You Can't Make This Up - No Discussion

[arielilane]

This holiday season, many Americans will be decorating Christmas trees, lighting Hanukkah candles, building gingerbread houses and savoring time with family and friends.

And across the country, many people will be celebrating with less conventional — but no less beloved — local traditions, from lighting lobster trap trees in New England to caroling in caves in Wisconsin to watching Santa surf in California.

https://www.npr.org/2023/12/08/1215889436/unique-us-holiday-traditions-hanukkah-festivus-christmas

 

[arielilane]

@YellowstoneNPS

From our friends @USGSVolcanoes: Steamboat Geyser is the tallest geyser in the world and has been putting on a show the last few years at Yellowstone with a record number of eruptions - 48 each in 2019 and 2020. But it's only had 8 eruptions in 2023. Is Steamboat losing steam?

https://twitter.com/x/status/1731743576919286100

1:33 PM · Dec 4, 2023


Just a pretty view for your Saturday!A sun dog, or parhelion, occurs when sunlight refracts through icy clouds to form concentrated patches of light on either side of the sun. They can sometimes be very colorful, almost like pieces of a rainbow, if conditions are juuuuust right


9:52 AM · Dec 2, 2023

https://twitter.com/YellowstoneNPS

 

[arielilane]

A blue-and-yellow mecaw flew next to two police officers on motorcycles in Brazil as they patrolled the city of Miracema do Tocantins. https://abcn.ws/403WuaU

https://twitter.com/x/status/1733849045502935175

 

[arielilane]

Multiple long-track tornadoes were reported in northwest Tennessee Saturday afternoon, including "extensive" damage in the city of Clarksville, located about 48 miles northwest of Nashville, police say. https://trib.al/XlkCH5b

https://twitter.com/x/status/1733646629268275265

https://twitter.com/ABC

 

[arielilane]

@accuweather

New footage shows the destructive power of an EF3 tornado that struck Clarksville, TN on Saturday.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1734238650924400945

 

[sds71]

Woman enters MRI machine with a gun and gets shot in the butt

The 57-year-old's gun went off as she was getting an MRI.

www.boston25news.com

 

[arielilane]

Carol McKinley reposted

https://twitter.com/x/status/1731461068717760823

 

[arielilane]

So they put us in charge of decorating a FISH-mas tree

https://twitter.com/x/status/1734229828763529362

 

[arielilane]

@COParksWildlife

Our ELK on a Shelf is still busy creating holiday magic and mischief and he's left instructions on how you can make your own ELK on a Shelf.Peep those instructions and to make things easier, you can buy an elk plushie from our CPWSHOP:
cpw.info/3uNbfnJ



And the ELK on a Shelf certainly got into some mischief...he didn't change the ink toner in our office but did remind his friends that they shouldn't feed elk popcorn (or other food)

https://twitter.com/x/status/1732902378196574709

Plus he helped a customer at one of our regional offices but had some issues answering questions because he's an elk

 

[arielilane]

And he seems just a tad too big for his camper van


6:19 PM · Dec 7, 2023

 

[arielilane]

Florida deputies arrested a burglary suspect after he submerged himself in a pond and hid in long grass.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1734249092237193324

11:29 AM · Dec 11, 2023

 

[seasideForest]

Florida deputies arrested a burglary suspect after he submerged himself in a pond and hid in long grass.

11:29 AM · Dec 11, 2023

RSBM for brevity.

Being on this thread and then with the preceding pics with the ELK, I wondered if it might be a "burglary suspect", like a cute 4-legged one, but it's a real human burglary suspect!

 

[arielilane]

@dcsheriff

Congratulations to the Hazard family from Highlands Ranch. While you may not have been the top winner on Sunday night's "The Great Christmas Light Fight," you are the winner in our book. Our #DCSO deputies are always on the lookout for the best lights of Douglas County, and we think we hit the jackpot with this house.Thanks for letting us share in your holiday spirit. Have a house that compares? Share your photo. Deputy Anderson.



12:27 PM · Dec 4, 2023

 

[ifindedout]

Russian airline passenger arrives at LAX from Copenhagen without a ticket, passport or visa.

LAX's Russian mystery man: A chatty, chocolate-stealing passenger — with no passport, no ticket

Without a passport or even a ticket, a mysterious man with apparent ties to Russia slipped onto a flight from Copenhagen to Los Angeles, hiding in plain sight until he was apprehended after landing in Los Angeles, an extraordinary federal criminal filing reveals.

www.latimes.com

The man, identified as Sergey Vladimirovich Ochigava, a seemingly gregarious flier who constantly shifted seats, spoke to several passengers, asked for two in-flight meals and even tried to snack on a cabin crew member’s chocolate bar during the more than 12-hour flight aboard Scandinavian Airlines Flight 931 on Nov. 4, court documents filed by federal prosecutors allege.

But when he disembarked at Los Angeles International Airport at about 1 p.m., officials quickly discovered he was a stowaway without a passport and not listed on the passenger manifest, and was taken into custody, according to a federal court filing. He carried domestic identification for Russia and Israel and that said he was born in 1977.

After an FBI investigation, Ochigava pleaded not guilty earlier this month to violating a federal law that prevents anyone from boarding or secreting themselves on an airplane or vessel without the consent of the owner or person in command.

Aviation experts called the incident unusual and suggested that Ochigava may have relied on inside knowledge of airline operations.

 

[whitelilac]

Tesla recalls nearly all 2 million of its vehicles on US roads​

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/13/tech/tesla-recall-autopilot/index.html

These vehicles scare me personally. Stuck accelerators etc. I know one person, a local respected real estate agent who was killed recently when her Tesla accelerated on a residential street here and crashed into a house.
I've read of several other incidents on freeways here, where the driver suddenly could not control their car.

 

[neesaki]

I lost $800 at Walmart - even after showing my receipt I didn't get the cash

A WOMAN claims to have lost hundreds of dollars after purchasing Walmart gift cards. Susan Kunz bought $1,000 in gift cards at a Houston, Texas, Walmart as Christmas gifts for the needy. When she c…

www.the-sun.com

Susan Kunz bought $1,000 in gift cards at a Houston, Texas, Walmart as Christmas gifts for the needy.
When she checked to see the balance on the cards, she found that some of them were already completely drained.

In total, three were wiped out worth $800.

“The cards had been only in my possession so the question was ‘How does this happen?” Kunz said to NBC affiliate KPRC.

“And if this is happening to us, who else has this happened to?”

 

[neesaki]

Tesla recalls nearly all 2 million of its vehicles on US roads​

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/13/tech/tesla-recall-autopilot/index.html

These vehicles scare me personally. Stuck accelerators etc. I know one person, a local respected real estate agent who was killed recently when her Tesla accelerated on a residential street here and crashed into a house.
I've read of several other incidents on freeways here, where the driver suddenly could not control their car.

This was / is a disaster waiting to happen, IMO. It’s a mystery to me that the autopilot thing is being allowed at all. I wouldn’t have it if they gave it to me free of charge. What’s the point, so they can sit there and play on their cell phone?
Sometimes EM reminds me a bit of the Titan submarine guy. Jmo

 

[seasideForest]

Here is a 4-legged thief: Moment elephant smashes van window in search of food in Sri Lanka

 

[ifindedout]

Bull on tracks in Newark Penn Station, NJ disrupts trains (I know the Dow Jones hit a record high just a few miles away across the Hudson, but still...)
Happy spoiler: The steer was tranquilized and taken to a local animal rescue facility, where he was named Ricardo.

Loose steer spotted on train tracks near Newark Penn Station captured safely

The steer was captured running along the train tracks in Newark before it was safely captured.

abc7ny.com

The first reports came in around 10:30 a.m. at Newark Penn Station.

[...]

"And I looked out the window and it was there, it was just kind of trotting down the track there," said Neptune resident Jason Monticelli. "I thought maybe it was a Red Bulls PR stunt or something like that, considering the stadium was right there. But yeah, he was just trotting along. We were just trying to figure out what where it came from."

https://twitter.com/x/status/1735329196690362534

 

[arielilane]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1735288529750724670