David Paul Wipperman, 61, of Largo, Florida, was taken into custody Nov. 21 in response to a road rage altercation a few weeks before, the Tampa Bay Times reported. According to arrest reports, during the incident, Wipperman left his truck and approached a woman driving a Kia sedan. She rolled down the window and apologized to Wipperman, who then spit the food he was chewing into her face, and some of it went into her mouth, the report said. Next, he allegedly opened her driver's side door and began screaming at her, pointing his finger in her face. He was charged in Pinellas County with felony battery and burglary of an occupied vehicle and held on $12,500 bail. [Tampa Bay Times, 11/22/2019]

Picky, Picky

In Boca Raton, Florida, a robber approached a Wells Fargo bank branch teller with a very specific request on Nov. 18, reported WPLG. Sandy Hawkins, 73, entered the bank that morning and told the teller, "This is a robbery. I have a weapon," and put his hand in his waistband to indicate a gun, according to the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office arrest report. The teller started counting out $100 bills, eventually totaling $2,000, the affidavit said, but Hawkins explained that was too much money, and he only wanted $1,100. Authorities said the teller made the adjustment, then slid the bills through the window to Hawkins, who left the bank. When detectives caught up with him the next day, he told them, "I will make this easy" and showed them a note he had written, which read, "Give me $1,100. Now, No Alarms, Hope to get caught." He was booked into the Palm Beach County Jail on robbery charges. [WPLG, 11/20/2019]

Bright Ideas

-- Elementary and middle school students in Bandung, Indonesia, have been spending too much time with their smartphones, according to Mayor Oded Muhammad Danial, who has come up with a clever distraction. In mid-November, authorities began distributing 2,000 baby chicks in cages with signs that read: "Please take good care of me." AFP reports the students will be required to feed their pets before and after school and can keep them on school premises if they don't have space in their backyard. Danial said the chick project, dubbed "chickenisation," is part of a larger endeavor by President Joko Widodo to broaden students' education. "There is an aspect of discipline here," said Danial. [AFP, 11/20/2019]

-- Eighth-graders in the Payatas district north of Manila in the Philippines have come up with a way to help rid city streets of dog feces and maybe even lower local construction costs. The "bio-bricks" they've developed are made of 10 grams of poop, which the students collect and air-dry, and 10 grams of cement powder, Reuters reported on Nov. 20. The students say their bricks can be used for sidewalk pavement or small structures, such as backyard walls. They admit the bio-bricks have a faint odor, but assert that it will fade with time. [Reuters, 11/20/2019]

Compelling Explanation

In Bainbridge Township, Ohio, a 60-year-old man called police on Oct. 22 after firing two warning shots into his backyard, WOIO reported. The unnamed man told officers he was trying to scare an animal away, but when asked if it might have been a bear, he said, "It ain't no ... bear because it was jiggling my doorknob." The homeowner went on to tell police the animal had to be Bigfoot because it was 7 feet tall, and it comes to his home every night because neighbors feed it bananas. He also speculated that a woman who was missing from the area was taken by the "creature." However, officers found no large animal tracks in his yard and suggested he call again if he witnesses anything suspicious. [WOIO, 11/12/2019]

Multitasking

As college student Morgan Taylor got her nails done in a High Point, North Carolina, salon on Nov. 20, she was shocked when one of the nail technicians spread out a tarp on the shop floor and began butchering meat with what appeared to be a kitchen knife. "I asked them what it was, because just seeing them unload flesh and bones was a little bit shocking," Taylor told WFMY. "They said it was deer meat, and they were splitting it up between the workers to take home. It had already been skinned; they were sectioning it." Taylor reported the shop to the North Carolina Board of Cosmetic Art Examiners, which told WFMY its "inspectors have not received a complaint within memory of butchering in a cosmetic shop." It declined to comment further on the open investigation. [WFMY, 11/22/2019]

Wait, What?

Zhang Binsheng, 30, of Harbin, China, finally sought a doctor's attention after three months of struggling to breathe through his nose, Metro News reported in early November. Zhang told doctors at the Fourth Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University that he couldn't sleep and also had a constant smell of decay in his nostrils. X-rays revealed Zhang had a tooth stuck in his nostril. The tooth, which Zhang had lost when he was 10 years old after a fall from the third floor of a mall, had somehow rerooted and continued to grow in his nasal cavity. It was removed in a brief surgery, and Zhang is said to be recovering. [Metro News, 11/11/2019]

Weird "Science"

Beware medical advice derived from Instagram, we always say. "Metaphysicalmeagan," who boasts nearly 10,000 followers on the social media site, is advocating a new "ancient Taoist practice that has been around for a while": perineum sunning. "Many of you have been asking about the benefits of this practice," she writes, "30 seconds of sunlight on your butthole is the equivalent of a full day of sunlight with your clothes on!" She goes on to say she has experienced energy surges, better sleep and more creativity, reports IFLScience.com, along with myriad other improvements. Scientists point out that while sunlight and taking some time to relax are healthful, "there is no evidence that (sunlight) has to be taken as a suppository." [IFLScience.com, 11/26/2019]

Great Art!

A Japanese man who goes by the name Kiwami Japan on YouTube has chronicled his novel approach to fashioning a very personal engagement ring, the Mirror reported on Oct. 25. For 365 days, the man collected his fingernail clippings, which he then ground into a fine powder and mixed with water in a pan. After compressing the mixture, he baked it in an oven for 90 minutes, which resulted in what looked like a lump of dark clay. The substance was packed into a diamond-shaped mold and then mounted into a four-prong silver ring (which he also made himself). The finished ring features a dull black "stone." Social media followers were unimpressed, but you can't say he didn't put a little bit of himself into the ring. [Mirror, 10/25/2019]

Animal Help Now, a group that assists in "animal emergencies," has gathered almost 160,000 signatures on a petition to repeal legislation allowing "Possum Drops" in North Carolina. In a number of communities in the state, the custom of putting an opossum in a transparent box, suspending it in the air and then slowly lowering it to the ground is a feature of New Year's Eve celebrations. Organizers in Brasstown told the Raleigh News & Observer they ended its Possum Drop after the 2018 event because it's "a hard job to do, and it's time to move on," but they maintained that the tradition does "absolutely nothing to harm" the animal. Animal Help Now, however, is continuing its campaign against the state statute that makes it legal for people to treat opossums however they wish between the dates of Dec. 29 and Jan. 2. [Raleigh News & Observer, 11/18/2019]

Bright Ideas

-- Maybe they're betting no woman will reveal what she weighs in public, but the Fusion Club in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, is offering women free drink credits based on their weight. For example, a woman who weighs 150 pounds would receive about $18.50 in free cocktails. Anil Kumar, spokesman for the club, told Insider that while they have a scale behind the bar, they will also accept a woman's word about what she weighs. "They can just write the weight on a paper and give it to the bartender discreetly," he said. "Very simple, no strings attached. We wanted the ladies to surprise their partners and friends that it's good to gain weight!" [Insider, 11/15/2019]

-- A 16-year-old boy was detained by U.S. Border Patrol agents on Nov. 17 after an agent saw him hiding in brush about a mile north of the Otay Mesa Point of Entry near San Diego. Authorities said the teenager had a remote-control car with him, along with two large duffel bags stuffed with 50 packages of methamphetamines, weighing more than 55 pounds and worth more than $106,000. Border Patrol spokesman Theron Francisco told The San Diego Union-Tribune that authorities believe the car was used to carry the bundles across the border, making many trips through the bollard-style fence from the south side and driving to the teen on the north side. The boy was charged with drug smuggling and held in Juvenile Hall. [San Diego Union-Tribune, 11/19/2019]

Yeah, No

If you're passing through the seaside city of Fukuoka, Japan, here's a tip for a cheap hotel: A night in room No. 8 at the Asahi Ryokan will cost you just $1. And your privacy. In return for the low rate, your entire stay in your room will be livestreamed on YouTube. Hotel manager Tetsuya Inoue told CNN on Nov. 20 that while the world can watch the room's guests, there is no audio, so conversations and phone calls can remain private. Also, the bathroom is out of camera range. And, of course, guests can turn out the lights. "Our hotel is on the cheaper side," Inoue said, "so we need some added value, something special that everyone will talk about." [CNN, 11/20/2019]

Crime Report

When Martin Skelly, 41, was arrested on Nov. 16 in a Clearwater, Florida, McDonald's for possession of methamphetamines, he told officers he did not have any other contraband. But during his intake at the Pinellas County Jail, a deputy found a "small bag of crystal powder substance wedged deep within (his) belly button cavity," Fox News reported, which later tested positive for meth. Skelly, who is 5-foot-9 and weighs 380 pounds, received two additional charges for introducing contraband into a correctional facility and narcotics possession. [Fox News, 11/20/2019]

People Different From Us

Bodybuilder Kirill Tereshin, 23, a former Russian soldier also known as Popeye, underwent surgery in Moscow in mid-November after doctors told him that the petroleum jelly he had been injecting into his biceps to increase their size might result in the amputation of his arms. Surgeon Dmitry Melnikov told Metro News: "The problem is that this is petroleum jelly. (Tereshin) injected this so thoroughly that it spread in the muscle and killed it." In this first of four surgeries, doctors removed 3 pounds of dead muscle and 3 liters of jelly that had formed into a solid lump. The injections were causing Tereshin high fevers, pain and weakness. Following the operations, doctors have told Tereshin, he will have arm movement but his arm muscles will be diminished. [Metro News, 11/20/2019]

Awesome!

Over the past five years, 12 separate bundles of cash, totaling nearly $45,000, have turned up on sidewalks in the quiet, beachside English village of Blackhall Colliery, posing a mystery for local Detective Constable John Forster. "These bundles are always ... discovered by random members of the public who have handed them in," Forster told 9News, although he did admit he suspects some bundles have not been turned over to police. Officials have no evidence of a crime committed related to the bundles, usually containing about 2,000 pounds apiece. After a period of time, if no one claims them, the folks who discovered the bundles will get to keep them. [9News, 11/19/2019]

Compelling Explanation

Police and firefighters in Liberty, Ohio, were called to the Liberty Walmart on the afternoon of Nov. 16 to find a car on fire in the parking lot, reported WFMJ. Owner Stephanie Carlson, 40, told them there was a can of gas in the trunk and she had lighted a candle to get rid of the smell, but she later admitted she had poured gas on the seats and started the fire with a lighter because the car was dirty and there was a problem with the front wheel. The car belonged to her husband, who said he had been looking for her all day, and also told officers she had allegedly been found huffing mothballs and paint thinner recently. Police took her into custody and found a lighter and mothballs in her purse; she was charged with arson, inducing panic and criminal damaging. [WFMJ, 11/20/2019]

Suspicions Confirmed

After the death of their uncle, Sifiso Justice Mhlongo, in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa, Thandaza Mtshali and Thobeka Mhlongo ran into trouble trying to settle a claim on his life insurance. According to The Daily Star, Old Mutual required confirmation the man had passed away and delayed payment because they were waiting for "additional assessments." So on Nov. 19, the women went to the funeral home, retrieved their uncle's body and took it to the company's local office. "They said they had paid the money into our bank account and we wanted to be sure," Mtshali said, "so we left the body at their office and went to check at the bank." When they had their money, they returned the body to the funeral home, and Mr. Mhlongo now rests in a family burial plot. Old Mutual pronounced the incident "most unsettling," and promised a full investigation, but Muzi Hlengwa, spokesman for the National Funeral Practitioners Association of South Africa, said the matter was far from over: "The rituals that were supposed to be done to move the body from one place to another were not done. The soul of that man is still left at the Old Mutual, so they will have to cover the costs of performing these rituals." [Daily Star, 11/20/2019]

About a year ago, Les and Paula Ansley of Mossel Bay, South Africa, stumbled upon a novel idea for a new type of spirit, which they call Indlovu Gin, the Associated Press reports. During a safari, they learned that elephants eat a wide variety of fruits and flowers, but digest less than a third of it. "As a consequence, in the elephant dung, you get the most amazing variety of these botanicals," Les Ansley said. "Why don't we let the elephants do the hard work of collecting all these botanicals and we will make gin from it?" Why, indeed? They collect the dung themselves, by hand, and describe their gin's flavor as "lovely, wooded, almost spicy, earthy." ("Indlovu" means elephant in the Zulu language.) Each bottle's label notes where the dung was gathered and when. "Most people are very keen to actually taste it," Ansley said. A bottle sells for about $32. [Associated Press, 11/12/2019]

Fine Points of the Law

After losing in district court, convicted killer Benjamin Schreiber took an unusual claim to the Iowa Court of Appeals, but was shut down again on Nov. 6, according to The Washington Post. Schreiber, 66, was sentenced to a life term in 1997, but in March 2015, he suffered a medical emergency in his prison cell that caused doctors to have to restart his heart five times. Schreiber thus claimed he had briefly "died," and therefore he had served out his life sentence and should be released. The district judge didn't buy it, though, saying the filing proved he was still alive, and the appeals court agreed, saying, "Schreiber is either alive, in which case he must remain in prison, or he is dead, in which case this appeal is moot." [Washington Post, 11/8/2019]

Higher Education

A Dutch university now offers students a turn in the "purification grave," a hole dug in the ground where students can lie down and reflect on their lives for up to three hours. The student chaplaincy at Radboud University initially offered the experience in 2009 as a temporary experiment, but due to increased demand, it's back this year, according to Vice. Students are not allowed to bring their phones or a book with them into the grave. "You can see it as a special place of meditation: below you the earth, above you the sky," the university website explains. "You will then automatically notice what is going through your mind." If you're skittish about entering the grave, you can sit on the bench nearby. Radboud also offers a finals-season "crying room" and nap pods. [Vice, 10/24/2019]

The Continuing Crisis

Female employees in Japan who wear eyeglasses are seeing red after some companies there have reportedly banned eyewear for their women workers, according to the BBC. While some retailers have said women in glasses give a "cold impression," the hashtag #glassesareforbidden has been trending, and Kumiko Nemoto, professor of sociology at Kyoto University of Foreign Studies, spoke out against the "outdated" policies: "It's all about gender. It's pretty discriminatory. ... The company values the women's appearance as being feminine and that's the opposite to someone who wears glasses." Japanese women have also rebelled against policies that require them to wear high heels. [BBC, 11/8/2019]

Bright Idea

Subhash Yadav, 42, of Jaunpur, India, visited a market to eat eggs with a friend, News18 reported on Nov. 4, but the two fell into an argument. To settle the dispute, police said, Yadav accepted a challenge to eat 50 eggs in exchange for 2,000 rupees. He ate 41 eggs, but just as he began to eat the 42nd, he collapsed, unconscious. He was rushed to the hospital but died a few hours later. Doctors claimed Yadav died of overeating, but family members would not comment. [News18, 11/4/2019]

Least Competent Criminal

On Oct. 30, Hudson, Florida, resident Michael Psilakis, 21, lost $1,000 in a card game to an unnamed man, which a witness told police upset Psilakis, reported the Tampa Bay Times. When the man was reported missing, Pasco County Sheriff's deputies started their investigation with Psilakis, who told them the victim had dropped him off at his mother's house after the card game, so when the man turned up dead in a burned-out Ford Taurus, police visited Psilakis' mother. During her interview, Psilakis called his mother, according to court documents, and officers recorded the conversation. In it he told his mom he had burned his legs throwing gas on the car and they needed to coordinate their stories so he was coming right over. When he arrived, police found a stolen handgun in his car along with a cellphone containing internet searches for "can u shoot through a seat" and "how to treat burns." Deputies arrested him on weapons charges on Nov. 2 and later added first-degree murder, grand theft of a motor vehicle and resisting arrest. [Tampa Bay Times, 11/12/2019]

Oops!

The Northern Echo, a newspaper in northeast England, is catching it from an area family after it ran an obituary on Nov. 10 for Charlie Donaghy, a local sports enthusiast and teacher -- who is not dead yet. In fact, his son, Ian, reports that Charlie is "alive and well," according to Fox News. The Echo published an apology the next day, but Ian posted on Facebook that "you can't UNHEAR or UNREAD that your Dad's dead! ... Northern Echo website arseclownery!" A statement from the Donaghy family said the mistake has "caused immeasurable distress" and is "unforgivable." [Fox News, 11/13/2019]

Government in Action

Residents of a small Canadian island off the coast of Maine are up in arms and demanding that the province of New Brunswick either establish a year-round ferry service or build a bridge to the mainland because their mail keeps getting opened by U.S. Customs. Mail to Campobello Island has to cross the border by sealed truck into Maine before it reaches the island, which rarely caused problems, reports Fox News, until last year, when Canada legalized recreational cannabis. Since then, U.S. Customs and Border Protection has been searching for marijuana ordered from Cannabis NB, the only authorized seller of cannabis in the province. Cannabis NB has now stopped shipping packages to the island, but U.S. customs officials continue to search the mail, and the island's residents are fed up. "Expectations of privacy that the rest of Canada has just don't exist on Campobello," said Justin Tinker, a local engineer. Politicians are said to be open to the idea of the ferry, but there are no plans in place to fund the project. [Fox News, 11/14/2019]

Cold

Hot Springs, Arkansas, paramedic Lisa Darlene Glaze, 50, was arrested on Nov. 11 after she allegedly cut a 1.7-carat diamond ring off the finger of a dead woman and sold it to a local pawn shop. The patient, Gloria Robinson, had been transported to a medical facility on Oct. 16, where she later died. When her personal items were returned to her family, they noticed three of her rings were missing, according to arrest documents. KTHV reports two of the rings were found, but investigators say Glaze sold the third ring at Hot Springs Classic Gun and Pawn for $45, and the band had been cut. Robinson's sister retrieved the ring from the pawn shop and had it appraised, revealing it was worth almost $8,000. Glaze was charged with felony theft and misdemeanor unlawful transfer of stolen property. [KTHV, 11/13/2019]

Awesome!

For the person on your gift list this year who can't get enough ranch dressing, Hidden Valley comes to the rescue with a decorative plastic stocking full of its creamy nectar. FanSided reports the Hidden Valley Ranch Custom Holiday Stocking measures 105 square inches festooned in red and green and filled with 52 ounces of Original Ranch. It comes with its own mantle holder and has a handy pouring spout at the toe. All that ranchy fun costs just $35. Time to get dippin'! [FanSided, 11/13/2019]