Jan. 15 - The Austin Chronicle

56 | THE AUSTIN CHRONICLE | JANUARY 7, 2005LEAD STORYSome well-off taxpayers in Washington, D.C.,are picking up an easy $30,000 or so from theU.S. Treasury, courtesy of a 1976 “historic preservation”tax-code deduction, according to aDecember Washington Post investigation. About900 properties qualify, and owners get thededuction merely by forgoing the right to alterthe building’s facade (which D.C. law restricts,anyway). Giving up this “right” “earns” them an11% tax deduction, and the average value ofqualified buildings (according to the Post) is $1million (historic facades are not often found ondownscale homes), meaning that a claimant inthe middle tax bracket would get about $30,000.SCENES OF THE SURREAL1) In November, mind reader the AmazingKreskin wrote to the acting governor of hishome state of New Jersey that he wanted tohelp the state shed its image of unethical dealsand thus volunteered to sit in governmentmeetings and identify which officials are secretlyup to no good. 2) Stephen J. Marks, 47, wasdriving in morning traffic on Nov. 3 nearNashville, Tenn., wearing a ski mask andgloves, though the temperature was in the 60s,and an alarmed citizen called police. However,Marks demonstrated that he has a medicalcondition that necessitates his wearing a skimask except when the temperature is above 80.NO LONGER WEIRDAdding to the list of stories that were formerlyweird but which now occur with suchfrequency that they must be retired from circulation:71) The dedicated or sanctimoniousdrunk-driving counselor or prosecutor whohimself gets ticketed or arrested for drunkdriving,such as the aggressive supervisingDUI prosecutor Lydia Wardell of Clearwater,Fla. (November). 72) Anyone who advertisesgoods (now limited only by the imagination)on Internet auction houses, such as ChrisDoyle of Sydney, Australia, who, inspired bythe recent $28,000 sale of a 10-year-oldgrilled cheese sandwich with toast marksresembling a visage of the Virgin Mary, listeda grain of unnamed breakfast cereal thatresembles the movie alien E.T. (and wasoffered about $800) (November).CUTTING-EDGE ACTIONON PROSTATE CANCERDoctors at the Ballarat-Austin RadiationOncology Centre in Australia have begunROY TOMPKINSinserting three rice-sized grains of 24-karat goldagainst patients’ prostates. The pellets (cost:about $300 each) graft permanently onto thegland and help doctors aim the radiation withmore precision.QUESTIONABLE JUDGMENTSCiting a police press release, the Germannews organization Deutsche Welle (DW-World) reported in November that the reasonthat motorist Julia Bauer of Bochum,Germany, lost control and smashed into aparked car and a lamppost was that she waspreparing cereal and milk on the passengerseat while driving to work and tried to catchher bowl as it was falling to the floor. The costof her breakfast (in damages) turned out to beabout $27,000.BY CHUCK SHEPHERDIn December, in Vancouver, British Columbia, local TV stations said they were reluctant toair a public-service announcement provided by the Prostate Center at Vancouver GeneralHospital because it featured a prostate-examining doctor reaching inside his patient andpulling out a ticking time bomb (to dramatize the urgency for men to be examined).CULTURAL DIVERSITY• Sex-despondency among women is apparentlysuch a problem in Japan that business isbooming for counselor Kim Myong Gan’s 4-year-old company of trained male professionalswho invigorate them, according to a NovemberAgence France-Presse dispatch from Tokyo.Kim charges the equivalent of $190 for the initialconsultation and scheduling, and his menprovide hands-on assurance to the clients oftheir attractiveness and desirability. Mostclients are either middle-aged virgins or wiveswhose husbands have grown to treat them astheir sisters.• Zimbabwe, facing a severe food shortage,is considering an unlikely program to bringrich foreign visitors to the country, accordingto a government announcement in November.The information minister proposed an “obesitytourism strategy,” in which overweight visitors(especially Americans) would be encouragedto “vacation” in Zimbabwe and “providelabor for (government-confiscated) farms inthe hope of shedding weight.” Americans, theproposal noted, spend $6 billion a year on“useless” dieting aids and could be encouragedto work off pounds and then flaunt “theirslim bodies on a sun-downer cruise on theZambezi (River).”LATEST RELIGIOUS MESSAGESIn November, a Hindu seer in India’s Orissastate drew large crowds, inspired by his calmnessin the face of his announced, spirituallyinduced death, which was to come beforenoon on Nov. 17. At noon, however, he wasstill alive, and, according to Asian Age newspaper,the crowd of 15,000 suddenly turned ugly,berating him for not dying, and police had tointervene. The man, who is chief cleric ofSrignuru Ashram, told reporters, “I wanted toleave my mortal body, but I could not. Pleaseforgive me.”PEOPLE WITH ISSUESMr. Mount Lee Lacy, 21, was arrested for animalcruelty after his girlfriend’s mother sentpolice to his apartment in Gainesville, Fla.Lacy’s aggressive mastiff kept the officers at baymomentarily, but once inside, police noticedanother dog, a Jack Russell terrier, that had abloody paw, and eventually Lacy cheerfully toldthem that he routinely bit the dog. Accordingto a police sergeant: “[Lacy] said that biting thedog was good punishment and that’s how youtrain them, that dogs bite [and] so that’s whatthey understand.”LEAST COMPETENT CRIMINALSCriminals who accidentally leave identificationat the scene of the crime are (accordingto “News of the Weird”) “no longerweird,” but it was nevertheless remarkablethat on the night of Nov. 4, in Rapid City,S.D., two burglary suspects, in separate incidents,left ID behind. Both of them, Daniel P.Ader, 25, and Brian W. Crawford, 26, hadapparently removed their pants, for differentreasons, leaving their wallets. (Evidence suggestedthat the reason Crawford hadremoved his pants, after breaking into a lawoffice, was to photocopy his genitals on theoffice copy machine.)Send your Weird News to: Chuck Shepherd, PO Box 18737,Tampa, FL 33679 or weirdnews@earthlink.net.©2004 UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATEDIVORCE, ADOPTIONAND CUSTODYwww.littletonlaw.netThe Law Office of Susan R. Littleton702 Rio Grande • Austin, Texas 78701512.472.0600 (phone) • 512.478.6514 (fax)