April Fool's edition: The penguins return, this year's most foolish Yank, dangerous dawgs, a rabbit vanishes, strange accidents, and how not to steal

You know, TAR is pretty much the only publication in which you won't find a deliberate April Fool's Day story today. That, of course, is because we don't need to try to think up crazy stuff you can't really believe. The world does that for us, every week.

Tokyo zoo penguins in awe of giant

(AFP)

Dateline: Tokyo -- Emperor penguins looked up in awe as Tokyo's main zoo unveiled its latest addition -- a giant penguin said to be suspiciously close in height and weight to a human.



"A great discovery!" blared the special news release by the Ueno Zoo, saying the Tonosama (Lord) Penguin was 165 centimeters (five feet, six inches) tall and weighed 80 kilograms (176 pounds).

As the cameras rolled, the real penguins rose their beaks and gazed up at the purported Lord -- but then walked away disinterested when he took off his penguin face to reveal himself to be zoo director Teruyuki Komiya.

The press release -- which stressed the newly discovered animal would be unveiled on April 1 -- said the giant penguin's favorite food was "white fish meat with soy sauce." (/)

As TAR readers will know well, Komiya was lucky the penguins didn't take completely different kind of interest in him.

April 1 joke sparks protests

(Ananova)

Dateline: Croatia -- An April Fool's joke nearly caused a riot in Croatia after thousands of protesters took to the streets.

It came after an online news service claimed the country faced being banned from the 2006 World Cup finals.

Index news claimed FIFA would not allow Croatia to take part in the World Cup unless the country handed over fugitive general Ante Gotovina.

Gotovina is wanted for war crimes during the civil war that led to the break up of Yugoslavia. The EU has cancelled entry negotiations with Croatia for refusing to hand him over.

FIFA's president Sepp Blatter was quoted as saying: "It is clear that Croats care about football more than about anything else.

"In contact with EU Council of Ministers, we have decided to ban Croatia from World Cup before the country extradites the fugitive general Ante Gotovina."

Thousands of protestors took to the streets carrying banners in support of Gotovina and attacking FIFA before the web site admitted it had made the whole thing up.

Croatia leads in the World Cup's Group Eight with 13 points from five matches ahead of Sweden, Bulgaria, Hungary, Iceland and Malta. (/)

Come on! It's Sepp Blatter! You know I can't resist putting Sepp Blatter in TAR. Sepp. Blatter.

Often in TAR's week it's hard to tell if any day isn't April Fool's Day. But this story... well, I'll leave it to you to judge. It ran yesterday (Thurs 31/3), but nonetheless I couldn't believe it was real, until the amazingly Bad Taste Moment occurs halfway in.

Michael Jackson wins 'Most Foolish American' title for third time

(AFP)

Dateline: Los Angeles - Accused pop icon Michael Jackson has been crowned America's most foolish person for the third straight year, snatching the dishonour from the likes of a murderer and US President George W. Bush.

Some 80 percent of 1,030 people who took part in an annual April Fool's Day survey felt that Jackson, on trial for molesting a 13-year-old boy, deserved the top spot on the 2005 list that also featured his bra-popping sister Janet Jackson and convicted domestic diva Martha Stewart.

"It's getting hard to envision an America in which Michael Jackson isn't the most foolish individual," said public relations consultant Jeff Barge, who compiled the sixth "Most Foolish American" survey obtained by AFP.

"Short of a lesbian wedding ceremony for Paris Hilton, it's hard to imagine who could possibly push him out of the number 1 spot," he added.

Eight out of 10 people polled in the telephone survey felt that the faded "King of Pop" had "done something foolish" in the past year, giving him top spot in the survey for the third time in a row.

In second place on the list of dubious achievements in 2005 was convicted murderer Scott Peterson, sentenced to death this month for killing his eight month pregnant wife in California. He scores 68 percent of the vote.

[Martha] Stewart, who was released from jail in early March after serving five months for lying to stock market regulators about a share deal, was third on the list, with 59 percent of those polled feeling she had been foolish.

Some 56 percent of those surveyed felt that Bush was the most foolish American of 2005, putting him fifth on the list, between socialite hotel heiress and reality television star Paris Hilton in fourth spot and Janet Jackson in sixth.

Bush won re-election in November but has been fiercely criticised for his leadership of the war in Iraq.

Janet Jackson caused a national scandal last year when a "wardrobe malfunction" resulted in her breast being bared on national television during the football Super Bowl, earning her sixth spot this year.

Also on the list of 23 foolish Americans were actor Robert Blake, acquitted this month of murdering his scam-artist wife, former US television news anchorman Dan Rather, actor Brad Pitt, whose marriage to Jennifer Aniston collapsed this year and Aniston herself. (/)

I'm not sure where I am with someone murdering his pregnant wife being pegged merely foolish. Perhaps I'm alone on that one. But it behoves (no, really, it does) to append to this story a couple of the posts that were made on Yahoo news about it. Because:

Bush Lost Becase He Aint Foolish
by: madnotangry (45/M/Spiritial Being on a Huma) 03/31/05 08:52 pm
Msg: 6 of 11
1 recommendation

Bush is fukking DANGEROUS, reckless, arrogant, fukked in the head, stupid, vane, and retarded... But not foolish

Re: Bush Lost Becase He Aint Foolish
by: rick_carpenter2001 03/31/05 09:31 pm
Msg: 8 of 11

You, on the other hand, are a genius I suppose?! (/)

Dog walks five miles on hind legs

(Ananova)

A Chinese man has trained his pet dog to walk on its hind legs for up to five miles.



Mr Liu, of Wuchang city, Hubei province, says he had the idea while drying the dog's hair with a hairdryer.

He had got two-year-old Qiangqiang to stand on his back legs while he dried the hair on its stomach.

Noticing how long Qiangqiang could balance, Mr Liu decided to train him to walk in that posture.

He made the dog two small leather shoes to protect his back feet, reports Chutian City Daily. (/)

Meanwhile, in sleepy Indiana...

Chihuahua Terrorizes Postal Workers

(AP)

Dateline: Hobart, Indiana -- While there's nothing special about U.S. Postal Service workers being terrorized by dogs, the size of one here is raising eyebrows.

Mail carriers said they were recently unable to deliver mail to homes along a section of Guyer Street in this northwestern Indiana city because of a 4.5-pound Chihuahua named Bobo.

"The little Chihuahua was 10-foot tall when he was on the street," said Florence Page of the Hobart Humane Society, which picked up the dog twice for running loose. "It's kind of comical, you know, but after a while it's not any more."

She said there were no reports of the dog actually biting anyone, however.

Police have nonetheless ticketed the dog's owner, Vicki Seber, twice in recent weeks for violating a city ordinance requiring pet owners to keep their animals restrained.

Hobart police officer Ron Schalk said he had no option but to cite Seber for allowing the dog to run loose.

"The biggest thing I was concerned with is there were a lot of residents that week who couldn't get their mail," he said. "The little Chihuahua was running around being aggressive and trying to bite people's ankles." (/)

TAR regulars may recall recent coverage of crazy people buying thousands of KitKats to win things, rather than just working for money and saving it up, like normal people. Actually, I'm led to believe that "normal people", in fact, buy holidays on credit and then spend six months paying for them. Which sounds hilarious.

However, I asked at the time what happens to those KitKats. And here is the answer: four very fat people in Redcar.

Family eat 20,000 Kit Kats

(Ananova)

A family ate more than 20,000 Kit Kat bars in two months in order to win prizes worth £12,000.

The family bought the bars so that could take part in an online auction by Kit Kat makers Rowntree.

Pat and Carol McGovern, 49, spent £3,000 buying 54,000 bars on a two-for-one offer so they could use points on the wrappers to bid in the auction.

The couple and their sons Andrew, 22, and Scot, 16, got through 20,000 bars and gave away the rest.

Retired soldier Pat, 53, of Redcar, Teesside, said: "We had them for breakfast, dinner and tea. We're over the moon - but sick of Kit Kats."

They won holidays to Australia, Disneyland Paris and LA - plus a portable DVD player.

Kit Kat's marketing manager Mark Simester said: "We're extremely impressed." (/)

Shouldn't that have been "We're extremely rich"? Or "they're extremely lardy"?

Memorial looks like big penis

(Ananova)

A Dutch war memorial that goes up and down, and spurts flames may be scrapped after complaints it looks like a giant penis.

The Liberation Monument is a giant copper obelisk that rises and falls depending on the level of sunlight, and spurts flames out of the top during important festivals.

It is due to go on show in the village of Wageningen where the German capitulation was signed at the end of the Second World War 60 years ago.

In full sunlight, the erection reaches a height of ten metres, shrinking back to just six metres when the light dims.

It was due to be exposed to the public at an official ceremony in May but now village councillors say it should either be scrapped or radically redesigned.

A spokesman said: "Any association with a phallus is undesirable, whether justified or unjustified, and is to be avoided at all costs." (/)

Couldn't agree more. Now, on to someone really stupid.

Teenager tried to cut up missile with an axe

(Ananova)

A teenager who found a cloud-seeding missile was almost killed when he tried to cut it up for scrap metal with an axe.

Milan Petrov, 16, from Vinica, Macedonia, found the missile in a forest near his house and brought it home to cut up for scrap metal.

But he was badly injured when it blew up after he hit it several times with a heavy axe.

Doctors said he was lucky to be alive, adding: "It's a miracle that he wasn't blown to bits along with the rocket." (/)

Sad, really, because it was a perfect Darwin Awards story in the making.

New Coffee Claims It Helps People Lose Weight

(Wireless Flash)

Dateline: Las Vegas – Diets often come in the form of shakes, meals, and pills, but now one is popping up in a buzz- inducing morning beverage: coffee.

Slim Cafe has just hit the market with the claim that it’s the first premium coffee that helps drinkers lose weight.

Besides beans, the coffee includes seven weight loss ingredients including chromium – which supposedly suppresses the appetite – and three ingredients to increase metabolism. Three cups of the fat-shrinking joe must be drank a day for maximum effect.

Although most diets aren’t very tasty, Slim Cafe CEO Herb Rossin insists the coffee “tastes great” and that the diet ingredients have no effect on the beans, which come from Central America.

He is so sure that the coffee will help people lose at least a pound a week, that he offers a money-back guarantee on each $22 bag of coffee beans. (/)

Coffee. With speed in. Is this wise?

Zoo struggles with onion-loving simians

(Popbitch - spotter J White)

Monkeys at a village zoo in Omsk, Russia, are on hunger strike after their keepers failed to satisfy their addiction to onions. The little beasts are sitting in their monkey house, sulking, and refusing to eat the delicious bananas, kiwis and papayas prepared for them.

Three Hamadryad monkeys are the Arthur Scargill-style hardline strike leaders. The other monkeys, afraid to be singled out as scabs, follow their lead. Zoo keepers started giving onions to the monkeys in the middle of winter to try to stop them coming down with colds and flu, and the Hamadryads got hooked. (/)

Beauty queen brighter than nuclear physicist

(Ananova)

A Slovenian TV programme that tried to prove top models were brainless bimbos was scrapped after an ex-Miss Universe turned out to have a higher IQ than a nuclear physicist.



Iris Mulej, better known for her comments about group sex, was found to have an IQ of 156 by scientists working for the programme makers.

She had to take a series of logic tests looking at spatial awareness, mathematical equations and problem solving ability.

The test result forced Slovenia TV, the state broadcaster, to cancel its programme involving the model who left school at 16 to pursue a modelling career.

A spokesman for Bronz Model Management that represents Iris, 22, said: "They couldn't really do a programme making fun of dumb models when she turned out to be smarter than anyone else on the programme.

"They are now wondering if they can do a different programme about the world's smartest model, and are trying to persuade Guiness to accept it as a record category."

Iris, who previously admitted one of her ambitions was to have sex with one guy and three other girls, won Miss Universe in 2002. (/)

Do they mean 'at the same time'? Or is she just, like, not getting any?

Thief pulls rabbit out of a hat -- and runs

(AFP)

Dateline: London -- Police in the south of England were on the look-out for a thief who leapt onto a nightclub stage and stole a magician's black hat -- and the rabbit inside it.



Lynn Thomas, alias The Great Velcro, was mid-way through his show at the Komedia club in Brighton when the culprit -- described as a "skinny" man in his late 20s -- jumped onto the stage last Saturday and snatched the props.

Irate members of the 150-member audience gave chase, but the thief -- who earlier had been heckling The Great Velcro -- managed to flee with both hat and rabbit, known as Georgina.

"If anyone has any information as to the whereabouts of the rabbit, please contact police," said a statement issued Wednesday by Sussex Police, amid suspicions that the thief was an animal rights activist.

Thomas, 71, quoted in the Daily Mirror newspaper, said Georgina was only the fourth rabbit he has worked with in his 20-odd years as a magician.

"I was in the middle of my act when I saw this shadow out the corner of my eye fumbling with my top hat," he said. "Then someone from the audience came up to me and said 'Was that man supposed to run off with your rabbit?'" (/)

Every year, I think, I'd have to check, which I can't be arsed to do, but every year, right, the report into amazingly dumb hospitalisation reasons in Britain gives me a laugh.

Help! My nightwear is on fire!

(AFP)

Dateline: London - Two people were injured by centipedes, and no fewer than 22 suffered mishaps involving nightwear. Britain is a perilous place in all sorts of unusual ways, according to new statistics on hospital admissions.

The Department of Health data, reported in The Times newspaper in its Tuesday edition, also included people requiring hospital treatment in Britain for accidents which happened overseas.

Thus, of the near-million people seen by emergency hospital staff in the 12 months to April 2004, six had been stung by scorpions, along with the 451 stung by hornets and 24 bitten by rats.

The house was no haven, with nine needing treatment for accidents with their beds and 22 exposed to "ignition or melting of nightwear", usually due to cigarettes or faulty electric blankets.

Other unusual problems which burdened the state-run National Health Service included nine people who experienced "accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed" and a child who attended hospital after a "prolonged stay in a weightless environment".

A Department of Health spokesman told The Times that the precise accident categories were set by the UN's World Health Organisation, and could only speculate that the weightlessness might have been caused by a fairground ride.

In the natural world, 37 people were admitted as "victims of volcanic eruption", and 207 needed treatment after "coming into contact with plant thorns, spines and sharp leaves".

Among more traditional accidents, those involving non-power tools such as hammers affected 4,115 people, while around 2,000 more -- mainly children -- fell out of trees.

The data for admissions also included 138 people who had foreign objects left in their bodies following surgery. (/)

Ugh.

Candy Dishes Can Sweeten Workplace Raises

(Wireless Flash)

Dateline: East Hanover, N.J.– If you want to sweeten your chances of getting a raise, keep a candy dish on your desk at work.

According to a survey by LifeSavers, 60 percent of workers with candy dishes claim they received a raise last year compared to only 49 percent of people who didn’t supply sweets.

Even sweeter: 43 percent of candy dish owners received a bonus.

Other sweet stats from the survey:

69 percent of candy dish owners are female.
10 percent of male candy dish owners say the dish helps them keep up on office gossip and six percent claim they’ve been asked out on dates because of the dish.
Finally, only one percent of candy dish owners were asked to take a pay cut last year, compared to five percent of people without a candy dish. (/)

Elephant to Trim Fat on Treadmill

(AP - Rebecca Boone)

Dateline: Boise, Idaho - It's not easy being a pudgy pachyderm. Everyone — from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals to the U.S. Department of Agriculture — seems to want to weigh in with opinions on trimming Maggie the elephant's waistline.



Soon Maggie may not need the advice. Keepers at the Alaska Zoo in Anchorage, where Maggie lives, are preparing to install the world's first elephant exercise treadmill.

"All I know is it seems like a good idea to get a sedentary animal moving," said Sid Cannon, the vice president of Boise, Idaho-based Conveyor Engineering, a company that designs heavy-duty conveyor systems used in mining and has offered to build Maggie's treadmill.

"I figured that we put rocks on our conveyors that are as big as an elephant, and a treadmill is basically a conveyor, so building one would be no big deal."

It has turned out not to be that easy.

In the wild, African elephants stay on the move about 16 hours a day foraging for food and water. But Maggie, like all zoo elephants, is confined and alone. The cold Alaska winters keep her indoors part of the year.

That's got some animal advocates pushing to have Maggie retired to a sanctuary or moved to a zoo in a warmer climate.

"There's no comparison to a treadmill versus life in the wild or in a sanctuary," said Nicole Meyer, an elephant specialist with PETA. "Female elephants are highly social and to keep them in solitary confinement is completely cruel."

John Seawall, who heads up the elephant habitat at the Alaska Zoo, hopes the treadmill will stem some criticism.

"She could stand to lose a couple of hundred pounds, but out of a weight of 9,200 pounds it's somewhat insignificant," he said.

Cannon first heard about the search to make the elephant treadmill while watching the evening news. He called up Seawall and offered the services of Conveyor Engineering — for free.

"We do a little community service, but rarely have the opportunity to help people with our work," he said. "Little did we know that this is a controversial thing."

Animal treadmills are nothing new — the exercise wheel is standard equipment for pet mice. Some veterinarians use partially submerged, aquatic therapy treadmills to help injured dogs regain mobility. There also are high-speed treadmills for race horses and even treadmills for race camels.

Expected to be installed sometime this summer, the treadmill will be just over 20 feet long and five feet wide. Elephants walk by simultaneously moving two legs at a time along a path only about 18 inches wide, so the machine has to be able to withstand concentrated weight.

Of course, training an elephant to walk on it is another matter. Seawall plans to install the machine in the pathway between Maggie's indoor barn and the rest of her outdoor habitat area. They will give her some time to get used to the presence of the machine before turning it on.

Cannon, meanwhile, said he's enjoyed working on the treadmill but doesn't plan to make any more.

"Mining is controversial enough," he said. (/)

The image in my head is of the elephant not liking the treadmill idea.

Confused Cops Swarm Woman After Birth

(AP)

Dateline: Kettering, Ohio - A woman rushing to a hospital to give birth hit a few stops along the way — first at a gas station where she delivered the baby herself, then when confused police ordered her out of the car at gunpoint.

Debbie Coleman, whose 3- and 4-year-old daughters were asleep in the back seat, pulled over at a gas station just after midnight Tuesday.

"I asked if she needed help, and she just leaned back in the seat, hollered a little, and I looked down and there was the baby's head," said station co-owner Lloyd Goff, who was alerted to the emergency at pump No. 7 by a customer.

Goff said Coleman "threw her leg over the steering wheel, groaned once, and the rest of the baby came out.

"She caught that baby, put it to her chest, gave me a look, like, 'I gotta go,' closed the door, put the van in gear and away she went."

A customer at the gas station in suburban Dayton tried to give police a heads-up about Coleman's situation, but a mix-up involving the license plate number had them thinking the van was stolen.

As officers went looking for her, Coleman headed for the hospital, naked below the waist and with the baby boy in her arm. His umbilical cord was still attached.

"I kept pulling over, making sure (the baby) was all right, breathing," she said.

Meanwhile, police had straightened out the license plate issue. But another caller mistakenly reported someone trying to throw a baby from a van.

Coleman said she noticed several cruisers following her before one cut her off. With guns drawn, officers ordered her out of the van with her hands up.

"I opened the door and said, 'I just had a baby' and just let them see everything," she said.

Officers sent Coleman on and let the hospital know she was coming.

Coleman was discharged Wednesday. Her 6-pound, 8-ounce son, Richard Lee Coleman Jr., remained in intensive care. (/)

Thief Steals Poop From Woman Walking Dog

(AP)

Dateline: San Diego - The hunt is on for a turd burglar. Police in San Diego are searching for a gunman who swiped a bag of poop from a woman out walking her dog.

The woman told police that she was out walking her dog, Misty, on Monday night when a man in his 20s ran up behind her and grabbed the bag she was holding.

When the gunman discovered what was in it, he threw it down in disgust, pointed his gun at the 32-year-old woman and demanded money, San Diego police detective Gary Hassen said.

He then aimed his .22-caliber semiautomatic at Misty and pulled the trigger twice but the gun didn't fire, Hassen said.

The robber ran to a waiting small, silver car and fled the scene, police said. (/)

I actually don't know if AP knows what "turd burglar" means in Britain...

Sport

Schumacher fan causes chaos in Ferrari

(Ananova)

A Michael Schumacher fan who wanted to emulate his hero virtually demolished an entire street when he crashed a new Ferrari.

The 28-year-old, who has not yet been named, caused nearly £200,000 of damage in Dusseldorf.

His firm's new £70,000 Ferrari F360 was a write-off, and he caused another £120,000 damage.

He smashed into three parked cars, two bikes, a street lamp, a set of traffic lights, a billboard, a signal box and two trees, and left a number of houses without power.

The young driver, who emerged from the vehicle unhurt, told passers-by: "There was a problem with the gears." (/)

Yeah. Right.

Brie Fly

When they said petting wasn't allowed...
(Popbitch - J White again)

A 36 year-old Belgian man is on trial for having sex with dogs. He says he did it "out of love for animals", as many dogs can't have sex, like those in dog homes.

Twins have surgery to be different
(Ananova)

Identical twin sisters in Taiwan have resorted to plastic surgery so people can tell them apart. The 22-year-old girls say that even their family and friends could not tell which was which. Even wearing different clothes and having different hairstyles seemed to make no difference. Doctors gave one of the twins a new nose and chin so people could tell them apart. The sisters proclaimed themselves happy with the result, reports the Yangcheng Evening News. (/)

And finally

April Fool's Day And The British Press

(Museum of Hoaxes)

April Fool's Day, 1977
San Serriffe
The Guardian published a special seven-page supplement describing the tenth anniversary of the small island of San Serriffe.

The island's geography appeared to be named after printing terms. For instance, its two islands were named Upper Caisse and Lower Caisse. Its leader was General Pica, and its capital was Bodoni.

Articles described the eccentric culture of the island. One strange island custom was the Festival of the Well Made Play, during which islanders would perform the complete cycle of plays by playwright William Douglas-Home in English, Caslon, and Ki-flong (languages of the island). Strangely enough, the islanders did not appear to understand the plays themselves. It was merely certain ritual aspects of the plays that they appreciated, as evidenced by the fact that they would "applaud widely whenever an actor appears wearing a Harris tweed hacking jacket with a centre vent and cavalry twill trousers and a paisley cravat."

Adding credibility to the supplement was the fact that many eminent people were quoted in it, referring to their experiences in San Serriffe. Authentic advertisements also accompanied the articles and played into the hoax. For instance, Texaco offered a contest for which the first prize was a two-week trip to Cocobanana Beach in San Serriffe. Kodak also ran an ad in which it said, "If you have a picture of San Serriffe, we'd like to see it."

The Guardian reported that its phones rang all day as people called up requesting more information about the island. The success of this hoax was largely responsible for the flood of April Fool's Day jokes that appeared in other papers in succeeding years.

At the Guardian itself the island of San Serriffe became a running gag in the years to follow. The island reappeared on April Fool's Day in 1978, 1980 and 1999. Moreover, each time it reappeared the island had changed location. It began in the Indian Ocean, moved to the South China Sea, and ended up in the North Atlantic. (/)

Until next time...

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Like TAR? We'd love to hear from you. Feel free to forward TAR on to your friends. Assuming you have friends who still speak to you.

Contact TAR: Click here or just mail thepitcanary@hotmail.com