Hiya, and welcome to another action-packed funniest news stories of the year, the 2007 edition.
I have to admit that every January, I go through a phase wondering what kind of hilarity will take place over the next 12 months. Somehow, almost magically, the world of the surreal never leaves me disappointed.
In fact, it was early February when I knew this year was going to be out-of-this-world funny — all thanks to a lovesick astronaut who allegedly drove across the country with adult diapers, eventually pepper-spraying another aviator over the affection of a male astronaut.
 “Can someone please Pamper me with a little love?” |
Headlines across America went nuts, astronuts that is, over Lisa Nowak with banners such as “Lust in Space” and “Dark Side of the Loon.”
By summer, Nowak was jettisoned from NASA, and announced she would claim she was insane at the time of the incident.
Comedian Conan O’Brien clowned, “Yeah, when they heard about Nowak’s insanity defense, the jury said, ‘Please. You had us at diaper.'”
The male astronaut in this love triangle was Bill Oefelein, who wrote steamy e-mails to Colleen Shipman, the other woman.
“Will have to control myself when I see you. First urge will be to rip your clothes off, throw you on the ground and love the hell out of you.”
“I need to see you — I am having Colleen withdrawals. Must see Colleen.”
While we’ve never been told why all these NASA gals had the hots for Bill, he sure gives new meaning to the term “Rocket Man.”
Loose slots, looser bladders
 Floyd Kibiloski, soaked by casino |
In other diaper news, apparently the personal dumpsters are also needed in casinos across America. Just ask Floyd Kibiloski, a computer consultant and retired Air Force veteran from Kentucky who enjoys playing slot machines.
What he does not enjoy is sitting in seats that have been soiled, literally, by gamblers who just can’t tear themselves away from their machine. He found this out first hand, or should I say first tush, when he hit the jackpotty.
According to the Louisville Courier-Journal, Kibiloski “sat in a chair soaked with urine, apparently left there by a woman who had been playing at that slot machine moments earlier. It was dripping off his shorts and down his leg.”
“It’s not apparent that they have anything in place to deal with this kind of situation,” he complained.
Sometimes patrons “just pee in the seat,” said Arnie Wexler, a recovered gambling addict. “It’s not something the industry really likes to talk about.”
Not a square to spare
Meanwhile, for those who actually do make it to the throne, there was a push to fight so-called climate change by cutting down on toilet paper.
 Wipe out global warming with a single sheet? |
“Although my ideas are in the earliest stages of development, they are, in my mind, worth investigating,” she wrote on her website.
“I propose a limitation be put on how many squares of toilet paper can be used in any one sitting.”
Not to be outdone, Paul McCartney’s estranged (and really strange) wife Heather Mills had her own thoughts on preserving the environment by cutting down on cows’ milk.
“There are many other kinds of milk available,” she noted. “Why don’t we try drinking rats’ milk and dogs’ milk?”
Could someone please inform me how one goes about milking a rat?
There’s something about Larry
 Sen. Larry Craig in front and side stance. Wide stance too disturbing |
The biggest flush to judgment made worldwide headlines when U.S. Sen. Larry Craig, R-Wide Stance, Idaho, pleaded guilty to a disorderly conduct charge after he allegedly solicited sex in a men’s room at the Minneapolis airport.
David Letterman joked, “But Senator Craig said he made a mistake by pleading guilty. And I was thinking, well, maybe that was your second mistake. The way I look at it, anybody who spends more than two minutes in an airport bathroom is guilty of something, for God’s sake.”
He added, “My idea of getting lucky in a men’s room is when the motion sensor works on the faucet.”
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Jay Leno explained, “The Democrats may have control of the House, but the Republicans have control of the bathroom.”
A knight’s tail
And before we exit the royal throne, I came across this photo from a summer historical festival in Northamptonshire, England.
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While the knight was documented entering the port-a-potty, who knows if he ever made it out, given all that armor.
The Precious Juice
 A true slice of Americana |
Also on the arrest docket this year was the man best known for hunting for “the real killers” on golf courses across America.
Yes, O.J. Simpson was finally collared, not for slicing anyone’s head off, but for conducting his own personal sting, as he put it, trying to get back his sports memorabilia in Las Vegas.
Interestingly, Simpson was in Vegas to attend a friend’s wedding. My question is: who would invite O.J. Simpson to a wedding? Is it because of his dexterity with knives to cut the cake?
For what it’s worth, just before O.J.’s arrest, someone caught the Juice on video whistling a song that seemed to be, “If I Only Had a Brain.”
Hilton on ice
Paris Hilton joined O.J. on the list of celebrities doing time in the joint, as the hotel heiress did a brief stint for driving under the influence. It was during her jail time that I discovered Paris, as a teen, was an ice hockey sensation at her Connecticut high school.
 What Paris Hilton looks like with clothes on |
Hilton’s team captain, Stacy Burns White, recounted how one day during practice, Paris kept complaining her head was hurting. White thought there might be a problem with Paris’ helmet, so she helped her take it off.
“When I removed her helmet, I saw she had a banana clip [keeping her hair in place]. They’re rather big underneath the helmet. I told her, ‘We need to take the banana clip out.’ Paris responded, ‘What am I supposed to do about my hair?’. She clearly didn’t understand how this all worked.”
Breaking wind news
 Stewart Laidlaw, stealth flatulence expert |
I’ve said this in previous years, but as a general reminder, flatulence is funny.
“No one could smell anything when the pub was full of cigarette smoke,” Laidlaw said. “I never used to complain about the smell of their cigarette smoke, but now everyone complains about me. It’s just a natural thing. What can I do about it? I must be the first person in the country to get banned from a pub for passing wind. But it’s not a title I want. I certainly don’t see it as funny.”
John Thow, the landlord at Thirsty Kirsty’s, blasted back, saying the long-term flatulence was beyond a joke.
“It is just disgusting,” he said. “He revels in this and does it all the time and it’s absolutely foul, it would make you sick. Since the smoking ban he’s made a career out of this. … The final straw was when an old gentleman came in and had his gin and tonic and the old guy was almost sick. Other people have dropped handbags, shall we say.”
Interestingly, another bloke from the UK got in trouble for tooting too much.
According to BBC News, 77-year-old Maurice Fox was banned from indoor flatulence at the Kirkham Street Sports and Social Club.
“I am a loud farter, but there is no smell,” Fox admitted. “I am happy to oblige them, there is no problem. I do get a bit windy ? I am an old fart now.”
The agony of da-feet
In recent years, “Dancing with the Stars” has become somewhat of a TV sensation, but nothing on the show compares to the footwork displayed by the commander in chief and his former top aide, all caught on camera.
 Leader of the free world demonstrates why the U.S. is respected across the globe |
 Karl Rove demonstrates why he’s no longer working at the White House |
Their techniques are unique to each, to say the least. I’ll leave other comments to you as you check out the videos of President Bush and Karl Rove for yourself.
Hooked on ‘Phonycs’
While Hillary Clinton wasn’t caught dancing, she did have a few episodes of speaking in tongues, southern tongue to be specific as she adopted a drawl during public appearances in the South.
 A Southern Fried Spring Chicken |
While Internet newshound Matt Drudge called the senator “beyond phony,” pundit Michelle Malkin of HotAir.com went a step further to try to emulate Mrs. Clinton and learn her new style of speech in this video.
Too ‘Gay’ for her own good
 “Yes, I’m really Gay” |
It’s one thing to be “gay,” as in homosexual.
It’s another thing to be “Gay.” Sometimes you can be both.
But apparently, Gay was just too “gay” for the e-mail system at Telecom, the Internet company from which she sought broadband service.
She received an automated reply which read: “[Your email] was identified by our content filtering processes as containing language that may be considered inappropriate for business-like communication. … The content which caused this to happen was … ‘gay’ eight times, at two points each, for an expression score of 16 points.”
While the company has apologized to Gay, there’s no word if it censored any objectionable words in e-mails about Vice President Cheney.
Father Nose Best
Keith Richards remained alive in 2007, and perhaps part of the reason for the continued longevity of the Rolling Stone guitarist is his family diet. And when I say family diet, I mean FAMILY diet.
Richards stunned the world this year when he said he actually snorted his own father’s ashes.
“He was cremated and I couldn’t resist grinding him up with a little bit of blow,” he was quoted as saying.
My dad wouldn’t have cared ? he didn’t give a s—. It went down pretty well. And I’m still alive.”
 Keith Richards and father in days before they were “reunited” |
Richards claimed he was misquoted, but later confirmed the story as true.
“The cocaine bit was rubbish,” he said. “I said I chopped him up like cocaine, not with. I pulled the lid off [my father’s urn] and out comes a bit of dad on the dining room table,” Richards continued. “I’m going, ‘I can’t use the brush and dustpan for this.’ What I found out is that ingesting your ancestors is a very respectable way of … y’ know, he went down a treat.”
The Terminator
 Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger armwrestles ABC’s Claire Shipman while heroically slapping her self-righteous attitude |
The best news interview of the year was Arnold Schwarzenegger’s manhandling termination of ABC’s Claire Shipman, the nagging “journalist” who suggested not enough was being done with planes to extinguish California’s wildfires.
The video is classic, as Arnold grabs hold of Claire’s flesh, and says, “Trust me when I tell you. You’re looking for a mistake, and you won’t find it because it’s all good news. As much as maybe you hate it, but it’s all good news. Trust me, OK?”
While the hand-grab smackdown was brilliant enough, many people might have overlooked Schwarzenegger’s comment that amid the blazing mayhem across the Golden State, he let everyone know the children were “getting their tutoring, and they’re getting their yoga classes.”
Mapquest for U.S. Americans
Finally, I can’t say farewell to 2007 without mentioning Caitlin Upton, Miss South Carolina Teen USA who had a meltdown of geographic proportions during a beauty pageant.
 Caitlin Upton, my favorite “U.S. American” |
When asked about the reason why some Americans could not locate the U.S. on a world map, the beauty queen gave this strange, grammarless response:
I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because, uh, some people out there in our nation don’t have maps, and, uh, I believe that our education like such as in South Africa and, uh, the Iraq everywhere like, such as, and I believe that they should, our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., er, should help South Africa and should help the Iraq and the Asian countries, so we will be able to build up our future for our children.
Upton’s “brilliance” became a national phenomenon, and the incident sparked the creativity of some short filmmakers who produced online spoofs.
 Another U.S. American has fun as Caitlin Upton |
The incident was also relentlessly mocked on national television.
ABC’s late-night host Jimmy Kimmel actually broke out a chalkboard to try to explain to his audience what Upton was trying to say.
 ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel still trying to make sense of Caitlin Upton’s answer |
“Some people out there in our nation don’t have maps,” he recalled Upton as saying. “That’s actually true. I had a neighbor that didn’t have a map. And I loaned him a map and he never returned it and now I actually don’t have a map.”
Some creative soul even designed a convenient map of the topics covered in the answer.
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Just before the Miss Teen USA contest, Upton said she had originally entered the realm of beauty pageants to improve her personal communication skills.
“When I first started pageants, I wanted to build up my communication skills for interviews for college and for jobs,” she said. “I was determined to prove I was able to accomplish anything I put my mind to.”
Ironically, no news agency wrote about Upton’s astonishing answer until yours truly provided the first coverage the weekend of the event in Pasadena. So, in effect, I’m partly responsible for the juggernaut the young woman has become, now making thousands of dollars a day as a model for Donald Trump.
No need to thank me, Caitlin. I was just doing my patriotic duty, as any U.S. American would do. Such as.
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