Month: November 2018

Dutch police found around €350,000 stuffed inside the drum of a washing machine and accused a man of money laundering.

Facial recognition cameras installed in Chinese cities to catch jaywalkers misfired when a woman’s face was captured in an advertisement on the side of a bus driving thru an intersection.

Scientists concluded that it takes on average 1.71 days for a tiny, yellow Lego head to make its way through the human digestive system.

A Bank of America employee put $100 bills into the $20 tray at a Houston-area ATM and all hell broke loose.

A school in Connecticut had such a problem with parents visiting their kids at school they had to tell parents to stop. Some felt the new rule, “deprived them of cherished time to check in on their children and model good social behavior.”

A school in Michigan handed out hockey pucks to be used as weapons in case of an active shooter.

A blind man filed a class action lawsuit against Playboy.com for not supporting screen-reading software so he could, “fully and equally use or enjoy the facilities, products, and services.”

Knickers, the massive steer from Australia, was the most talked about bovine last week until mild-mannered Canada begged to differ.

Photo credit: 500px user Raylivez

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Scientists at the International Bureau of Weights and Measures voted to redefine the kilogram.

Hasbro updated its Monopoly board game with a Millennial Edition in which players collect life experiences instead of real estate, “because you can’t afford it anyway.”

The world of Professional Darts erupted in controversy when two players accused each other of farting onstage to distract their opponent. “It definitely came from table-side and it was eggs, rotten eggs, but not from me,” said one of the players.

A German teenager lost his license for excessive speeding just 49 minutes after earning it.

A Louisiana couple discovered some old lottery tickets while tidying up for Thanksgiving and discovered that one of them was worth $1.8 million. The ticket was due to expire within two weeks.

The latest broadside in the on-going trade war with China was lobbed by the Trump administration, to protect rubber bands.

A missionary kayaked to a remote island in the Indian Ocean to bring, “the kingdom of Jesus” to one of the last tribes on earth untouched by civilization.  He brought with him a football, a gift  from his home state of Alabama, and was shot dead on the beach in a hail of arrows.

Archeologists translated a Mesopotamian clay tablet from almost 4,000 years ago and discovered that it was a letter of complaint.

TWTW is a weekly collection of bits and pieces I run across each week while looking after things at SmartNews. Feel free to sign-up to get this via email, follow on Facebook, or forward to a friend.

Tanzania threatened to deploy the army to harvest the cashew nut crop from farmers who refuse to sell.

A Wisconsin company decided to give all its employees a gun for Christmas.

A New Jersey man, pulled over for driving under the influence told officers he did it because, the “Jets suck.”

A robotic bricklaying machine in Australia completed an entire house in just three days.

The Japanese government’s recently appointed head of cybersecurity admits that he’s never used a computer.

Oxford Dictionary announced that the word of the year is, toxic.

TWTW is a weekly collection of bits and pieces I run across each week while looking after things at SmartNews. Feel free to sign-up to get this via email, follow on Facebook, or forward to a friend.

An uninhabited island off the coast of Japan vanished. No one noticed until a photographer went looking to update his book of Japan’s “hidden” islands.

A former pro boxer was taken down by a croissant. Mario Melo died while choking on his third croissant in a croissant-eating contest.

Harley Davidson unveiled an electric motorcycle.

A Chinese pork-producer, facing a bit of a cashflow problem, is paying off its bondholders in ham. “Payment in kind becomes PIH (Pay In Ham).”

The Japan Post has begun unmanned drone document delivery in Fukushima.

Researchers in Sweden have figured out how to store solar energy in liquid form, essentially “bottling sunlight.”

A dead man was elected in Nevada. Dennis Hof, who ran the Bunny Ranch brothel in Nevada recently died while celebrating his 73rd birthday.

Two Marine Corps pilots were grounded after it was revealed that the “irregular flight pattern” they were flying drew the shape of a huge phallus.

Photo credit: Twitter user @muumi5x15

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The world’s first, all-robot restaurant opened in Beijing. “Robots will take orders, prepare and deliver raw meat and fresh vegetables to customers to plop into soups prepared at their tables.” The mechanized helpers will, “lower labor costs and boost efficiency” and allow the Haidilao, the $10 billion eatery chain, to open a planned 5,000 new branches worldwide.

Multiple counties in Texas issued instructions to voters to check their ballots prior to submitting them because some machines were changing or de-selecting votes.

Nebraska congressman Jeff Fortenberry made a lot of noise about a University of Nebraska professor liking a Facebook post showing a doctored campaign sign that changed his name to Fartenberry. This of course delighted the media which was desperate for an alternative to 24-hour Trump news.

A Russian scientist working in Antarctica is facing attempted murder charges after allegedly stabbing a colleague for telling him the endings of books he wanted to read.

Miners unearthed a 1.1 kg emerald in Zambia. The 5,655 karat-stone with  “remarkable clarity and a perfectly balanced golden green hue,” was found in Kagem, the world’s largest emerald mine.

Salesforce Tower, the tallest building in San Francisco, has a large programmable display covering the top floors. It was designed to be an art installation for the citizens to celebrate the the pride and beauty of their city. Cheeky residents promptly petitioned and were granted a wish to display a giant flaming Eye of Sauron during Halloween.

It was discovered that for the past two and half years an elderly Japanese employee of Shinjuku Gardens in Tokyo was too afraid to ask foreigners to pay the $2 admission fee and was letting them in for free. It’s been calculated that he has cost the gardens almost a quarter million dollars in lost revenue.

October Books, a small independent community bookshop in England, put out a call to their neighborhood to form a human bucket brigade which helped it move it’s stock, book-by-book, to its new location down the street.

A drunk baggage worker at the Kansas City airport decided to take a nap inside the hold of an airline and woke up in Chicago.

TWTW is a weekly collection of bits and pieces I run across each week while looking after things at SmartNews. Feel free to sign-up to get this via email, follow on Facebook, or forward to a friend.