From cate3@netcom.com Thu Feb 23 08:53:54 1995 Subject: Life D.3 To: jwry.dli@netcom.com From: [cate3@netcom.com] "Henry_Cate_III" Reply-to: cate3@netcom.com --------------------------------------- Date: 11 Apr 94 10:05:32 PDT (Monday) Subject: Life D.3 The following are selections from WhiteBoard News To join, send mail to: joeha@microsoft.com (Joseph Harper) ---------------------------------------------------- Fast News Forum: A highly dangerous prisoner on the lam in Britain asked a policeman for directions when his taxi driver lost his way. In another Boston courtroom, a bookkeeper who embezzled from a car dealership to repay what she stole from a construction company drew 27 months in prison. A fraternity at Keene State College in New Hampshire threw a party and served milk and cookies -- no alcohol. The college administration was so delighted it picked up the tab. A Bangladeshi cook won the international Indian Chef of the Year title in Edinburgh, Scotland, recently, then reported to authorities to be deported. Airline flights in Madang, Papua New Guinea, were rescheduled to avoid collisions with huge flocks of bats migrating at night. A pregnant women told a 911 operator in Morgantown, West Virginia, her water had broken. He thought she was having a plumbing problem and asked whether she knew where the shut-off valve was. -------------------------- Washington, District of Columbia: Margaret Milner Richardson says she has discovered two instant conversation stoppers: Her birthplace (Waco, Texas) and her job (IRS commissioner). -------------------------- Preston, Connecticut: Workers at a Preston trash incinerator take time to inspect loads from nearby casinos, where chips and cash sometimes fall into the trash. -------------------------- Longview, Washington: Roger Gammel was out hunting a few days ago on Weyerhaeuser land near Pe Ell with a friend and dogs. Their quarry: a bobcat. They flushed one and it sought refuge in a hemlock tree. So Gammel, 62, climbed 40 feet up and fired his .22 caliber pistol to scare it down. The cat scrambled down, bit his left arm and bumped his right hand gripping the gun. The gun fired. The bullet went not into the cat but into Gammel's arm. The dogs killed the cat. Gammel climbed down and drove his pickup 40 miles southeast into Vader for a cup of coffee. By then the bleeding had stopped, but patrons at Brook's Nook asked what happened. "I just told them a bobcat shot me," Gammel said yesterday. "I just wonder when they're going to make the bobcats register their guns." -------------------------- Toledo, Ohio: Is your dog tired of Kibbles 'N Bit's? How about a cheeseburger, fries and a kanine kola? Don't have a dog? Puppy Hut, a drive-through restaurant for pets, also serves cats, hamsters and other animals -- including monkeys. Puppy Hut serves pet food made with ingredients similar to those in dog biscuits but shaped like people pleasing dishes such a steaks, burgers and ribs. "Business has just been fantastic," said co-owner Sheila Mullan, 36, a former computer programmer. -------------------------- Spokane, Washington: When Kato's owner paused on the T.J. Meenach Bridge to watch a bald eagle, the 4-year-old retriever jumped off. It wasn't the best move. It was a 50-foot drop, and Kato's owner was still holding onto the leash. The woman tried to haul Kato back up. But his choke collar was strangling him, so she let it go and watched her pet drop into the Spokane River. Luckily, the dog landed in the water and made it to an island in the middle of the river. Kato wasn't hurt and was resting comfortably by the time rescue crews made an uneventful rescue. -------------------------- Indianapolis, Indiana: Be true to your school: even in the afterlife. An Indianapolis wholesaler is selling funeral caskets in Indiana school colors. The Indiana University cream-and crimson casket is a good seller, says Marty Gaede, owner of Gaede Casket Company, which makes college-oriented panels for the caskets. "It comes in a crimson color and it's got white pin stripes on it," Gaede says. The interior even comes with a panel that says Indiana Hoosiers. "That one has a basketball going through a hoop-and-net combination. It's really a neat thing. Jerry Ellenwood of Day Mortuary in Bloomington says he has sold three $2,800-$3,300 Indiana-colored caskets since last summer, adding, "They're lovely, but it's not the way I want to go out." For Purdue University fans, caskets in black and gold are also available. -------------------------- Charlotte, North Carolina: Wilton Connor Packaging in Charlotte employs Leroy Henderson to fix faucets, paint walls, patch ceilings, repair floors and do other odd jobs at employees' homes. Employees buy parts, but the company pays Henderson's wages, transportation and buys his tools. "He as more than 40 hours a week of work," says Wilton Connor, the company's owner. -------------------------- Koping, Sweden: A court has ordered a burglar to pay $370 in damages for scaring a parrot by breaking into a house. Since the burglary last year, the parrot has been afraid to stay at home alone and its owner is forced to drive it to relatives when he leaves his house in Arboga in southern Sweden. The court in Koping ruled Monday that the thief should pay transportation costs as damage. -------------------------- Lakewood, Colorado: After a month-long investigation, police in Lakewood announced that the 100-plus bullet firings that had frightened neighbors into believing that gangs were engaged in drive-by shootings in the area were actually caused by the poor aim of employees at the nearby federal prison facility firing range. According to a prison spokesman, all employees, including clerical personnel, must be trained in firearms, and some apparently missed not only the targets but the large hill that separates the range from the complaining neighborhood. -------------------------- Hoboken, New Jersey: How much for the luck of the Irish? Exactly $20.95 at Emerald Enterprises, a New Jersey floral shipping firm. It will ship a three-inch pot of clover bred to sprout leaves of four leaflets on 39% of all the stems in its lifetime. The clover was developed by a University of Florida breeder. -------------------------- Cape Canaveral, Florida: Astronauts on one of the longest flights in space shuttle history conceded Thursday it was time to return to Earth -- even if it meant landing 57 minutes shy of an endurance record. "Our commander just discovered we're out of tortillas, so it must be time to come home," astronaut Pierre Thuot reported. Columbia was due to touch down on the Kennedy Space Center runway 13 days, 23 hours and 16 minutes after blasting off March 4 just a few miles away. That's 57 minutes shy of the longest shuttle flight to date, also by Columbia, last fall. An extra orbit -- which takes about 90 minutes -- would give this mission the endurance record. But that hope faded as meteorologists forecast good weather for Friday's landing at Kennedy. -------------------------- Detroit, Michigan: Wildlife experts in Detroit are amazed by the two- timing behavior of a peregrine falcon they have been monitoring. "Pop" has been commuting daily between the nests of his two girlfriends, "Judy" and "Sunrise," wooing each of them with tasty treats such as dead pigeons and other birds he has killed. Judy Jerke, coordinator of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources program that introduced the predatory birds into urban areas, thinks this is highly unusual behavior for falcons, which are believed to be faithful to one mate at a time. It could be that this kind of mating has just gone unnoticed in the wild, or is perhaps "just a normal city thing," speculates Jerke. -------------------------- Saratoga Springs, New York: Laughter is big business, as companies seek ways to break office tension. Companies are increasingly hiring humor consultants to help reduce employee stress and burnout. "Everyone uses the expression 'Someday we'll laugh about this.' Why wait?" says Joel Goodman, director of the Humor Project in Saratoga Springs. He suggests workers pretend they are Allen Funt, of Candid Camera fame, for five minutes a day to find humor in stressful situations. Businesses put cartoon bulletin boards near elevators and play funny videotapes in staff lounges. Some managers wear "Save Time: See It My Way" buttons. Ben & Jerry's, which has celebrated Barry Manilow's and Elvis's birthdays, maintains an employee committee dedicated to increasing workplace happiness. It is called the Joy Gang. -------------------------- New York, New York: Job seekers in Pic'n Pay shoe stores must dial an 800 number and answer a 100-question interview via phone mail. A computer compiles responses to the yes/no questions, even measuring how many seconds it takes to answer such queries as "To get a job, would you lie?" Pic'n Pay says the system allows it to centralize personnel operations and ensure no one is asked illegal questions. -------------------------- Greenbrier, Arkansas: Elephants are not what one ordinarily expects to find on a 300-acre wooded farm in central Arkansas. Hogs, perhaps. Old yellow dogs, maybe. Elephants, no. But this is the '90s, and strange things are happening all over, so there they are: elephants in Arkansas. The name -- Riddle's Elephant Breeding Farm & Wildlife Sanctuary -- pretty much says it all. There is a serious point to the sanctuary, the protection and promulgation of an endangered species. Visitors are welcome, and so is a donation, which is tax-deductible. Also, the Riddles want a larger herd, so any and all unused elephants can be sent the sanctuary. Postpaid please. -------------------------- Mount Wilson, California: For the first time, the public now has access to a computer-controlled research telescope. From a home computer, anyone can dial the Mount Wilson Observatory outside Los Angeles and point the facility's 24-inch telescope at planets, galaxies, comets, even tongues of fire on the sun. Stephen Bisque was the first to try the technology. Last August, he used his computer to instruct the telescope to swivel and lock onto the globular cluster M14. He then snapped a four-second exposure, using the telescope's charge-coupled-device camera, which translates measurements of light intensity into a computer image. A few minutes later, M14 popped onto his screen. The technology is now available to other skygazers. "Eventually, anyone using a telephone line, desktop computer, software, and modem will be able to download high-quality images of nebulae, stars, and galaxies from world-renowned observatories," predicts Bisque, whose company developed the SkyPro software that is used to access the Mount Wilson telescope. -------------------------- Charleston, West Virginia: A mugger forced a victim to write him a check and got caught the next day when he tried to cash it, police said. Richard Allen Gallogly, 22, was charged with aggravated robbery. James Hylton told police he was walking on the street Wednesday night when a man approached with a knife and demanded money. Hylton said he gave the man $12.50 in cash, but the man was not satisfied and had him write a $300 check. -------------------------- Napa, California: When Kenneth McDaniel let police peer into a neighbor's yard from his deck, he apparently forgot what he was growing in his own backyard. The memory lapse landed him in jail. Police came to McDaniel's house to look into the yard of a neighbor suspected of stealing a bicycle. Officers did not find the bike but arrested McDaniel on charges of cultivation and possession of marijuana. -------------------------- Hollywood, California: The Barry Levinson movie, "Jimmy Hollywood," is the story of a struggling actor who buys advertisements on bus benches with his picture and phone number. Turns out there's a real-life counterpart, Steven Paul Mozena. Mozena, 33, is looking for his big break. He's bought a series of ads on Los Angeles bus benches that bear his picture and the copy, "The Look! The Talent! The Ability! For your next production cast actor Steve Mozena." Mozena has bought 24 benches, strategically located in front of major movie studios, along with some "floaters." The cost for the bench ads works out to about $10,000 a year. "It's not an expensive investment," Mozena said. "This field takes a lot of dedication, a lot of drive and a lot of money. In order to rise above the crowd, you have to think of something different." -------------------------- Yellowstone National Park: The boat is called the Little Dipper, but you'd be a fool to dip even your little toe in the waters where this vessel ventures. The 4-by-8-foot boat is Yellowstone National Park's first thermal-pool watercraft. In trial runs last summer, park staff took the Little Dipper for a spin in geothermal pools whose surface water reaches 160 degrees Fahrenheit. Shaped much like a common fishing boat but specially constructed to withstand extreme temperatures, the craft is used to reach vandalized pools for cleanup as well as for study of the park's famous geothermal features. The best thing about the boat is that it's constructed so that it's impossible to capsize anyone into the potentially lethal waters. -------------------------- Arezzo, Italy: Dogs could soon be wearing diapers in this central Italian town's drive to keep sidewalks clean. Officials in Arezzo have bought 2,000 plastic underpants for dogs, to be distributed free at pharmacy shops, a local newspaper reported. "The idea has caught us all by surprise," said Rolando Tucci, a pharmacist. "It sounds more like something the English would do." -------------------------- Ypsilanti, Michigan: Geoffrey Rose had no declared opposition for re- election to the Ypsilanti City Council. He lost anyway, to an 18-year-old he thought was working for his campaign. Frank Houston, an Easter Michigan University freshman, collected 32 write-in votes in Monday's general election. Rose got 16. "I am dumbfounded, to put it mildly," Rose said. "This guy was on my campaign staff. I gave (Houston) a copy of my list of registered voters last week and he said, 'I am going to help you identify voters for your election.' "I'm guess I'm too trusting." Houston defended his winning tactics. "All I would tell was that I would get the people to vote," he said. He said he never told Rose which candidate he would promote. Houston said Rose, whose ward includes Eastern Michigan University, approached him several times seeking his volunteer help because Houston is a member of the student Senate. Houston said he eventually decided to run because he thought Rose was inadequately representing students. "I couldn't come out and tell him I was going to run against him. I thought he had figured it out," said Houston. He is considering majoring in political science. Rose gave a different scenario, saying Houston approached him, volunteering to help identify voters for his campaign. Houston and other newly elected council members will be sworn in Monday.
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