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Funny, It Doesn't Look Yellow

This story is not for the squeamish. 

When the Shuttle Endeavor blasted off for the International Space Station on Friday, it carried a lot of stuff in addition to seven new astronauts; a new fridge, some exercise equipment and a second toilet.  But the most expensive and interesting piece in the payload is the $250 million dollar wastewater recycler that will purify the astronauts urine into drinking water.

Yes, you read that correctly.

The recycler will come in handy as the number of crew members doubles aboard the Space Station and you have the dual problem of no place to store fresh water and what to do with the waste. The recycler will process urine through a series of purification techniques; filtration, oxidation and ionization.  Then a small amount of iodine will be added to prevent microbial growth.

Bottoms up!

Whatever Happened To Turn The Other Cheek?

Two monks were arrested after a brawl erupted inside the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. The church, considered one of the holiest places in Christianity, is the supposed site of the crucifixion, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ.   The fight involved monks from the Armenian and Greek Orthodox sects, and they were taken away in handcuffs.  So much for love thy neighbor.  (photo courtesy of AP)

Ladies, Start Scrubbing Your Hands

Listen up guys!  You may think twice about holding hands with your sweetheart.  A study found that females have a lot more bugs on their hands than you do.  Everyone has bacteria on their hands, but researchers at University of Colorado found that women had more varieties of bacteria on theirs.  Researchers aren't sure how to explain it but they believe that men have higher skin acidity which could kill more bacteria.  Women also have more bacteria that lives under the skin, and is inaccessible to washing.  USA Today has more...

Flatulence Finds Favor Among Scientists

The next time you need to fart, be thankful.  It means you're producing hydrogen sulfide, the stuff that makes passing gas, well, smelly.  And scientists now believe hydrogen sulfide plays a positive role in preventing high blood pressure, at least in rats.  But they believe it would have the same effect on humans and are looking for ways to utilize hydrogen sulfide formation in the treatment of hypertension. 

We've Heard Of Dedicated Athletes, But This Is Ridiculous

Great athletes sacrifice a lot to get to the top of the heap, but a finger? 

Trevor Wikre, a lineman for Mesa State College in Grand Junction, Colorado did just that when physicians informed him he had to cut off a severely injured finger or have surgery and forget about the rest of the football season. 

"I said, 'Cut it off,' " Wikre says. "I knew right away.  It wasn't a hard choice."

Wikre had shattered his pinkie in practice on September 30th.  He wanted trainers to tape it up and return to the field, but they took him to the hospital instead.  Doctors there told him they needed to perform surgery to repair his finger but it would mean the end of the football season. 

Wikre was having none of it.  He told them he was a senior and if they put pins in the finger, his senior year and career was finished.  He told them to just take it off.  Said Wikre-

"They said I was being dramatic. I said, yeah, well, losing my season is dramatic, too."

Doctors were able to remove the finger at the knuckle leaving him a somewhat functional stump.

Wikre's coach told USA Today, "He's pretty darn committed to this team."

We'll say.

Make That A Double Scoop Of Breast Milk Ice Cream

People For The Ethical Treatment of Animals also known as PETA are not exactly known for their subtlety.  Now they are urging Ben & Jerry's ice cream makers to stop using cow milk in their ice-cream, and substitute human breast milk instead.  They claim that cows milk is unhealthy and that milking the cows is cruel.

Seriously.

To quote the AP article where we found this story, Ben & Jerry's execs found the idea "udderly ridiculous."  But they were more polite and issued this reaction-

"We applaud PETA's novel approach to bringing attention to an issue, but we believe a mother's milk is best used for her child."

Customers who heard of the proposal, were more pointed.

"I think it's kind of creepy," said one at Ben & Jerry's factory in Vermont. 

DNA Test Will Figure Out Which Poop Belongs To Which Pup

All dog owners in Marin County (and there are a lot of you out there) should take heed from this story.  A suburb of Tel Aviv has initiated a special doggie doodoo identifier program.  Here's how it works- the dog owners in Petah Tikva are being asked to bring their dogs down for a swab of its mouth to obtain DNA for the town database of dogs.  The city will then collect any poop it finds that has not been picked up by the dog owner, and the DNA will be checked against the town database.  Offending owners will then be fined.  Sounds perfect for Marin, don't you think?

Thief Armed With Spices & Sausage

This little gem caught our eye.  A thief, apparently channeling Julie Child, broke into a house, and rubbed spices over a sleeping occupant.  As if that wasn't bizarre enough, he then attacked another man with a sausage before fleeing.  Police who responded couldn't find the weapon/sausage as it had been eaten by the dog.  Too weird for words, but then again, this happened in Fresno.

Bobcats Are The King Of This Castle

In a classic case of what goes around, comes around, check out this tale of wildlife encroaching back into human territory!

Pay Your Library Fine...Or Else Face Arrest

Things must be pretty slow crime-wise in Grafton, Wisconsin.  A woman there was handcuffed, arrested and booked for failing to pay a library fine.  Twenty year-old Heidi Dalibor apparantly ignored requests, phone calls and letters to pay her delinquent library fine.  When she ignored the notice to appear in court; the police went a-knockin.  When she opened the door, they handcuffed her and took her down to the station to be fingerprinted, photographed and booked.  Dalibor paid her $30 overdue fine, but her mom got stuck with the $172 it cost to release her. 

Miss Universe For Nuns

They won't parade down a runway in evening gowns or bathing suits, but the "Sister Italia 2008" contest will pit nun against nun in an online 'beauty contest' organized by who else; a priest. 

Bedbugs Welcome College Students Back Into The Dorms

"They're taking off right now," says Dan Mizer, associate director of residence life at Texas A&M University.

He's talking about bedbugs, those tiny, bloodsucking nocturnal pests which have made a recent unwelcome return to beds in apartments and hotel rooms in NYC, and now appear to have crawled their way onto college campuses nationwide.  Ohio State, Texas A & M and the University of Florida are some of the colleges infested with the icky bugs and experts point to several reasons- an increase in international travel, larger bedbug populations worldwide, less pesticide spraying and maybe tougher bugs that resist spraying.  The bug, which leaves itchy welts after it bites, can hang out for up to a year without a blood meal so the summer respite is not an issue while it waits for students to return to school in the Fall.  That really bites.

Calling Harry Potter! Muggle Scientists At UC Designing Invisibility Cloak

It won't take a bedazzlement hex to create an invisibility cloak in the research labs at UC Berkeley.  Mere muggles are working on creating invisibility cloaks the old fashioned way; by using artificially engineered materials that redirect light around the objects.  Researchers at Cal were able to demonstrate cloaking on a three dimensional object using something called  metamaterials which deflect radar, light or other waves around an object rendering it invisible to the eye.  Maybe someone will be able to transform BART into a train like Hogwort Express, that can go through walls and get to their destination without breaking down.  Or maybe not.

At The Age Of 111, This Guy Waited 38 Years To Become A Father

Ok so, he's only a reptile, but Henry, a New Zealand Tuatara (a distant relative of the dinosaur) just became a father.  Henry, who at the age of 111 isn't exactly a spring chicken, hadn't shown a bit of interest in his mate, Mildred, since 1970.  But after removing a cancerous growth from his- ahem- genitals, Henry rose to the occasion and Mildred produced a dozen eggs.  Officials are thrilled and noted the centenarian was enjoying the company of three tarty tuatara females, and they are hoping he breeds again next year.  Hey, he's gotta make up for lost time, doesn't he?

The Newest Pedicure Rage- Callus Eating Fish

In our Almost Too Weird For Words category comes this nugget.  A spa up in Virginia has been doing a bang-up business by using teensy carp to eat away the flaky, dead skin and calluses on your feet.  The fish, commonly called doctor fish, don't have teeth so they can't bite new skin, but are attracted to dead skin which they gnaw away, leaving feet smooth and soft.  Customers describe the fish feed as a 'tingling sensation' and most are thrilled with the results.  We think we'll just stick to the plain old pumice stone, if you don't mind. 

Tiny Shrew Is Big Party Animal

In the category of "we wonder what its liver looks like"- check this out!  Seems there's an itsby, bitsy animal that can drink you under the table.  The Malaysian pen-tailed tree shrew survives on a diet consisting entirely of fermented flower nectar.  With an alcohol content of nearly 3.8%, it would be like drinking beer as your only source of food, 24-7.  But this little tree hanger wouldn't have any trouble walking the line; it doesn't actually get drunk.  Apparently there is something internal that prevents it from getting drunk.  We're presuming no hangovers either.

(Photo courtesy MSNBC/Annette Zitzmann)

This Jewelry Really Bugs Us

Anyone who has spent time in the Midwest or East knows that the decidedly deafening end of summer buzzing sound, signals the arrival of the cicadas.  Most people aren't too fond of the benign, cockroach-like bug, which emerges from years in the soil to spend just a few days above ground to mate, lay eggs and then die.  But a couple of teens figured they could make some money after a swarm of them hit Cape Cod earlier this month.  Talk about a fashion statement!

Suspicions Grow About Five-Time Widow...Ya Think?

Don't marry Betty Neumar if you expect to live.  Officials are re-examining the deaths of four of the five dead husbands of the 76 year-old North Carolina resident.  Neumar has just been charged with conspiring to kill her fourth husband.   Her first husband was slain and that case remains unsolved,  her second died of circumstances not discussed by authorities, the third after allegedly committing suicide, a fourth from shooting (she has been accused of soliciting his murder) and the fifth and final spouse died of a septic infection of an unknown cause.

If this isn't a case of a 'Black Widow', we don't know what is.  US Today has the story...

Can I Get 950 Years Off For Good Behavior???

A man in Egypt, just got sentenced to one-thousand years in prison.  Yes, you read that correctly.  One-thousand years.  Abdullah Kamel Mohammed was sentenced to the lengthy prison term after being found guilty of money laundering.  No word on whether Mohammed will be eligible for parole, but unless it's in next 50 year, it won't matter. 

Doc, You Want To Pull What From Where?!?

Frankly, a written introduction would not do this story justice.  Better to just get straight to the article. They call it 'natural orifice surgery', we call it Almost Too Weird For Words...

Eighteen Kids And Counting

Just in time for Mother's Day, we find this gem.  An Arkansas woman, 41 year-old Michelle Duggar, is pregnant with her eighteenth child!  The newest Duggar baby, due on New Years day, will join ten brothers and seven sisters.  The Duggar children are all home-schooled and their first names all begin with "J", like their father, Jim Bob. Really.  Not even MoreMarin could make something like this up.

Someone Ratted On Her

A house up in Washington, became so overrun with rats, it will have to be torn down and rebuilt.  A woman who lived in the house, originally bought some rats as food for her pet snakes, but then couldn't bear to kill them and kept them as pets.  The rats did what rats will do, and eventually the home was so overrun with rats, they had chewed through the electrical lines, cupboards and walls.  Yikes, that is almost to weird for words...

Hey Yury...Is That A Knife In Your Back?

Chalk another one in the category of almost too weird for words.  Seems a guy in Russia tied one on, came home and fell asleep.  The story would end there, were it not for the knife handle his wife spotted, sticking out of his back.  Ouch!!  Apparantly the man did not realize he had been stabbed.  Nasdrovya, Yury...that was some cocktail!

Nosing Around For A World Record

Thirteen year-old Washington resident, Andrew Dahl, is claiming a world record for blowing up 213 balloons within an hour...with his nose. 

$100-Dollar-A-Cup Coffee...Doo Doo Included

We're wondering why this wasn't featured on the reality show, Bizarre Food.  It's almost too weird for words...

Introducing "Almost Too Weird For Words"...Strange Stories That Defy Categorization!

Socialist candidate, Milly D'Abbraccio, has approached her campaign for a seat in Rome's City Hall  in today's Italian election, a bit differently.  D'Abbraccio, a porn star, has been plastering campaign posters, featuring her rear end, all over Rome.  She wants to be known as the "derrière of the Socialist Party" and establish a red-light district with strip clubs and discos in Rome, called "Love City".  U.S. voters surely won't see any campaign posters that interesting before our election...