Silly Stories From Now and Then

Let's be honest, there have been a few HUGE "Oops!" stories going around in the news lately. But we pride ourselves on going beyond the headlines, so here are the more minor "Oops!" you don't want to miss.

HEL ON EARTH?

The End of Route 666

In keeping with the time-honoured tradition of trying to ruin something for other people that doesn’t affect themselves at all, a group of very religious conservatives in Poland has achieved a so-called victory of Good over Evil: For years, the bus route to the Baltic town of Hel has been listed as Route 666, but now it has instead become Route 669. (Warning: May lead to ~impure~ thoughts.) Complaints about the route invoking the devil number came largely from those associated with a far-right Catholic magazine, whose issues (one source states) are a whopping 350 pages long. Sounds like these guys spend their time whining about numeric superstitions when they should be editing their publication.

    The number flip has resulted in backlash from other locals, who argue that tourists in particular enjoy the joke. I’m not usually one to side with tourists, but here we are. That said, there’s a possibility the conservative group won’t be satisfied until they have not only changed a route number, but shut down the region’s bus system altogether. After all, the use of public transit does not allow humankind to exercise dominion over God’s “green” Earth, understood by them as burning the absolute maximum quantity of fossil fuels.

    THE BETTER TO SAY I LOVE YOU WITH

    Who's the #1 Slurpiest Pup?

    A German Shepherd/Labrador mix named Zoey just gained the distinction of being the longest-tongued dog in the world. How long, you ask? Just the visible part, from tip to teeth, is over five inches long. Her snout is not that big so we don’t know how she folds it up in there. Hailing from Louisiana, Zoey loves to play fetch, sit for a Milk-Bone, and casually allow her tongue to dangle further and further out of her mouth until her owners ask her their favourite rhetorical questions, “Who’s got the longest tongue of any living pup? Who left all those pathetic, normal-tongue dogs in the dust!?” Meanwhile, an anonymous source close to the family worries it won’t be good for the pup’s social integration to believe she’s a cut above the rest.

      Does having a startlingly extensive tongue give Zoey a certain advantage? Sure, she can’t pull a sledge or detect trace amounts of drugs like the other canines, but you’ve got to work with what you’ve got. Having read The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Dogs, Zoey’s humans are considering starting a bespoke envelope-licking service to help her monetize her talents.

      You thought we were gonna write about Canada Day, didn't you? Try again...

      PLUG IT IN, PLUG IT IN!

      Unidentified Fragrant Object!

      So here’s what happened. A French farmer called Maurice Masse was simply smoking a cigarette early in the morning when he noticed a large object descending from the sky—a helicopter?—and landing about 200 feet away in his lavender field. Deeply annoyed, he went over to yell at the helicopter whatever “Get off my lawn!” is in French, but froze when he saw it wasn’t a helicopter at all. It was a more egg-shaped vehicle, from which some humanoid but oddly-shaped figures in jumpsuits emerged, making grumbling sounds. Even more strangely—perhaps offended that they hadn't been offered a cigarette—one alien pointed a skinny tube at the farmer, and he was temporarily paralyzed. Shortly after, the figures hopped back in their ship and lifted off. Once Maurice regained his mobility, he had to tell everyone what just happened. This took a lot longer before Snapchat.

        Maurice’s bizarre story combined with his generally reliable personality caught the interest of researchers and the government. They tested the soil where the UFO had landed, and found inexplicably higher levels of…calcium. The haziest part of the story, though, is that Maurice claimed the aliens communicated something to him while he was immobilized—but he never told anyone what they said. 

        One of the neglected issues in this case is why the visitors would target a lavender field. For instance, is their ship powered by lavender? Or did they freeze the farmer so they could harvest some of his plants and make fancy lattés? Do these aliens love their milky beverages so much that their ship left calcium-rich traces where it touched Earth? Were they just having trouble sleeping? Maybe we should take action to protect our planet’s lavendula crops from extraterrestrial enthusiasts. Or maybe it’s a positive sign. I mean, if they eventually become our new overlords, these aliens will likely be zen AF. Plus, they’ll smell like a nice soap.