Three teenagers from Rahway, New Jersey, who call themselves the Rahway Bushmen, have been discouraged from their signature prank: dressing up as bushes and popping up in Rahway River Park to say "Hi!" to unsuspecting passersby. NJ.com reported in October that the Union County Police Department warned the Bushmen that they would be arrested if caught in action. The high school students started by jumping out to scare people, but decided to soften their approach with a gentler greeting. "We were trying to be harmless," one of the Bushmen said. "It's more or less an idea to try to make people smile." But Union County Public Information Officer (and fun sucker) Sebastian D'Elia deadpanned: "It's great until the first person falls and sues the county." Or puts an eye out. [NJ.com, 10/26/2017]

Animal Troublemakers

-- Pilots were warned of "low sealings" at Wiley Post-Will Rogers Memorial Airport in Utqiagvik, Alaska, on Oct. 23 because of an obstruction on the runway: a 450-pound bearded seal. Meadow Bailey of the Alaska Department of Transportation told KTVA-TV that the city, also known as Barrow, was hit by heavy storms that day, and airport staff discovered the seal while clearing the runway. However, staff are not authorized to handle marine animals, so North Slope Animal Control stepped in, using a sled to remove the seal. Bailey said animals such as musk ox, caribou and polar bears are common on the runway, but the seal was a first. [KTVA, 10/25/2017]

-- About two dozen car owners in the Nob Hill neighborhood of Snellville, Georgia, were perturbed in late October by what they thought was vandalism: Their cars' side mirrors were being shattered, even in broad daylight. Finally, according to WSB-TV, one resident caught the real perpetrator: a pileated woodpecker who apparently believes his reflection in the mirrors is a rival. Because pileated woodpeckers are a protected species, neighbors had to get creative with their solution. They are now placing plastic bags over their side mirrors while the cars are parked. [WSB-TV, 10/24/2017]

Undignified Death

Nathan William Parris, 72, met his unfortunate end when a cow he was trying to move turned against him at his farm in Floyd County, Georgia, on Oct. 25. Parris was pinned against a fence by the recalcitrant cow, reported the Rome News-Tribune, which caused him severe chest trauma. First responders tried to revive him, but he was pronounced dead at the Redmond Regional Medical Center emergency room. [Rome News-Tribune, 10/26/2017]

Ironies

-- Workers at a Carl's Jr. in Santa Rosa, California, were busy filling an order for 165 Super Star burgers for first responders to the Fountaingrove area wildfires on Oct. 26 when a grease fire broke out in the restaurant. The fire started in the char broiler and then jumped to the exhaust system. Franchise co-owner Greg Funkhouser told The Press-Democrat the building was "completely torn up. ... We made it through the big one, only to get taken out by this." When the person who placed the order arrived to pick it up, he saw six Santa Rosa Fire Department trucks in the parking lot and left, so Funkhouser handed out free burgers to "anyone around." [The Press-Democrat, 10/26/2017]

-- A Henrietta, New York, gifts and oddities store earned its name on Oct. 24 when a garbage truck rolled between two gas pumps and across a road to crash into the 200-year-old building where the store had opened in June. Jeri Flack, owner of A Beautiful Mess, told WHAM-TV that her building is "wrecked in the front so bad that I can't open back up." Witnesses say the truck driver pulled into a spot at a Sunoco station across the street and got out to use the restroom. That's when the truck rolled away and barreled into the business. Sunoco employee T.J. Rauber said, "I see a lot of crazy stuff up here, but I ain't never seen nothing like that." [WHAM-TV, 10/24/2017]

Least Competent Criminal

Burglary suspect and career criminal Shane Paul Owen, 46, of South Salt Lake, Utah, was on the run from police on Oct. 24 when he dashed into a vacant church. A Salt Lake City SWAT team held a standoff at the church for more than six hours -- until Owen called 911 to say that he was locked in the church's boiler room and couldn't get out. "Can you hurry?" he asked the dispatcher. "I need to talk to them first so they don't ... shoot me," Owen pleaded. The Deseret News reported he was booked on outstanding warrants for retaliation against a witness, drug distribution and identity fraud. [Deseret News, 10/24/2017]

Ewwwww!

Two doctors from the University of Florence in Italy have documented the case of a woman who has been sweating blood from her face and the palms of her hands for about three years. Roberto Maglie and Marzia Caproni wrote in the Canadian Medical Association Journal that the unnamed Italian woman couldn't identify a trigger for the bleeding, but said times of stress would intensify it for periods of from one to five minutes. After ruling out the possibility that she was faking it, the doctors diagnosed her with hematohidrosis, a rare disease that causes blood to be excreted through the pores. They were able to treat her, but couldn't completely stop the bleeding. The cause remains a mystery. [United Press International, 10/24/2017]

Thinning the Herd

In Paris, a 21-year-old "train surfer" was killed on Oct. 24 when he fell to the train tracks after hitting an overhead obstacle. His two friends, who were riding atop a train on Metro Line 6 with him, ran away from the scene, according to The Sun. The three had been attempting the stunt at the Bir-Hakeim Bridge during rush hour. The unnamed victim was pronounced dead at the scene. [The Sun, 10/26/2017]

Anger Management?

Katarian Marshall, 24, of New Orleans, Louisiana, apparently hit her limit of "fun" at a Chuck E. Cheese in Metairie on Oct. 29 and began "indiscriminately" spraying pepper spray on nearby patrons during an altercation that got out of hand. The Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office told The Times-Picayune that five adults and two children were treated for exposure to the spray at the scene. Marshall was charged with disturbing the peace by fighting. [The Times-Picayune, 10/30/2017]

Model Parent

Amber L. Schmunk, 28, of Fredonia, Wisconsin, put all her resources to work in concocting a way to get a plastic kiddie pool from one house to another on Sept. 9. Her solution: She had her 9-year-old son climb on top of her minivan and hold down the pool as she drove through Saukville. She must have had second thoughts, though, because according to the Ozaukee Press, she told police the boy was up there for only 20 to 30 seconds before she pulled over and wedged the pool into the back of the minivan. Schmunk said she thought it would be OK for her son to ride atop the car because her father had allowed her to do similar things when she was a child. But officers disagreed, charging her with second-degree recklessly endangering safety. [Ozaukee Press, 10/18/2017]

Justice With a Side of Vocabulary

Daren Young, 30, of Kahului, Hawaii, will need a good dictionary and thesaurus for the task ahead of him. On Oct. 27, Second Circuit Judge Rhonda Loo sentenced Young, who violated a protection order taken out by his ex-girlfriend to the tune of 144 calls and texts, to write down 144 nice things about his ex -- without repeating any words. "For every nasty thing you said about her, you're going to say a nice thing," Loo commanded. The Maui News reported that Loo also meted out two years' probation, a $2,400 fine and 200 hours of community service. [Maui News, 10/30/2017]

The 72nd annual Yellville (Arkansas) Turkey Trot, which took place on Oct. 14, is famous for its Turkey Drop, in which live turkeys are dropped from a low-flying airplane and then chased by festivalgoers. This year, KY3.com reports, several turkeys were dropped during the afternoon despite animal-rights activists having filed a formal complaint with the sheriff's office, saying the pilot "terrorized" the birds. But pharmacist and past pilot Dana Woods told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: "We treat the turkeys right. That may sound ironic, but we don't abuse those turkeys. We coddle and pet those turkeys. We're good to them." Wild turkeys can fly, but in 2016, about a dozen turkeys were dropped and not all survived the fall. According to The Washington Post, over the past several years, local sponsors and the chamber of commerce have distanced themselves from the Turkey Drop, now more than five decades old. The Federal Aviation Administration is checking to see if any laws or regulations were broken, but said it has not intervened in past years because the turkeys are not considered to be projectiles. [KY3.com, 10/15/2017; Washington Post, 10/13/2017]

'Tis the Season

Could turkeys be sensing the peril of the season? Police in Bridgewater, Massachusetts, tweeted a warning to the town's residents on Oct. 15 about aggressive wild turkeys, WBZ-TV reported. As proof, an accompanying video showed four turkeys chasing a Bridgewater police cruiser, but police were not as amused as their Twitter followers. "Aggressive turkeys are a problem in town," the department tweeted. "State law doesn't allow the police or (animal control) to remove them." [WBZ-TV, 10/17/2017]

Update

In 1990, Marlene Warren, 40, answered her door in Wellington, Florida, and was shot in the face by a clown bearing balloons (one of which read "You're the greatest!") and flowers. On Sept. 26, Palm Beach County Sgt. Richard McAfee announced that Warren's widower's current wife, Sheila Keen Warren, 54, had been arrested for the murder, 27 years after the fact, and taken into custody in Abingdon, Virginia. Sheila Keen married Michael Warren in 2002, NBC News reported. (Warren went to prison in 1994 for odometer tampering, grand theft and racketeering in connection with his car rental agency.) Sheila had worked for him, repossessing cars, and they were reportedly having an affair when the murder took place. While Sheila had always been a suspect, new technology finally allowed prosecutors to retest DNA evidence and build a case against her. [NBC News, 9/27/2017]

Sex Therapy

Zookeepers believe China's 4-year-old giant panda Meng Meng, currently on loan to the Berlin Zoo, displays her displeasure with her surroundings, food or caretakers by walking backward. "Meng Meng is in puberty," zoo director Andreas Knieriem explained to the Berliner Zeitung newspaper on Oct. 22. "The reverse walk is a protest." To address the situation, zookeepers will introduce Meng Meng to Jiao Qing, a male giant panda three years older, who presumably will ease her frustration by engaging in sexual activity with her. [Reuters, 10/22/2017]

Lucky!

Kenyans Gilbert Kipleting Chumba and David Kiprono Metto were among the favorites to win the Venice Marathon on Oct. 22. Instead, Eyob Ghebrehiwet Faniel, 25, a local running in only his second marathon, took the prize after the lead runners were led several hundred meters off-course by an errant guide motorcycle. Faniel is the first Italian man to win the Venice Marathon in 22 years. "Today's race shows that the work is paying off," Faniel said following his victory. Uh, sure. [NPR, 10/23/2017]

Most Considerate Criminal

Nelly's Taqueria in Hicksville, New York, suffered a break-in on Oct. 3, but the burglar redefined the term "clean getaway." Surveillance video showed a man donning food-service gloves and starting a pot of water to boil before hammering open the cash register. He secured $100 in his pockets, leaving a dollar in the tip jar, then started "cooking up a storm," owner Will Colon told Newsday. Cameras recorded as the thief cooked beans, sauteed shrimp and chicken, and helped himself to a cold soda before enjoying his meal standing up. "The way he handled that pan, man, the dude had some skills," Colon said. Afterward, he carefully stored the leftovers in the refrigerator, cleaned his pans and wiped down all the surfaces he had used. Then he took off through the back window, the same way he had come in. [Newsday, 10/4/2017]

People Different From Us

-- In Lissone, Italy, 40-year-old fitness instructor Laura Mesi made news when she married herself in late September. "I told my relatives and friends that if I had not found my soul mate, I would marry myself by my 40th birthday," Mesi said, according to The Independent. She spent more than 10,000 euros ($11,700) for the occasion, which included a white wedding dress, a three-tiered cake, bridesmaids and 70 guests. Mesi is part of a self-marrying movement dubbed "sologamy" that has followers all over the world. Her marriage holds no legal significance. "If tomorrow I find a man to build a future with, I will be happy, but my happiness will not depend on him," Mesi declared. [The Independent, 9/27/2017]

-- An anonymous collector from Palm Beach, Florida, was the winning bidder in an Oct. 11 online auction for a half-smoked cigar that British Prime Minister Winston Churchill enjoyed during a 1947 trip to Paris. AP reports the 4-inch cigar remnant brought just over $12,000 in the auction managed by Boston-based RR Auction. The company says Churchill smoked the cigar on May 11, 1947, at Le Bourget Airport. A British airman, Cpl. William Alan Turner, kept the cigar after he and his crew flew Churchill and his wife between Paris and London. The label on the Cuban stogie includes Churchill's name. [Associated Press, 10/12/2017]

Least Competent Criminal

Greensburg, Pennsylvania, police made a traffic stop on Oct. 19 and found drug paraphernalia in plain sight on the car's front seat. When police asked where the occupants had obtained the heroin found in the center console, they said they had bought it from someone named Cody in the maternity ward at the Excela Health Westmoreland hospital in Greensburg. Officers arrested Cody R. Hulse, 25, at the hospital after he admitted to possessing and selling heroin just feet away from his newborn daughter. The Tribune-Review reported that police found 34 stamp bags of heroin, four empty bags and multiple hypodermic needles in Hulse's possession. "I have an issue myself with drugs ... heroin," Hulse told them. "I really didn't want to bring it in." Hulse's girlfriend, the mother of the newborn, said she did not know he was selling drugs from the room. [Tribune-Review, 10/20/2017]

Crime Report

Coroner's pathologist Elmo A. Griggs, 75, was arrested Sept. 12 in Morgan County, Indiana, for drunken driving, but it was what was rolling around in the back of his pickup truck that caught officers' attention. Along with a half-empty vodka bottle, Griggs was transporting several labeled totes, according to the Indianapolis Star, containing organic material. Marshal Bradley K. Shaw of the Brooklyn Police Department said early investigations showed the totes contained brain and liver samples. Griggs' wife posted on Facebook that he "had a bad day and had a couple of drinks before driving home," but court documents revealed he failed all field sobriety tests. [Indianapolis Star, 9/13/2017]

It's Good to Have Goals

Alysha Orrok of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, will head to Las Vegas in February to compete for the $10,000 prize in the National Grocers Association 2018 Best Bagger contest, reports The New York Times. Orrok, who recently won the New Hampshire competition, is a teacher who moonlights at a Hannaford Supermarket. Competitors are judged on multiple skills, including speed, weight distribution, appearance and technique. [New York Times, 10/13/2017]

Quick-thinking paramedics in Dorset, England, saved the life of a man whose fishing outing went south when a dover sole jumped down his throat and blocked his windpipe on Oct. 5. Sam Quilliam, 28, had just caught the 5 1/2-inch-long fish and went to give it a kiss when it wriggled free and lodged in his throat. "I ran round the pier like a headless chicken and then passed out," Quilliam told The Guardian. When first responders arrived, Quilliam was not breathing, but friends were performing CPR. Paramedic Matt Harrison said: "It was clear that we needed to get the fish out or this patient was not going to survive. ... I was able to eventually dislodge the tip of the tail and very carefully, so as not to break the tail off, I tried to remove it -- although the fish's barbs and gills were getting stuck on the way back up." Finally, the fish "came out in one piece," Harrison said. Quilliam said his brush with death won't put him off fishing. "Once I am back at work and fit, I will probably get back at it again," he said. [The Guardian, 10/13/2017]

What's in a Name?

Carrie L. Hitt, 42, of Junction City, Oregon, died after her Ford Bronco left the road on Territorial Highway and rolled on Oct. 4. Hitt was ejected from her car and then struck by a second vehicle, driven by Nadine M. Killmaster, 32, of Yakima, Washington. Oregon State Police told The Register-Guard they believe Hitt was using a mobile phone just before the crash. [Register-Guard, 10/6/2017]

Horsing Around

-- Lindsey Partridge of Ontario, Canada, booked herself at a pet-friendly Super 8 in Georgetown, Kentucky, for the Retired Racehorse Project's Thoroughbred Makeover on Oct. 4. At check-in, Partridge asked the front desk clerk if the pet policy included horses, to which the clerk answered, "Aw, I wouldn't mind. You could do that." So Partridge returned to her horse trailer and brought Blizz, her retired racehorse, into the hotel. Partridge and Blizz took a video and a few photos in the room, but eventually Partridge took Blizz to the Kentucky Horse Park, where the rooms are more suited to equine visitors. The Lexington Herald-Leader reported that Blizz took third place in the trail competition during the event. [Lexington Herald-Leader, 10/14/2017]

-- Meanwhile, in Iowa, a pair of women stopped at a traffic light in Altoona in October looked at the car next to them and saw a horse staring back from the back seat. "This is the most Iowa thing that has EVER happened to me," Hannah Waskel tweeted, along with a video of the miniature horse. "We started laughing and the people driving the horse saw us and waved," Hannah told UPI. "They even rolled the window down for the horse." [United Press International, 10/16/2017]

Questionable Judgment

Tucson, Arizona, firefighters were called on Oct. 15 to a mobile home park after a resident there tried to remove spiderwebs from beneath his trailer using a propane torch, but ended up setting his home on fire. KVOA-TV reported that the unnamed man's elderly mother, who also lived there, suffered minor injuries while being carried out of the mobile home with the help of neighbors. [KVOA-TV, 10/16/2017]

Wait, What?

U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport made an unusual discovery in the luggage of a traveler arriving from Vietnam in October: 54 illegal bird nests. The nests, which are considered a delicacy in some countries, are built out of solidified bird saliva and are used to make soup and broth, reported UPI. However, they are banned from entering the United States because they may carry infectious diseases. The nests were destroyed. [United Press International, 10/13/2017]

What We'll Do for Love

The Daily World in Centralia, Washington, reported that Rachel A. Deckert, 27, tried to turn herself in at the Lewis County Jail on an outstanding DUI warrant on Aug. 21, but was turned away because she brought along her partner -- literally glued to Deckert by her pinky finger. When Deckert tried again the next day, still attached to her partner, police and firefighters were called. The two women were attached by a copper elbow pipe into which they had each inserted a pinky finger secured with "some kind of epoxy," a firefighter said. They told authorities they had been that way about a week at the suggestion of a couples therapy counselor. "They haven't been able to feel their fingers for three days," said police detective Patty Finch. Efforts to separate the women were unsuccessful, and Deckert was released with advice to seek medical attention. [Daily World, 8/22/2017]

Timing Is Everything

Eva Pandora Baldursdottir, a member of the Icelandic parliament from the Pirate Party, was scheduled to take part in a debate on Oct. 12, according to UPI, but an unexpected injury lent her an especially jaunty look for the televised event: She had to conduct the debate wearing an eye patch after her toddler daughter scratched her eye. "Sometimes astounding things can happen at the worst time," Baldursdottir shared on Facebook, along with a photo of her wearing the eye patch. [United Press International, 10/13/2017]

Awesome!

For the last time, Flight 666, traveling from Copenhagen, Denmark, to HEL (Finland's Helsinki-Vantaa airport), took off on Friday the 13th of October. A Finnair spokesman said the flight, questionably numbered for the superstitious among us, has been making the trip for 11 years and has flown on Friday the 13th 21 times. "Today will actually be the final time that our AY666 flight flies to HEL," a spokesman told The Telegraph. Some Finnair flights are getting new numbers, and the infamous route will be renumbered to 954. The flight arrived safely in Helsinki. [The Telegraph, 10/13/2017]

Bright Ideas

-- Malcolm Applegate, 62, of Birmingham, England, couldn't take life with his demanding wife anymore, so 10 years ago he escaped. Applegate spent five of those years living in the woods near Kingston, until applying to live at a homeless charity called Emmaus Greenwich Center in South London, Fox News reported. "Without a word to anyone, not even family, I packed up and left ... I went missing for 10 years," Applegate said. "I enjoyed my life," he wrote in a blog on the Emmaus Greenwich website, but says he's grateful to the charity for encouraging him to reconnect with his sister. As for his wife, there has been no reaction from her to Applegate's reappearance. [Fox News, 10/17/2017]

-- Residents of Rogersville, Missouri, are protesting a high school fundraising plan to convert an abandoned funeral home into a haunted house, according to KY3.com, calling the idea distasteful and insensitive. The Preston-Marsh Funeral Home had been scheduled for demolition, but the owner gave permission to students from Logan-Rogersville High School to use it at the end of October to raise money for a safe graduation celebration for seniors. Students said they would use leftover equipment such as gurneys to enhance the spooky experience. But one Rogersville resident said doing so is "akin to opening a strip club in an old church." [KY3.com, 10/12/2017]

Oops!

In Vero Beach, Florida, a husband and wife made a hot bet on the Dallas Cowboys vs. Green Bay Packers football game on Oct. 8: The loser would set their team's jersey on fire. When the Packers won, the husband, 27, took his blue and silver Cowboys jersey outside and set fire to it. But, as he later told sheriff's deputies, because he was drunk, he then tried to put the jersey back on, and that's when things got heated. Family members pulled the burning jersey off the man and rushed him to the Indian River Medical Center. A witness told the Sebastian Daily "skin was hanging off his arm and back." He suffered second- and third-degree burns to his hand, arm and back. [Sebastian Daily, 10/9/2017]

Unclear on the Concept

An unnamed Colorado woman apparently defied death when a train rolled over her near Whitewater, Colorado, on Oct. 15. The woman was sleeping on the tracks and wearing earphones when one engine rolled completely over her before the train could stop. She was then removed from the tracks and refused medical attention. Lands End Fire Protection District chief Brian Lurvey told the Grand Junction Daily Sentinel he was not sure whether she had been cited by Union Pacific for sleeping on the tracks. [Grand Junction Daily Sentinel, 10/15/2017]