The 95-year-old Giant Dipper wooden roller coaster at Belmont Park in Mission Beach, California, is a National Historic Landmark, but it, along with all of the other rides in the park, has been closed to riders since March. To keep it in good repair and ready for reopening, the coaster must run 12 times every day, and park mechanics discussing how reopening would happen hit upon an idea: They loaded the coaster's 24 seats with giant plush animals from the park's midway games prize stash. "People are loving it," Steve Thomas, the park's general manager, told The San Diego Union-Tribune. "We've seen tons of videos and pictures that people have been posting online." Thomas said when the coaster reopens, he may keep the furry riders on board to help with social distancing rules. [San Diego Union-Tribune, 6/2/2020]

Least Competent Criminal

An unnamed 29-year-old man in Berlin, Germany, triggered alarms at a supermarket on June 5 when he tried to leave without paying for $5.65 in merchandise. The Associated Press reported that police had little trouble apprehending the man because, in his hurry escape, he left his 8-year-old son behind. Not only did the burglar's "accessory" help police identify him, but the thief fell down as he was escaping and ended up in the hospital. [Associate Press via Norfolk Daily News, 6/8/2020]

Can't Possibly Be True

The Daily Star reports that a 30-year-old man turned up at Zhaoqing First People's Hospital in Guangdong, China, on June 3 suffering from abdominal pain. Doctors performed a series of scans before discovering a freshwater fish in the man's large intestine, the presence of which he explained by saying he had accidently sat on it. "Do you think I'm an idiot?" one of the doctors replied. The spiny fins of the Mozambique tilapia had caused ruptures in the man's intestine and had to be removed through his abdomen by surgery, but the man survived the ordeal and recovered. [Daily Star, 6/8/2020]

The Entrepreneurial Spirit

Canadian Glen Richard Mousseau's adventure with Michigan law enforcement began on May 10, when he was arrested in St. Clair County driving a U-Haul truck and in possession of $97,000. He cooperated with authorities, admitting he was the owner of a submarine seized by the Border Patrol April 23 and he had been using it to ferry drugs between Michigan and Ontario, Canada. Mlive.com reported Mousseau agreed to await the investigation's outcome in a local hotel, but on May 22, federal agents said he had absconded, leaving behind five phones, a laptop and a diving suit. On June 5, Border Patrol officers observed packages thrown into the Detroit River from a vessel entering U.S. waters and found Mousseau unconscious in the water with 265 pounds of marijuana tethered to him with a tow strap. He's being held on charges of smuggling and possession of a controlled substance. [mlive.com, 6/8/2020]

Fail

Several sailors of the Royal Navy found themselves in over their heads on May 30 as their plan for a barbecue and beers got out of hand. A witness told The Sun, "They were smashed and hadn't bothered to watch for the tide." The Daily Star reported that one partier became cut off from the group, and when another went out to rescue him, they both struggled. Emergency services had to be called in, and one of the sailors had to be lifted off a cliff with a winch, the coast guard confirmed. The Royal Navy expressed its regret that emergency services were needed, but they "remain grateful for their help." [Daily Star, 6/8/2020]

Questionable Judgment

Shaun Michaelsen, 41, told police in Jupiter, Florida, he was only trying to be a "cool father" when he let a friend's 12-year-old daughter drive his Jeep on June 8. Officer Craig Yochum saw the Jeep make an illegal U-turn and speed away, the Associated Press reported, so he followed as the vehicle hit speeds of 85 mph in a 45 mph zone. The underage driver told Yochum that Michaelson, who admitted he had been drinking, told her to drive fast. He was arrested and is being held in the Palm Beach County Jail. [Associated Press, 6/9/2020]

Overreaction

Richland County (South Carolina) sheriff's officers are searching for a man and woman who held a Pizza Hut manager at gunpoint on May 29 in Columbia -- because they didn't receive the 2-liter bottle of Pepsi they had ordered for delivery with their pie. The manager told WIS the couple entered the restaurant complaining about the delivery, then came behind the counter and as the man held out a gun, the woman removed a bottle of Pepsi from the cooler. Once the goods were in hand, the man put his gun away, and they left the store. [WIS, 6/10/2020]

Bright Idea

A tech startup called ChampTrax has a novel solution for the problem of professional sports being played in empty stadiums. Jason Rubenstein told Fox4 News in Kansas City, Missouri, that his company's Hear Me Cheer technology allows fans watching at home to enable a microphone on a phone or laptop as they watch a game; the sounds fans make will then be captured and aggregated into a single track for the broadcast. "If you're alone in your home, what's the point of booing if no one can hear you?" Rubenstein asked. ESPN featured Hear Me Cheer on a June 9 boxing broadcast and during the NFL draft in April, and the company says it is in talks with other networks and sports leagues. [Fox4 News, 6/10/2020]

Oops

Seniors at Ashley Ridge High School in Dorchester County, South Carolina, were excited about attending their in-person graduation ceremony on June 10. Administrators planned limited proceedings on the field at Swamp Fox Stadium, where students and spectators could spread out in keeping with COVID-19 restrictions. But as Principal Karen Radcliffe began to introduce the valedictorian and salutatorian, the field's sprinklers switched on, spraying the field and sending people scrambling. "Everyone started running to the sides to try and avoid getting soaked before getting their diploma!" senior Megan Mowrer told WCBD. [WCBD, 6/10/2020]

Everyone's a Critic

Saxophonist Christian Beck, 50, has been treating his neighbors to two hours of music from his front porch in Sible Hedingham, England, every Saturday during the local coronavirus lockdown. Passersby would stop and listen, residents of Forest Home care facility nearby were particular fans, and money has been raised for charity through donations people have left. But Beck told the Daily Gazette his Saturday concerts will come to an end on June 13 after a letter from the Braintree Council informed him that an official noise complaint has been lodged against him. "Playing the saxophone is like a therapy for me ... and it's upsetting to think that someone complained," Beck told the Daily Gazette. "I didn't want to go against anyone so I'm calling it a day." [Daily Gazette, 6/11/2020]

Police Report

-- Angel Castro, 39, was arrested in Schenectady, New York, on June 9 after police found him and a missing golf course beverage cart at the Kelsey Commons apartment complex. Police spokesman Sgt. Nick Mannix told The Daily Gazette a worker at the Stadium Golf Club had driven the beverage cart up to the clubhouse to restock it with drinks when the suspect jumped inside and took off. Castro was charged with felony grand larceny. [The Daily Gazette, 6/9/2020]

-- Mark Alan Johnson, 67, of Rice Lake, Wisconsin, was sentenced June 3 to five years in state prison following his 15th arrest for drunk driving. Most recently he was arrested in November after steering his pickup into a ditch near his home. At the time, his license had been revoked, and his blood alcohol content was measured at almost twice the legal limit, even though Johnson told police he'd had only two glasses of wine and a can of beer, The Smoking Gun reported. Johnson's attorney, Renee Taber, noted that Johnson is a "likable, down-to-earth, blue-collar man," but his "downfall is that he is an alcoholic." After four years of confinement, he'll be eligible for the state's substance abuse program. [The Smoking Gun, 6/5/2020]

Alex Masmej of Paris, France, is a 23-year-old with a strong sense of self-worth. So strong, in fact, that he sold shares of himself via an initial coin offering, or ICO, in April. Masmej sold tokens, called $ALEX, to 30 investors, raising more than $20,000, which he plans to use to move to San Francisco. Investors in $ALEX reportedly receive a share of any money he makes over the next three years, up to $100,000; a vote on some of his life decisions; and promotion from Masmej on his social media channels, Decrypt reported. (He has a whopping 3,200 followers on Twitter and 517 on Instagram.) "Since there are no legal contracts," Masmej said, "I can technically run away with the money." But he won't because "it will hurt my reputation amongst those very people I need help from. It's more likely that I just don't make money and pay back very little." Mmm hmmm. [Decrypt, 4/18/2020]

Double Trouble

Some folks never learn. On May 9, a New Hampshire State Police trooper pulled over Nicole George, 31, in Newington. George was driving 90 mph in a 50 mph zone; after the traffic stop, she went on. But only 13 minutes later, a second trooper clocked her doing 111 mph in a 65 mph zone in Rochester. The first trooper responded to assist at the second traffic stop, NECN reported, and she was arrested for reckless operation. However, after her arrest, authorities found about 40 grams of fentanyl and some methamphetamine in George's possession; they seized her Honda Pilot, and they suspect criminal activity was the reason for her big hurry. [NECN, 5/10/2020]

Priorities

As rioters looted and vandalized stores and other businesses in Seattle on May 30, one woman, wearing a cloth mask and a backpack, was caught on news cameras calmly walking out of the Cheesecake Factory with a whole cheesecake, adorned with undisturbed strawberries on top. A KIRO news crew captured the footage as others threw bottles of liquor and broke windows. "With everything going on, sometimes you just have to take a moment to treat yourself," one Twitter user commented. [KIRO, 5/31/2020]

Oops

-- Dang those tricky Zoom calls. As at least 12 government officials met online on May 29 in Mexico, Sen. Martha Lucia Micher thought her camera was off and changed her top as her colleagues looked on. Micher, 66, issued an apology, saying: "In one part of the session, without realizing and while the camera of my computer was on, I got changed showing my naked torso. ... Thanks to a call from (other) senators ... I realized my error." She went on: "I am a woman who has fought for the left for almost 40 years and who has occupied various public roles in my fervent commitment for the defense of human rights, I am a woman who is not ashamed of her body." According to the Daily Mail, she blamed the mistake on her lack of technological savvy. [Daily Mail, 6/3/2020]

-- Car buffs who were able to snag a 2020 Chevrolet Corvette C8 were lucky: Coronavirus shut down production before too many of them could be built. So imagine how angry the owner of one of the prized autos was when he took his car to a Chevy dealership in Jacksonville, Florida, for service on June 1 -- and the car was dropped off the lift. According to CarBuzz, the new 'Vette has a different weight distribution than its predecessors, and service techs didn't know the right way to position it on the lift. Car owner Jake Anthony posted a photo of the wrecked hot rod on his Instagram account, where he noted that "I've spoken with (GM) executives, I'm not interested in a new base model." [CarBuzz, 6/2/2020]

I Am Not Dead Yet

The BBC reported that on June 2, railroad workers became alarmed after spotting a pair of human feet and "no signs of life" near the Chafford Hundred station in Essex, England. The British Transport Police reported that officers who rushed to the scene "found a man in his late 30s enjoying some nude sunbathing." A spokeswoman for Network Rail punned: "Let me lay it bare, the railway is not a place to sunbathe. Please keep away from the tracks." Another spokesperson said the episode was "not as uncommon as you might think." The sunbather received "words of advice" but no citation. [BBC, 6/3/2020]

The Foreign Press

Police in Madrid, Spain, caught up with a wanted criminal in late May, AFP reported. Nacho Vidal, a porn star, was charged with manslaughter relating to the death of fashion photographer Jose Luis Abad last year at Vidal's country residence. According to authorities, Abad died after inhaling "venom of the bufo alvarius toad" during the "celebration of a mystic ritual." The toad, which is native to Mexico and the southwestern U.S., secretes venom containing a powerful psychedelic substance. Police said Vidal and his cohorts have lured people who are "easily influenced, vulnerable or who were seeking help for illnesses or addictions" to the rituals on a regular basis. One of Vidal's relatives and an employee were also arrested. [AFP, 6/3/2020]

Unclear on the Concept

Julie Wheeler of Beaver, West Virginia, pleaded guilty in February to health care fraud and faced up to 10 years in prison. So she and her husband, Rodney Wheeler, apparently cooked up a plan to keep her out of jail: On May 31, Rodney and the couple's 17-year-old son reported that Julie had fallen from the Grandview overlook at the New River Gorge National River. Federal, state and local law enforcement agencies and rescue crews began a search for her, including use of a helicopter and rappelling into a jagged canyon, to no avail. After three days of searching, however, Julie turned up -- hiding in a closet in her home, WVNS reported. Now, in addition to the fraud conviction, Julie and Rodney will face multiple charges of conspiracy and giving false information to West Virginia State Police. "It is hard to hide at home," remarked U.S. Attorney Mike Stuart. [WVNS, 6/3/2020]

The Entrepreneurial Spirit

Cobbler Grigore Lup of Cluj, Romania, was disturbed to see people ignoring social distancing guidelines put in place for the COVID-19 pandemic. So he created a pair of size-75 (European) men's shoes, each of which is about 2 1/2 feet long. The shoes have a regular space for the foot but then a long bill-like section that extends from the toe. Lup told United Press International that the shoes are designed so that two people facing each other (and wearing his shoes) have to keep a distance of about 5 feet. [United Press International, 6/3/2020]

The Way the World Works

Lowering the Bar reported on June 3 that the divorce rate in Saudi Arabia has climbed by as much as 30% during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to a referenced report, at least some of those divorces are the result of women finding out that their husbands are secretly also married to another woman, an apparently not uncommon practice in that country. "The pandemic, domestic isolation and curfew contributed to uncovering the hidden (marriage)," the report noted, citing specific cases. [Lowering the Bar, 6/3/2020]

In 2013, Chad Dearth of Overland Park, Kansas, purchased his dream car, a 1964 Chevy Impala, and got an "antique" license plate for it. Since then, he has sold the car and moved to a new neighborhood, but earlier this year he received word that seven to 10 collection letters a day were arriving at his old address from state turnpike authorities up and down the East Coast. That's when Dearth learned that Kansas is one of a few states that assign identical numbers to different categories of specialty license plates, and his old antique plate number matched the number on a commercial semi truck -- the one photographed by one of the authorities demanding payment for toll violations. Lee Ann Phelps, vehicle services manager for the Kansas Department of Revenue, told Fox4 she doesn't know why the state uses identical numbers, but there are about 625,000 plates in the state that share a number. Kansas has issued a new license for the truck, but in the meantime, the bills continue. Dearth most recently got a letter from the Delaware Turnpike Authority seeking $479. [Fox4, 5/27/2020]

Green Eggs, No Ham

A.K. Shihabudheen of Malappuram, India, and his wife cracked an egg from one of their chickens about nine months ago and were surprised to see a dark green yolk, rather than the standard yellow. "All the eggs which the hen laid ... were this kind," Shihabudheen told The News Minute, "and so we started to incubate the eggs. Out of the six chicks which hatched from these eggs, a few have started to lay eggs and those yolks are also green in color." The eggs taste like other eggs and cause no health problems, the family said. Experts from Kerala Veterinary and Animal Sciences University suspect the feed given to the birds may be behind the phenomenon, according to Dr. S. Sankaralingam, but Shihabudheen says he gives all his birds the same feed. [The News Minute, 5/15/2020]

Monkey Business

Egyptian talk show host Lobna Asal abruptly fled the studio mid-interview on May 27 after being attacked by the monkey brought to the set by her interview subject, actor Ibrahim El-Samman, United Press International reported. Appearing on Egyptian channel Al Hayat, the monkey co-starred with El-Samman on his latest project, and at first settled in Asal's lap for several minutes, calmly listening to the conversation, but then jumped down and attacked her legs. As she ran off, another person arrived to wrangle the primate. [United Press International, 5/27/2020]

Another Job Threatened

Massachusetts-based Boston Dynamics has partnered with the New Zealand robotics company Rocos to develop a robotic dog, Spot, to herd sheep. "The age of autonomous robots is upon us," Rocos chief executive David Inggs told United Press International. The dog can be controlled remotely as it guides sheep through mountainous and difficult terrain, according to the company. "It just needs to walk with intent toward the sheep and they seem to respond," said Richard Stinear, Rocos chief technology officer. In other words, they act like sheep. [United Press International, 5/22/2020]

Bird Brain

Security agencies in India thought they may have captured a Pakistani spy after villagers in Manyari, a border town in the disputed region of Kashmir, delivered the courier to police, but the mole wasn't a mole at all; it was a pigeon. According to Sky News, Kathua Police Superintendent Shailendra Mishra said the bird flew into a home on May 24 and a "ring was seen attached to one of its legs with some numbers on it ... Some called it a coded message." Authorities are trying to decipher the message, as pigeons have been used for espionage in the disputed region in the past. Meanwhile, the BBC reports that a Pakistani man named Habibullah is claiming the pigeon is his, and the number on the ring is his mobile phone number. Habibullah, who lives just a few miles from the India/Pakistan border, has asked for the pigeon's return and told local media India should "refrain from victimizing innocent birds." [Sky News, 5/26/2020] [BBC, 5/27/2020]

The Allure of Junk Food

-- San Diego police responding to a burglar alarm at a Wells Fargo bank in Chollas View, California, around 3:30 a.m. on May 27, found a broken window by the bank's drive-thru. Alarm company personnel told officers surveillance cameras showed a man inside the bank's break room, using the microwave. Police gained entry to the bank and arrested the unnamed man, who told KGTV he had gone into the bank only to warm up his Hot Pockets. Asked if the Hot Pockets were worth the arrest, the man said, "Hell yeah it was worth it." [KGTV, 5/27/2020]

-- City Parks and Recreation employee Zach Morris was cleaning up storm damage in Wynne, Arkansas, at the city's sports complex on May 24 when he noticed that someone had broken into the concession stand. "The whole place was just looted," Morris told WREG. The stand had been fully stocked for games scheduled before COVID-19 lockdowns began, and thieves helped themselves to drinks and candy, even taking the time to prepare nachos and popcorn before they left. Police are hoping the culprits will confess. "The right thing to do is take responsibility for the mistakes you made," Morris said. [WREG, 5/25/2020]

Latest Sightings

UFO hunter Scott Waring discovered what he believes to be the "entrance to an alien base" on Earth on May 13 by studying Google Earth. According to the Mirror, Waring said the base doesn't fit in with its surroundings on a "small and uninhabited island in Indonesia" and "aliens would love to have a hidden base" in such a secluded location. Using a Google Earth tool, he measured the opening, which is about 66 feet across -- big enough, he said, to "get a lot of alien ships in there." One commenter on Waring's YouTube channel praised his finding: "My gut tells me this is 100% legit. Good job man!" [Mirror, 5/20/2020]

Florida

Police in Miramar, Florida, are still trying to identify a man who was caught on surveillance video ransacking Miramar High School on May 25. The suspect spent nearly 24 hours destroying computers, painting graffiti on the walls and flooding areas of the school, the Miami Herald reported -- all while stark naked, except for headphones. School officials put the cost of the damages at about $100,000. [Miami Herald, 5/26/2020]

It's a Mystery

Folks in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, have been hearing odd, loud banging noises at all hours over the past few weeks. "We're all hearing it and it's interrupting our sleep," Heather Donily told the CBC. "There's a sense of panic when you first hear it." Most people believe the noises are "bear bangers" -- noisy flares used to scare bears away in the wilderness -- and police are investigating, but Councilman Pete Fry has concerns: "Bear bangers actually do have the potential to cause harm. ... If they're being indiscriminately used throughout the city ... somebody might actually get hurt." [CBC, 5/28/2020]