It’s time, once again, to delve into the unseemly underbelly of the mainstream media to find the stories that went largely unreported but are stories, all the same, that you, my valued readers, have a right to know about.
For example, while CBS and Dan Rather suffered under the slings and arrows of its own forged documents scandal, most of the world didn’t realize that a 67-year old man accidentally sliced off his own private part while trying to kill a chicken.
According to an Oct. 4, 2004 Reuters news report out of Bucharest, “an elderly Romanian man mistook his penis for a chicken's neck, cut it off and his dog rushed up and ate it, the state Rompres news agency said Monday.”
I know what you’re thinking, because I’m thinking it, too. You’re thinking “why is the Romanian state news agency named Rompres?” The answer, of course, according to the Rompres Web site, is that it was “baptized as Rompres on January 8, 1990, after the reorganization of former Romanian Press Agency Agerpres, which was subordinated to the Council of Ministers since May 20, 1949.”
So, there you have it, our pressing question has been answered. The only question remaining is “an elderly Romanian man did WHAT?!!”
“It said 67 year-old Constantin Mocanu, from a village near the southeastern town of Galati, rushed out into his yard in his underwear to kill a noisy chicken keeping him awake at night.”
"‘I confused it with the chicken's neck,’ Mocanu, who was admitted to the emergency hospital in Galati, was quoted as saying. ‘I cut it ... and the dog rushed and ate it.’”
We can only hope that this incident does not spawn a new type of dog food but, if it does, I think it should be called “Rompres Chow.”
In far less disturbing news, we travel to Malaysia where, according to an Oct. 6 Reuters new report out of Kuala Lumpur, we learn that “a 72-year-old Malaysian man married this week for the 53rd time and insisted he was no playboy despite some marriages lasting just days.”
Now, I’m no dating expert; I’ve probably actually “dated” fewer than 20 women in my life. But, one thing that every woman I’ve ever dated has done is to ask if I’ve ever been married. I’m pretty certain, if I had answered “oh, I’ve been married 50 times or so,” the date would have ended right about then, rather than dragging on and on into the evening, culminating in an awkward moment at her apartment door, where I didn’t even get a HUG, despite spending over $100 for dinner, driving all over town, waiting for her to get her hair JUST RIGHT, and. . . and. . .and. . . where was I? Oh, right, the marrying man.
"‘I am not a playboy. I just love seeing beautiful women,’ the New Straits Times quoted Kamarudin Mohamad, who hails from northern Kelantan state, as telling the paper.”
I love seeing beautiful women, too. But, dude, that’s what Playboy Magazine is for! I mean, 53 wives? That’s like 53 issues of Playboy. That’s a four year subscription! Think of the time and money he would have saved. Sheesh.
Finally, in a landmark legal ruling that is sure to be hailed by practitioners of the trade known as “sleazy bar pick ups,” an Italian court ruled that “making love” in a bar bathroom does not break public decency laws as long as the bathroom door remains shut.
According to an Oct. 6, Reuters news report out of Rome, “a Swiss couple was accused of committing obscene acts after the owner of a bar in the northern Italian town of Como caught them making love in the lavatory, Ansa news agency reported.”
I will neither confirm nor deny whether I, myself, have ever engaged in such acts in a bar lavatory. But, if I did, I always made sure the door was locked. Er, I mean, I WOULD HAVE made sure the door was locked. And I always made sure I washed my hands afterwards. Er, I mean, I WOULD HAVE washed my hands afterwards. *sigh*
“But Judge Luciano Storaci threw out the case, saying public decency was not offended because the door was closed. However, he fined the Swiss man 200 euros ($246) for breaking the lock on the lavatory after he was caught with his trousers down.”
All I can say is that it’s a good thing a certain elderly Romanian didn’t barge into the lavatory at that moment looking for a chicken to kill, or things could have really gotten ugly.
Posted by Ryan at October 6, 2004 01:56 PMAnd people are always looking at me funny when I tell them that a penis does too look like a chicken's neck.....
Posted by: Rick at October 6, 2004 03:08 PMYou missed a really great one - "Vibrator Shuts Down Australian Airport"
I never knew my bedroom was harboring terrorists...
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1503&u=/afp/australia_air_vibrator&printer=1
Posted by: D at October 6, 2004 05:25 PMThe news about the Romanian guy seems to me very unlikely. I can think of 3 possible explanations:
#1: The incident never happened. An unscrupulous reporter fabricated the whole story. A lot of those Rompres journalists served under the Ceausescu regime and thus are accustomed to making up lies.
#2: The elderly Romanian tried to get himself off in an embarrassingly deviant way, and rather than admit to his family and friends that he had sex with a kitchen appliance, he made up a cock-and-bull (heh) story to make his injury seem like an innocent mistake ("It was dark, I was sleepy, and, ya know"). And when he was asked why his penis wasn't where his story implied it should be, he gave the classic "My dog ate it" excuse.
#3: The victim suffered from visual agnosia, a neurological disorder that wrecks one's ability to interpret visual information and recognize familiar objects. Dr. Oliver Sacks wrote about his experiences with an agnosiac patient in his book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. To mistake one's penis for a rooster is no less farfetched, right? Call him The Man Who Mistook his Cock for... a Cock. Oliver Sacks smells sequel.
What an idiot, doesn't he know you're supposed to CHOKE YOUR CHICKEN? Not chop its head off.
Besides, anyone crazy enough to chop off his own wanger was probably done using it anyway. Or shouldn't have been given one in the first place.
Posted by: Johnny Huh? at October 7, 2004 02:53 PMYeah, Jimmo, I've pretty much surmised that the elderly Romanian in question was probably undergoing some sort of exotic canine fellatio that I'd basically not like to know about. Thus, I'll take his story at its word. You know, so I can sleep better at night.
Posted by: Ryan at October 8, 2004 10:14 AM
Stumble It!
