Portal To What The Hell

This is definitely an example of weirder than weird.

Two women got up in the morning to let their dog outside when they noticed that the contents of their shed were all over everywhere. Wondering what in hell happened, they went to look. The shed door was closed. Hmmm. Even weirder. When they opened it, they were pounced on by a maniac! Morgan Mesz was inside their shed. And why was he there? He was seeking the portal to hell. Whaaat?

The two women screamed for help, and a neighbour came to their aid. He thwonked Mesz in the head with a bat and subdued him, but not before he was stabbed as well, along with the women, who are now in serious and critical condition. Mesz is receiving a psychological evaluation.

But, depending on where he ends up, he may have found the portal to hell after all.

All Aboard The Obliviot Train

People are really losing respect for trains. A man in Missoula, Montana was in his car, drivin' along groovin' to music. He was so oblivious that he drove through an intersection onto some railroad tracks, seemingly while a train was coming. He had the music set so loud that he didn't notice the slow-moving train until it hit his car. Luckily for him, his car was pooched but he was fine.

In New Mexico, however, 18-year-old Amanda Byrne wasn't so lucky. She was jog jog joggin' along, listening to music in a headset, and also wearing a headband, and jog jog jogged right into the path of a train. It honked frantically and tried to put the brakes on as it came up behind her, but she somehow didn't feel the vibrations either, and...ker smacko! Amanda Byrne is no longer with us.

People, please, watch out while walking on train tracks. They're primarily meant for trains!

The Importance Of Capitalization

Ann sent me this yesterday, and I chuckled. How true.

Those of us who fall into the world of hi-tech should take note of the importance of correct grammar. I have noticed that many who text messages & email, have forgotten the "art" of capitalization. Capitalization is the difference between helping your Uncle Jack off a horse and helping your uncle jack off a horse. Grammar is important, let's not forget it!

Oh boy is it ever.

Funnily enough, that joke reminded me of this old legend. So it appears forgetting about grammar is older than we thought.

And is it me or is there one weirdly-placed comma in the joke?

Not Better With Butter

Thanks Ann for this one too.

A Sicilian couple thought they would murder the woman's ex husband with, wait for it, butter! They thought butter was the perfect weapon. It would melt after they had used the slab of butter to smother her poor unfortunate ex, so there would be no weapon left. Too bad, some of the butter ended up in his airways, so the coroner was a wee touch suspicious...and the couple couldn't slip away from justice.

Butter? For real?

How Many Stacey Champions Could There Be? Well, At Least Two.

We have a twist on the puppy in the mail story. It looks like there's more than one Stacey Champion, and the wrong one is getting hate mailed off the earth. What really sucks is they both spell their names the same, both are the same age, and both have a connection to Minneapolis. But the one getting all the hate mail lives in Arizona, and didn't mail the puppy! She just adopted a puppy, though, and owns a business and doesn't need people boycotting it because they think she's the puppy-mailing demon woman. Someone even somehow linked her Facebook profile to the puppy-mailing story, and she had to change her name on Facebook to "Stacey 'nopuppymailing' Champion."

here's a video showing what kinds of emails she's been getting.

This is why mindless vigilantiism isn't good. You feel good. You feel like you've done something, and you have. But is it the right thing?

Now all we need is a picture of the Stacey Champion who *did* try to mail a puppy. Then we could show who was who.

This Sick Individual Is Someone's Mother

Ann sent me this one, and I just can't believe someone did this. I just, I just can't.

A 51-year-old woman in South Africa really wanted to be a grandma. But her 24-year-old daughter wasn't interested in having a baby yet. So, grandma-wannabe decided to hire a man to rape her, in the hopes that she might get pregnant. Such a man was found, and carried out her request a week ago yesterday.

Yes, this woman paid a man to rape her daughter. No matter the motive behind this, the woman who brought her daughter into this world and was supposed to protect her and look out for her best interests paid someone to violate her in the worst way. Wow. My heart sinks as I type this. I can't even imagine what growing up with this woman as a mother must have been like, and I can't even imagine what is going through the daughter's mind now.

grandma-wannabe and the rapist have been arrested and charged. I hope grandma-wannabe lives out the rest of her days in a small cage and never sees any family. Even better, if grandma-wannabe has other kids, I hope they all have many grandchildren and this woman lives a long time. Hmmm. I think 50 years in isolation knowing that she has grandkids running around, but will never see a single one would be a fitting punishment.

Susan The Speech Synth's Lament

I am full of this crazy energy, but cannot focus it. It's kind of what it looks like if I have one of those heavily-caffeinated drinks, or, if all is in the right combination, a cuppa soup. I just sort of run around in several directions and get nothing done, but boy do I want to do something! Anything! Anything at all! Just lemme at it!

So, I figured maybe if I did something simple, it could kick start my brain into being able to harness this power.

Last week, I asked on Twitter if anyone had the mp3 where this synthesized voice talks about how it can't say certain words. Nobody came back with it. So, damn it, I figured out how to search my Qwitter buffers and root it out! Here it is, so I'll never lose it again. Susan can't say blag.

Have a good giggle. I love how she says "Help!" at the end.

She Wants The Puppy Back?

Wow, there's an update to the story of the puppy in the mail. It appears that Stacey Champion has had a change of heart and wants the puppy back. Um, what? I hope she doesn't get it. When her stance changes from "just give me the 20 bucks back that I paid to mail it" to please please let me have him back over the course of a day, she can't be that stable.

Somebody Needs To Tell This Kid That There's No Such Thing As An Extra Life

I respect the hell out of Alessandro Micalizzi. Don't feel bad, I didn't know that name until just now either.

To a lot of people, the off-duty Italian police officer is a hero. With just seconds to spare, he managed to jump off of a subway platform and rescue a 10-year-old boy who had fallen onto the tracks as a train was about to pull in.

Yeah...hero.

I'm not sure I could do what Micalizzi did. Not only because it's pretty goddamn dangerous and who knows if I'd have the guts, but also because in the few seconds I would have to act I would probably be in conflict with myself over whether or not I really wanted to rescue somebody who is in this position becausehe was playing his PlayStation Portable and not watching where he was going.

Yes, I know the kid is only 10. I remember being 10. It's pretty easy to get distracted by things when you're 10. But that's what parents are for, and according to this he was walking with his mother and sister at the time. There's no way in hell my mother would let me be so careless, unless of course she decided she didn't want me anymore. She would do what a parent is supposed to do, make me shut off the damn game until we're in a safe place. If she didn't think she could trust me to do that she'd take it away from me, probably for a few days until I figured it out.

Honestly, what's wrong with people?

There's a video at the link, but it's a silent film. Sorry, blind people.

Power Outage Or Intelligence Outage?

We have talked about people burglarizing houses and staying around to watch porn or go on their Facebook or MySpace, but thanks to Cody Wilkins, we have a new one. You see, the power was out at his house last week due to the crazy weather. He liked to break into places and take jewellery, only this time, he thought he'd use their electrical socket to charge his phone. The only problem was someone heard him, and he ran off suddenly, leaving his phone behind. All police had to do was call his girlfriend and ask her a few questions, and wammo, they were at Wilkins's door.

Apparently, when they got there, he was busy flushing jewellery down the toilet. Yup, definitely not bright. All that'll do is clog his drain.

What a dumbass.

Another Update To The Wendy Portillo Story

Somehow, I missed a development in the Wendy Portillo saga. The mom of Alex Barton, the kid that got voted out of kindergarten, sued the schoolboard and had to take a settlement. $300000 doesn't seem like nearly enough punishment for what that teacher did.

But I guess this will be the real end to the story.

A Study On The Intelligibility Of Speech, Or The Twistedness Of The Human Brain, Or Both. I Don't Know.

Ouch. My brain hurts. I just completed a study trying to rate the intelligibility of text to speech synthesis. You wouldn't think that would be hard, but by the end, it gets fucking next to impossible! Don't believe me? I dare you to try it. You listen to 198 nonsense sentences that seem to come at you at faster and faster rates and try to write down what you hear. By the end I was writing things that made no sense like "The autism bandit kicks the eggs." and "I think I found traces of Harvey." I was starting to wonder if I was losin' it, or if they'd start to think so.

This study is only for people who have been legally blind since the age of 6 or younger. There's another study for those with greater vision, and I have no idea what that study involves. There doesn't appear to be anything for folks who went blind later.

Ug. My brain. It hurts. That was hard.

Hittingonchildren@federalprison.com

There's no such thing as the proper time, place or method for a 50-year-old man to communicate with his teenaged girlfriend, but if there were, I'm sure we could all agree that the time wouldn't be whenever he could, the place wouldn't be from inside a Marion, Illinois federal prison where he is currently incarcerated and the method wouldn't bean email address provided by the Bureau of Prisons' Trust Fund Limited Inmate Computer System (TRULINCS) program.The above is becoming quite clear to Franesiour Kemache-Webster, who has gone from white-collar criminal to pretty good bet to be the world's next great dim bulb sex offender.

In a May 2010 note to the girl, the 50-year-old inmate wrote, “I really do miss & desire you & love U.” After the girl wrote that she planned to lick whipped cream off him, Kemache-Webster responded, “da whip cream thing was a great touch…U r such a devil I love U and miss U and can’t wait to C U all over again.”

A subsequent e-mail sent via the BoP system by Kemache-Webster cautioned the girl to “make sure U watch wut u e-mail 2 me when it comes 2 us b’n personal, and such bcuz I don’t want them here 2 get da wrong idea of how our closeness is.” Since, he added, “dis place is a sex offender type place also.”

In another e-mail, Kemache-Webster wrote, “I love U, U kno this it’s so much love like husband & wife.” In a letter mailed from the Marion penitentiary, Kemache-Webster referred to his future release from custody, writing that “Our agreed Anniversary is Sunday October 10, 2010 at 10:00am. Even though we will be doing it from my return home date until forever [smiley face]. On Sunday 10-10-10-10, this date, we will try to celebrate all day…I mean the entire day…doing it! So if you are not pregnant before than on that date it will be dedicated to getting you to be…for sure.”

Kemache-Webster is being held with out bail and has been charged with using an interstate commerce facility to entice a minor to engage in sexual activity. He is also alleged to have tried to intimidate his future wife in phone calls, threatening her with harm if she didn't tell the police the allegations against him were false. Due to that but not hopefully only that, he has been ordered to have no contact with the girl. No word on whether he's still allowed to use the computers for other purposes.

Another Opportunity To Comment On The Standards

Well, it's time, again, to comment on those Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act standards I mention from time to time. They have tweaked the integrated standard, and we have until March 18 to comment. So, read the standards, and comment if you feel you have something to say. I probably will at some point.

He Won't Come, When You Call, He Won't Chhase, Squirrels At All...

I wish I hadn't already used the title "Dead Puppies Aren't Much Fun" because it would have been appropriate for this story.

We honestly don't know what the hell Stacey Champion was thinking. My best guess is that she was trying to save money, and was too stupid/uncaring to figure out that this was a bad idea. All we do know is she tried to send a puppy to someone via priority post. Yes. And what air holes she had cut in the box, she had sealed over with mailing tape. On top of that, she lied about the contents of the box, saying it was a robot, so don't be alarmed if it makes noise. Thankfully when the box started moving on its own, people were alarmed and ripped it open.

What they found inside was a 4-month-old puppy, which she had intended to send to a kid for their eleventh birthday. Can you imagine what would have happened if the puppy hadn't moved? The kid would have received a dead puppy as a birthday present. It's a guarantee. It would have taken 2 days to mail the box, and it would have been sent in an unheated cargo hold.

But when the woman was charged with animal cruelty, all she cared about was the $22 she had paid to mail it, and she wanted the other money she had attached to a dog collar.

Poor little puppy. I'm glad they saved the poor little thing. Now it's with Animal control, and will likely be adopted out to someone who cares about its well-being.

Help Out NVDA

I've been meaning to put this up for a while. Just one thing led to another, and it's finally going up today.

I think lots of blind folks have heard of NVDA. Ya know, it's NVDA, the free screen reader. Probably lots of us have downloaded it and used it to see if it could handle something better than our primary screen reader. Well, now it appears that NVDA is running out of money. Even if they are a non-profit organization, they still have to pay their developers. They do this through a lot of grants. With the economy sucking right now, those grants have dried up and after July, they won't have any more money.

But there is a way. If all of us who have downloaded NVDA chuck them 10 bucks, they should have enough money to get them through for the next little while.

Please help NVDA. I downloaded it, I plan to. I think the idea is awesome, and should be supported.

Free-Dumb: The Police Got A Free Dose Of Dumb, And He's Dumb And Not Free.

If you're looking for someone to carjack, a uniformed deputy in a sheriff's inmate van probably isn't your best choice. You'll likely end up on the inside of that van, but not driving it. Wouldn't you agree, Leonard Baskerville?

Frank's Red Hot: I Put That Shit On Everyone!

It's pretty sad when a kid gets adopted by someone who ends up treating him like this. Jessica Beagley adopted two boys from Russia. One of them hasn't had any issues, but this one apparently does. So, in the video, she resorted to forcing hot sauce into his mouth and then throwing him in a cold shower. Even better, her ten-year-old daughter shot the video. Just dandy. Then they sent the video to Dr. Phil for help. now she's facing charges, and will probably always be known as the hot sauce lady from Dr. Phil.

Seriously, what was the big deal with taking 3 cards instead of two? Lady, get some help.

Common Sense Just Went Down The Toilet

This story of a three-year-old being suspended for a month from preschool for having a few accidents is such bullshit. This trend of getting kids into schools younger and younger and then not dealing with the consequences is total insanity.

Little Zoe Rosso is 3. She's pretty good at making it to the potty on time, but sometimes she doesn't. For that, she was being yelled at, escorted from the school, and being made to feel as if she was no good.

And what is this pile of nonsense about people at preschool not being comfortable changing a child? If you don't feel comfortable doing things like that, then maybe you're in the wrong profession.

An even better question is what is possessing some parents to try to start toilet training their kids at 3 months of age by a process that sounds downright cruel? Saturate them with drinks and then sit them on the pot. That just sounds straight up evil.

Did the people at this preschool ever think that stressing a kid out is bound to increase the tendancy to have accidents? It's amazing what the body will do when under stress. Problems will become aggrovated. I know it's not the same thing, but just hearing a teacher's voice would make me not notice stuff and run into it. Once, I hit a chair so hard it folded just because I was trying to get as far from this teacher as I could. If the poor kid has a bit of an issue, yelling at them will only make that issue grow into a monster.

I'm glad Zoe's family found a school with more sense. And amazingly, the accidents have stopped. Wow! What a concept!

Luckily For Him, He Stayed Unleaded.

I guess one thing I can say about this guy is he didn't bring his kids to the scene of the crime, like some of our other prizes have. No, he left the kids, both under 5, at home alone when he went out to rob a gas station. Then he came back home. Too bad police dogs tracked him right to his house. When police knocked on his door, he thought it would be smart to pull a knife on them. He also thought it would be smart to respond to their commands to drop the knife with a command of his own. "Drop your guns." Are you serious? I love the phrasing “The police officers failed to do so, but he decided not to push the issue.” I think that's the smartest thing he's done so far.

Well, those kids won't be in his care anymore. Off to jail he went.