10 Weirdest and Oddest Stories of 2010

2010 has been a wacky year for many, but few news events have grabbed people quite like the stories here. From the out-of-the box, to the crazy, to the unfortunate 2010 produced some truly memorable news moments including odd 911 calls, drug trafficking parrots, and cat-cooking chefs. Paul the 'Psychic' Octopus was perhaps the year's most famous piece of odd news, but here's a few more than really turned some heads and may have made you chuckle.

The triplets who were born 11 years apart

Ever wonder what you were like when you were growing up? Two 11-year-old sisters in England will have just that chance, thanks to the amazing birth of their newborn triplet who had been on ice since she was conceived more than a decade ago. When Adrian and Lisa Shepherd decided to start a family in 1998, they underwent in vitro fertilization at the Midland Fertility Clinic because Lisa suffered from fertility issues that made traditional conception difficult. Doctors obtained 24 eggs from the mother, 14 of which were successfully fertilized. Two of those embryos were then implanted in Lisa, who gave birth to twins Megan and Bethany in 1999.


The other 12 embryos were placed in cryogenic storage until the family started talking about having another child last year. The Shepherds returned to the clinic, where doctors implanted a third embryo in Lisa that had been conceived on the same day as Megan and Bethany. Ryleigh was born on November 2010 at 7 pounds 10 ounces -- 11 years after her sisters. Experts told the paper it could be the longest age gap between siblings conceived during the same fertility treatment.

(Link | Via)


The man who was shot in the head but only found out 5 years later
A man living in Germany walked around and functioned normally for five years without noticing he had been shot in the head. The .22 caliber bullet was found when the man went to the doctor to have what he thought was a cyst removed. All he could remember was that he had received a blow to the head around midnight at a New Year's party "in 2004 or 2005," but had forgotten about it because he had been "very drunk." The wound later healed around the bullet and it was not until the man decided to have the lump examined due to recurring pains that the discovery was made. (Link)


The man who shot a teenager for wearing baggy pants
Cops in Tennessee say 45-year-old Kenneth Bonds got so angry at a teenager's baggy pants that he shot the young man in the buttocks. In Sept 25, Bonds, who was charged with two counts of aggravated assault, allegedly fired several shots at the 17-year-old after the victim refused to pull up his sagging trousers and called the accused gunman a "fat ass." (Link | Via)


The Taliban insurgents who were training Kalashnikov-armed macaques and baboons to shoot at US troops
A report in China's People's Daily indicated that the Taliban is creating an army of monkey mujahideen. The story that appeared in July 2010 in the Chinese People's Daily suggested that insurgents used a reward-and-punishment system to train macaques and baboons to target soldiers wearing U.S. military uniforms. The Taliban supposedly "taught monkeys how to use the Kalashnikov, Bren light machine gun and trench mortars." But a researcher who has spent his career studying the social life of non-human primates casted a highly critical eye on the story.

"They can be trained to do things like turn off lights and open faucets and so on, but eventually that breaks down," said William Mason, a psychologist and professor emeritus at the University of California. The Chinese story cited unnamed British journalists and U.S. military sources when discussing the idea of insurgent monkeys. By contrast, the U.S. Stars and Stripes news source interviewed a NATO spokesman who said the notion had no basis in reality. (Link)

The woman who achieved the record of world's fattest at 700 pounds
Terri Smith, 49, a 700-pound woman is pinned in her sleeping room, incapable to move, stand or roll across by herself - adjusting the fresh world record as the Fattest woman. She suffers severe headaches and needs an MRI scan to check out for a potential brain tumor, unfortunately she is also too big to fit in a scanner or to pass through the doors of a hospital.

Terry has never been a delicate female child. At the age of 7, she weighed almost 70 kilograms. The woman explains that her family was poor which did not allow for her parents to bargain healthy foods. At the age of twenty, Terry weighed about 120 kilograms. Terri wedded husband Myron, whom she looks up to as her guardian spirit, in 1986. At the age of 32 she built up severe arthritis in her knees and was incapable to walking more than a couple of steps at one time. Smith was lastly given an electric wheelchair to get around in. The lack of physical exercise and not having modified her eating caused her weight balloon to the point wherever she could barely stand. Then about three years ago a change in her medicine caused her to gain 91 pounds in 30 days. Those pounds forced her to the bed ridden state she has been in ever since.

(Link)


The thief who tried to steal from a museum wearing an elaborate camouflaged "ghillie suit"
Gregory Liascos might have been an invisible man, but he still had an ill-conceived plan. According to police in Oregon, the 36-year-old suspect wore an elaborate camouflaged "ghillie suit" before attempting to break through the wall of a rock and mineral museum over the course of several nights in October in an attempt to snatch the museum's quarter-million-dollar gold collection. Museum staff alerted police after spotting a half-chiseled hole that the Moss Man had allegedly carved into a bathroom wall, and though his grassy outfit was hard to spot, police dog had no trouble sniffing out the suspect. The animal found a large piece of ground interesting. The dog bit - the ground screamed. (Link)


The man who fled hospital to avoid having his penis amputated after 27 hours erect
In May 2010, a man tried to escape from a hospital in the Dominican Republic where he had been hospitalized for priapism, a condition characterized by a prolonged and painful erection not associated with sexual desire after learning that doctors planned to amputate his penis because he may have gangrene.

Luis Rodríguez Taveras, 45, had been admitted more than three weeks in a hospital north of the Dominican Republic because of this problem, which was caused by eating a lot of sexual stimulants. In statements given to local journalists later, Rodriguez declared that he had ingested drugs. Rodríguez Taveras said he warned his wife not to sign the document authorizing the operation because “I could not live without my penis.” He argued that the erection began to subside gradually after treatment provided by an urologist at another hospital, who was defined as a good doctor and “very human.” (Link)


The baby who survived a seven-story fall
In November 2010 a 15-month-old baby girl survived a seven story fall after she bounced off an awning into the arms of a man in Paris. The tot had been playing unsupervised with her older sister when she fell out of the window. A young man saw the baby starting to fall and alerted his father, who raced to get into position, arms outstretched, to catch her after she hit the awning. “He must have played rugby for years to have developed reflexes like that,” a bystander reported. The baby was lucky: normally the cafe owner closes the awning because people throw their cigarette butts on it. The baby girl is in the hospital, but is virtually unscratched. (Link)


The Flight Attendant who quit his job during a flight using the emergency slide.
In August 2010, Steven Slater, a flight attendant of JetBlue airlines, got into an argument with a passenger during boarding at a Pittsburgh airport. He finally had enough of his job, quit, and opened the emergency slide on the plane in order to leave. He grabbed the intercom and said: “To the passenger who called me a mother ——, —- you. “I've been in the business 28 years. I've had it. That's it.” Mr Slater then activated the emergency exit and slid down the inflatable slide on to the tarmac. He then boarded a train to the terminal, stripping off his tie and discarding it to the astonishment of bemused onlookers. Slater was later arrested and charged with reckless endangerment and criminal mischief. (Link | Via)


The dog who swallowed a $20,000-worth diamond in a jewelery
A diamond dealer never imagined that his $20,000 dollar diamond would make for a good dog biscuit, but a dog named Sully had other plans. In March 2010, the dealer brought the $20,000 dollar gem into the Robert Bernard Jewelery Store to show owners Robert Rosin and George Kaufmann, but dropped it when he went to pull it from his pocket. In the blink of an eye, Sully, a golden retriever, pounced on the diamond and sent it down the hatch; it was by far the priciest dog treat Sully had ever tasted. Sully's expensive taste sent the owners of the jewelery store owners into a panic. A quick call to the vet and the owner's had a plan to retrieve the gem -- allow nature to take its course and don't leave Sully out of your sight.

Owner Kaufmann says it was an unpleasant experience, as he had to no only follow Sully, but also check up on the dog's bathroom breaks in hopes of finding the diamond.After three days of careful search, Sully gave up the goods and the owners were able to return the stone back to its owner -- after a thorough shine and polish. Sully is back on a steady diet of regular doggy treats. (Link)