2011


Assorted Stupidity #28

I still didn't want to believe that Italy was actually going to put seismologists on trial for manslaughter for failing to predict an earthquake, but that farce did in fact begin on Tuesday. This was just a preliminary hearing, and…


Further Reactions to the Turtle Code Controversy

I want to end this week with one more follow-up on last week’s revelation that the new set of federal insurance billing codes has some real gems in it, the most puzzling to me being the code for “struck by…


TIP: Courts Frown on Lawyer “Gibberish”

As we have seen, one of the more important legal skills is the ability to get other people to understand what the hell you are talking about. See Order Denying Motion for Incomprehensibility, In re King (Bankr. W.D. Tex. Feb. 21, 2006)…


Greased-Pig Contests Illegal in Minnesota

343.36 GREASED PIG CONTESTS AND TURKEY SCRAMBLES No person shall operate, run or participate in a contest, game, or other like activity, in which a pig, greased, oiled or otherwise, is released and wherein the object is the capture of…


Man Demands Hot Sauce at Gunpoint

As we've seen many times, it is rarely a good idea to take the law into your own hands, even in response to the most dastardly outrages such as an inexplicable condiment omission. And yet it continues to happen. On…



F-16s Scrambled Due to Inappropriate Bathroom Use

In two incidents on September 11 (the recent one), F-16s were scrambled to escort planes on which "suspicious activity" had been reported. The activity: using the bathroom. Frontier Flight 623 and American Flight 34 were escorted to their destinations after…


Man Changes Name to “Led Zeppelin II”

Since I became Led Zeppelin, my life has improved a thousand-fold. — Led Zeppelin II (formerly George F. Blackburn) Let's say you're 64 years old and just got divorced from your third wife. You're going to want to try to…