A woman who faced the prospect of 93 days in jail for refusing to stop growing vegetables in her front yard is sighing with relief after the Detroit suburb dropped all charges against her. All charges regarding her garden, that is. Now they have renewed charges against her for having two unlicensed dogs, even though she got her paperwork taken care of in June. [More]
ridiculous
Woman Faces Jail Time For Growing Veggies In Front Yard
By 7.11.11
Who knew a Victory Garden could have you facing defeat? A Michigan woman is looking at the prospect of 93 days in jail because she planted vegetables in planters in her front yard and refused to abide by the town elders’ interpretation of the planning code, WJBX reports. [More]
"EDGE Performance Chips" Are Stickers Purporting To Heal Pain
By 6.30.11 — Updated: 11.7.12
Okay, now they’re just messing with us. You’ve seen the Q-ray “chi-balancing bracelet” and the PowerBalance bands, now here are “EDGE Performance Chips.” These are little silver stickers that say they help relieve your pain and enhance your athletic performance. [More]
Mall Security And Suspected Shoplifters Engage In Car Chase
By 8.31.10
Earlier this month, two mall security guards in Montville, NJ, gave chase to a carful of suspected Victoria’s Secret shoplifters for six miles. Both vehicles eventually stopped at a liquor store parking lot two towns over, where a real policeman–who at first thought the guards were legit undercover cops–stepped in and started issuing tickets. [More]
Stashitware Turns Your Underwear Into A Man Purse
By 8.25.10
Hey guys, do you know what will really sex up a special occasion? First, take off your pants to reveal your enormous crotch bulge. Then reach into your underwear and pull out a 2 liter bottle of Coke. [More]
What Do $155K Shoes Look Like? Kinda Like $15 Stripper Heels
By 6.30.10
When Paul Simon sang “She got diamonds on the soles of her shoes,” we don’t think he was daring anyone to actually make said shoes. But jeweler House of Borgezie has gotten pretty close, slapping over 2,000 diamonds on a pair of stiletto heels and charging $155,000 a pair. [More]
The $25,000 Hot Chocolate
By 6.25.10
What’s the best thing to eat in your $33,000 bed? A $25,000 “frrrozen haute chocolate” from Serendipity 3 in New York, obviously. [More]
4 Reasons You Should Never Resolve Your Dispute On Judge Judy
By 2.26.10
We can understand just a little bit why some people might be willing to go on any of the countless daytime “judge” shows like Judge Judy, Judge Mathis, Street Court, etc. The shows pay you a nominal fee to appear, you get to be on TV and if the defendant loses, the show foots the bill (up to a certain amount). But the following video should give you four very good reasons for why you should never, ever, ever go on one of these shows. [More]
You Want Broadband At Home? Fine, British Telecom Wants $70,000
By 2.18.10
The Walker family, who live in a 150-person village in England, would like to upgrade their dialup Internet connection to broadband. Unfortunately, in order to do that, British Telecom insists that they would need to install higher capacity equipment for the entire village, and send the Walkers the £45,000 ($69,788) bill.
It probably goes without saying that BT has a monopoly.
Never Embarrass Yourself Trying To Unscrew A Wine Bottle Again
By 12.4.09
The horrible thing about screw-cap bottles of wine, says the website butterflywineopener.com, is that they suck all the romance out of bottle opening. But lucky you! “The Butterflyâ„¢ solves that by flawlessly and expediently opening any screw cap bottle while retaining the elegance of traditional wine service.” [More]
1.3 Mile Long Wedding Dress Shows China Is Ready For Gross Consumerism, Too!
By 8.8.09
A Chinese bride recently walked down the aisle wearing a 7,083-foot-long wedding dress that took 200 guests over three hours to unfurl. The $5,800 dress could be a sign of China’s potential to threaten America’s reigning status as the capital of gross consumerism, if only the bridegroom hadn’t personally designed the dress with his family’s help. Explaining the lavish garment, he said: “I do not want a cliche wedding parade or banquet.”
Why Cash For Clunkers Was Doomed
By 7.31.09
Cash For Clunkers never had a chance. It was smothered at birth by a pile of paperwork and ever-changing rules, as this dealership worker reveals, using a combination of the words “cluster” and “fudge,” except, of course, not fudge.
Got Solar Panels? Utility Wants To Charge You For Not Using Their Energy
By 7.26.09
Midwest utility Xcel Energy wants to charge anyone using solar panels a monthly fee for sustainably generating their own energy. According to company spokesman Tom Henley, “We just don’t think it’s fair that customers that don’t have solar panels on their homes should subsidize these solar panel customers any further.” Huh?
The Real Reason Behind The $23 Quadrillion Errors
By 7.16.09
The secret of the $23 quadrillion VISA debit errors looks like a specific and not uncommon programming error. Take the insanely large number, if you convert 2314885530818450000 to hexadecimal, you end up with 20 20 20 20 20 20 12 50. In programming, hex20 is a space. Where a binary zero should have been, there were spaces instead. What made this instance special is that it wasn’t caught in time. A Slashdot commenter identifying himself as working in the industry explains more about what very likely happened:
The $23 Quadrillion Meal
By 7.15.09
I hope he cleaned his plate. Jon Seale was another of several VISA customers who were charged $23 quadrillion for mundane purchases. This time it was his July 13th meal a Dallas restaurant, reports KXAS. VISA said a temporary programming error affecting prepaid accounts was responsible for the error . Jon spent the rest of the day calling between Wachovia and VISA to try to clear the $23,148,855,308,184,500 charge.
Unruly Teen Charges $23 Quadrillion At Drugstore
By 7.14.09
Kids these days! Hawkins writes, “My lectures about financial responsibility appear to have failed: yesterday [my teenaged daughter] charged $23,148,855,308,184,500.00 at the drug store.” You would think Visa would have caught the error and addressed it, if you were high. What Visa actually did was slap a $20 “negative balance” fee on it, of course. Update: Here’s what happened!
