News Of The Weird-29

Bizarre but true stories about real people collected by syndicated columnist Chuck Shepherd.

About 40 percent of U.S. elementary schools have eliminated recess over the last 20 years (according to a September story in New Times Broward-Palm Beach, Fla.), so that schools could squeeze in more classroom time. In addition to the problem of overweight students, Florida school psychologist Marvin Silverman referred to children’s “chemical need” for recess, pointing out that even psychiatric institutions give recess to help with “mood and movement.” A complicating factor is that in some schools, playground equipment has already been removed because of safety concerns and fear of lawsuits.

Prominent author and filmmaker Timothy Treadwell, much of whose work was devoted to his love of brown bears and a campaign to make people more tolerant of them, was killed and partially eaten by bears in October near Kaflia Bay, in southern Alaska. Treadwell carried no weapons in the wild, and according to friends, was unmoved by brown bears’ ferocity. He told one friend, “I would be honored to end up in bear scat.”

“Thousands” rioted in Sierra Leone when a prominent pair of Nigerian dwarf comedians no-showed a performance and promoters tried to substitute two local dwarfs (Freetown, Sierra Leone).

A brother and sister who had thrown away a winning, $10.5 million Illinois Lotto ticket recovered it, only because their garbage had remained uncollected due to a nine-day sanitation workers’ strike (Chicago).

Dog-Plus K-9 Water went on sale in Australia (for about US$2.10) in flavors like “bacon and beef” because, said the inventor, “dogs get bored with plain water.”
Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, Fla. 33679 or [email protected]
Copyright © 2001 by Chuck Shepherd

NEWS OF THE WEIRD