More proof: It's really nuts out there...

Granddaughter's 9th birthday is coming up. She LOVES dogs, arctic foxes, anything that swims,  slithers, has four legs, is cute, cuddly, bites (softly), etc. None of this nurse stuff, she's going to be a vet. So we mail-ordered for her, among other things, a packet of eight dog pencils we saw on-line. Cost: $2.95 plus about a million dollars for postage/handling, etc. Hmmm... that seemed kinda high, but heck, she's our granddaughter, and she will love the pencils, so ok.

Two days later, UPS leaves a box at our front door. "Honey, did we order a new set of encyclopedias, A-through-Ma ?"

Yep. That was the size of the box... except it was really very light. Inside were 4 yards of that plastic, softly inflated 'packing cushion' stuff... and, of course, the pencils--that's all... just the four ounces of pencils, taped to the bottom. At least now, I can understand the high cost of  postage/handling.

Not nuts enough for you? How about the gang of robbers trying to blow open a German ATM machine? A few explosives here, a few explosives there... that should do it.

Well, the blast destroyed the entire bank building (except for the safe) and damaged cars a football field away. When the dust had settled, the building was nothing but a pile of bricks and the landscape looked like a war zone. Only thing still standing was the completely intact ATM machine. Whoops. My bad!


A man, trying to shoplift soothing skin lotion, was "noticed" by a female security office because of  the rather large bulges in his pants which were tied off at the ankles. (Is that skin lotion or are you just happy to see me?) He had 75 bottles--that's a lot of aloe-- stuffed below his belt... so many that the police couldn't fit him into the squad car because, like the Michelin Man, he couldn't bend over.

Three adjacent stories in The Week magazine: Rep. Mark Souder, an outspoken evangelistic Christian advocate of abstinence before marriage, resigned from Congress after admitting to an extramarital affair with a staffer. An Alabama high school teacher was suspended after assigning his students to, 'hypothetically,' plan the assassination of President Barack Obama as a way to teach angles to his geometry students. Connecticut's attorney general, Richard Blumenthal was thrown a curve ball in his campaign to win a senate seat. Seems he remembered what it was like to serve in Vietnam and recalled "the taunts, the insults, even the physical abuse (inflicted on veterans ) when we returned." Fact is, Blumenthal received five draft deferments before joining the Marine Corps Reserve and never saw action overseas. To his credit, he took full responsibility for "a few misplaced words." Atta way sport. Got to admire a man who takes responsibility for his actions... when he is caught with his mouth open.

That Rhode Island school board is tough. It suspended an 8-year-old second-grader because he glued toy soldiers to his hat for a patriotic-themed class project. Seems the tiny soldiers were carrying even tinier guns which was in clear violation of the school's "zero-tolerance for weapons" policy.

And as final, undeniable proof that it really is nuts out there, in the year 2000, television carried 4 reality TV shows... just 4. Ten years later, we can 'enjoy' 320 of them on many channels, almost always. Remember America, you asked for it.

Lots of stuff out there...

... which only proves my blog has it right... it IS nuts out there. The Week magazine usually has some fine examples:

• A Florida bank wouldn't cash a check drawn on his wife's accout for a man who had two photo IDs. Bank demands a thumbprint for identification. HELLO! The man has no arms. He wears prosthetics. Oh well. Rules is rules.
• Bob Dylan is working on a Christmas album. Songs included are "O Little Town of Bethlehem" and "Here Comes Santa Claus." There goes the image.
• Cuba will run out of toilet paper before year-end. (True.) Emergency exports are a distinct possibility. That and tree leaves, I guess.
• A Florida city employee was threatened with job suspension or firing because she failed to say "Hello" to the mayor as the two passed in the hallway.
• A high school football coach used a school bus after practice to take nine of his team to his Baptist church where they were baptised without the parents permission.
• A comedian is being sued by her mother-in-law for telling mother-in-law jokes.
• Brad Pitt just built a gerbil home for his children's pets. It features tunnels, bridges and seesaws as you may expect. It only cost him $82,000. Report says his children were delighted... to say nothing of the gerbils. I wonder if Angela knows this? Meanwhile, I'll bet those homeless living under bridge overpasses are wondering why gerbils live better than they do. (If it is of any consolation, homeless folks, at least you don't run the risk of another gerbil biting off your head.)
  
• After a dinner-date, a Michigan man, upon receipt of the check, needed to borrow his girl friend's car keys. Seems he left his wallet on her car seat. Not only did he leave her stuck with the bill, he stole her car. So much for going too far on the first date.
• A Missouri high school marching band had to change their matching T-shirts. The shirts depicted brass instruments evolving into one another over the slogan, 'Brass Evolutions.' The shirts drew complaints from religious conservative parents. "If the shirts had said "Brass Resurrections" and had a picture of Jesus on the cross we would have done the same thing," said a spokesperson. Hmm, somehow, I can't picture that "Brass Resurrections' T-shirt being something a marching band would do.
  

See. I told you It's Nuts out There.