Xxxnews Of The Weirdxxx
Bizarre but true stories about real people collected by syndicated columnist Chuck Shepherd.
Making a claim on British television in March that should alarm all News of the Weird readers, James Watson (co-discoverer of the structure of DNA) said he saw no reason why “stupidity” could not some day be corrected by gene therapy just as other “disorders” are now being addressed. “If you’re really stupid, I would call that a disease,” he said, on the Channel 4 documentary “DNA.” “I’d like to get rid of (stupidity).”
Two TV stations reported in February that Paul West of Winsted, Conn., had taken the then-current Homeland Security alerts very seriously and covered his entire house, top to bottom, with 3,500 square feet of plastic sheeting to “protect” against “radiological or biological or chemical attack,” he said. West, his wife and two children live on a farm outside Winsted, in northern Connecticut, about 120 miles from New York City. Said West, “I just have all this energy from tension and anxiety (about terrorism), and I don’t know what to do with it.”
According to a December Federal Trade Commission lawsuit, Mark Nutritionals Inc., of San Antonio, Texas, earned $190 million in four years selling a $40 solution that guaranteed weight loss even if the user ate lots of pizza, beer, tacos and doughnuts.
In November, the new Kaiser Medical Center hospital in Fremont, Calif., staged a special ceremony, by the hospital’s chaplain, using symbols and inspirational words on rocks, to battle “spirits” that some nurses believed were responsible for beds moving and doors slamming on their own.
Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, Fla. 33679 or [email protected]
Copyright © 2001 by Chuck Shepherd
NEWS OF THE WEIRD
