Shoutbox

These news range from January 1, 2005 to today. I dont have a link for them because some of them I wrote in another forum (typed it from the newspaper), other's I got from various websites a while back. You may have heard some of them, other's not.


Mysterious hand falls from sky interupting boat party

A boat party in an exclusive area of Long Island Sunday night was interrupted - when a severed human hand mysteriously dropped out of the sky onto the deck of a boat, police said yesterday. The bizarre incident occurred in the water just off the Lawrence Village Marina, where a group of boats had gathered to have a party. One owner was in the cabin when "he heard a noise, goes out to check and finds the hand on the rear deck of the boat," said Nassau Detective Sgt. John Azzata. "At this point, we don't have a clue where it came from. It's a mystery."


Police siren kills 435 chickens, Farmer sues

A Chinese farmer from the Huxian province in Western China filed a lawsuit against local police after the siren of a police vehicle had scared 435 chickens to death.The siren was undergoing repair works. It went off automatically by itself only 10 meters away from the poultry farm.
As a result, 35 birds died instantly; the other 400 died later from shock.


Durango, Colorado -- Two teenage girls who surprised their neighbours with homemade cookies late yesterday night were ordered to pay $900 in medical bills for a woman (neighbour) who says she was so startled and surprised that she had to go to the hospital. Taylor Ostergaard, 17, and Lindsey Jozellitti, 18, declined comment after the ruling. Taylor's mother said the girls "cried and cried, they felt they were being punished for doing something nice".

LONDON -- A Welsh rugby fan cut off his own testicles to celebrate his side's victory over England. Geoff Huish, 26, was so convinced England would win last Saturday's match he told his drinking buddies at a bar that "If Wales win, i'll cut my balls off." Huish went home after the game, severed his testicles with a knife, and walked 200 metres back to the bard. He was later taken to hospital in serious condition.

ST.LOUIS - A 12 year old girl is charged with murder after she told police she strangled her nine year old sister to death in a fight over a hamburger. The medical examiner's office said it ruled the death of the younger girl in homicide weeks after her body was found in her home on Dec. 22, 2004. Authorities were unable to determine how she died until the 12 year old said days later she had killed her younger sister in a spat over a hamburger, investigators said.


An Indian policeman who caught a burglar red-handed fainted because he thought it was a ghost. Sub-inspector Ramkailash Dangi was returning home at Vidisha, in Madhya Pradesh, when he heard a noise. It appeared to come from the locked former home of a colleague who had recently been killed in a shoot out. Sub-inspector Dangi went to investiagte and saw a figure in the supposedly empty house and fainted, thinking it was the ghost of his late colleague. A security guard found the officer still lying outside the door the next morning, reports Keralanext.com. The guard unlocked the house and found bags of loot the burglar left behind when he was disturbed by Sub-inspector Dangi.

CALGARY, Canada—Just the thought of being surrounded by 101 grandkids…and counting, is exhausting, yet Anne McKervey considers her crowded lot in life a blessing. After all, she’s embraced almost daily by the love and vibrancy of so many family youngsters; often dozens of times. Anne Mckervey has 15 children of her own, so close to her home and heart. In fact Anne can actually see herself as a grandma to at least 120, especially since two of her kids have yet to marry. Then there are the 12 great grandchildren already in the fold. But perhaps the most amazing number, said daughter Monica, is 72, which is Anne’s age, young for a woman with so many descendants. Some of her children have as many as 12 children of their own. “God bless them all” said Anne.


MONTREAL -- A Montreal man died of a heart attack after he had rushed to support his 15-year-old son who had just been spat on at an amateur hockey game. "He was talking to his son to give him some encouragement," spectator Michel Gaudreau said.  "He was holding his hands, he sat down and then he collapsed." Gaudreau, whose son was playing in the game, said ambulance technicians spent about 30 minutes trying to revive the man. As well as spitting at the boy, some parents had thrown objects at him.



Ghosts chase prez out of state house

LILONGWE, MALAWI (Africa) -- President Bingu wa Mutharika has temporarily moved out of his 300-bedroom state mansion, insisting it is haunted by ghosts. Rev. Malani Mtonga, presidential aide on Christian affairs, said Mutharika asked the clergy to pray to "exorcise evil spirits."

"No strategy designed from the pits of hell will prosper against the president because we have asked for divine intervention to cast the blood of Jesus against any evil plots against the president," Mtonga said.

Mtonga refused to give details about the spooks. But another aide, who asked for anonymity, said the president hears footsteps and noises in the presidential suite in the dead of night. Nobody else hears anything, the aide said.

"Sometimes the president feels rodents crawling all over his body but when lights are turned on he sees nothing," he said.

He said it the 71-year-old president will sleep at another state house in Mtunthama, some 100 km from the capital, and just work at the mansion.



HOUSTON -- A two-year-old was shot by his four-year-old brother, who may not have known the difference between a real gun and a toy one, police said. The two-year-old, who suffered a single gunshot wound to the temple, was in critical condition Saturday night at Ben Taub Hospital. The shooting occurred Saturday afternoon.

Police Sgt. Cameron Grysen said the boys had been arguing when the younger one threw a toy at his brother. The mother thought the boys had returned to their room, but they had instead gone to her room, where the older boy took a gun from the woman's purse.

"The four-year-old was angry ... He went and got the gun, put it to his brother's head and shot the gun," Grysen said.

Authorities said the four-year-old didn't seem to understand. "He's wondering where his brother is, and when his brother's coming back," Grysen said.



In a game that requires so much patience and concentration, you'd never imagine a child could be so good at it. But six-year-old Michael Kavchak of Ottawa (Canada) is the highest-ranked chess player in the country for his age group.

Michael's father started teaching him to play just over a year ago. After only a few months, Michael was playing tournaments around the city. Now he's better than other players his age and often better than older opponents.

Michael said his dream is to be a chess master, another name for the highest-ranked players in the world.

"We've been playing every day since last year," said Michael's dad, Andrew Kavchak. "It's a pleasure to watch. He's always very quiet and he watches everything."

GETS EXCITED

Michael said his favourite part of chess is when he gets to take his opponent's pieces.

Kavchak said his son sometimes gets excited and slams down the captured pieces in triumph, but dad has made sure to teach Michael about etiquette.

As something that's being introduced into the classroom more and more, Kavchak praises the benefits of chess for schoolage children. He said it teaches kids to sit and focus, think logically, strategize and plan -- all things relevant to any area of study.

"It's a really good life lesson," Kavchak said. "Michael's a much more confident boy."

Peter Arseneau, executive director for the Chess Federation of Canada, said the fact chess is a game is enough to interest any child.

"It's actually quite a simple game, and that's why kids are good at it," Arseneau said. "I'm not surprised that young children are playing a lot more."



In February, Amanda Monti, 24, of Birkenhead, England, was sentenced to 30 months in jail for ripping off one of her ex-boyfriend's testicles with her bare hands in a rage over his refusal to have sex. (According to witnesses, Monti briefly hid the testicle in her mouth, but a friend retrieved it and handed it back to the man, saying, "That's yours.")


Boys robbed shop with toy guns

Two twelve year old boys used toy guns to rob a pet shop in Brazil.

They threatened shopkeepers and customers during the raid in Sao Paulo, Folha de Sao Paulo reports.

Shop owner Eduardo Spirandeli had already handed over all of his takings before he noticed the guns were toys.

He chased away the boys but they were quickly arrested after he called the police.

A police spokesperson said: "The two boys said they were playing a role play game with real people! We couldn't help but laugh when they said that."

The boys were sent to an institution to young offenders while they await trial.



Frogs rain down on Serbia

Traffic came to a halt and locals fled inside after thousands of frogs fell from the sky onto a Serbian village.

Residents in Odzaci told local daily Blic they thought the world was coming to an end.

Aleksandar Ciric said: "I saw all these small frogs just start raining down. There were thousands of them."

Another villager, Caja Jovanovic, added: "This huge 'cloud' seemed to come out of nowhere and its shape and colour looked very strange.

"We were all wondering what it was when suddenly frogs started to fall from the sky. I thought maybe a plane carrying frogs had exploded in midair."

But climatology expert Slavisa Ignjatovic said there was a simple scientific explanation for the incident.

He said: "A whirlwind has sucked up the frogs from a lake, the sea or some other body of water somewhere else and carried them along to Odzaci where they have fallen to the ground. It is a recognised scientific phenomenon."



Man lost licence because he was gay

An Italian man who lost his driving licence because he was gay has won it back on appeal.

The 23-year-old man, not named for legal reasons, is now demanding more than £300,000 in damages.

The man had been kicked out of the army after it emerged that he was gay, Italian daily Corriere della Sera reported.

Officials said at the time that as he was not "suitable" to be in the army because he was gay, it meant he had also not been "suitable" to hold a driving licence.

But a court in Catania ruled the 23-year-old could have his licence back.

The man has said he will now sue for £330,000 damages.



Sleepwalker fell off roof

A German who fell off a roof while sleepwalking said he lost his balance because he woke up.

The man climbed out of a first-floor window, shimmied up a drainpipe and walked across the roof before falling 20 feet to the ground.

He told rescuers that he lost his balance after waking up and realising where he was.

Thomas Manninger, 39, from Eltville, said he had often woken up in different parts of the house after sleepwalking, but this was the first time he had ended up on the roof.

He said: "I must have been having a very strange dream."

A police spokesman said: "The only thing that saved him was the fact that he fell onto a lawn that was still soggy from the rain."

Mr Manninger was taken to hospital, where doctors said he had a few bruises but no broken bones.

He has now been booked into a specialist sleep laboratory in Frankfurt for a course of therapy.



A 130-year-old man has died in Saudi Arabia after a life of eating only the fruit of his labour and making the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca three times on foot, a newspaper reported today. Zafer bin Yehya al-Asmari died in Ballasmar in southern Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, leaving behind about 60 grandchildren, the Al-Watan newspaper reported, without making clear how many times he married.

His son Abdullah told the paper that Asmari, who walked to Mecca three times for the annual hajj pilgrimage, never wore shoes and never travelled by car except when he was once taken to hospital.




Crazy stuff eh...some of it also disturbing..