Category Archives: true story

September 28, 2011 · 10:32 pm

Popping Porcelain

[Editor’s note: This story is true as far as I know, and comes from the I Can’t Make This Stuff Up Department.]

Woman reportedly injured by exploding toilet at GSA building – WTOP.com

http://www.wtop.com/?nid=109&sid=2565294

WASHINGTON — A toilet reportedly exploded Monday and injured a woman at the General Services Administration Building in D.C.

The D.C. Fire and EMS Department confirms a woman went to the hospital with serious but non-life-threatening injuries.

“The GSA National Capital Regional Office Building experienced a building mechanical incident, which we understand may have resulted in injuries,” a GSA statement reads.

Channel 9 (WUSA) reports a memo made the rounds in the GSA building, warning people not to flush.

“Do NOT flush toilets or use any domestic water,” Channel 9 quotes the memo as saying.

“Due to a mechanical failure, there is high air pressure in the domestic water system that resulted in damage to toilets … There has been damage to flushed toilets that has resulted in injuries.”

The GSA has refused to respond to specific questions, only referring to its statement.

“The restrooms are back in service, and mechanical systems are being monitored as we speak,” the statement says.

The incident is not the first of its kind in the United States. A trial lawyer in Memphis, Tenn., Parke Morris, says he represented a client who was seriously injured when a urinal exploded in a GSA building.

Morris says the client told him he was working on a Saturday at the Federal Courthouse in Memphis when he used the sixth floor men’s bathroom.

“This was an old, kind of primitive urinal that had almost like a gas pedal that you would press down when you were finished doing your business,” Morris says. “And he pressed it, and it literally exploded. It was like a porcelain hand grenade went off.”

Morris says the explosion blew the man backwards onto the floor and severely injured his knee. He required a surgery and seven months of rehab before he could return to work.

After the man was blown back, he called down to the security desk and had a guard come up to help him.

“I don’t know if [the guard] didn’t believe him, or couldn’t believe what he saw, but he decided to flush the urinal next to the one that was now in pieces. That one exploded as well.”

Morris said in total, four urinals exploded in that Memphis bathroom that day and it was later determined to be caused by a problem in the water pressure.

Follow Andrew Mollenbeck and WTOP on Twitter.

(Copyright 2011 by WTOP. All Rights Reserved.)

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September 25, 2011 · 12:05 am

Not so slim waisted

I'm not sure what to make of this offer on Twitter. If she thinks I am somehow one of these women in the guise of a not-so-slim-waisted man, she would definitely be disappointed.

As a recent member of Twitter, it sometimes surprises me what can get done with only 140 characters.

Take this offer, for example. Certainly the name should say it all: “Jenny Breastits.” But to further drive home the point, she is “@LovelySoftBoobs.” And if that is not enough, her description makes it absolutely clear what she loves.

What I don’t understand is why she wants to follow my tweets? I am not a woman, don’t have the naturally full items she is most interested in, and I possess a not so slim waist. If she thinks I am harboring any of these things, she is suffering from delusions I cannot even begin to fathom.

Twitter may have a limit of 140 characters, but it does seem that at times, all of those characters are odd.

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February 27, 2011 · 11:11 pm

Ripped from the headlines #3: Death Panels do exist … in Arizona

Death panels do exist, and the Republican-controlled legislature and governor’s office in Arizona has the votes to prove. With a 21–9 majority in the state senate and a 40–20 majority in the state house, they could even override Republican governor Jan Brewer, should she stray and veto a piece of not only Republican, but Tea-Party-Republican legislation.

These two legislative bodies and the governor have decided to hold 96 critically ill people (human bodies) hostage to a battle with Washington. They have voted to cut $1.4 million from this fiscal year’s transplant budget in an attempt to cut $561 million in Medicaid payments from its $1.2 billion budget deficit. This $561 million is part of a state-federal program that helps provide coverage for about 280,000 of the state’s poor. At least two of the transplant candidates have already died.

When asked about, Republican State Senator Frank Antenori was quoted as saying, “Government makes decisions that affect people’s lives all the time.” Including some that apparently will kill you.

Seems Sarah Palin was right: the government has created death panels. In this case it is a solidly Tea-Party-Republican-control state government of Arizona that has done so – at the expense of the poor, of course.

When Arizona considered passing a law requiring people to carry papers proving they were U.S. citizens should they be stopped by the police, the conservative mouth piece Glenn Beck was heard responding to critics by sarcastically saying, “Arizona sure has put the A-Z back in Nazi.”

Maybe he was more right than he realized.

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February 22, 2011 · 9:25 pm

Ripped from the Headlines, no. 2: GOP carrying for wildlife

Congress just voted for a Republican amendment to cut all federal funding from Planned Parenthood health centers, one of the most trusted providers of basic health care and family planning in our country.

And if that wasn’t enough, Republicans are pushing to eliminate all funds for the only federal family planning program. (For humans. But Republican Dan Burton has a bill to provide contraception for wild horses.)

So, if you’re a wild horse and you sow wild oats, there’s help from the GOP; but if you’re human, well that’s a different bucket of oats.

I didn’t know the GOP cared so much for wildlife.

Or maybe they just want to make sure there’s more cannon fodder for the war machine.

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January 30, 2011 · 10:00 pm

A sign of the times

I went to the store the other day,
and it wasn’t in a place very far away.
While going through the checkout line
the bagger asked me if I’d mind
spending a dollar to support a charity.
I said yes, how fine that would be.
He then asked for my name
Saying he’d put it in the window for a little fame.
I said I didn’t need the notoriety.
He said that just could not be,
and he would write “lowel customer.”
Though his accent was a bit tough to be sure,
I said “Loyal Customer” was fine with me.
He then wrote it on the window slip for all to see.
Lowel Customer now hangs on the glass
with all the other names that you pass.
But if Lowel Customer you happen to see,
give him a pleasant hello from me.

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