weird stories

In a story that was shared with a monthly police magazine, a police officer in Sussex, England, ended up chasing himself around for 20 minutes. A CCTV (closed circuit TV) operator saw a suspicious man on the streets, and called a plainclothes officer for help. The operator gave directions to the areas where the suspicious man was caught on camera, and the officer always seemed to be close, but could not see any evidence of the man. That is, until they realized that the suspicious character was actually the plainclothes officer! The date of the misadventure has been lost in the retelling, as all police officers involved were too busy laughing.

A mysterious box appeared in a parking lot at Erie Community College campus in Amherst, N.Y., last Friday afternoon. The state police bomb squad responded and took an x-ray of the sealed box, which showed a cat inside! Police turned the cat over to the local SPCA. Gina Browning of the Tonawanda SPCA says the cat is okay. The cat was not malnourished, not dehydrated, didnt need any kind of veterinary care. So, it had a happy ending. What concerns me is the people capable of doing this might be capable of doing something worse, Browning said. Just who would put a cat in a taped up box and leave it in a parking lot remains a mystery at this point. Capt. Camilleri said, Right now it doesnt appear theres really much to follow up on. It didnt have any identification on the box or anything like that. The upside to this is that the cat, named Truffle, is fine, healthy and back with her owner. Tracking down the person responsible is unlikely, if not impossible. If found, the persons responsible could be charged with animal cruelty. Even Schrodinger never wanted to try his famous thought experiment on a real cat.

The planned expedition led by Norwegian Jarle Andhoy was already shady, and now theres an unwilling member along for the ride. The yacht took off in a hurry as immigration officials arrived to investigate Andhoy at an Auckland harbor, while a local mechanic was on board repairing an anchor on the 52-foot boat Nilaya. Andhoy and three crew members have embarked on an unpermitted voyage to Antarcticas Ross Sea, in defiance of both the Norwegian and New Zealand governments. A previous trip he made to Antarctica almost a year ago ended in disaster when his yacht Berserk sank in a fierce storm and three men died. Declaring himself a Viking, the Norwegian adventurer says he is seeking the wreckage of the Berserk, which was serving as a supply ship for an attempt to reach the South Pole on quad bikes. Authorities are looking for the Nilaya, which Andhoy said does not have a locator beacon. It is not thought to have adequate supplies for an extra crew member, either.

London mayor Boris Johnson is enjoying his time in the spotlight and the opportunity to promote his city. However, theres always the risk of something going wrong. One of those promotional opportunities was at Victoria Park, where Johnson took a ride on the zipline while carrying two British flags. But the wire sagged about 65 feet from the end of the line, and the mayor was left dangling in the wind. It was only a few minutes before help arrived, but the press was there to record the event. Johnson used the time to wave the flags and cheer on the British Olympic team.

A typhoon wrecked the squirrel enclosure of the Inokashira Park Zoo in Tokyo in July, resulting in the escape of 30 squirrels. Attempts to recover the animals were quite successful; at one count, 38 squirrels had been recaptured. Zoo officials have offered three different explanations for the discrepancy: 1. They miscounted how many squirrels had escaped 2. The squirrels reproduced while on the loose and 3. Some wild squirrels may have been picked up by mistake. The zoo implants microchips in their animals, so all recovered squirrels will eventually be scanned.

A 30-year-old man in Madison, Wis., found a way to get his 15 minutes of fame. Jeffrey Drew Wilschke had legally changed his name in October 2011 to Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop. That makes a great headline in itself, but Zopittybop-Bop-Bop was arrested in early January after neighbors complained of excessive drug use. Police recorded quite a few charges, including carrying a concealed weapon, possession of drug paraphernalia, possession of marijuana, and probation violations. When Zopittybop-Bop-Bop was taken into custody, he told police he would get even with them.

Sometimes the way a news story is presented makes it special. The Reykjavik Grapevine is a a master of that sort of thing. Residents of Su?urnes, Iceland, called police on Sunday after they observed several cats going in and out a window of an unoccupied house. Police arrived at the scene and, entering the house, found no people there. However, two to three cats the exact number is still unclear were allegedly occupying the house. According to police reports, the cats were snuggling on a couch that had been left behind by the previous residents. Officers on the scene sprang into action, immediately evicting the cats from the house. They then ensured that all doors and windows into the house were securely closed and locked, in the hopes of preventing an incident of this sort from ever happening again.

Children playing on the Russian steppe in the Rostov region found a 5-month-old lion cub and took it to school with them. Their teacher contacted authorities, but the children played with the lion cub while waiting. The cub, named Barsik, had escaped from a car while being transported to a zoo in Dagestan.

Norwegian teenager Lars Andreas Bjercke downloaded an intriguing app that imitates the sounds of rabbits, in order to attract foxes. It worked very well. After several nights of circling the yard where the phone was left, a fox took the phone and ran off! The theft was captured on video. But the story gets even better.

A fresco of Christ by artist Elias Garcia Martinez was painted more than 100 hundred years ago in the Sanctuary of Mercy Church near Zaragoza, Spain. A recent donation from the artists granddaughter was intended for the paintings restoration. However, cultural officials found that an elderly parishioner had already done her own restoration. The woman, who is in her 80s, did an alarming and unauthorized touch-up of the original work that completely covered Martinezs painting, although she claims the priest gave his permission. The woman had eventually realized she was having trouble with the job, and contacted the cultural ministry for guidance, but it may be too late to save any of Martinezs work. If the painting cannot be recovered, a photograph of the original may be mounted over what now adorns the wall which you must see to believe. The restored picture became one of the biggest internet memes of the year. The elderly art restorer, Cecilia Gimenez, became an instant celebrity, so we revisited the story later.