Fun_People Archive
15 Sep
News of the sick


Date: Tue, 15 Sep 92 14:40:58 PDT
To: Fun_People
Subject: News of the sick

Via: pep@research.att.com
Via: schaefer@hri.com
Via: limey

Channel 5 in Nashville, Tenn., held a "Mission: Bermuda Triangle" trivia
contest in May offering viewers a chance to win a seven-day vacation in
Florida.  The contest had to be restarted after the "hundreds" of initial
entries disappeared from the station.  (The manager suspects a cleaning-crew
mistake.)

Mendocino County peace activist Kwazi Nkrumah, angered by a series of
unfavorable articles by Boonville newspaper editor Bruce Anderson, confronted
Anderson in May and slugged him.

Norman W. Bertsavage of Pottsville, Pa., told reporters in February that
he still wanted "to carry on my argument" in his campaign for the Republican
nomination for president, despite a poor showing in the New Hampshire primary.
(He received no votes.)  The day after the election, he compared himself to
Mikhail Gorbachev, citing their similar messages of party reform.

A Michigan boating agency official, after examining all accidents in the
state over the last 15 years, concluded that the most dangerous activity for
boaters is falling overboard.

A physician at Johns Hopkins medical school reported in April that a
21-year-old college student suffers from a condition ("phantosmia")
that causes her to emit a foul odor so overpowering that she cannot
eat or engage in ordinary school activities because she cannot concentrate.

Criminal justice professor Michael Petrik, 30, who taught the "alternatives
to prison" course at Nassau County (N.Y.) Community College, was arrested
in May for helping two inmates escape from a correctional facility in Warwick,
N.Y.  Said a former student, "He made class interesting.  I guess everybody
has their own little secrets."

Spartanburg, S.C., mayor Bob Rowell changed his mind in April about
publicizing a proclamation dedicated to Holocaust survivors.  He admitted
that the reason was his fear of offending the German BMW car company,
which was then deciding between Spartanburg and Omaha as the site for a
new U.S. plant.  In July, BMW selected Spartanburg.

A Washington, D.C., organization, Africa Watch, estimates that as many as
100,000 people, mostly children, live in slavery in the Islamic country of
Mauritania.  The slaves get no pay, have no rights, and can be tortured or
killed by their owners without penalty.

A 15-year-old boy was arrested for suspicion of murder in March after a
5-year-old boy a half-mile away, in Carson, was hit by a flying bullet
seconds after the older boy fired his gun almost straight up into the
air while showing off for friends.  [No, it doesn't say where.]

Now available at your local pharmacy, from Unimed Co., is Unimist --
"Instant Dry Mouth Relief" -- in a fine, pump-squeeze container.  It
"eliminates dryness by replenishing normal levels of moisture" and is
"safe to use" with a "refreshingly slightly minty taste."

Sam F. Stewart, 17, was arrested for burglary in Waskom, Texas, in April,
after he had broken into a van housed in a residential garage and then
inadvertently activated the electric locks while trying to start the car.
As he hit various controls in an attempt to get out of the car, he awoke
the owners.  Stewart was still trapped inside the car when police arrived.

Sheriff Bill Wiester announced in Moses Lake, Wash., in March that he had
arrested a man sitting in a car bobbing his head and who thus looked like he
was doing drugs.  On closer inspection, however, no drugs were found; the
man had a straw in his mouth and was blowing bubbles into a fishbowl he was
holding in his lap, aerating the water for his pet piranha.

Robby Doyle Calhoun, 30, was arrested for stabbing letter carrier Raymond
Bell, 35, in Dallas in April.  Apparently, Calhoun was upset about receiving
bills.  A police detective said that Calhoun had told a maintenance man the
day before that he was "going to get the mailman."

In February, Roman Catholic parishioners in Sluis, The Netherlands,
disturbed by loud noises that interrupted their worshipping, opened the
curtains of a confessional to find a man and woman having sex inside.
(The parish priest was out of town at the time and thus could not grant
the couple absolution for the incident.)

In April, former Springfield, Ore., Human Rights Commissioner Katherine
Maris (a white woman who is married to a black man) was convicted under
the state's racial intimidation law for making repeated racial insults
against police officer John Patterson, who is black.  Patterson had stopped
her for driving the wrong way on a one-way street.

In July, the Iowa Board of Dental Examiners charged dentist Vincent P.
Graettinger, whose license had already been suspended in May, with another
incident in June.  The board said Graettinger locked a female patient in
a room by herself and forced her to watch a film on proper dental care.
Graettinger denied the charge and accused the board of "nitpicking."

Cozette Wright, 35, was charged in May with stabbing her daughter, Dennisha,
20, on Mother's Day in Omaga, Neb., after an argument over who was the
better mother.

Among award-winning stories at the Texas Associated Press Managing Editors
Association awards was one from the Austin American-Statesman, reporting a
plan by city officials of Rollingwood.  Officials planned to spray-paint
all loose dogs in the city so owners would call up to complain and could then
be cited for violating a law prohibiting dogs from roaming free.

Actor Charlton Heston wrote the Los Angeles Times, admonishing producers
of the TV show "Studs" to provide participants with free AIDS tests "as part
of the casting process," since the show's premise is that participants will
have sex.

Among the information that came to light in April as a result of Atlanta's
new government officials' financial disclosure law was the existence of the
city's not-well-known Board of Astrology.  The Associated Press could find
no records of the board at City Hall but concluded after interviewing its
three smoked-out members that the board administers tests to, and licenses,
prospective astrologers.

Janie A. Coleman was arrested in Columbia, Mo., in January after being accused
of trying to pass counterfeit $5 bills in the purchase of perfume.  The bills
were merely photocopied fronts and backs of bills, taped together.

In June, a 29-year-old man from Moab, Utah, fell to his death off the North
Rim of the Grand Canyon.  He had backed up while having his picture taken.



[=] © 1992 Peter Langston []