Topical Chat, October 20, 2006

What is it about Friday that makes even a rainy day seem like a sunny one?

1. On an Austrian businessman who announced Thursday that he would get rid of urinals shaped like a woman's mouth from a public toilet near Vienna's national opera, after facing pressure from politicians who demanded their removal:
“They are going to replace them with clown mouths, and the person with the most urine will now win a prize.”

2. On a Connecticut woman claiming that she found a black widow spider from a bag of supermarket grapes:
“Looks like she won the ‘Grape-tastic Black Widow’ contest, in which she won a new oak casket.”

3. On a panda cub that bit off part of the thumb of an American visitor who was feeding it at a reserve in southwest China:
“Great, now their teaching their communist beliefs to the animals???? Where the hell is PETA when you need them?”

4. On officials at an elementary school south of Boston that have banned kids from playing tag, touch football and any other unsupervised chase game during recess:
“The school said it is looking to eliminate the word ‘fun’ from the dictionary.”

5. On the Spanish King denying that he shot an inebriated bear:
“He says he was aiming for the pink elephant behind the bear.”

6. On an environmentally friendly nightclub design that generates electricity from dancers:
“Certain night clubs could probably provide enough energy for small cities.”

7. On the report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) that the average gas mileage for new vehicles sold in the United States has 23.1 miles per gallon (mpg) in 1980 to 24.7 in 2004:
“Good to see the automobile companies really improving the cars over the years … I just can’t understand why they get such a bad rap.”

8. On a letter to John Madden from the worst-rated player in Madden 2007:
“All I can say is, please read this – you’ll thank me later.”