News of the Weird
Floridians do the darnedest things. Are people that crazy in
Ohio or Wyoming? I wonder. The newspaper provides a few chuckles a week,
showing the misguided creativity of some of Florida’s citizens. One might say,
too, that cruelty knows no limits.
Here are some examples:
1. A husband and wife arranged to have a date at a Florida
movie theater. During the previews the husband texted their three-year-old
daughter in her day care. A retired policeman sitting behind them didn’t like
this one bit and asked the husband to desist. An altercation ensued, during
which the husband tossed some popcorn at the policeman.
Or I guess it was the husband who did the tossing. Some
witnesses aren’t sure.
In any case, the policeman apparently became enraged, pulled
his gun and fired away, killing the husband and wounding the wife in the hand.
2. A very thirsty man walked into a convenience store
desiring a six-pack of beer. He didn’t have any money so he offered to trade
the three-foot alligator he’d just caught for the brew. He had the gator in a
big cooler. The clerk was not amused.
3. Baptism parties can be dangerous, as one Floridian found
out. There was some kind of fight when partycrashers realized there weren’t
enough food, drink and utensils to go around. They had heard about the party on
social media and just showed up. The man who was killed tried to be a good
citizen and break up the melee and got in the way of a bullet. Doesn’t
everybody pull a gun when party food is insufficient?
4. Police are scratching their heads over this one; A
paraplegic man stole a used car from a dealership in central Florida, but was
later caught gassing up at a service station. A sales person at the dealership
told police he had helped the man into the car, whereupon the thief locked the
doors, started the car and gave it the gas by pressing the accelerator pedal
with a folding cane. Turns out the paraplegic was driving with a suspended
license.
5. A woman ran over her husband in their driveway. She said
she didn’t see him lying there and thought he must have been intoxicated. He
died at a hospital.
(My book Goat Water Is Not What You Think is available from Hawthornepub.com. Sales are going very well, and I'm happy.)
Dave Barry and Carl Hiaasen have made careers of detailing the weirdness of Florida. The gun stuff is, unfortunately, everywhere. Here in Albuquerque, we have trigger-happy police.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me--I want to check and see if Barnes and Noble has your book yet. If not, I'm ordering from Amazon. (I like to order fro B&N, not only because I used to work there, but because I like to support them because they still maintain brick-and-mortar stores, though heaven knows how long they'll last. They're starting to move to smaller venues.) But I'm not willing to wait much longer for them to get it! I shared the Amazon link on my Facebook page, and bragged about my friend who wrote a book!