Offbeat News - Weird News Stories from Around the World

Wednesday has come around again, and it's time for the latest weekly edition of Offbeat News.

What Is Offbeat news?

Offbeat news stories are those weird news items that make you realize that fact is stranger than fiction. These are the odd but true bizarre news stories that make you wonder how, why, what on earth were they thinking, and that's just amazing!

I am still trying to come up with a new name for my edition of Offbeat News to make it unique. I hope to do this in the next week, but meantime - it's still Offbeat News.

This is a selection of weird news stories from the past week that I hope will leave you as astounded as they did me:

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Japan Finds It's Centenary Records To Be Deadly Inaccurate

The Japanese pride themselves on being a nation famed for longevity of life, but the government, who recently began a study of those citizens aged 100 or over, found over 230,000 centenarians to be missing or dead.

It seems that although the Japanese have a reputation for longevity, their record keeping doesn't quite have the same reputation.

Included in the list of missing centenarians are nearly 1,000 people who would by now have been 150 years or more of age.

We have to hope that it's just a case of bad record keeping, since with parts of Japan being so overcrowded these days, and with their unusual lifestyle and tastes, one might be tempted to wonder if they haven't invented their own version of Soylent Green.

Read the full story HERE.

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George Bush Runs From Police After Crash

Meantime, back in Central Florida, in a street that was crowded with children waiting for a school bus, two police cars were following a driver, who appeared to be trying to lose them.

Realizing that this was a dangerous situation, the police cruisers pulled back, and moments after they did, the man crashed his car and did a runner into some nearby woods.

The man was identified as George Bush, who is aged 47 or 48, and only having one leg, and the police don't know why he ran from them, since they were only wondering why he was in a busy neighborhood.

Of course if it was the George Bush that you were thinking of, he has plenty of reasons to run from the law, or at least that is what many people believe.

Read the full story HERE.

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What's That Niff? It's Not Our Fish!

Employees at Whitey's Fish Camp on Fleming Island in Florida reported a really nasty smell in the air, and they were sure it wasn't coming from their business premises.

When deputies arrived soon after 8pm, they found that the smell was being caused by the resident of a nearby trailer park.

Gregory Doyle Lawley, aged 34, was cooking a mixture of acetone, liquid sulphur and other chemicals in an empty gas container, on the electric burner in his trailer.

He claimed that he was "trying to make diamonds" and that what he was doing was not illegal.

The Sheriff's office sent Lawley to a local medical center, because he said that he wouldn't stop what he was doing, and he was a danger to others.

Only in Florida folks...

Read the full story HERE.

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Man Uses BB Gun To Force Teen To Exercise In Extreme Heat

Deputies in Lake County in Florida had to arrest a man for child abuse after he reportedly fired a BB gun to force a 13 year old football player to do sprints, while the temperature was blisteringly hot.

The boy had apparently fallen ill at a football game earlier in the day, and the man, Robert Lynn Baker, 41, was trying to motivate him.

Baker set up cones about 20 yards apart outside the front yard of a home, and forced the boy to spring between them, using the BB gun to force him to keep going.

The temperature at the time was 91 degrees, with a heat index of 107, and it was only when a neighbor called the police that the incident was called to a close.

Baker was released from jail on bond the following day, but you might wonder what effect the heat had on him, especially if you click on the link below and look at the photo.

Read the full story HERE.

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Baby Locked In Pickup Truck While Dad Goes Off Drinking

It's bad enough when a child gets left in a car by accident, but there aren't many times in Florida when it's not too hot for it to be dangerous, and at no time in the summer months is it safe, not even thinking of anything else that might happen to the child.

William Ferrer, 33 of Orange County in Florida was arrested for locking his 17 month old child in his pickup truck, after a passer by at 1am found the child standing on the front passenger seat and screaming.

Ferrer told officers that he just stopped at the bar for 5 minutes to "say hello to a friend", but witnesses said that he had been in the bar for at least 30 and maybe even 45 minutes, and had drunk two beers.

The man was placed under arrest, the baby placed in the care of the mother, and the Department of Children and Families were notified.

It's so sad isn't it, that no matter how many warnings are given out, people still ignore the fact that children left in vehicles on their own are likely to be in danger.

Read the full story HERE.

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My Cat Downloaded The Porn - Honest!

A Florida man who was found to have over 1,000 pornographic images of children on his computer, claimed that he used to leave his computer on, and his cat used to jump on the keyboard, and up would pop these indecent images.

The police however didn't believe him, and he is now serving 12 years in the big house having finally pleading guilty to 25 felony charges related to child pornography.

The question is, before heading off to serve his time, did he leave his computer on, in which case will his cat get up to anything else while he is away.

Personally, I don't trust cats anyhow...

Read the full story HERE.

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Well you heard these stories first on Offbeat News, and if these aren't proof enough that the truth is stranger than fiction, check the previous installments of this weekly series.

You can now also find links to all of the Offbeat News editions at Squidoo, and if you do enjoy these weekly Offbeat News articles, please could you help share them with your friends etc. I am sure they could use a good laugh too.

For more fun at the expense of victims around the world, take a look at the previous editions of Offbeat News:

1st September 2010 - 8th September 2010

25th August 2010 - 18th August 2010 - 11th August 2010 - 4th August 2010

28th July 2010 - 21st July 2010 - 14th July 2010 - 7th July 2010

30th June 2010 - 23rd June 2010 - 16th June 2010 - 9th June 2010 - 2nd June 2010

26th May 2010 - 19th May 2010 - 12th May 2010 - 5th May 2010

28th April 2010 - 21st April 2010

31st March 2010 - 24th March 2010 - 17th March 2010 - 10th March 2010 - 3rd March 2010

24th February 2010

As always, your comments on any of these news stories are appreciated, and if you enjoy the Offbeat News, please share this edition with your friends.

Sources:

Digital Spy

ABC News Australia

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

The Bournemouth Echo

The London Evening Standard