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Above and Beyond

In Search Of Intelligent Life

By James L. McClinton, Ph.D  

The human race seems obsessed with finding intelligent life on other worlds. But all of the evidence indicates that we need to focus our search here on planet Earth.
Read the following true accounts and see if you agree:

Who nose?... Just as in the fairy tale, Pinocchio, new research shows that our noses really do get bigger when we lie. Scientists at the Smell and Taste Foundation in Chicago found that more blood is pumped into our nasal tissues when we tell fibs, causing them to swell. That is why people who are lying often end up scratching their noses. The scientists stumbled on the discovery while watching Bill Clinton giving evidence during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. They said that when Clinton was questioned about his affair, he became tongue-tied and often scratched his nose. During the part when he was telling the truth, he never touched his nose at all, but when he was lying, he touched it 0.26 times a minute. (There’s another way to tell when a politician is lying...it’s whenever he opens his mouth.)

“Hey man, why does the coke smell like a wet dog?”... Dee Blyth reported a burglary of her home in Chadwell Heath, Essex, England, in which thieves had helped themselves to what they thought was her stash of cocaine (“Charlie” in local slang), leaving behind the residue of cocaine “lines” on a table after lifting several electronic appliances and jewelry worth about $3,500. However, Blyth gleefully told police that the container of powder on her mantle (labeled “Newfoundland Charlie”) was not a coke stash, but was an urn containing the ashes of her late dog, whose name the label bore. (Later that day, the thieves were found on their hands and knees next to a fire hydrant.)

I see you will make a new friend named Bubba... Police in Leesburg, Virginia, are pretty sure they have their man in a series of home robberies. The suspect broke into a house, stole a diamond ring and some coins, then took a break to consult his psychic advisor. During a $250 phone call made from the crime scene, he gave the psychic his real name. (“Yes...it’s becoming clear...I see what appears to be a jail cell in your immediate future...”)

“Look smart,” but not “be smart?”... A man in Portugal has been reprimanded there for shaving while driving. He was using a razor and wet shaving, not an electric razor. In his defense, he said that he needed to smarten up for an important meeting. (Yeah, and the rough Portuguese roads are why they now call him “Scarface.”)

A frying pan on the head will make you “feel good?”... The Court of Appeals in Vancouver, British Columbia, is considering a man’s challenge to his 1996 $75 speeding ticket, which has so far cost him about $75,000 in lawyers’ fees to make his point that the province’s system of photographing speeders’ cars is unfair. The man, who admits he was speeding, told reporters his wife does not agree that this is a good way to spend the household budget but that, “If I let it go, I wouldn’t feel good.” (And, the good news is that’s $75,000 she won’t get in the divorce settlement!)

“O.K. sir, I fixed it. It should detonate just fine now”... In Makhachkala, Russia, a man who called an electrician because his Mercedes car wouldn’t start due to a faulty ignition was informed that it was because there was a powerful bomb wired to it - a favorite tactic of the Russian mafia. (You mean it wasn’t the “Die-Hard” battery?)

“But, gee, officer, I only brought this along as a training aid!”... In Yankton, South Dakota, a woman went with her son to his boy scout meeting. The boys were excited because there was a police officer there who was demonstrating his drug dog’s ability to sniff out contraband. Before the demonstration was to begin, however, the dog became excited and alerted the officer to something in Mom’s purse. Yep, she had brought along a little stash of pot to the meeting. (Isn’t that how you become a “Beagle Scout?”)

Isn’t that what the Sooners are noted for?... A man who had just bonded out of jail in Oklahoma City was in a big hurry to get home - too much of a hurry. He hadn’t gone very far before he was agitated by a slow moving van on the highway. The miscreant veered in front of the van, making obscene gestures at the occupants and generally harassing them. When the van pulled into a parking lot, he wheeled up beside them and jumped out of the car. Well, friends, the occupants got of their van, too - all seven of them. They happened to be members of the Oklahoma City Police Department’s tactical unit, in full gear. A check of our man’s car turned up some crack cocaine. They rushed him back to jail. (“Gee, officers, I’d sooner be in jail than here right now!”)

IN RECOGNITION OF...In Canterbury, New Zealand, a man robbed a local resident. When he got the loot back to his house and took a good look at it, he concluded that it just didn’t meet his high standards. So, he called his victim to tell him that his stuff was “crap.” That was not a good idea. The police were able to trace the call to his house where they found him and the stolen items. (“Thank you for taking the time to tell us how you feel - customer satisfaction means everything to us!”)

IN RECOGNITION OF...In Malaysia, a house robber was surprised by the homeowners as he rummaged through their personal effects. He bolted out the door, not realizing that he had left the keys to his getaway car behind on the table inside the house. What’s a thief to do in a situation like that? Well, this guy returned a few minutes later, knocked on the door and politely asked for the keys to the car. The homeowners refused, of course. The thief ripped the license plate off his car as he left, but police didn’t have any trouble tracking him down. (It appears that this is one burglar who is a little unclear on the concept.)

IN RECOGNITION OF...A man walked into a KFC restaurant in Salt Lake City, brandished a box cutter and demanded money from the cashier. After getting away with a small amount of cash, he made a quick dash to his getaway vehicle, only to find he had locked his keys in the car. He then “beat feet” out of the parking lot as KFC employees called the cops. Later, while police were investigating, an employee looked out the window of the restaurant and shouted, “There he is!” Seems he had returned to the scene of the crime armed with a coat hanger and was trying to get back into his car. (Well, of course, that’s where he kept his packets of honey mustard sauce and napkins.)

IN RECOGNITION OF... A man in Fort Worth, Texas, rode his bicycle to the Taco Bell window and ordered the workers to give him all their money. He also told them to make him a Chalupa! One employee handed him the cash and went to work on his order while another employee called the cops. He was still waiting for his Chalupa when the police arrived. (Well, of course he was, he was undoubtedly waiting to complain about the slow service.)

IN RECOGNITION OF... A man in Merced, California, bought himself a fully equipped SUV which included the impressive OnStar Global Positioning System. But, his penchant for driving too fast soon resulted in an accident. Thinking he could simply drive away from the scene of the accident, he failed to remember that his impressive OnStar GP System detects accidents and immediately relays location and vehicle description to the police. Officers followed the trail of leaking coolant from the accident scene to where he was hiding. (Thereby proving that intellectual idiots and technological marvels are incompatible.)

IN RECOGNITION OF... Three men robbed a taxi driver at gunpoint in Buffalo, New York, and made off with a small amount of cash. The police caught two of them who then went to trial. At the hearing, the prosecutor asked the cabbie to point out those who had robbed him. He promptly pointed to the two culprits at the defense table, then gestured toward a man sitting at the back of the courtroom. He told the court that it was the man who had held the gun on him. Seems the robber who had gotten away showed up in court to see what was happening to his friends. (Acquaintances come and go, but friends are forever...well, five to ten years anyway.)

They graduated from prison “Summa Cum Stupid”... Two men in Wrightsville, Georgia, thought they’d get rich with an extortion scheme. They sent a letter to a school superintendent asking for $100,000 to prevent several pipe bombs supposedly planted at the school from being set off. Authorities evacuated the school as a precaution, but were not really worried. Why? They knew these guys weren’t going anywhere because they signed the letter with their real names and included their return address on the envelope. By the way, the return address was “Reidsville State Prison.” (An awful mistake has been made - these guys don’t belong in prison, they should be in an insane asylum.)

Well, at least it wasn’t a law book... In Kent, England, a man who had been convicted for illegal use of explosives, was allowed to borrow a chemistry book from the prison library. Armed with the proper information, he built a torch from foil food trays and packets of brown sauce stolen from the cafeteria. He powered his device with the single electrical socket in his cell. He managed to cut through one two inch bar in his cell before he was caught...and was caught only because he had bragged about his ingenuity to another inmate. (I think it would be wise to remove all books about nuclear fission from the library.)

It doesn’t do a lot for a “tough guy” image... Sheriff Warren Hege hosts a television show from his county jail which he calls the toughest - and the pinkest - in America. The sheriff of Davidson County in rural central North Carolina, who painted his jail bright pink to make inmates feel like “sissies,” is an up-and-coming star on “Court TV.” He tapes his prime-time show, “Inside Cell Block F,” featuring interviews with inmates, once a week from the jail. Prisoners in Hege’s 300 bed facility dress in striped uniforms. Accused felons wear orange and white stripes; those charged with sexual offenses wear green stripes; cooks and others doing jobs around the jail wear blue stripes; while the road squad, which does work outside, wears black stripes. The jail’s block walls also feature paintings of teddy bears crying. “We have a lot of muscle-bound, tattooed guys in here who have done silly things. The pink and the teddy bears bring them down a bit.” (Welcome to Mr. Rogers’ neighborhood, kiddies.)

Stupidity is punishable by six months in jail... A young man went to trial for cocaine possession in Clarksdale, Mississippi, but the jury could not reach a decision, so he was called into the judge’s chambers. The judge gave him a stern lecture and, after the man promised to stay out of trouble, the judge released him. But, when he picked up his jacket to leave, something fell from the pocket. Hitting the floor right there in front of the judge was a bag of marijuana. He’s back in jail. (You shouldn’t be a “slime” if you can’t do the time!)

“Get out of jail, free”... Prison service officials in the UK told a man serving four years for violent robbery to take a bus, all by himself, from Camp Hill prison on the Isle of Wight to Ford Open prison in Sussex. He never arrived. (I suspect those same officials were subsequently put on the same bus...to never return.)

Out of the frying pan and into the fire... An inmate at the Elmwood Correctional Facility in California should have planned his escape route a little more carefully recently. The 25-year-old man broke out of a medium security dorm by squeezing through the bar on the roof of his cell and breaking out of the skylight. He then jumped down about 20 feet from the roof, but instead of heading toward the fence that leads to a public road, he jumped a smaller fence and ended up on the women’s side of the facility. (Afterwards, he explained to the warden that he had no intention of breaking out - just a “hot date.”)

One man’s trash is another man’s treasure?... For reasons that defy logic, a man tried to rob a garbage truck in Seattle, Washington. He brandished a pair of scissors at the employees, but they had no money to give him. Thinking the truck probably had some value, he decided to settle for it instead. That didn’t work out for him, either. He was arrested when he was unable to get the big truck into gear. (Excuse me, I’m a little dense: Where do you suppose he was gonna hide a full garbage truck and how was he gonna fence it?)

So, what’s so odd about that?... Geniuses in Pasadena, California, hatched a scheme in which they posed as military officials seeking to buy several gold products, such as gold wire and gold sheets, for use by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on the Space Shuttle. These items, worth over $1.5 million, were to be billed to the Jet Propulsion Lab and shipped to a phoney office they had set up in Pasadena. The firm they were negotiating with, accustomed to dealing with the federal government, thought something might be up and called federal agents when they noticed that the person who had filled out the requisition form for the gold, a Sgt. Michael Jeffries, had misspelled the word “sergeant” on the form. (“That’s rite...I’m a sarjint...sew watt?”)

Tired, or retired?... A group of criminal masterminds in Davenport, Washington, hatched an elaborate scheme to rob a tire store. They drove into one of the shop’s service bays and, while one man requested a new set of tires, the others went inside the store. One distracted the tire store employee while the other opened the cash register and grabbed the cash. Their clean getaway didn’t pan out, however. Since they had asked for a new set of tires, one of the mechanics had the car three feet off the ground with all four tires removed. They tried to flee on foot, but were quickly apprehended. (Hey, I’ve got a gripe! Why can’t I get that kind of service in tire stores!)

Not even a remote chance... Two thieves broke into a home in Tallahassee, Florida, and helped themselves to numerous treasures, including two televisions. But, when they got home with their ill-gotten gains, they discovered that they failed to steal the most important items of all. Wanting to finish what they’d started, they returned to the scene of the crime and made off with the rest of their haul. Things didn’t go so well that time, however, and a neighbor called the cops who nabbed them before they could hightail it. By the way, in case you’re wondering what items were so important that they risked being arrested by returning to get it, it was the remote. (You ladies wouldn’t understand - it’s a “guy thing.”)

Just one cookie short of a dozen? ... A man who stole a car in Woodstock, Georgia, found a checkbook in the glove box which belonged to the car’s owner. He waited a couple of days for things to cool off and got into his recently stolen car and headed to the bank to cash a check. He was patiently waiting in the drive through lane when a familiar face drove up behind him - the owner of the car who had stopped by the bank to close out the stolen checking account. Recognizing his car, he called 911 and, after a short chase, the man was arrested. (Woodstock, Georgia, is not exactly a thriving megalopolis - so how did this guy figure he had successfully dropped out of sight?)

Never compromise your standards... In Bordeaux, France, a man pointed a gun at a bank teller and demanded $13,700. When the teller told him there wasn’t that much in the cash drawer, he compromised and lowered his demand to $6,800. The teller apologized and told him she didn’t have that amount of cash, either. Frustrated, he told the teller he would just withdraw a small amount from his personal account and handed over his ID card. You know the rest. (You know what law enforcement personnel in the States call morons like that? - “Job Security.”)n