Gabriel and Tracy Brawn moved into Gabriel's childhood home in Dover-Foxcroft, Maine, in 2012 and enjoyed a warm relationship with next-door neighbor Steve Ritter, whose garage had been partially built on the Brawns' property decades ago. But after Ritter passed away in 2016, his wife and grown children took over the property, sometimes renting it out, and "this place turned to craziness and chaos," Tracy Brawn told the Bangor Daily News on July 16, leading finally to Gabriel Brawn grabbing his Sawzall on May 26 and cutting the Ritters' garage in half, right down the property line. "We're putting up a fence," Tracy Brawn said. "Fences make good neighbors." Dover-Foxcroft police Chief Ryan Reardon said, "We were aware of the situation and believe it's been resolved at this point." [Bangor Daily News, 7/18/2020]

Latest Alarming Headlines

A roving gang of baboons in Knowsley Safari Park in Merseyside, England is known to vandalize cars and otherwise alarm visitors, but lately, The Sunday Times reported, they've been seen carrying knives, screwdrivers and a chain saw, which workers believe they've acquired from visitors. "We're not sure if they are being given weapons by some of the guests ... or if they're fishing them out of pickup trucks and vans," an employee said. Park officials have pooh-poohed the reports, saying, "We believe that many of these stories have grown in exaggeration as they've been retold." [Sunday Times viz NY Post, 7/27/2020]

Predictable

A $64,000 glass replica of a Disney castle on display at the Shanghai Museum of Glass in China was shattered in July after two kids "hit the exhibit counter when they were chasing each other," a museum spokesperson posted on Weibo. The Today Show reported Spanish glassblower Miguel Arribas spent 500 hours creating The Fantasy Castle in 2016, but "luckily it's not destroyed," said Arribas Brothers company spokesman Rudy Arribas. When COVID-19 restrictions are lifted, Miguel will go to Shanghai to repair the castle. "We're used to kids and this kind of stuff happening," said Rudy. "Glass breaks." [Today, 7/27/2020]

Lost and Found

-- Chris Marckres of Hyde Park, Vermont, went skydiving on July 25, but, he told NECN, "I think my adrenaline was so high and I was just so excited, I didn't realize I had lost it." "It" was one of Marckres' two prosthetic legs. The double amputee was harnessed to an instructor and landed safely, but he didn't know where the leg ended up. His plea for help on Facebook was answered the next day by farmer Joe Marszalkowski, who found the prosthetic in his soybean field. Marckres said the leg suffered a few scratches but was otherwise unharmed. "We kind of take for granted sometimes how many truly good people there still are in the world," he mused. [NECN, 7/27/2020]

-- Mike Evans of Woodson Terrace, Missouri, went for a 5-mile float trip with friends on the Meramec River on July 25 and decided to get out of the raft and walk behind it in the water for a bit. As the water got deeper, he had to swim to catch the raft, and as he climbed back in, Evans discovered his prosthetic leg was gone, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. He searched with no luck, but a Missouri state trooper responding to a call nearby heard about the loss and coordinated a dive team to help. It took divers a couple of hours the next day to find the leg, saving Evans about $27,000 to replace it. "It was a happy ending to a stressful few days," Evans said. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 7/28/2020]

-- After Christian Meyer of Berlin, Germany, lost his running shoes to a thief, he posted a notice on a community sharing platform and learned other residents had also lost shoes that were left outside. Meyer soon discovered the culprit, telling local media on July 26 that he caught a fox "red-handed" with a pair of blue flip-flops in its mouth and eventually found its stash of more than 100 multicolored shoes, according to Fox News. Meyer's shoes, however, were not among them. [Fox News, 7/28/2020]

The Street Where You Live

Concerned friends of Hartford, Connecticut, retiree Victor King contacted police on July 26 when they couldn't reach King, who had recently reported being threatened with a samurai sword by a man he rented a room to, according to an arrest warrant. The Hartford Courant reported that first responders arriving at the house on Asylum Avenue found King's body, badly slashed and decapitated. Police began a search for the renter, Jerry David Thompson, who was soon found and arrested, but refused to cooperate with detectives, referring them instead to paperwork in his car indicating he believes himself to be a sovereign citizen and therefore not subject to the law. He was arraigned on July 28 and held on $2 million bail. [Hartford Courant, 7/28/2020]

Awesome!

A Gwinnett County (Georgia) Sheriff's deputy is recovering at home thanks to three inmates who came to his rescue. The unnamed inmates noticed the deputy didn't seem well as he conducted security checks, the sheriff's office said in a July 28 statement, and then saw him lose consciousness and fall to the floor, "splitting his head open." The inmates began shouting and banging on their doors, which roused the deputy enough that he "thought an inmate needed help and somehow managed to rise to his feet and press the control panel to open cell doors." The inmates rushed out and called for assistance as the deputy lost consciousness again, the Gwinnett Daily Post reported. "These inmates had no obligation whatsoever to render aid to a bleeding, vulnerable deputy, but they didn’t hesitate," the sheriff's office said. "We're proud of them." [Gwinnett Daily Post, 7/28/2020]

Inexplicable

Out for an early morning stroll on July 27, Mariel Kinney, 32, and Kevin Pinto, 30, drew the attention of residents in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, who called police to report a naked couple walking their dog down the street, authorities said. "It was kind of wild," Police Chief Joseph Bennett told the Milford Daily News. "They were buck naked." Officers asked the couple why they weren't wearing clothes, but they declined to answer or were incoherent, Bennett said, and "(t)here was a short foot pursuit." After a struggle, they were captured and charged with indecent exposure and assault and battery on a police officer, along with other crimes. [Milford Daily News, 7/27/2020]

-- Commuters in Berlin, Germany, are required to wear masks on public transportation, and are subject to fines if they don't. Despite that, reports Deutsche Welle, so many people wear their masks incorrectly (covering the mouth but not the nose) that Berlin's transport company, BVG, is now suggesting that riders skip deodorant when they're getting ready for the day, in hopes that the body odor on crowded trains will keep those masks in place. "Given that so many people think they can wear their masks under their noses, we're getting tough," read a bright yellow posting from July 1 on Twitter. "The BVG is calling for a general deodorant waiver. So now do you still want to have your nose out?" [DW, 7/3/2020]

-- Farm families in Botswana living beside the Chobe River have long battled herds of elephants that often pass through their fields at night, trampling crops as they move toward the river. Barking dogs and fences have failed to stop the elephants, the BBC reported on July 7, but farmers are having remarkable success with a new weapon: disco lights. Scientists from Elephants Without Borders placed solar-powered strobe lights that flash color patterns along the sides of fields elephants are known to walk through, frightening the elephants away. One farmer reported that before he had lights, "I had more elephants raid ... but in these two seasons with lights I have harvested successfully." [BBC, 7/7/2020]

News That Sounds Like a Joke

A man attempting to elude police in a stolen Toyota Land Cruiser on July 5 in Newberg, Oregon, crashed into a woman driving a Buick Regal that had been reported stolen three weeks before, giving police a two-fer. Newberg-Dundee police said they arrested the driver of the Toyota, Randy Lee Cooper, 27, and then found the driver of the Buick, Kristin Nicole Begue, 25, to be under the influence of intoxicants and arrested her, too, KOIN reported. Neither driver was injured [KOIN, 7/6/2020]

Suspicious

Liberty County (Georgia) sheriff's officers who found a body lying next to a railroad track in Allenhurst on July 14 followed protocol by covering the body with a sheet and waiting for the coroner. When the coroner arrived, detectives looked for injuries and quickly discovered the body was a female sex doll. WSAV reported that the doll was fully clothed and was anatomically correct. Officials think they may have been victims of a prank. [WSAV, 7/15/2020]

Least Competent Criminal

Wendy Wein, 51, of South Rockwood, Michigan, was arrested July 17 after offering an undercover state trooper $5,000 to kill her ex-husband and giving him money for travel expenses, WXYZ reported. Wein met the trooper after allegedly visiting the fake website rentahitman.com, where she completed a form requesting a consultation and named her ex-husband as the target. The owner of the website contacted Michigan State Police, who sent the undercover officer. "I'm very surprised that someone thought this website was a true website," said state police spokesman Lt. Brian Oleksyk. The website owner said over the last 15 years he's been contacted a number of times by people wanting someone killed, and he turns all of those requests over to law enforcement. [WXYZ, 7/21/2020]

Wait, What?

Iceland is offering a stressed-out world a unique way to blow off some steam, reports Sky News -- scream therapy. The country's tourist board is inviting people worldwide to record their screams to be played over loudspeakers in one of seven remote locations. "You've been through a lot this year," says the project website, "and it looks like you need the perfect place to let your frustrations out. Somewhere big, vast and untouched. It looks like you need Iceland." Psychotherapist Zoe Aston approves: "Using a scream as a way to release pent-up emotion allows you to ... reclaim the power that is inside you." Iceland has suffered relatively little during the COVID-19 pandemic, with 1,905 cases of the disease and 10 lives lost. [Sky News, 7/15/2020]

Compelling Explanation

What started as a report of a naked man running down a road hitting cars in Owensboro, Kentucky, on July 16, soon turned into a home burglary in progress, reports WFIE. Daviess County Sheriff's deputies said they arrived at the home around 1:30 a.m. to find John Stefanopoulos, 41, standing inside, naked and covered with mud and blood. Authorities said the suspect rushed the officers while repeatedly telling them he had used "mushrooms with Jesus and that they were playing a virtual reality video game together." Stefanopoulos was eventually tased and taken into custody. [WFIE, 7/17/2020]

"Incorrigibel"

Robert Berger, 25, of Huntington, New York, was scheduled to be sentenced last October after pleading guilty to possession of a stolen Lexus and attempting to steal a truck, but in an effort to avoid jail, he tried faking his own death, prosecutors charged on July 21. The scheme, they said, unraveled when authorities discovered a spelling error and inconsistencies in the font styles and sizes on the fake death certificate submitted by his lawyer. Further, The Associated Press reports, while Berger was "dead," he was arrested in Philadelphia for providing a false identity to police and stealing from a Catholic college. "It will never cease to amaze me the lengths some people will go to to avoid being held accountable on criminal charges," Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas said. "It's never a good idea to submit phony documents to the district attorney." [Associated Press, 7/21/2020]

Suspicions Confirmed

Andrea Balbi, president of the Gondola Association in Venice, Italy, announced on July 22 that the organization is reducing the maximum capacity allowed on the iconic boats from six persons to five, CNN reported. The change comes not because of social distancing, but because "over the last 10 years or so, tourists weigh more," Balbi said. He noted that heavier loads often mean the boats take on water, which makes it harder for the gondoliers to navigate in heavy traffic. "Going forward with over half a ton of meat on board is dangerous," remarked Raoul Roveratto, president of an association for substitute gondoliers. [CNN, 7/22/2020]

The Passing Parade

Fashion designer and activist Vivienne Westwood, 79, dressed in canary yellow, perched on a swing inside a giant metal birdcage outside London's Old Bailey court on July 21 and led a crowd in chanting, "Free Julian Assange!" Fox News reported Westwood said freeing Assange would mean "journalists can continue to tell the truth." The Wikileaks founder is being held in London awaiting an extradition hearing now scheduled for Sept. 7. [Fox News, 7/21/2020]

Justin Couch, 25, of Spring Hill, Florida, who sports a tattoo of a machete under his left eye, was arrested June 13, according to the Hernando (Florida) County Sheriff's Office, for allegedly attacking a man with a machete. The unnamed adult male victim told officers Crouch forced him out of the home where he'd been living and began arguing with him "for no reason," reported Fox13 News. As the man attempted to gather his belongings from the home, deputies said, Couch allegedly hit the victim with the flat side of the machete's blade, "then swung the machete at the victim's face," striking his arm with the blade as the man tried to ward off the blow. "The victim is currently unable to use or move his left hand due to the severity of the injury he sustained," investigators said. Couch was arrested for aggravated battery. [Fox 13 News, 6/19/2020]

Sign of the Times

A perfect storm may be brewing to strike down the long-maligned one-cent coin, the penny. Earlier this year, the U.S. Mint cut back on coin production to keep its workers safe amid the COVID-19 pandemic, reported NPR's Planet Money. At the same time, people stopped spending, especially with cash, and word of a coin shortage spread, prompting some stores, such as Kroger, to start rounding their prices to avoid making coin change. Last year, the mint made more than 7 billion pennies, almost 60% of its total coin production, and each one-cent coin cost TWO cents to produce, putting the loss at more than $72 million. Still, the mint has no plans to eliminate the coin. It's been up and running at full capacity since mid-June, and according to spokesman Michael White, about 40% of the coins it has produced since then have been pennies. [Planet Money, 7/14/2020]

Angry Animals

-- At Lassen Volcanic National Park in Northern California, five acres around Manzanita Lake were shut down after a man was attacked by an otter on June 25. Park Superintendent Jim Richardson told the Redding Record Searchlight the unnamed man was swimming in the river and came too close to the otter's offspring, known as kittens. "It is significant anytime an animal attacks a human," Richardson said. He did not believe the man was seriously injured, and he said the otter would not be relocated. "It's the protective momma (doing her job), and the attack came as a surprise," he said. [Record Searchlight, 6/30/2020]

-- Neighbors on Occidental Street in a North Oakland, California, are at odds over the presence of Bruce, aka Paco, aka Peter, aka Pierre, aka Abraham ... a peacock. While some residents are happy to welcome him, SFGate.com reported on July 15, others want him to move on and have lodged a complaint with the city. "For the past 15 weeks or so he has screamed relentlessly, every day," Jesse T. wrote on the Nextdoor app. "It literally feels like he is inside my house." The peacock is believed by Animal Control to be feral. But Dennis Fett of the Peacock Information Center in Minden, Iowa, thinks Bruce/Paco/Peter is providing a service. "They're like a watchdog," Fett said. "They have keen hearing. (The neighbors) should count their blessings." [SFGate.com, 7/15/2020]

Chutzpah!

Amber Gilles made news in San Diego, California, in June when she posted a photo of Starbucks barista Lenin Gutierrez, complaining that he "refused to serve me cause I'm not wearing a mask. Next time I will wait for cops and bring a medical exemption." In response, KGTV reported, Matt Cowan of Irvine started a GoFundMe page to collect tips for the barista who "faced ... a Karen in the wild," and soon raised more than $100,000, which Gilles now claims she should get half of. "I've been discriminated against," Gilles said, noting that hiring a lawyer to help her get her half was too expensive, so she has started her own GoFundMe page to raise money. Gutierrez said he plans to use the money to further his education and follow his dream of being a dancer. [KGTV, 7/15/2020]

Latest Religious Message

Maintenance workers pruning trees in Itaquirai, Brazil, on July 9 discovered a compelling image in a fresh cut from a willow tree. Some of them were convinced that Jesus Christ was depicted in the wood grain of the branch. Oddity Central reports Odimar Souza, who was overseeing the work, posted the image online and explained that just before the image was discovered, the chain on the worker's chainsaw broke and had to be replaced. Back at work, "we cut this same trunk in two pieces and that was when this perfection appeared," Souza wrote. [Oddity Central, 7/15/2020]

Inexplicable

An unnamed 37-year-old man driving along a Lincoln, Nebraska, street on July 14 came upon Dominic Kinser, 20, beating a car with a shovel, KOLN reported. After the man pulled over and got out of his car, Kinser turned his anger on him, according to police, yelling at the man and then going into his garage, where he grabbed a rifle, which he pointed at the passerby. Kinser, who police determined owned the car, was charged with making terroristic threats and possession of a deadly weapon in the commission of a felony. [KOLN, 7/15/2020]

Animal Lovers in Maine

-- At the Inn Town Motel in Norway, Maine, manager Andrew Coombs was not happy when he entered the room rented by Sean Schoomaker and his girlfriend July 11, hoping to collect payment, and discovered more than 50 large spiders, most of them tarantulas, in plastic boxes. "I booted him," Coombs told the Sun Journal. "He must have snuck them all in at night. We never would have allowed that in our motel." Animal Control officer Robert Larrabee responded to the motel, and the Maine Warden Service confiscated the arachnids, taking them to a facility for exotic animals in Lewiston. Schoomaker was cited for possession of three tarantulas that are illegal in the state. [Sun Journal, 7/15/2020]

-- Officers from the Somerset County (Maine) Sheriff's Department and the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency searched the apartment of Jessica Hutchins, 36, looking for drugs on July 13, which they found, according to Sheriff Dale Lancaster. "We also got an alligator out of her home," he told the Morning Sentinel. The 2-foot-long gator was being kept in Rubbermaid tubs, but, Lancaster said, having an alligator in Maine is illegal without proper permits. Officers seized a total of $12,000 worth of drugs along with the alligator, and Hutchins and several accomplices were charged with a number of drug-related crimes. The gator was removed by the Maine Warden Service. [Morning Sentinel, 7/16/2020]