January 1997
The Awards
He Lost a Stroke Too
Scott Browning of Houston was awarded $16,500 in damages from the Men’s Club in Houston after an exotic dancer who was assigned to be his “designated caddy” and cart driver during a golf tournament at the club became inebriated during the event and overturned the cart into a drainage canal, causing his Achilles tendon to rupture.
Junkie Over Chunky
When researchers at St. Edward’s University in Austin tested male reaction to personal ads placed by females by making up two ads—one for a woman who said she was a drug addict, the other for a woman who described herself as fifty pounds overweight—79 percent of the men who responded replied to the addict.
He’s Trying So Hard To Cut Back
A convenience store customer in South Padre Island was arrested after he opened a pack of cigarettes, removed one, tore off the filter, and walked out with the remaining piece.
It Happens
Electrical contractor Harry Glass of Pasadena won first place in a Worst Workday contest with the story of how he was giving a safety talk to employees on the need to wear hard hats at all times when he was hit on his hatless head by bird droppings.
Tofu. It’s What’s for Dinner
News reports revealed that Texas Department of Agriculture assistant commissioner Diane Smith, who was in charge of marketing and promoting Texas beef, was a vegetarian.
The Truck Was Coming Down the Rhode. The Weather Was Fowl, and There Was No Chanticleer. The Driver Was a Brooder Who Kept His Capon as He Munched on a Hamburg And Listened to a Sumatra Tape. Suddenly He Saw a White Plymouth Campine Out in the Passing Lane. Was It Andalusian? He Blew the Leghorn, Turned The Styrian Wheel, But Couldn’t Pullet Off. The Truck Went Into a Faverolle. The Ending of Our Story May Be a Little Cornish: When the Cops Came to Chick It Out, They Rounded Up the Usual Sussex. (This Story Will Get Your Goat Too. No Kidding.)
A Pilgrim’s Pride truck overturned on Interstate 30 near downtown Dallas, killing about four thousand chickens, one day after a truckload of goats overturned on the same stretch of highway.
A Man’s Home Is His Palette
After his Abilene neighbors successfully protested his plan to convert his home into an interior decorating business, Jody Morales repainted the house in fluorescent colors of yellow, green, purple, and pink.
Wrong! It’s Not in the Desert
Hardee’s Food Systems apologized to the city of Mesquite and donated $2,500 to a local charity after city officials protested a national ad campaign touting Hardee’s mesquite-flavored bacon cheeseburger. The television commercial portrayed Mesquite, a suburb of Dallas, as a sleepy hayseed desert town with ostrich farms and billboards of two-headed steers.
Don’t Tell Hardee’s
A livestock truck overturned on a U.S. 80 interchange ramp in Mesquite, unleashing more than one hundred head of cattle that ran through the streets of the city for hours before they could be rounded up.
The South Is Risen
Cornerstone Church in San Antonio was forced to change the name of its “slave sale” fund-raiser, in which high school students were to be auctioned off to church members to perform chores, after black leaders protested the Reverend John Hagee’s announcement of the event in the church newsletter—including a mention that slavery would be “returning” to America.
She Started From Scratch
Lauretta Adams of Dallas has let her fingernails grow out for 23 years until they have become 10 to 29 inches long.
Comeback of the Year, Part I
Jose Estrada of Houston left home in his pickup and drove to the neighborhood jogging trail. While he was running, another jogger suffered a heart attack on the trail. Paramedics called to the scene could find no identification, but the victim was clutching a set of car keys. A deputy constable tested them in vehicles parked nearby and discovered that they fit Estrada’s pickup.
Here’s the Advice: Do as We Say, Not as We Do. Now Let’s Party
Texas lottery officials threw a two-day party at Houston’s Ritz-Carlton Hotel for people who had won at least $1 million and their guests, with attractions that included theater or hockey tickets, a trip to a ranch with Longhorn cattle, and an evening of dining and dancing, along with seminars on financial advice.
Fur! Bidden!
Animal rights activist Kelly Nichols was arrested after she interrupted a Neiman Marcus charity fashion show in Dallas by shoving a piecrust filled with non-dairy whipped cream into the face of designer Oscar de la Renta while shouting “Fur! Shame!”
A Voice Said, “Serve Cabrito and It Will Come”
Capitalizing on rumors that the legendary chupacabra, or goat sucker—a four-foot high, red-eyed winged demon with fangs—had been sighted along the Rio Grande, the people of Zapata decided to hold the First Worldwide Chupacabras Festival.
Comeback of the Year, Part II
The deputy checked the pickup’s license number and found that it was registered to Estrada. He went to the Estrada home and told Jose’s wife, Herlinda, that her husband had had a heart attack. When she arrived at the hospital, a doctor told her that her husband had just died. In shock, she viewed the body, which was still covered with tape and medical tubes, and identified it as her husband.
It’s the Station Formerly Known As Smart
Radio station KTFM in San Antonio was fined $7,500 by the Federal Communications Commission for violating the rule against airing indecent material before 10 p.m. when it played “Erotic City” by the singer formerly known as Prince.
Everyone Will Be Asking for a Cuddly Squashed Armadillo
Miles O’Neal of Austin, an Internet consultant who operates a Web site called Roadkills-R-Us, was threatened with litigation by Toys ‘R’ Us if he did not change the name of his homepage. The company wrote O’Neal, “People might easily believe that we were in some way sponsoring this entity, and this could adversely affect our long-standing customer good will.”
Comeback of the Year, Part III
The family began notifying friends and relatives of Jose’s death. Meanwhile, Jose finished his run, went to the grocery store, and returned home to an empty house. The phone rang. He answered it. His wife’s boss said, “Joe! You’re not dead. Don’t tell me it was Herlinda who had a heart attack and died.”
“Haven’t I Seen You Somewhere Before?”
A witness scheduled to testify in a Brownsville capital murder case was beaten up after bailiffs at the Cameron County jail mistakenly placed him in a holding cell where one of the inmates was Jesus Ledesma Aguilar, the accused murderer against whom the witness was supposed to testify.
It Used to Be Very Popular in Dallas
The operators of Fort Worth’s Ultimate Paintball game parlor, where players shoot each other with dye-filled pellets from plastic rifles, bowed to parental protest and canceled a game known to players as “Kill the President,” in which competitors were assigned to teams of “assas-sins” and “Secret Service” agents, with one player designated the presidential target.
Comeback of the Year, The Conclusion
Jose raced to the nearest hospital, saw his wife’s van in the parking lot, and went in. He asked where his wife was and was told to join the rest of the grieving family. At the same moment, he and his wife realized that the other one wasn’t dead.
Hi There. Enter at Your Own Risk. You Are Hereby on Notice That the Carpet May Slip, That Obstructions—Including But Not Limited to a Coffee Table—May Impede Your Progress Across the Floor, That Closed Curtains May Reduce the Visibility, That I Do Not Vouch for The Safety of Light Switches and Other Electrical Outlets and Appliances, That the Quality of the Drinking Water Is the Responsibility Of the City and Not of the Owner, That the Presence Of Ashtrays Does Not Mean That the Owner Encourages Smoking or Implies That Cigarettes Are Healthy, and That This List of Potential Sources Of Injury in No Way Warrants That the House Is Otherwise Safe or Free Of Dangerous Conditions. And Caveat the Dog
Attorney Juan Guerra of Raymondville, representing Alex Anzaldua, filed suit against Dennis Hickey for $25,000 because his client, while visiting in Hickey’s home one afternoon, walked into the kitchen and tripped over a dog. Guerra’s petition contended that Hickey should have warned Anzaldua that he was “walking on the floor at his own risk” and that Hickey failed to give a warning of “the dog’s propensity of lying in certain areas.”
Here Comes Peter Cottontail / Parachute on and Ready to Bail
A small plane that hit a power line near Ovilla in Ellis County and crash-landed safely was carrying a costumed Easter Bunny who had been tossing candy to children on the ground.
I’m Dreaming of a White Recess
Chandler Elementary School in Kilgore requested some snow from Buffalo, New York, and received a ton.
Some Are More Like Texaco
The Independent Petroleum Association of America purchased $100,000 worth of TV time during the two-hour reunion movie Dallas: J.R. Returns to air a commercial designed to show viewers that real-life oil producers are not like J. R. Ewing.
We Know What You’re Stuffed With
Self magazine, in a short piece called “The Skinny on … Popcorn,” said, “Texas Junior Leaguers stuff their turkeys with kernels and bake it until the bird ‘blows its ass off.’”
Now Try the Other One
After receiving a heart transplant, retired neurosurgeon Roy Selby of Texarkana kept his old heart, took it to an anatomy and physiology class at Texarkana College, and dissected it.
On This Date in 1996, The Texas Historical Commission Went Bonkers
The Texas Historical Commission asked the state attorney general’s office to prevent two entrepreneurs from marketing humorous plaques parodying the state’s historical markers, such as one that read “On March 2, 1836, Texas declared her independence from Mexico, wild Comanches roamed the plains, Rangers protected frontier settlements, and this building was not here yet.”
