FunnyColumns

Column: Missing out on Halloween

Since it's Halloween, I thought you might enjoy a column I wrote a decade ago.

 

  MISSING OUT ON HALLOWEEN

  Halloween has always been somewhat of a mystery to me.
 
  Perhaps that's because I grew up in Africa, where you'd have
  to be a little crazy to leave your pumpkins outside. Folks
  there never have trouble distinguishing between decorations
  and food. And leaving food on your porch is not a good idea.
  Especially during a famine. When people are starving, there
  is nothing more arrogant than decorating your house with
  food.
 
  Actually, the conditions were never that bad in Zambia, the
  country I grew up in. We never felt the need to go door to
  door, begging for candy.
 
  My mom would have been so embarrassed if I had asked a
  neighbor for food. Especially after giving the neighbor a
  threat. Trick or treat? A quick call to my mother and the
  trick would have been saving my butt from a whipping.
 
  If we were guests at someone's house and they offered me a
  second helping of dessert, the correct response was "No,
  thank you." Mom was always watching and I didn't want it to
  be my last dessert.

Drumming some sense into the KKK

I've often wished we could get all the racists together, the brown racists, the black racists and the white racists. A fight would inevitably break out and, with a little luck, we'd have fewer racists in the world. My wish may never come true, not in the way I imagine it, but I'm getting a little satisfaction from what's happening in Cullman, Alabama, where the KKK is in conflict with ... well, the KKK.

Members of one Ku Klux Klan organization say they will assemble at the courthouse Nov. 10 to show their opposition to another Klan group that plans an anti-immigration rally there that day.

Ken Mier, who described himself as an investigator for the Alabama Ku Klux Klan and the national office of the Ku Klux Klan LLC, said in an e-mail to The Cullman Times that his group is against the tactics of the National Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, which held an anti-immigration protest last month in Athens.

"We are opposed to the ignorance and stupidity as displayed by the individuals that thumbed their nose at the area churches by continuing to use racial slurs, threats and avoided Christian deportment," he said. [Link]

It's about time the KKK realized the ignorance and stupidity of the KKK. These losers ought to go to school and get an education, instead of trying to feel superior to other races. I'm hoping the KKK ends up drumming some sense into the KKK. Perhaps someday my dream will come true and Wal-Mart will see a big drop in sales of white bed sheets.

Having a ball with the church offering

If you go to church and put money in the offering plate, do you know where the cash goes? Of course you do. It goes toward the priest's salary and various church-related expenses, such as maintenance of the sanctuary, maintenance of church vehicles, and maintenance of the priest's girlfriend. (Some of them can be quite high-maintenance.) And let's not forget about overseas vacations and gambling trips for the priest. Nothing wrong with that, is there?

TWO Irish priests accused of misappropriating millions from a Florida church had formed a mortgage company with another priest called Shag Inc.

Fr John Skehan (80), originally from Johnstown, Kilkenny, and Fr Francis Guinan (64), originally from Birr, Co Offaly, are accused in relation to $8.6m missing from church coffers.

The two men are accused of using offertory dollars to keep girlfriends, take gambling excursions and foreign holidays, and buy property. [Link]

$8.6 million? Wow, you can keep a lot of girlfriends with that, depending on the size of the building you keep them in. If they question your virility, wonder if you're too old to perform, just tell them you're president of Shag Inc.

Palm Beach diocese spokeswoman Alexis Walkenstein said they are seeking to have all the funds reimbursed. When asked about Shag, she said it was "pretty unusual for priests to form for-profit corporations".

"However because diocesan priests do not take a vow of poverty, there is no rule to prevent diocesan priests from accumulating wealth as long as it is within legal and moral confines," she said. [Link]

We've told them it's okay to save money, but it's much better to save souls.

Skehan and Guinan were arrested last September on suspicion of stealing millions in offerings and gifts made to their parish as far back as 40 years ago. They are likely to be charged with stealing less than $1m when the case goes to trial next February but could face jail sentences of up to 30 years if they are found guilty.

However, they are likely to enter a plea bargain, which would see them serving around four years. [Link]

Only four years? Come on, that's not long enough for them to set up a successful prison ministry. I don't know about you, but I'm eager to see them get whatever the other inmates are offering.

Signs for a safer India

Yes, please drive around them.

Photo by Shira Golding

The British learned from insects too. That's how they ended up with so many colonies.

Photo by Matt Logelin

"This would be a hell of a sign in Australia, mate."

Photo by madhatrk

Forgery 101: Don't use Sellotape!

If you're going to make counterfeit money -- and I'm not suggesting that you do -- try to make it look like real money. Don't do what a New Zealand woman did.

A Palmerston North woman out shoe shopping has been caught flat-footed after allegedly trying to pass off a crudely forged $100 bill as genuine currency.

Staff at Number 1 Shoe Warehouse phoned police on Friday  when they realised the note handed  to them was fake. [Link]

It was such a bad forgery that a blind man holding a cup on the street corner refused to accept it.

Another three $100 prints - each  with one blank side - and a fake $50  bill were later allegedly found in the  woman's purse.

The woman, 30, was to appear in  court today charged with using a  forged document.

Mr Affleck said the notes - made of paper using a colour photocopier, adhesive and Sellotape - were an "extremely poor attempt" at counterfeit.

"Basically they've just stuck two pieces of paper together and got some Sellotape to make the transparent panels," he said. "It's a pretty crude method and you can tell it's fake as soon as you touch it." [Link]

Sellotape? Even I know better than to use Sellotape. If you want to do it right, you have to use Scotch Tape!

I wonder how the interrogation went.

Cop: "Where did you learn to make forged money like this?"

Woman: "FU."

Cop: "Hey, you'd better watch it! You're in big enough trouble already."

Woman: "FU -- that's where I learned it. Forgery University."

Cop: "Oh, I see. Did you graduate?"

Woman: "No, they kicked me out in my second year. Didn't like the money I used to pay the tuition."

Photo by Taniwhaiti

Why Sarkozy likes America

Appearing on the CBS news show "60 Minutes," Nicolas Sarkozy, the president of France, spoke of his admiration of America.

Sarkozy said he admired Americans' work ethic and the opportunities for advancement in the country, irrespective of class or background.

He said while his Hungarian father had worried that his surname would be an obstacle in France, "he was proven wrong."

"That's what he thought. That a name like Sarkozy was a handicap," the president said. "That's the reason why I like the United States. You can have a name like Schwarzenegger and be governor of California. You can be called Madeleine Albright and be secretary of state. You can be called Colin Powell or Condi Rice, and succeed." [Link]

I think he's overstating it. Schwarzenegger was a movie star and household name. Albright, Powell and Rice were appointed. Sure, Louisiana just elected Bobby Jindal as its governor, but his first name is as American as liposuction and his last name is pretty short and non-threatening. I hope I'm wrong, but I don't think America is ready for President Lakshmanathan Balasubramaniam. Or President Lupando Kwamanakweenda. Or President Ibrahim bin Abdullah Al Sadr.

But first, we'll have to see if America is ready for First Lady Bill Clinton. I mean, First Gent Bill Clinton.

I'VE GOT better things TO do than CRITICIZE THEM

The bracelets handed out to students in Iowa were supposed to carry an anti-drug message, but may have given some students the wrong idea.

A New York state company will stop production of Red Ribbon Week bracelets and discard its remaining inventory of the rubber wrist bands because of an unintended message printed on them.

The bracelets, handed out last week to students in the WACO school district in southeast Iowa, carried the anti-drug slogan "I've Got BETTER Things to DO than DRUGS."

The issue was the unintended message of the all-uppercase words: Better Do Drugs.

Mark Taxel, executive vice president of Hauppauge, N.Y.-based Positive Promotions, said no one noticed how the words looked on the bracelets before they were distributed. Only two complaints were received about the bracelets, he said.

Taxel said the company doesn't want to put out a message that could be misconstrued. He said a new bracelet would be produced in all capital letters. [Link]

Perhaps the company needs to produce several versions of the bracelets:

For the student dealer: "I'VE GOT better things to do than DRUGS."

For his rival dealer: "I'VE GOT BETTER things to do than DRUGS."

For the glue- and aerosol-sniffing student: "I'VE GOT BETTER THINGS to do THAN DRUGS."

For the lonely, depressed student: "I'VE GOT better things TO DO than DRUGS."

For the rich, shopaholic student: "I'VE GOT better THINGS to do than drugs."

For her best friend: "I'VE GOT BETTER THINGS to do than drugs."

For the busy, high-achieving student: "I'VE GOT better THINGS TO DO than drugs."

For the grammar-challenged, forever-dieting student: "I'VE GOT better THINgs to do than drugs."

For the school janitor: "I'VE GOT better things TO DO thAn dRUGs."

The laptop thief who satisfied 'em all on eBay

If you own a laptop, you'll want to read Scott Barancik's well-researched article in the St. Petersburg Times about Eric Almly, a career thief who stole 130 laptops in the last five years or so.

In March, a clean-cut stranger wearing khaki pants and a polo shirt strolled into the Tampa headquarters of Outback Steakhouse, mingled with company staff until they left for the day and walked out with 11 laptop computers crammed into his shoulder bag.

When a security guard stopped him in the parking lot, the gifted liar convinced him he was out for a jog. Later, at his $1,800-a-month apartment along Miami Beach, the burglar erased the laptops' hard drives and began selling them via services like eBay, where he had earned a 99.4 percent customer-satisfaction rating and tens of thousands of dollars in profit. [Link]

I cringed when I read the part about erasing hard drives. I'm a grown man, but if someone erased my hard drive, I would definitely cry. "My columns! My stories! My Kournikova pics!"

Though his plain features defy Hollywood's idea of a con artist - think Leonardo DiCaprio's rakish character in Catch Me If You Can - Almly has the right resume. A determined thief since his mid teens, he has made a near science of stealing and selling laptops over the past five years. He's even developed some acting skills, if you consider perpetrating a faceless office-worker a form of theater.

"This is a very intelligent young man," an Almly defense attorney said in 1993, moments after the 18-year-old had been sentenced to serve one year on a work farm. "If he can put his intelligence to positive uses, then the sky's the limit." [Link]

I'd like to see him put his intelligence toward making license plates. Or picking up trash on the highway.

Beat first, ask questions later

Misunderstandings are the staple of comedies, but they also happen in real life and not always to comedic effect, as this story from Mumbai shows.

So many men travel by the ladies’ compartments in local trains while the Government Railway Police (GRP) look the other way.

But when the GRP did decide to act, the man at the receiving end turned out to be the train’s guard who had come to investigate a chain-pulling incident.

The incident occurred on Sunday night at Vasai. The guard, Mohammad Yasin Sheikh, 40, was badly injured after being beaten up by five GRP personnel. He is being treated at Western Railway’s Jagjivan Ram Hospital at Mumbai Central. [Link]

The policemen obviously didn't follow the GRP's Official Rules of Conduct, specifically Rule 5 in Section 3: Always attempt to identify a lawbreaker before beating him up.

On Sunday, Sheikh was on duty on a Virar-bound local when he noticed a signal that the emergency chain had been pulled by someone in the ladies’ compartment. When the local reached Vasai at 10.39 pm, he got down to investigate.

Sheikh said, “We are supposed to go to the compartment in which the chain was pulled and verify the complaint of the passengers. But as I was getting into the ladies’ compartment, the GRP constable on escort duty objected. Before I could explain, he slapped me. I fell on the platform.”

The GRP man then called a few colleagues from other platforms to help him deal with Sheikh. According to the guard, the five men beat him up without giving him a chance to explain himself. “I tried to reveal my identity but the GRP men did not allow me to speak. They kicked me and hit me with the butt of their guns,” said Sheikh. [Link]

The policemen are in trouble, of course. Not only did they break Rule 5 in Section 3, they also violated Rule 7 in Section 6: Railway personnel must not be beaten up under any circumstances, except with prior approval of the commissioner.  

Photo by Marc van der Chijs

The escape artist who duped a cop

Richard McNair, a prison escapee who was one of the U.S. Marshals Service's 15 most wanted, was recaptured this week in New Brunswick, Canada, but you can bet your last egg roll he'll be out again.

During a 20-year career as a criminal Houdini, he escaped three U.S. prisons, outsmarted authorities on both sides of the border and became proficient at hopping moving trains, disappearing on the rails in a puff of train smoke. ...

When Mr. McNair was arrested for murder in 1987, county sheriffs left him alone, handcuffed to a chair. He greased himself out of the irons with lip balm and bolted. During his escape, he jumped off a roof, missed a tree limb and fell to the ground where he was recaptured. [Link]

Lip balm? Is that all it takes to get out of handcuffs? I had no idea. I'll have to keep that in mind, just in case my wife feels like doing something kinky.

No jail has been able to keep him -- he's broken out of a North Dakota county jail in 1988, crawled to freedom through a state penitentiary ventilation duct in 1992, and infamously escaped by mailing himself out of a Pollock, La., maximum-security prison hidden under a pallet of shrink-wrapped mailbags on April 5, 2006. [Link]

He mailed himself out of prison! Why put tattoos on yourself when you can put stamps?

Inmate: "Hey Bob, why do you have stamps all over yourself?"

McNair: "Isn't it obvious? I'm a first-class male."

The highly desired profession of rat killer

Ah, government jobs. People will do anything for them. A Mumbai man had been trying to get one for 19 years  -- he even slit his wrists to get attention -- and was finally rewarded recently.

Kishore Bhende, a Ghatkopar resident, received his confirmation letter last week as a permanent employee. Bhende had cleared the written and practical examinations for night rat killers six months back and was appointed as a Night Rat Killer (NRK) in BMC’s pest control department. [Link]

Written and practical examinations for night rat killers? I didn't realize you needed professional qualifications to catch rats. I thought you just needed to set traps, use poison or play a musical pipe.

I wonder what type of questions he had to answer. Where is the best place to look for rats?  (A) In the sewer. (B) Under cars. (C) Inside law offices. (D) On the branches of trees. (D) In the kitchen of fast-food restaurants. (E) At your nearest pet store.

According to pest control officer Deepak Adsul, Bhende got the job on merit. “Looking at his work, he can even be promoted,” Adsul said. [Link]

He does good work. When he brought the rats to us, they were all dead. We are thinking of promoting him to DRK (Distinguished Rat Killer). Of course, he will have to pass more examinations.

Lynette Sheffield column: Getting Fruity

Here's a funny column by humorist Lynette Sheffield:

Getting Fruity

While walking through the snack aisle at Costco (And no, it wasn’t like I was going to actually buy anything that would ruin my diet, I was simply looking. Truly.), I saw this product that was called “Fruit Leather.”

I understand that Fruit Leather is a fruit snack.  But I can’t believe that “Fruit Leather” was the name chosen by the company name-choosers. 

I mean, really? 

Fruit Leather was the best you could come up with? 

I can tell you with all sincerity that I have never, not once, looked down at my own shoes and thought, “I wish they were made out of fruit so I could eat them.”   

Maybe I should get out more. Maybe this is a personal expression that is quite common and I am so out of it, I cannot even consider this option. 

I don’t know. 

What I do know is that if something is presented to me to eat and part of the name of that food is leather; I will go hungry.

I’m not a radical vegan, protein disciple or a member of the Carb Police.  I’m just on a lifelong leather-free diet.

Draw the curtain, I gotta go

Ever been stuck in traffic with a full bladder and no restroom in sight? It's no fun, really, especially when there are too many cars around you, you can't go discreetly behind a tree -- and too many passengers in your car, you can't grab that empty bottle on the floor.

Thankfully, a Japanese company, Kaneko Sangyo Co., has given a lot of thought to the problem.

The manufacturer of plastic car accessories drew back the curtain on Tuesday on its new portable toilet for cars.

The toilet comes with a curtain large enough to conceal users and a plastic bag to collect waste.

"The commode will come in handy during major disasters such as earthquakes or when you are caught in a traffic jam," a company official told reporters, according to Kyodo News.

Japan is situated on the Pacific "Ring of Fire" and accounts for about 20 percent of the world's earthquakes of magnitude 6 or greater.

Drivers stranded by tectonic movements or stuck in tailbacks simply assemble the cardboard toilet bowl, fit a water-absorbent sheet inside and draw round the curtain. [Link]

I don't understand how it would help during earthquakes. I mean, if I have a full bladder and there's a major earthquake, I'm not going to wait to draw a curtain.

Health scare at Calgary McDonald's

If you live in Calgary, you might want to recall which fast-food restaurants you visited in the last month.

Thousands of Calgarians are at risk of contracting hepatitis A after a food-handler at a southeast McDonald's tested positive for the disease.

The Calgary Health Region yesterday confirmed the case of an employee who prepares meals at the fast-food restaurant located in the Foothills Industrial Park, 5326 72 Ave. S.E., across from the Calgary Soccer Centre.

Anyone who ate at this location from Oct. 1 to 23 may be infected, said Dr. Judy MacDonald, the health region's deputy medical officer of health. [Link]

In other words, MacDonald says if you ate at that McDonald's, you might be McScrewed.

Hepatitis A is not a chronic disease and victims usually recover within a month.

Infected people can spread the disease if they don't wash their hands properly after using the washroom, said MacDonald. [Link]

They can also spread the disease by flipping burgers at McDonald's.

Chris Stannell, spokesman for McDonald's in Western Canada, said the restaurant is working closely with the health region to resolve the issue.

"At McDonald's, we take the health and well-being of our customers and staff very seriously," he said. [Link]

Yes, that's why McDonald's works so hard to make sure your burgers and fries are as nutritious and healthful as can be.

According to WebMD, the symptoms of hepatitis A include: Extreme tiredness (fatigue), fever, sore muscles, headache, pain on the right side of the abdomen, nausea, loss of appetite and weight loss, yellowing of the skin and the white part of the eyes, and an obsessive desire to watch ice hockey.

Actually, I made up the last one. It's not a symptom of hepatitis A -- it's a symptom of being Canadian.

Photo by Naystin

Sewing their mouths shut

You know what's wrong with the world? The wrong people are sewing their lips together.

LA PAZ (Reuters) - Prostitutes in the Bolivian city of El Alto sewed their lips together on Wednesday as part of a hunger strike to demand that the mayor reopen brothels and bars ordered closed after violent protests by residents last week. [Link]

Here are just five people whose lips I'd like to sew together:

1. V.S. Naipaul. The Nobel laureate is a great writer (the greatest writer in the history of the world, if you ask him), but also attracts controversy as easily as mud attracts children. Invite him to speak at a conference and he'll do his best to offend everyone, to speak ill of other writers, to bash Islam and his motherland, to make sure that everyone knows he's the greatest living writer, even if half the audience wishes the middle part weren't true.

2. Rosie O'Donnell. Oprah Winfrey may have the highest rated talk show in the history of television, but O'Donnell still reigns as the Queen of Talk. And while I generally agree with her political views, I'd still like to sew her mouth shut and give some much-needed help to her brain, which has been struggling for years to keep up with her lips.

3. Terrell Owens. He's the star wide receiver for the Dallas Cowboys, a man with such a big mouth, he's been known to catch balls with it. He's a great football player, but he'd be even greater if he didn't suffer from foot-in-mouth disease.

4. Bill O'Reilly. I don't watch him anymore -- mercifully, my cable company has spared me the "fair and balanced" channel -- but the right-wing talk show host's words still echo in my head. I'd love to sew his lips together, but considering how vigorously he moves them, I'm not sure that would do the trick. I might need to use Super Glue. A whole tube of it, I'm sure.

5. George Bush. Did you really think I'd spare him? If I sewed his lips together, we wouldn't have to hear words such as "nucular" and "misunderestimate" -- or even "axis of evil" and "mission accomplished." But I have a feeling the Secret Service won't let me within 100 feet of him with my needle and thread, so I'm just going to have to enlist Laura. It's a wife's job, after all, to needle her husband.

Farmer harvests kindness and love

I love stories like this, stories about people helping others in need, without expecting anything in return. It's always good to have friends and neighbors you can rely on and Ron Edwards obviously has some great ones.

The 47-year-old Manitoba farmer had planted more than 300 hectares of wheat, oats and canola in the spring. Then he was diagnosed with cancer and underwent chemotherapy and open lung surgery. He was in no shape to harvest his crops.

Fortunately, more than 20 people — some he barely knew — pitched in to help get the crop off, saving him thousands of dollars in hired help.

"A combine is worth a lot of money. Some of them run $100, $150 an hour. I know some guys worked a day, two days, three days even, and they didn't charge anything at all for their machines," he said.

At one point, he said, he looked out his window and saw six combines working in his fields. [Link]

That's what you get when you combine kindness and selflessness. The farming community is like that -- they're always helping each other, perhaps because they're not caught up in the rat race, not trying so hard to get ahead that they have no time for their friends and neighbors. When was the last time you heard one of them say, "I'm just a farmer, but someday I'd like to be the CFO -- Chief Farming Officer." 

"That was something to see. It was hard not to get emotional when you think of all the people that came out to help," said Edwards, who took out two advertisements in local papers to thank everyone who helped.

"Words can't express how I feel about everybody that helped. It's so amazing. I don't know what to say." [Link]

We're often amazed when we hear of people helping other people, not so amazed when we hear of people robbing other people. Perhaps that's because the newspapers are full of crime stories. Try doing a good deed and see how many reporters come to your door. One or two perhaps -- if your aunt works at the local paper. But commit a terrible crime and the media will swarm to your door like you're dating Jennifer Aniston.

Photo by hedgerowmobile

Watching the birds and the guys

When it comes to gay pickup spots, I'm pretty ignorant. Until Sen. Larry Craig was arrested, I didn't realize airport bathrooms were a prime spot. And now I'm learning that birdwatching areas are also quite popular.

Birders and cruisers have found value in the same patches of land because not only do they attract scores of birds, but they also allow for partial privacy and chance encounters in a public setting.

In cruiser communities,  birding areas are known to be prime hook-up spots.

"It's bad, dude, real bad," said Munoz, 47, a Chicago police homicide detective who began birdwatching during a trip to Yellowstone National Park. "I've been confronted a couple times, and I've seen a few things happening. Like guys in the middle of some things." [Link]

Surely there are better places to hook up, places where you don't have to worry about birdwatchers dropping in on you -- or birds dropping on you.

At best, birders said, the cruisers are tasteless; at worst, birders said they feel uneasy amid occasional leers and advances.

Birders said the cruisers are generally easy to spot: men without birding gear, such as binoculars, sketch books or birding books, who wander the less populated trails with deliberate gaits and searching eyes.[Link]

Cop: "Look at that guy. He has no binoculars and he's looking around intently."

Second cop: "Yeah, he's either a gay man seeking sex or a poor birdwatcher."

Wrongfully convicted better off in Canada

If you're going to be wrongfully convicted, you're better off in Canada than in America. Not only is the Canadian justice system more lenient, when (if) you're finally released from prison, you'll virtually win the lottery. In America, on the other hand, you'll be compensated like you mop floors at Wal-Mart. Take the case of a North Carolina man.

Dwayne Allen Dail, 39, was cleared in August of the 1987 rape of a 12-year-old Goldsboro girl. The girl identified him as her attacker and hair found at the scene was similar to his. But DNA evidence found on a fragment of the girl's nightgown years after the trial proved Dail wasn't involved in the attack.

Gov. Mike Easley pardoned Dail two weeks ago, making him eligible to receive $360,000 from the state – $20,000 for each year he spent in prison. [Link]

In case you were sleeping in math class, that means he served 18 years in prison. It may seem like a full sentence for a rape conviction, but Dail still had two life sentences to serve. Yes, the jury had sentenced him to two life sentences, plus 18 years. (But at least he wasn't in Saudi Arabia. He got to keep his you-know-what.)

The poor man was wrongfully convicted, served 18 years, was compensated, and what do you think happened next?

Dail, who now lives in Florida, was served Tuesday with a lawsuit by Lorraine Michaels, the mother of his son, who is seeking back child support. The suit does not specify how much money she wants, as is normal in North Carolina, but asks a "reasonable sum for the care and maintenance of the minor child." Dail did not provide while he was in prison.

Dail said he was devastated by the suit. He said his son recently moved to Florida to live with him.

"I was thrown in prison. What could I do? I missed my whole life. I missed my son's whole life. I'm not the person to be compensating anyone for anything – not me," Dail said. [Link]

Not only is the state paying him a pittance, he's being sued for part of it. When everything is said and done, he'll be lucky if he can afford to get gas. Burritos can be expensive.

Doris Lessing hates to say it, but ...

Reporter: "Doris Lessing, you just won the Nobel Prize in Literature. What are you going to do next?"

Lessing: "I'm going to do my best impression of V.S. Naipaul, of course. We Nobel winners need to be a little cantankerous."

MADRID, Spain — Nobel laureate Doris Lessing said the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States were "not that terrible" when compared to attacks by the IRA in Britain.

"September 11 was terrible, but if one goes back over the history of the IRA, what happened to the Americans wasn't that terrible," the Nobel Literature Prize winner told the leading Spanish daily El Pais.[Link]

Let me get this straight, Doris: It was terrible, but it wasn't that terrible. On a scale of 1 to 10, you'd give it a 6 for terribleness -- on par with eating liver 'n onions.

"Some Americans will think I'm crazy. Many people died, two prominent buildings fell, but it was neither as terrible nor as extraordinary as they think. They're a very naive people, or they pretend to be," she said in an interview published Sunday. [Link]

Yeah, there's nothing extraordinary about planes being flown into buildings, Doris. Now Britney Spears appearing in public with all her clothes on -- that's extraordinary!

No mosques in our neighborhood please

A Muslim group wants to build a mosque in rural Maryland and local residents are giving them lots of assistance. I mean, resistance.

WALKERSVILLE, Md. -- A Muslim group's plan to build a mosque and convention site on a 224-acre farm has met with resistance from many residents of this rural, overwhelmingly Christian town who fear its tranquility and security may be jeopardized.

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA insists it will be a friendly neighbor, but its proposal -- including an annual national gathering of thousands of Ahmadis -- could be blocked by a measure under consideration by the town commissioners.

''Muslims are a whole different culture from us,'' said the mayor, Ralph Whitmore, taking a break at his livestock feed store. ''The situation with the Muslims is a touchy worldwide situation, so people are antsy over that.'' [Link]

Oh no, they're a whole different culture. We'd rather be surrounded by people of the same culture, people who worship the same God, wear the same clothes and drive the same pickup trucks.

Muqtedar Khan, a political science professor at the University of Delaware, said the blunt opposition voiced by some Walkersville citizens is reminiscent of the persecution Ahmadis have endured in Pakistan. There, they are forbidden to practice their religion because they believe there was a prophet after Muhammad -- Hadrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, who died in 1908.

''It is quite ironic,'' Khan said, that the Ahmadis -- allowed to worship freely in the United States -- ''are suffering a backlash because of their association with Islam.''

But Syed Ahmad, a federal economist who is managing the Walkersville project for the group, said the persecution in Pakistan is far worse.

''Here, people are civilized and they get up and they talk and they oppose you,'' Ahmad said, ''but they're not going to kill you.'' [Link]

They're good people, here. Even when they attack our mosques, they do it nicely. They don't kill anyone.