A male Swedish college student,Ragnar Bengtsson, 26, has begun pumping his breasts at three-hourintervals in a 90-day experiment to see if he can produce milk. If hesucceeds, he said, it could prove “very important for men’s ability toget much closer to their children at an early stage.” A professor ofendocrinology told the daily Aftonbladet that male lactationwithout hormone treatment might produce “a drop or two,” but suggestedthat men instead consider offering their breasts to babies as a matterof comfort and warmth, rather than as a source of food. Bengtsson, whowill report regularly on his progress via Stockholm’s TV8 channel andthe station’s Web site, acknowledged that his timetable would sometimesrequire him to pump during classes.
Compelling Explanations
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Improbably Successful Pickup Line: InSeptember, school officials in Australia's Queensland state said theywere investigating an incident earlier in the year in which twoteenagers had consensual sex that was recorded on a cell phone cameraby a third party. The girl reportedly said she was convinced to loseher virginity out of fear that the world would end with the start ofthe Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland.
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InAugust, police in Deer Lake, Newfoundland, decided not to pursuecharges against three boys they previously believed had harassed ayoung moose (which ultimately had to be put down). The decision againstprosecution followed evidence from the father of one of the boys, whovouched that the three could not have committed the crime because theyhad been busy vandalizing a nearby church at the time.
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Not My Fault: (1) In July, a 60-yearold highway worker was injured whenhe was struck by motorist Catherine Stotts, 62, who was speeding down alane that had been blocked off for road construction near Willits,Calif. The worker required hospitalization, but Stotts complained aboutreceiving a traffic citation: She told officers that the man could havejumped out of the way faster. (2) In May, Alexander Kabelis, 31, wasarrested for slashing tires on almost 50 vehicles in Boulder, Colo.,but he offered several explanations, including being overwhelmed byradiation from the nearby Rocky Flats nuclear facility and having beenforced by his mother to wear braces on his teeth as a child.
Ironies
ToFight Sin, One Must Know Sin: In April, the Arizona State Parks Boardunanimously chose Renee Bahlthought to be a dynamic, experiencedprofessionalto be director of state parks. However, her employmentrecord while an assistant parks director in California included anincident 10 years ago in which she was disciplined for etching “Renee’99” into the wall of one of the parks’ historic adobe barns.
Update
Alongtime saga in News of the Weird came to an end this summer. InAugust, the annual Gotmar festival in India’s Madhya Pradesh state wasfinally banned, after centuries of “tradition.” Residents of twoneighboring villages would come together once a year to bombard eachother with rocks for an entire day (resulting in dozens of bloodyinjuries and, most years, some deaths as well), but at the sundowncease-fire, both sides would bandage their wounded and celebrate witheach other (only to do it all over a year later).
Copyright 2009 Chuck Shepherd
