bored?

At least you're not as bored as this guy, who made a 13-foot long canoe out of chopsticks.  And you're definitely not as bored as this guy, who built a 50-foot replica of a Viking longboat out of 15 million popsicle sticks:

He hopes to sail the 15m (50ft) ship across the Atlantic.

The ship carried a crew of 20 on its maiden voyage.

"It's a dream come true. It's truly worth all the hard work," said Mr McDonald, quoted by Reuters news agency.

"I never want to look at glue again. I don't think I will be in a hurry to look at ice cream sticks again."

He should probably stop sniffing that glue, while he's at it.