Priorities
New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice study released in September warned that, unless major upgrades are made quickly, 43 states will conduct 2016 elections on electronic voting machines at least 10 years old and woefully suspect. Those states use machines no longer made or poorly supported, and those in 14 states are more than 15 years old. There are apprehensions over antiquated security (risking miscounts, potential for hacking), but also fear of Election Day breakdowns causing long lines at the polls, depressing turnout and dampening confidence in the overall fairness of the process. The NYU center estimated the costs of upgrading at greater than $1 billion.
Wait, What?
In a “manifesto” to celebrate “personal choice and expression” in the standard of beauty “in a society that already places too many harmful standards on women,” according to a July New York Times report, some now are dyeing their armpit hair. At the Free Your Pits website, and events like “pit-ins” in Seattle and Pensacola, Fla., envelope-pushing women offer justifications ranging from political resistance to “want[ing] to freak out her in-laws.” Preferred colors are turquoise, hot pink, purple and neon yellow.
Men Are Simple
Update: Five years after News of the Weird mentioned it, Japan’s Love Plus virtual-girlfriend app is more popular than ever, serving a growing segment of the country’s lonely males—those beyond peak marital years and resigned to artificial “relationships.” Love Plus models (Rinko, Manaka and Nene) are chosen mostly (and surprisingly) not for physical attributes, but for flirting and companionship. One user described his “girlfriend” (in a September Time magazine dispatch) as “someone to say good morning to in the morning and ... goodnight to at night.” Said a Swedish observer, “You wouldn’t see [this phenomenon] in Europe or America.” One problem: Men can get stuck in a “love loop” waiting for the next app update—with, they hope, more “features.”
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Buddhists Acting Out
(1) Police in Scotland’s Highlands were called in September when a Buddhist retreat participant, Raymond Storrie, became riled up that another, Robert Jenner, had boiling water for his tea, but not Storrie’s. After Storrie vengefully snatched Jenner’s own hot water, Jenner punched him twice in the head, leading Storrie to threaten to kill Jenner (but also asking, plaintively, “Is this how you practice the dharma?”). (2) A Buddhist monk from Louisiana, Khang Nguyen Le, was arrested in New York City in September and accused of embezzling at least $150,000 from his temple to fuel his gambling habit (blackjack, mostly at a Lake Charles, La., casino).
Oops!
* An official of the Missouri Republican Party apologized in September for the “thoughtless” act of using an original Thomas Hart Benton mural in the state Capitol as a writing surface. Valinda Freed and a man were exchanging business cards, and Freed, needing to jot down information on the card, placed it directly on the mural to backstop her writing.
* During a break in a murder trial in Lima, Ohio, in September, a jailer apparently absentmindedly locked inmate-witness Steven Upham in the same cell with the accused murderer he was about to testify against (Markelus Carter, 46). Upham was set to squeal that Carter had confessed the murder to him. Deputies soon rushed to the cell to break up Carter’s attempt, with his fists, to change Upham’s mind. (At press time, the jury had convicted Carter, although his attorney plans an appeal.)
No Longer Weird
Stories that were formerly weird, but which now occur with such frequency that they must be permanently retired from circulation: (1) Once again, in July, despite being handcuffed (by a King County, Wash., sheriff’s deputy) and placed in the back seat of a squad car, the prisoner managed to drive off alone. Teddy Bell, 26, was apprehended a while later with the help of K-9 officers. (2) And once again (in July in Bergen, Norway) a telltale Internet-search history made all the difference for a murder trial. Police discovered about 250 computer queries such as “How do you poison someone without getting caught?” (Ultimately, the woman confessed that she killed her husband by lighting a charcoal grill in his bedroom while he slept.)
© 2015 CHUCK SHEPHERD
