Overdosing on Halls?! NEVER! / Today's Distraught Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

I didn't know it was possible to technically overdose on these Vitamin C with echinacea Halls. I've only had three, and the package says there's a maximum of two a day. Whoops. Technically, I'm not a fan of overmedication... but I don't think I'll experience problems. My throat at least feels way better (right now?), and at least it's not sleeping pills / Tylenol or something like that! That can be truly deadly, which references my sister's fear that I'll be unconscious / dead of a heart attack in bed under my blankets. To me, it also references these true crime stories I hear about which involve serious overdoses of sleeping aids and THEN suffocation with a pillow. The cotton fibers never lie, criminals! :P


Today's Distraught Yet Truly Morbid Fact!

Before cops threw the book at him, Jakub Fik threw something unusual at them -- his penis. Fik, 33, cut off his own penis during a Northwest Side rampage Wednesday morning, March 15, 2006. When confronted by police, Fik hurled several knives and his severed organ at the officers. Officers stunned him with a Taser and took him into custody. "We took him out without any serious injury, with the exception of his own," said Chicago Police Sgt. Edward Dolan of the 16th District. Doctors at Northwestern Memorial Hospital reattached Fik's penis. He was listed in good condition Thursday. Fik, who lives in the 5400 block of W. Berenice, is charged with two counts of aggravated assault and one count of criminal damage to property. He told paramedics he was distraught over problems with his girlfriend in Poland. Police arrived on Fik's block at 8:20 AM Wednesday after receiving reports he was smashing car windows. Fik then broke into a house down the block. A group of six or seven officers assembled in front of the house. The occupants were not home. Fik was bleeding when the officers arrived, and may have already cut off his organ. "At that point, this guy came running out, naked, with a handful of knives... and started throwing knives at the police officers that were 10, 20, 30 feet away," Dolan said. Fik threw his penis during the confrontation, too. He then went back into the house and re-emerged with "another handful of knives." Dolan sneaked to the side of the bungalow's front steps and stunned Fik with the Taser. Fik fought back when officers went to restrain him. "About 10 feet from the front porch, right on the sidewalk, was his penis," Dolan said. Dr. Greg Bales, associate professor of urology at the University of Chicago, said severed penises are uncommon, but surgery usually works. "As long as the penis is placed on ice and reattached within a few hours, the success is usually pretty good," Bales said.

Culled from: The Chicago Sun-Times
Generously submitted by: Desmodus

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How upset do you have to be to cut off your own penis and hurl it at the police? I mean, I just about went postal at Washington Mutual the other day when they put a ridiculous 11-day hold on the money I just deposited to my checking account (hate that bank... HATE.THAT.F-ING.BANK!!!!!), but even as unmedicated as I was, I would never think to chop off a breast and hurl it at the clerk.

Maybe it's a guy thing?

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Ruthless Rhyme Du Jour!

I've been reading Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes and More Ruthless Rhymes by Harry Graham, a collection of hysterical poems originally published in 1899, and I thought I'd share with you some of my favorites.

L'ENFANT GLACE

When Baby's cries grew hard to bear
I popped him in the Frigidaire.
I never would have done so if
I'd known that he'd be frozen stiff.
My wife said: "George, I'm so unhappé!
Our darling's now completely frappé!"

Ruthless Rhymes For Heartless Homes

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Follow-Up Du Jour!

Back on February 20th, I featured a fact about the munitions ship explosion in Halifax, Nova Scotia on December 6, 1917, which resulted in 2,000 deaths and 9,000 injuries, many of which were caused by people watching the burning ships through plate glass windows that fragmented in the explosion. Peter has a personal connection to this gruesome incident:

"My grandfather was a physician in the Canadian Army during the First World War. He was in Halifax on the day of the explosion, and spent the next three days working with an eye surgeon, doing anaesthesia while the other doc picked glass out of the faces of people who had watched the ships burn. He didn't like to talk about it much."

Ah, that stoic older generation of men. Think of all the great stories we've missed out on because these guys didn't like to talk!

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Morbid Trinket Du Jour!

Okay, I meant to run this one before the new year, but forgot. But if you're still looking for the perfect 2007 calendar, why not take the Men of Mortuaries calendar into consideration?

Thanks to Alan for the link.

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Wretched Recommendations!

Wilf has a book recommendation:

"I just thought you might like to know about another book on London's strange history (and there's plenty of it). It's by a guy called James Clark, who I will not deny is a friend of mine, but it's well put together. The book is called Haunted Wandsworth (a borough of London), and has a range of old stories and new. He is actually a qualified paranormal investigator. If you like Call of Cthulhu (the Lovecraft roleplaying game), you will know they are the ones who go mad first, if they survive that long.... He is also writing another one on London ghost / paranormal stories in general, though it has to be said that it's likely to feature much new material."

Haunted Wandsworth by James Clark