October 6, 2003 -

FEARSOME FREAKOGRAPHY!

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It's Animal House Week. From Frogs to tigers and rattlers.

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Now, the details...

WASHINGTON -- The national media freaks are freaked over Joseph Wilson, the retired fourth-string diplomat whose CIA-connected wife got him a free trip to Niger -- so he could goof off on the government expense account and then report finding no signs that Saddam Hussein tried to buy African uranium. The reportorial big guns are firing away over Wilson, but no notice has been given to the fact that he and his spook wife apparently broke campaign-finance laws to give an extra-legal contribution to Algore (remember him?). Wilson is so full of himself, among other things, that he's musing about who would play him in the inevitable TV movie. If I get a vote, I'd go for Danny DeVito.

MOSCOW -- First Lady Laura Bush recoiled slightly but elegantly when French President Jacques Chirac kissed her hand when she made a courtesy call on foreign leaders in Moscow. Historians believe this is the first recorded instance of a Frog kissing a princess.

COLLEGE STATION, Texas -- I saw the headline on the news release and it seemed obvious that this had to be an Aggie joke. This one read: "Kennedy To Receive Bush Public Service Award." Yeh, sure. The Bushes will give an award to Teddy Kennedy. Right after an A&M engineer gets the Nobel Prize for inventing the first solar-powered night light. However, it seems this is for real. The Massachusetts White Whale will get the 2003 George Bush Award for Excellence in Public Service at the Bush Library Center at A&M on Nov. 7. Bush Foundation Director Roman Popadiuk effused about Teddy, saying he has "consistently and courageously fought for his principles -- and has rightly earned the respect of his Senate colleagues on both sides of the aisle." I suggest that President Bush arrange to have Teddy take Popadiuk for a nighttime drive across a remote Brazos river bridge. Since this award comes from Dubya's dad's foundation, maybe he should ask his Old Daddy to sit in the backseat.

TOW, Texas -- Those of us who live in what New Yorkers believe to be wild country find some New York stories difficult to believe. Take the sad tale of Antoine Yates, a 31-year-old man who lived in a fifth-floor unit of a Harlem housing project. Police officers called to Antoine's digs found a 400-pound tiger and a large alligator. Antoine attracted attention when he said he had been bitten by a pit bull but neighbors said Antoine had something fiercer than a bulldog in his apartment. He was arrested after being treated at a hospital. The tiger and the gator were taken to a wildlife preserve, but Antoine is reported considering a Las Vegas career. Intimates say he might move to Las Vegas and join a casino wildlife act to be known as "Siegfried and Dumbass."

BROWNWOOD, Texas -- Let's break out the crying towels for Douglas Hatchett of Bangs. The way old Doug tells it, he was shopping at his local Wal-Mart in Brownwood when a foot-long western diamondback rattlesnake snaked out of a shoebox and bit him on his hand. Wal-Mart officials insisted that Doug be taken to Brownwood Regional Medical Center -- against Doug's wishes -- for examination. The sawboneses said Doug hadn't been bitten by any rattler. There's always the possibility, maybe, that old Doug just got bit by the lawsuit bug. Or maybe it's all a case of mistaken identify. Could be that Doug was shopping for moccasins.

NORWOOD, Ohio -- I guess a kind person would say that Barbara Norris was a little on the "fluffy" side. Barbara died recently at the age of 63 but her family is in a high-calorie rage over her funeral. They say Tredway Pollitt Funeral Home buried Barbara in a too-small casket. Too small, the family said, because Barbara weighed more than 500 pounds when she left this earth.

The family rage strikes me as ridiculous. Caskets can be ordered. Or the Norris family could have bought a small camper, or a single-wide mobile home, for Barbara's resting place. However, we all can agree that it's tough, when you die so heavy that the funeral director might need to file an environmental-impact statement for the gravesite.

FORT WORTH -- There are cretins. And then there's Charles D. McKinley, who is sort of a crate-on. Chuckie D. made news when he shipped himself home to momma in DeSoto, Texas. No big deal about that, but Chuckie sent himself from New York City in a wooden crate by way of United Parcel Service. Chuckie was a shipping clerk in New York and got homesick. So he did the logical thing -- putting himself into a $668 New York-to-DeSoto crate which went air freight from New York to Dallas/Fort Worth. He charged the $668 to a UPS account, since he didn't think either he or his momma should have to pay for his trip. Chuckie goes on trial next month in Dallas, when we will find out what the government, and Brown, can do for him.

QUESTION FOR THE DAY: If Wal-Mart starts selling hard liquor, can I get bitten by a rattlesnake belt?