Weird Universe Archive

December 2020

December 26, 2020

Hearing music while checking a pulse

According to a recent report in the New England Journal of Medicine, when hospital workers in Southern California used a handheld Doppler device to check the pulse of a 65-year-old man who had recently had both hips replaced, they heard music. Other Doppler devices also picked up music seeming to come from inside the man. However, they didn't hear music from any other patients. The doctors concluded that the man's prosthetic hips were picking up a radio station.

LiveScience.com has identified the song his hips were playing as "Gracias Por Tu Amor" by Banda El Recodo De Cruz Lizarraga.

Posted By: Alex - Sat Dec 26, 2020 - Comments (3)
Category: Health, Music, Skulls, Bones and Skeletons

December 25, 2020

Santa Claus sues Santa Claus

The dispute began in 1935 between two toy and candy companies, both based in the town of Santa Claus, Indiana. On one side there was Santa Claus, Inc. On the other side was Santa Claus of Santa Claus, Inc. The former alleged that the latter shouldn't have chosen such a similar name.

In response, Santa Claus of Santa Claus, Inc. charged that its rival illegally put up a 25-foot, 20-ton Santa statue on land leased to Santa Claus of Santa Claus, Inc.

The lawsuit, Santa Claus, Inc. v. Santa Claus of Santa Claus, Inc., eventually made its way up to the Indiana Supreme Court.

As far as I can tell, Santa Claus of Santa Claus, Inc. won the fight. But either way you look at it, Santa Claus won.

Muncie Evening Press - Dec 30, 1935

Posted By: Alex - Fri Dec 25, 2020 - Comments (0)
Category: Lawsuits, 1930s, Christmas

Merry Christmas 2020!

Otherwise known as "Santa Claus's Mistake."

Posted By: Paul - Fri Dec 25, 2020 - Comments (8)
Category: Holidays, Toys, Gender, Goofs and Screw-ups

December 24, 2020

Nativity with Santa and Rudolph

In 2009, Marion Davis of Randallstown, Maryland got a design patent for this "Nativity scene decoration including Santa Claus and Rudolph".

But why stop with Santa and Rudolph? She could have added Frosty the Snowman and the Coca-Cola polar bears for even more holiday cheer.

Posted By: Alex - Thu Dec 24, 2020 - Comments (2)
Category: Patents, Christmas

December 23, 2020

Phone Calls From the Dead

As opposed to phone calls from telemarketers, who are more like the living dead.

"Scientific" parapsychologists D. Scott Rogo and Raymond Bayless have recently discovered a startling fact: that dozens of people have had telephone calls from the dead. "The weight of evidence has convinced us that there are surviving spirits making attempts to contact living people" through the telephone, Bayless told the National Enquirer. Their new book, Phone Calls from the Dead, describes fifty such cases. Unfortunately, if the person receiving the call realizes that he is speaking to a spirit from the Beyond, the call is usually over within seconds, they say. Some postmortem calls arrive, appropriately enough, over dead telephone lines. Rogo believes that these calls occur when a spirit manipulates electrical impulses in the phone to reproduce the sound of its own voice. "We've stumbled on a whole new mothod of psychic communication!" says Rogo.
The Skeptical Inquirer - Summer 1979



Posted By: Alex - Wed Dec 23, 2020 - Comments (4)
Category: Death, Paranormal, Books, 1970s

Metric Lunch Box

Imagine the insults suffered by the dweeb forced by well-meaning parents to carry this lunch pail to school.

The objects children take to school can communicate messages. In the 1970s, the U.S. government encouraged more general use of the metric units of weight and measure, units that had been adopted in almost all other nations. To teach children about metric units, some parents purchased this lunch box.




Source.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Dec 23, 2020 - Comments (1)
Category: Food, Government, Science, Bullying, Harassment, Outsiders, Persecuted, and Excluded Groups, Children, 1970s

December 22, 2020

Finding a needle in a haystack

ARTnews reports that the artist Sven Sachsalber recently died at the young age of 33. Sachsalber's most famous work, which Chuck posted about in 2014, was when he spent two days searching for, and eventually finding, a needle hidden in a haystack.



Some of Sachsalber's other works (or 'performances') included:

  • Completing, with his father, a 13,200-piece puzzle of Michelangelo's Creation of Adam
  • Eating a poisonous mushroom
  • Spending 24 hours in a room with a cow

For whatever it's worth, Sachsalber wasn't the first person to try and find a needle in a haystack. Legendary publicist Jim Moran did the exact same stunt back in 1939.

Popular Science - July 1939
Note: despite what the caption says, Moran did find the needle.
He then sent it to the Smithsonian.

Posted By: Alex - Tue Dec 22, 2020 - Comments (5)
Category: Publicity Stunts, Homages, Pastiches, Tributes and Borrowings, Performance Art, Obituaries

When Belgium Invaded England



Very good long article here.

Tip of the hat to pal Peter Danssaert.

Posted By: Paul - Tue Dec 22, 2020 - Comments (1)
Category: Government, Oceans and Maritime Pursuits, War, Reader Recommendation, 1960s, Europe, United Kingdom

Page 2 of 7 pages  < 1 2 3 4 >  Last ›




Get WU Posts by Email

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner


weird universe thumbnail
Who We Are
Alex Boese
Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction books such as Elephants on Acid.

Paul Di Filippo
Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1.

Chuck Shepherd
Chuck is the purveyor of News of the Weird, the syndicated column which for decades has set the gold-standard for reporting on oddities and the bizarre.

Our banner was drawn by the legendary underground cartoonist Rick Altergott.

Contact Us
Monthly Archives
October 2024 •  September 2024 •  August 2024 •  July 2024 •  June 2024 •  May 2024 •  April 2024 •  March 2024 •  February 2024 •  January 2024

December 2023 •  November 2023 •  October 2023 •  September 2023 •  August 2023 •  July 2023 •  June 2023 •  May 2023 •  April 2023 •  March 2023 •  February 2023 •  January 2023

December 2022 •  November 2022 •  October 2022 •  September 2022 •  August 2022 •  July 2022 •  June 2022 •  May 2022 •  April 2022 •  March 2022 •  February 2022 •  January 2022

December 2021 •  November 2021 •  October 2021 •  September 2021 •  August 2021 •  July 2021 •  June 2021 •  May 2021 •  April 2021 •  March 2021 •  February 2021 •  January 2021

December 2020 •  November 2020 •  October 2020 •  September 2020 •  August 2020 •  July 2020 •  June 2020 •  May 2020 •  April 2020 •  March 2020 •  February 2020 •  January 2020

December 2019 •  November 2019 •  October 2019 •  September 2019 •  August 2019 •  July 2019 •  June 2019 •  May 2019 •  April 2019 •  March 2019 •  February 2019 •  January 2019

December 2018 •  November 2018 •  October 2018 •  September 2018 •  August 2018 •  July 2018 •  June 2018 •  May 2018 •  April 2018 •  March 2018 •  February 2018 •  January 2018

December 2017 •  November 2017 •  October 2017 •  September 2017 •  August 2017 •  July 2017 •  June 2017 •  May 2017 •  April 2017 •  March 2017 •  February 2017 •  January 2017

December 2016 •  November 2016 •  October 2016 •  September 2016 •  August 2016 •  July 2016 •  June 2016 •  May 2016 •  April 2016 •  March 2016 •  February 2016 •  January 2016

December 2015 •  November 2015 •  October 2015 •  September 2015 •  August 2015 •  July 2015 •  June 2015 •  May 2015 •  April 2015 •  March 2015 •  February 2015 •  January 2015

December 2014 •  November 2014 •  October 2014 •  September 2014 •  August 2014 •  July 2014 •  June 2014 •  May 2014 •  April 2014 •  March 2014 •  February 2014 •  January 2014

December 2013 •  November 2013 •  October 2013 •  September 2013 •  August 2013 •  July 2013 •  June 2013 •  May 2013 •  April 2013 •  March 2013 •  February 2013 •  January 2013

December 2012 •  November 2012 •  October 2012 •  September 2012 •  August 2012 •  July 2012 •  June 2012 •  May 2012 •  April 2012 •  March 2012 •  February 2012 •  January 2012

December 2011 •  November 2011 •  October 2011 •  September 2011 •  August 2011 •  July 2011 •  June 2011 •  May 2011 •  April 2011 •  March 2011 •  February 2011 •  January 2011

December 2010 •  November 2010 •  October 2010 •  September 2010 •  August 2010 •  July 2010 •  June 2010 •  May 2010 •  April 2010 •  March 2010 •  February 2010 •  January 2010

December 2009 •  November 2009 •  October 2009 •  September 2009 •  August 2009 •  July 2009 •  June 2009 •  May 2009 •  April 2009 •  March 2009 •  February 2009 •  January 2009

December 2008 •  November 2008 •  October 2008 •  September 2008 •  August 2008 •  July 2008 •