Don't 'Bee' Cruel

Whatever happened to practical jokes? When's the last time you heard of anyone playing, or being the target of, a really GOOD practical joke? When I was in high school, not a week went by without a locker being glued shut or some other bit of classic juvenile slapstick.

Talk to any high school kid today, and they're too busy going through metal detectors, standing in line for locker searches, and taking their Ritalin to even consider any sort of creative pranksterism. Their lives have been sanitized, bowdlerized and overscheduled to the point that they don't have enough free time to make a decent paper airplane, much less learn the fine art of pennying a door shut.

That's why this week's top bit gave me such a hearty chuckle. Yes, there were the usual flurry of "someone could have gotten hurt," and "they just weren't thinking of others," but most folks I've heard from confessed, deep in their hearts, to be laughing their fool heads off.

A 'Hivenly' Prank

Students at DeLand High School, in Volusia County, Fla., got to go home early Monday. Someone, it seems had pilfered several beehives from a nearby apiary and took them to school. Morever, once there, they superglued the buzzing bee-boxes to the floor, ensuring that the roughly 80,000 hive denizens would be "in da house" for quite some time.

To compound the humor, it turns out that the principal of the school, Mitch Moyer, is allergic to bee stings.

Now, before you start the hate mail, let me make it clear that I understand full well how serious anaphylactic shock can be, and have nothing but sympathy for those affected by it. However, in this case, the mental image of those glued-down beehives, and the consternation of faculty and students trying to deal with them, is just too danged funny to ignore.

We hear every day about eighth-graders bringing guns to school, about drug dealers being busted on campus, and all the other pocket horrors and penny dreadfuls which make for big headlines. It is good, for a change, to hear about an infraction of the rules committed out of sheer youthful abandon, with no REAL intent (in my opinion) to wreak grievous bodily harm.

So allow yourself, in spite of the Safety Police and the Morals Squad, to enjoy a hearty belly laugh at the expense of Mr. Moyer and his stalwart staff. I'm sure they'll join you once the glue is scraped off the floor and they stop having the "creepy crawlies," feeling bees walking on their necks.

What's In A Name?

The Immortal Bard asked the question, and the answer, at least for Frederick James, is big bucks. The Washington Park, Ill., resident claims to have copyrighted his name, and presented authorities with a bill for $151 million, at $500,000 a pop, for 302 uses of his name both verbally and in written form during his competency hearing.

He was ruled competent, and will stand trial on drug and weapons charges. The U.S. Copyright Office says that it does not allow names to be legally protected from another's use.

Fred's bill remains unpaid, and his chances for collection don't look too promising. Next, perhaps he can try copyrighting a pronoun or verb. He might collect a dollar or three that way.

No Sex? No Deal

Faithful readers will remember when I chronicled the story of Luther Crawford a few months back. He's the fellow who, to avoid going to jail for delinquent child support, pledged to give up having sex until he set his situation to rights.

However, Judge Tom McDonald nixed the deal during a court hearing this week when when Crawford couldn't answer some simple questions, including providing the name of his 12-year-old daughter.

Making it worse? He'd been asked the SAME QUESTION in a previous hearing, and got it wrong then.

Now, I'm sure that Luther had been spending his time studying the lives of monks, ascetics and others who live lives of self-denial. I'm sure that his every waking moment was consumed with turning off his manly impulses and remaining master of his domain. That's why he couldn't remember. I'm sure that's right. Yup.

Fight On, Spammers?

Austin, Minn., is sacred in American food folklore as the home of Hormel Foods, makers of that most American of food products, Spam (and new Turkey Spam!). The local high school picked as its team name the appropriate moniker of the Packers, referring to the meat-packing industry which forms the backbone of the town. Therein lies the rub, and I don't mean a dry one you'd use to make some yummy ribs.

Enter PETA, those fun-loving folks best-known for shrill tirades against all manner of carnivorous endeavors and publicity stunts that would make Huey Long blush.

They've told the students of Austin High that they should be ashamed of their nickname because of its link to slaughterhouse workers, whom we all know are just Satan's minions in bloodstained coveralls. They have suggested the nickname "Pickers," which would promote, they say, a healthier plant-based diet.

The Pickers. OK.

I'd like to make a counter-proposal. Let the good kids of Austin High keep their nickname, and change PETA's acronym to one I recently encountered while out driving which almost caused me to fetch up against a concrete abutment, so incapacitated was I with laughter: People Eating Tasty Animals.

I'll bet the barbecues would be a lot more fun.

Now before the Divine Ms. Beth, my most wonderful and patient boss, who happens to eschew meat, throws anything heavy at me, let me make clear that I have nothing whatsoever against the vegetarian life. Most vegetarians I've ever known are a lot healthier than me, and they're basically good folk. What I take issue with, in food preference as in just about everything, is proselytizing and the attitude of "my way or the highway" inherent in PETA's screeds.

Give the kids a break, huh?

Urban Legend Of The Week

Want to dazzle everyone with your vocabulary? The next time you get e-mail hoaxes, urban legends or any other sort of fluff in your inbox, tell your friends you've been Turklebaumed. The good folks at NetLingo.com, the Internet dictionary, have officially added this word to their dictionary. It refers officially to all the bogus content floating about on the Internet, much of which you've read about in these pages.

Oddly enough, the term comes from the sad tale of George Turklebaum, reported in the second-ever edition of these very Chronicles.

According to the story, George was a proofreader (shudder, that's what I do 9-to-5) who croaked at his desk Monday ... and the fact of his demise wasn't noticed until Saturday, when a chatty janitor tried to strike up a conversation.

This one fooled just about everyone. Even my more trusted sources bought it for a little while. Imagine my chagrin when, a few columns later, I had to publicly eat a big steamin' plate of crow upon finding that the whole thing was a fabrication.

George Turklebaum, I salute you!

How's things in your world? Bigfoot rummaging in the trash? Aliens making crop circles in the herb garden? Let me know!