I'm going to be working on finding Alert Reader-style news, but I need you to send me good articles! The same stuff you send Dave. We Alert Readers are all serious journalists, of course, so I know you can do it! You send this stuff to him, (DAVE'S ADDRESS) just copy it to me too. If you can scan it, that's great! Find it on the web, forward it! If you want to re-type it, you really do have too much spare time. But that's what it takes to be an Alert Reader.
(What is an Alert Reader?)
From the Springfield Times in Virginia. Wednesday, December 23rd, 1998.
Article by Courtney Prebich
In this article, it is reported that an Alexandria man injured himself by looking down the barrel of a loaded potato gun. According to police spokeswoman Gretchen Lacharite, "He didn't see a little part of the potato was still in the gun." A potato gun is a home made cannon made from pvc pipe and something along the lines of hair spray. They shoot potatoes distances of up to 500 feet. As of the time of this article, the police hadn't decided if they were going to file charges.
Now, I seem to recall that Dave Barry wrote an article a while ago about potato guns. If you saw this one, then you'll recall that he and a friend fired this gun off of the roof of the Miami Herald. When is the public going to learn that they should NEVER attempt anything that Dave has done? That's the entire reason he does these things, so we won't have to! Never mind the fact that I fully intend to re-create the "Flaming Pop-Tart Experiment" (see links) myself. That is not the point. The point is, Dave Barry has done all of these things, plus set fire to his toilet, just for our benefit. When are we, as the general public, going to learn to appreciate this fact and stop hurting ourselves by looking into potato guns? When, I ask. When?
From the Washington Post. Wednesday, January 27th, 1999
Original Article Compiled from reports by staff writers Daniel Leduc, Jackie Spinner, Debbi Wilgoren, Caryle Murphy
and Craig Timberg
In an unforseen turn of events, on January 26th, the Virginia House of Delegates voted down the box turtle as
Virginia's official state reptile. This unfortunate event occurred after the House members learned
the turtle's official name: Terrapin Carolina. This name is, of course, reminiscent of Virginia's
southern neighbor, North Carolina. The Terrapin itself is the mascot of the University of
Maryland, Virginia's northern neighbor. As if all this turtle name sharing weren't bad enough,
another nearby state, Tennessee, already has the box turtle as its own state reptile!
It is a real shame when an old, respected state such as Virginia can't even use the box turtle as its own state reptile for fear of being laughed at by other states. The bill itself was defeated in the House 52 to 42. This means that of the 100 House members, only 94 voted. I suspect that the remaining 6 members were extremely sick, or they would have attended this historic vote. Delegate Leo C. Wardrup Jr. (R-Virginia Beach) was one who was not impressed by the box turtle. "I think," he said, "that the Commonwealth of Virginia deserves a better symbol." Let's hope they find it soon.
From the Washington Post Magazine. Sunday, January 31st, 1999
Article(Under Observation) By Al Kamen
As if the President didn't have enough on his mind, a woman recently approached the White House and demanded to see Mr. Clinton. When the local law officials took her back to her car, they discovered ammunition within. They proceeded to arrest her and impounded the car.
The police thought that everything was under control until they discovered a pet carrier in the car which contained a single cat. With the car going to the impound lot, the officers had no choice but to "arrest" the cat to take it into custody.
Click HERE to see the cat's arrest report. I swear I'm not joking!
For those who are concerned, the cat was given to the Humane Society, and after the owner failed to return for it, they gave it to a nice, law-abiding family who should set it back on the right track.
**UPDATE**
Read the next article for further news in the Authorities-After-Another-Animal (AAAA) trend.
From the Washington Post. Friday, February 12th, 1999.
Article by Tom Jackman & Allan Lengel
Second article in same paper on Saturday, February 13th, 1999
By Jo Craven
If you think an article about escaping Ostriches is funny, you should've seen the photograph. For copyright reasons, I can't just paste it here, but it features a herd (flock?) of perplexed birds standing around, as if they were by a water cooler saying "Hey, did'ja hear a bunch of us escaped last night?" I'll bet it's just like where you work!
It seems that dozens of ostriches escaped from a breeder's farm when two dogs broke in and caused a panic among the birds. Four birds died after being caught up in the fence, but some 32 Ostriches broke free and began wandering around Fairfax County. By the article on Saturday, only 13 ostriches were still at large. Fairfax County Police Officer John Carney advised anyone who spotted one to "treat them as a wanted criminal."
So far in our Current News section we have three salient facts:
District Police, in a move to protect the President, arrest a cat.
Virginia Delegates refuse to elect a turtle to a position of prominence.
Fairfax County police are advising residents to treat six foot birds as "wanted criminals."
If this bothers you as much as it does me, then keep checking my page. I'll be keeping track of this Authorities-After-Another-Animal (AAAA) trend based on how many articles I receive on it. Remember, if you read anything that could count as an AAAA news item, be sure to send it my way.
Those of you who saw Dave's column last week (1-29-99) recall that it involved exploding toilets. I have just heard from the actual Alert Reader who sent this information to Dave, Keith Ritter. He sent along this Web Site that shows scientific principles and some really great time-lapse photos of a toilet blowing up! Check it out.
From the Maariv paper in Israel. January 1st, 1999.
Article by Ayala Or-El
Sent in by Alert Reader Ziv Wities
Ziv translated this from Hebrew, so some names may be spelled incorrectly.
Every year, millions of people look forward to that spectacular, exciting, and even spiritual event: Valentines Day. These people are the women. The men, of course, look forward to the Superbowl. It seems that one man, Robert William Greer, likes football a little too much. We're not talking about your average Sunday-induced snack-wild kind of crazy, here. This is much worse.
It seems that Greer, age 52, was arrested in Las Vegas last year, nearly 10 years after the murder of John Dobbes of Fort Worth in 1988. As he awaits trial for this crime, one is forced to wonder "What sort of things does a man think about as he is tried for such a heinous crime?"
The answer, as anyone who is intelligent enough to read should have guessed, is football. Greer made a deal with the judge to plead guilty if he would be allowed to watch the Superbowl before being sent to prison. He was allowed to watch the game and is serving an 18 year sentence. After an entire decade, justice has been served.
I have no more recent information that would indicate if Greer thought that the game was "worth it" or not. After seeing how the score turned out, I hope that he at least enjoyed the commercials.
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