Subject: Daily Dose - 040223 - first carrier landing, BIZARRE NEWS, over-aged destroyers, instant messaging, DDL, Rotten News

Flying into a Middle East airport, my co-pilot and I reviewed our flight plan for the trip back to the USS Enterprise. We were to pick up a Navy captain, and experience had taught me that even seasoned vets turn white-knuckled during carrier landings.

Once the captain was strapped in, I turned around to welcome him aboard. "Sir," I asked, "will this be your first carrier landing?"

Looking at me with disdain, he opened his inflatable vest to display gold wings above five rows of ribbons. "Son," he said, "I have over 500 carrier landings in jet fighters."

"That's good to hear," my co-pilot said, winking at me, "because this will be our first."

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BIZARRE NEWS....  (true)

Bizarre Sporting Mishaps

After beating 1000 rivals in a 500-mile race, Percy the racing pigeon flopped down exhausted in a Sheffield loft and was promptly eaten by a cat.

In preparation for the 1992 New York Golden Gloves Championships, boxer Daniel Caruso psyched himself up by pounding his gloves into his face. In doing so, he broke his `nose and was disqualified from the match.

While waving to the crowd after finishing fourth in the 500cc US Motor Cycle Championship in 1989, Kevin Magee fell off the machine and broke his leg.

During a cricket game in Kalgoorlie, Australia, Stan Dawson was hit by a delivery which ignited a box of matches in his pocket. As he tried to beat down the flames, he was tagged out.

Russian athlete Ivanon Vyacheslav was so thrilled to win a medal at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics that he threw the medal high into the air. It landed in Lake Wendouree, and was never found.

***

Do I Hear $5.6 Million?

TORTILLA FLATS, Ariz. - An entire Old West Arizona town has been put on eBay with an asking price of $5.5 million.

Tortilla Flat, a historic tourist town of splintered-wood buildings and dust is posted on the site, and its listing has logged more than 6,500 hits.

Nestled in the Superstition Mountains about 18 miles northeast of Apache Junction, the 1904 town offers prickly pear cactus ice cream, half-pound cowboy burgers and saddle seating at the bar. Dave Levi, 54, who has co-owned the town for five years with his sister and brother-in-law, Pam and Alvin Ross, said he is "getting too old for this stuff." The land on which the town sits is leased from the Tonto National Forest Service.

The 20-year, renewable and transferable land lease, now in its third year, is included in the sale.

***

He Should Have Picked on Someone His Own Size

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. - A hefty California prostitute turned the tables on an abusive, small client with his own knife and paraded him naked in front of other streetwalkers.

The Bakersfield Californian said the man drove up to the unidentified woman and asked to pay for sex. He ignored her directions on where to park, and went to a field where he allegedly pulled a knife.

The man stands 5-foot-5 and weighs 140 pounds and the woman stands 5-foot-7 and weighs 245 pounds. She soon had the knife away from him and ordered him to strip. She then drove back to where other prostitutes were and asked if anyone recognized him.

Police did and charged 45-year-old Adrian Ramirez with committing forcible sex acts on the 24-year-old woman. Police said Ramirez has a lengthy criminal record including four counts of rape. He is free on $250,000 bond awaiting his Dec. 30 hearing.

***

He Auto Know Better

Joey Buttafuoco, who gained notoriety in 1992 when his affair with a teenager led to his wife's shooting, was arrested Wednesday and charged with insurance fraud after making phony repair estimates at his auto body shop.

Buttafuoco, co-owner of California Collision of Chatsworth, allegedly told undercover investigators how to file phony insurance claims for undamaged cars.

Prosecutors charged him with three counts of insurance fraud and one count of grand theft. He was being held on $50,000 bail.

A separate action was also filed by the state to suspend or revoke the body shop's license, alleging the shop charged customers over $12,000 for repair work that was not done.

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The following conversation took place one morning between a wife and her now ex-husband. They were discussing government cost cuts that they recently heard about in the paper.

"Honey," his wife said, while reading the newspaper, "it looks like the government is going to cut the military forces. They are going to eliminate six over-aged destroyers."

To which the husband replies, "Sorry to hear that, dear. I'm sure you'll miss your mother when she's gone."

____________________________

During the second Gulf War, I was an Air Force colonel. I routinely flew on different aircraft to familiarize myself with their capabilities. One day I was aboard an intelligence aircraft where each crew member was surrounded by complex gear.

A young major showed me his computer screen. "That's a chat screen, Sir," the soldier said.  "We use it to relay enemy information to the crew--like instant messaging."

Nodding, I moved down the line.  Flashing on an airman's screen several feet away was this warning:  "Heads up! The colonel's on the way!"

_____________________________

DDL

A circus midget named Lew
Once asked the fat lady to screw.
Said she, "I don't mind,
But I think you will find
Your father-in-law's not quite through."

______________________________

"I try to take one day at a time, but sometimes several days attack me at once."
--Jennifer Unlimited

***

"Nostalgia isn't what it used to be."
--Peter De Vries

***

"Never be afraid to tell the world who you are."
--Anonymous

______________________________

Rotten News...  (true)

Mafia Not Too Turned on by Sex?
Fri Apr 11,10:58 AM ET

ROME (Reuters) - Italy's infamous men of honor may be macho but they are not too turned on by sex, Sicily's pre-eminent specialist on the Mafia psyche said on Friday.

"The virile Mafia boss is a thing out of American movies," said Girolamo Lo Verso, who recently compiled the report "La Psyche Mafiosa" based on hundreds of sessions with Mafia wives and children and even a few turncoats.

"We found that real mafiosi are more interested in power and being in command than sex," psychoanalyst Lo Verso said in a telephone interview from Palermo.

"They have hurried sex with their wives in order to have children and some have lovers to prove their virility, but it's not really a situation of passion," he said.

Another Hollywood myth, he said, is the idea that mob bosses would ever go to a shrink as Robert De Niro did in the hit comedy "Analyze This."

While family and friends of mob bosses have sat on the psychiatrist's couch, Lo Verso said only mafiosi who have already broken the vow of silence by turning state's evidence would go into therapy.

"It has never happened. The very idea is preposterous."

********

Penis-Numbing Condom Planned

Thu Apr 17,11:56 AM ET

BERLIN (Reuters) - A German company said on Thursday it wants to market a new condom to improve men's sexual performance by numbing the penis to prevent premature ejaculation.

The condom, which would carry thin film of anaesthetic on its inner lining, has yet to win regulatory approval.

"Men tend to get turned on more quickly than women," a spokesman for Cologne-based firm Condomi told Reuters. "Our condom will even up the odds by numbing the man's sensitive regions -- but not the whole body like when you're drunk."

*********

Public Humiliation No Cause for Divorce?

ROME (Reuters) - Does your wife make your life hell, humiliating you in front of friends and family, insulting you day after day and even berating you for not giving her pleasure in bed?

Italy's highest court has ruled that this is not exceptional, and if you divorce your wife you must still pay her alimony, according to a report in the daily Il Messaggero.

The Court of Cassation has ruled that Antonio Giulia, a Naples magistrate who left his wife after 10 years of such treatment, was nevertheless at fault for ending the marriage and should pay up, the paper said.

"That woman massacred me for 10 years," a bitter Giulia said after the ruling. His ex-wife, Maria, argued that her behavior was normal in a married couple and she could not be blamed for a few "outbursts." The court agreed, but Giulia was seething.

"Not a day went by without her humiliating me in front of everybody. She would even scream at me that I no longer satisfied her sexually. And now I have to support her?"