Nominations for the Stupidity Award: Weird News Stories

There were several weird news stories I heard about as spring 2010 approached, and though I tried to ignore them, I couldn't. They grabbed hold of me in that rubbernecking at a train-wreck sort of way you don't really want to admit, but there it is. As I heard about these weird news stories, my first instinct was to want to nominate them for a Darwin Award, but since they're all alive and, well, let's just say alive, they aren't eligible.

So I looked for some other award I could nominate them for, and actually found something called the Stupidity Awards! So then, here are my nominations for the Stupidity Awards for the first quarter of 2010.

Really weird news story number one was reported in the Sun Sentinel (Broward County, Florida). An 80-year-old man from Port St. Lucie, Florida attacked his neighbors' door with a garden hoe when he thought they had stolen seven boxes of Little Debbie Oatmeal Cookies. When the police arrived, they found five boxes of the snacks in the man's pantry, and a receipt showing he had purchased five boxes the day before. So unless the man had seven other boxes of Little Debbie Oatmeal Cookies, he was just plain wrong about the theft.

There are three reasons I nominate this man for a Stupidity Award:

I am a Little Debbie Fan, and as far as I know, and from what I can see on the Little Debbie Website, there aren't any oatmeal cookies; there are Oatmeal Crème Pies. Not even close to being the same thing. So he doesn't even know what product he has so very much of in his home.

The fact that the man either doesn't know how to count, or had 12 boxes of any Little Debbie product in his pantry, is kind of dumb. Even with all the preservatives I'm sure are in those wonderful little snacks, that's a lot of stock to have if you're not a store, or going into hibernation; if you're retreating from the world, it's not nearly enough.

And last, but most important, if you are going to have 12 boxes of a Little Debbie product, while Oatmeal Crème Pies are good, choosing them over Swiss Rolls or even Nutty Bars? Stupid.

The next weird news story that qualifies for a Stupidity Award is, well actually, I'm not sure which of the participants to nominate. Maybe the situation is just stupid enough for an award.

The Associated Press reported a story of a 52-year-old Colorado woman who garnered complaints from her neighbors for gardening topless. Police said the woman wasn't breaking any laws, so the housing authority has plans to create new rules to ensure that people are appropriately clothed when outside.

The woman was previously threatened with eviction after being caught gardening while wearing just pasties and a thong. According to the report, the woman's husband has also been seen outside wearing only a thong.

I may be in agreement with the neighbors on this one: don't pull down the vines, shrubs, or trees, please! Leave as much barrier between you and them as you can.

My third nominee for a Stupidity Award comes from the weird news story of a San Francisco teenager, who, according to AFP, broke into a furniture store, pilfered a few things, then logged on to his MySpace account and tried to sell the hot items. Apparently the 17-year-old spent five hours on the store's computer, visiting porn sites as well as trying to cash in on his theft.

I'm not sure if my fourth candidate can be nominated, since his crime against intelligence occurred several years ago, but on hearing this story, I couldn't resist. If this isn't a really weird news story, I don't know what is.

As reported on News of the Weird, a two-time Canadian bank robber sued the Canada Parole Board in 2001 for letting him out of prison early: while on parole he robbed another bank. His case, stupid as it is, is that if he had been kept in prison for his complete sentence, he would have been mature enough not to rob another bank after his release.

My last first-quarter 2010 nominee for a Stupidity Award is conditional, since neither I nor anyone else knows whether this happened the way it's been reported. And at least for me, this is more of a sad story than weird news story, but just in case it is true, it's worth a nomination.

Therefore, conditionally, I nominate Floyd Landis, former Tour de France stripped-of-his-title-winner, for breaking into the computers of the doping agency, downloading data, and then using that stolen data in his defense.

I'm sure there are many, many more people worthy of Stupidity Awards that I've missed. If you know of any, let me know.

Sources:

News of the Weird

AP Yahoo! News

Sun-Sentinel

AsiaNews

Stupidity Awards