The Freakin' News Digest

TikiTam cannot possibly invent news this bizarre, news that deserves to be heard by the masses. News generated by future DARWIN AWARD recipients. Welcome to the Freakin' News. (NOTE: Tiki could not resist adding her own photos...)


City employee in California hits his own car - then sues himself

LODI, Calif. (AP) - When a dump truck backed into Curtis Gokey's car, he decided to sue the city for damages.
Only thing is, he was the one driving the dump truck. That minor detail didn't stop Gokey, a Lodi city employee, from filing a $3,600 US claim for the December accident, even after acknowledging the crash was his fault.

After the city denied that claim because Gokey was, in essence, suing himself, he and his wife decided to file a new claim under her name.
City Attorney Steve Schwabauer said this one also lacks merit because Rhonda Gokey can't sue her own husband.

"You can sue your spouse for divorce, but you can't sue your spouse for negligence," Schwabauer said. "They're a married couple under California law. They're one entity. It's damage to community property." (from CNEWS)

Spain braces for countrywide binge drinking jamboree


Antonio Marquez, a Madrid student, preps for his binge with fancy swill
imported from the USA.

By HAROLD HECKLE (Photos- SOUR GRAPES GAZETTE)

MADRID, Spain (AP) - Spain is bracing itself for a countrywide outbreak of uncontrolled outdoor drinking fixed for this weekend by youths set on celebrating through the night.
The booze-up, to hail the arrival of spring, has been organized on the Internet and with the aid of e-mails and cellphone messages. Health Minister Elena Salgado on Wednesday called for parents to try and ensure that adolescents under 18 - the age at which Spaniards can legally buy alcohol and tobacco - do not attend the call to binge-drink the night away Friday.

News of the boozy get-together has been gathering pace through the use of Internet chat room and messages saying, "Macrobotellon on (March) 17th" leading authorities to ponder on how best to tackle the public order and health issues involved.

Botellon - meaning large bottle in Spanish - is a decade-old phenomenon that sees young people gather in public places throughout Spain to share alcoholic drinks and socialize through the night.

Chicago Requires Driver's Ed for the Blind

Visually impaired student Mayra
Ramirez enjoys the school's driving
simulator

Chicago (AP) --

Most high school students eagerly await the day they pass driver's education class. But 16-year-old Mayra Ramirez is indifferent about it.

Ramirez is blind, yet she and dozens of other visually impaired sophomores in Chicago schools are required to pass a written rules-of-the-road exam in order to graduate — a rule they say takes time away from subjects they might actually use.

"In other classes, you don't really feel different because you can do the work other people do," Ramirez said. "But in driver's ed, it does give us the feeling we're different. In a way, it brought me down, because it reminds me of something I can't do."

Hundreds of school districts in Illinois require students to pass driver's ed, although the state only requires that districts offer the courses. A state education official says districts that require it should exempt disabled students.

"It defies logic to require blind students to take this course," Meta Minton, spokeswoman for the state Board of Education, told the Chicago Tribune in a Friday story.

ED NOTE: Since when has logic ever been a part of government and education???