The Hooters debacle
WHEN you get barred from Hooters restaurants on grounds of sexual impropriety, you've got problems. Hooters waitresses are selected on the basis of their sporty good looks. The very name is a play on American slang for the ladies' upper rigging. Hooters are not prudish.
Yet Bob Filner, Mayor of San Diego, in California, has been barred from four Hooters restaurants because of the sexual harassment allegations he is fighting, at the same time he seeks re-election.
Mr Filner, a member of the Democratic Party, is accused of having fondled and groped and forcibly kissed women for years. He is undergoing voluntary therapy in an attempt to free himself of this vile habit.
Now the Republicans are putting the boot in. Francis Barraza, executive director of the Republican Party in San Diego, has tweeted a photograph of a notice at a Hooters restaurant in Rancho Bernado: "This establishment recognises that we all have political differences and we serve people from all walks of life. We also believe it is imperative for people to have standards. The mayor of San Diego will not be served in this establishment. We believe women should be treated with respect."
Hey, that must hurt - especially in the Hooters context. Read that Republican's name fast and it could be Francis Brassiere who put out that tweet.
Pothole challenge
RUSSIAN bloggers have challenged internet users worldwide to come up with pictures of a stretch of road worse than that between Moscow and Yaroslavl, 250 km east of the capital.
Built more than 30 years ago for the 1980 Summer Olympics, hosted by the then Soviet Union, the road now has a cater-strewn lunar appearance, apparently caused by spring flooding, and is said to be the most dangerous in the whole of Russia.
Here's a challenge for the good folk of Kwambonambi. They have a pothole at the end of the high street that they want declared a world heritage site. This is the time to put out a blog and put Kwambonambi on the world map where it belongs.
Magnetic kids
IF YOU SEE an unusual number of small kids stuck to fridge doors, lamp-posts or other metal objects, it's probably because they've been eating magnets.
American doctors report a rising incidence of children eating high-powered magnets—usually in the form of little silver magnetic balls that can be shaped into pyramids and linked into ropes. When a child ingests more than one of these balls, they do what magnets do—stick together—within the curious kid's stomach. This can wreak havoc in the intestines
Dr Steven Schwarz, a professor of paediatrics at Downstate Medical Centre, in New York, says he recently removed a bracelet of 29 high-powered magnets from the stomach of a 13-month-old girl. More than 22 500 cases have been reported in the past 10 years and the frequency is rising dramatically.
Just imagine the chaos those kids must be causing with compass readings.
Demons
OVERHEARD in the Street Shelter for the Over-Forties: "Sometimes I wrestle with my internal demons. Other times I hug them and dance with them."
Bedbugs
RESEARCHERS in the US have come up with a new trap design for bedbugs. Experimenters from the Department of Entomology have produced a new "pitfall" trap. When baited with yeast and sugar, it captures more than three times the number of bedbugs captured by conventional traps.
These advances are no doubt welcome. Most of us were probably unaware that people are devoting their careers to catching bedbugs. But aren't there other ways to counter the bedbug scourge – such as the washing and airing of bed linen and avoiding contact with unkept individuals who provide a haven for bedbugs and other crawlies?
Sometimes it seems technology is going round in circles.
Tailpiece
SHE'S blonde and beautiful and they've been married a year. To mark the anniversary he gets her a fancy cellphone.
She's out shopping next day when the phone rings. It's him.
"How do you like your new phone?"
"I just love it. It's so small and your voice is clear as a bell. But how do you know I'm in Woolworths?"
Last word
Merely having an open mind is nothing; the object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid. -- GK Chesterton
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