xxxNews Of The Weirdxxx
Bizarre but true stories about real people collected by syndicated columnist Chuck Shepherd.
While New York state grapples with a serious budget shortfall, the speaker of the state assembly works at a law firm that trolls for “victims” of injuries at state parks, with a suggestive Internet-page list of accidents that might lead to lawsuits against the state. (In August, after the New York Post exposed the page, the law firm withdrew it.)
In July, just after New Jersey’s governor and legislature resolved a government-closing stalemate over spending in that heavily taxed state, the government announced it would reinstate its discontinued policy of paying for “erectile dysfunction” drugs for Medicaid recipients.
Beijing News reported in July that the city intends to assign tracking numbers to every single cabbage, carrot and pea pod in preparation for the 2008 Olympics, to identify their origins to improve food safety. Five thousand tons of vegetables may be eaten during the Olympics, and Chinese farming has been criticized by Greenpeace for using banned pesticides and other soil pollutants.
From an Atlanta police report, summarized in a July issue of the weekly Creative Loafing: A man working on a house on Smith Street was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital with serious injuries to his posterior. He happened to be bending over next to a wall that, unknown to him, a worker on the other side was drilling into, and the drill bit entered his “anal cavity.”
(Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or [email protected] or go to www.NewsoftheWeird.com.) NEWS OF THE WEIRD