Nevertheless, if all I talked about today were the positive things in life, you’d get bored pretty darn quick. So, instead, let’s take a look at relationships that are doomed from the start. Naturally, our quest begins in Florida where Colleen James tells the delightful story of a shunned smooch that ended in gunfire.
Helen Staudinger, 92, allegedly wanted a kiss.
But authorities say that after her 53-year-old neighbor refused, the central Florida woman aimed a semi-automatic pistol at his house and fired four times.
“If my head would have been over just a little bit further, (a bullet) probably would have hit me in the back of the head,” said the neighbor, Dwight Bettner.
Staudinger remained in jail on Tuesday, a day after being arrested on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and shooting into a dwelling. Her next court date is April 26.
Bettner, a former law enforcement officer and boilermaker, said his elderly neighbor has seemed attracted to him since he moved in six months ago. He’s not sure why.
“I’ve taken her trash out for her, just neighborly stuff,” Bettner said. “I guess she just took that as something else.”
Yeah, last week a neighbor lady helped me clear some trash from my backyard, which butts up to hers. Clearly that was an invitation to do the mattress mambo.
But some relationships get a little further along before the police are required. MSNBC reports that an Arizona wedding forced the local gendarmes to break out their riot gear.
Police say a bride was arrested at her own wedding reception near Phoenix after she kicked a police officer.
Police spokesman Hugh White said Monday that officers had to restrain 28-year-old Angela Davito around 9:30 p.m. Saturday after she became disorderly at the suburban Gilbert home where her reception was held.
Officers responding to a call found a large brawl in the backyard of the home and told everyone to stop fighting. But the commotion continued, and police officers pepper-sprayed the crowd. White says people then got angry and aggressive toward the officers and that Davito charged a partygoer.
He says Davito then kicked an officer and was arrested on charges of assault and obstructing governmental operations.
“Gosh Mom, here’s one of the cops spraying pepper spray on Aunt June, and here’s one of me getting arrested ….”
“Aw, shucks, my little girl’s all growed up, ain’t she?”
Yeah, that family album’s gotta be fun.
But the relationship that’s a complete head scratcher is the next one. It seems that Sammy Hagar and the Nation of Islam (which is very different than your regular old Islam) share a common belief. They both believe in UFOs and both believe they’ve either been in one or come from one.
I’ll let Lee Spiegal fill you in on the Nation of Islam.
It should be noted that the Nation of Islam (boasting up to 50,000 members), is not the same as the Islam religion (with nearly 2 billion worldwide followers). There are also several differences between NOI and core Islamic beliefs.
While Muslims believe in one God with no partners, Son or associates, the NOI says God appeared on Earth in the form of Fard, its founder. Its current leader, Farrakhan, has a history of anti-Jewish comments, and the NOI’s main interest is in helping black people who were descended from slaves. Muslims, on the other hand, do not favor one race over another.
And on top of all that, UFOs are an important aspect of the teachings of the NOI. Elijah Muhammad gave detailed accounts of a gigantic Earth-orbiting “Mother Plane” equipped with many weapons, but it’s never been clear what takes place on board this ship.
Seeking the divine in the skies is one of the core beliefs of NOI leaders and followers, which explains why so much of their literature tells of UFOs, or what they prefer to call airborne “wheels.”
But it’s not aliens flying around in these things, they say. Nation of Islam mythology teaches that the circular craft were somehow built by humans on Earth, many centuries ago, reportedly under the guidance of God.
According to the story, the original “wheel” was built by scientists on what is now the island of Japan, at a cost of $15 billion in gold. And, so the tale goes, these original UFOs were used to create mountains on Earth.
Part of the problem with all of this is that it raises more questions than it answers:
* Who really had the technological know-how millennia ago to make circular craft that could perform impossible aerial maneuvers?
* What happened to these ships? Are they the UFOs that are reported today?
* Why build these things just to make mountains?
Oh yeah, like those are the only problems with their spiel. But, it’ll do for our purposes here today. The fact that something flies in the face of logic or facts hasn’t stopped people from gleefully signing up before, and probably never will.
Which is kind of sad, but not nearly as sad as the hallucinogenic rant spewed by the Red Rocker, Sammy Hagar. Chris Epting has the complete story.
The 63-year-old Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee thinks he may have been “manipulated” in some way by a force not of this Earth, if not abducted by aliens. The story has touched off a firestorm of interest, and as Hagar told AOL News, he firmly believes in aliens (which he also states in his book).
“I believe in God, I believe in aliens — and I believe in Elvis,” he said, chuckling, before getting somewhat more serious on the topic. “We’re not the only ones, trust me, and those people that think we are, they’re the crazy ones — don’t call me crazy,” Hagar said, grinning, while talking about his belief that the universe is simply too vast to not contain other life forms.
“I also believe God made all of this around us, but that he didn’t make just us,” he said.
For all of his good-natured rambunctiousness and life-of-the-party persona, Hagar is thoughtful when talking about how his childhood dreams may be based in reality. He doesn’t make any claims of having seen UFOs or aliens themselves, but he seems to think he was part of something more cerebral or technology-based instead.
As for the specific incident Hagar recounted from his dreams, he explained that “they were 14 miles away from me, and we were connected in some kind of way, and either they were downloading or uploading, I don’t know. … It was something that existed between us: me and whatever was communicating with me from out there.”
Oooooookaaaaay, whatever you say Sammy. Let’s see what we’ve got here, shall we? The belief that we aren’t alone in the universe is logical. With billions of planets and even more billions of possible permutations available to create life, our being alone defies logic.
But, and this is a BIG BUT, why in God’s name would an alien travel untold light years just to mind meld with some random kid? That makes even less sense than the ever popular anal probes certain folks go on about. Unless, of course, he was psychically connected to NOI’s mother ship. That would be about the right distance from the ground. But what they’d want with a scrawny, white, kid only your deity of choice can answer.
What could possibly be odder than any of these couples? How about a Beatles song being performed by an Austrian Neo-Nazi band that features fish puppets?
Yeah. I win.
Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG AM 1280, every Thursday morning around 9:10!