Issue 23 of the Odd Stew: strange news items, oddities, plus other weird and fascinating things that have happened in the news that you may have missed.

An Unlucky String of Events

On January 15, 2017, a 49-year-old man in Dresden, Germany, inadvertently pulled into a disabled parking spot. The man quickly realized his mistake, but as he backed out of the spot, he accidentally hit a 72-year-old man walking behind his car. The older man received a minor injury but was able to exchange information with the younger man to go into a report. Things seem to be fine until the older man got into his car and backed out of his parking spot to leave. The older man then accidentally hit the younger man with his car, giving him a minor injury. Police were then called to the site to investigate the two consecutive accidents and the two periods of bad luck. (Associated Press 1/16/2018)

Prison Food is Known to Be Bad

An inmate at the Federal Correctional Complex, a federal prison in Beaumont, Texas, was arrested for escaping from prison in late January 2017. But what was odd was that the inmate was caught returning to the prison, not leaving it. What was even stranger was that the inmate had in his possession a duffel bag filled with liquor, tobacco, and home-cooked food.

Authorities from the Jefferson County Sheriff’s office along with U.S. Marshals had set up a surveillance operation overlooking private property close to the prison. They observed that a vehicle went on to the land and dropped a duffel bag. A couple hours later, the inmate in question escaped from the federal prison, grabbed the duffel bag, and began to return back to the prison. When police caught the man and retrieved the bag, they found a bottle of whiskey, three bottles of brandy, bags of Buglar tobacco, chicken, trail mix, rice, sausage, green beans, and pico de gallo. The inmate had already been serving time for drug charges and was additionally charged with escape and possession of marijuana. (UPI 1/26/2018)

A Little Fun in the Snow

A man in Montreal, Canada, decided to have a little fun with snow plow crews and sculpted a full-size DeLorean out of snow in an illegal parking space. It took Simon Laprise, a machinist by trade, four hours to finish the car that was not supposed to be parked on the street. He even found a windshield wiper to put on the car to give it an even more realistic look. But even though he meant the joke for the snow removal crews, the Montreal police ended up having some fun with the prank. When they approached it and realized that it wasn’t a real illegally parked car, the officer gave the fake car a fake ticket. It read, “You made our evening.” (NY Daily News 1/19/2018)

Take a Closer Look

School bus driver Edward Boudreau of Waltham, Massachusetts, was ecstatic when he discovered that he won a $10,000 prize from a scratch-off ticket in the Massachusetts State Lottery’s “$2,000,000 50X Cashword” game. But when he went to the lottery’s regional office to claim his prize, he was even more shocked to learn that he would have to go to the main headquarters instead. His previously thought winning ticket worth $10,000 was actually worth $1,000,000. He thought he had only matched ten words on the ticket, but he had really matched 11 words. Boudreau ended up claiming the one-time payout option and received $650,000 after withholdings.  (TIME 1/24/2018)

Have a Party, Clean the Drains

Mardi Gras is known for being one of the biggest parties in the world, but New Orleans maintenance crews discovered that much of the party goes underground, specifically in the storm drains. When crews began cleaning the drains at the end of 2017, they ended up finding 93,000 pounds of Mardi Gras Beads.

The three-month project to clean the drains cost the city $22 million, and crews removed a total of 7.2 million pounds of debris, 46 tons of it being just Mardi Gras beads. The city has discovered that the amount of debris is too much and is looking at ways to curb excesses at one the world’s wildest parties. (UPI 1/25/2018)

Check Out Previous Issues of the Odd Stew:

Odd Stew – Issue 22
Odd Stew – Issue 21
Odd Stew – Issue 20
All the Issues of Odd Stew

The post Odd Stew – Weird and Bizarre News – Issue 23 appeared first on Knowledge Stew.