NewsQuirks 712

Pre-Frontal Dispatches

Despite threats of a U.S. invasion, Iraq doubled exports of oil to U.S. refineries, helping them cope with the most chronic shortage of oil stocks in 27 years and offset the loss of 1.5 million barrels per day from Venezuela because of that country's strike. The report by London's Observer newspaper said that the shipment, which involved diverting oil bound for European and Asian customers, is legal under the terms of the United Nations' oil for food program.

U.S. sperm banks began offering servicemen being deployed to the Middle East free storage and discounts on sperm processing. Lab managers explained that the men making inquiries are concerned less about dying in combat than about returning to discover they're infertile from exposure to anthrax and smallpox vaccinations and chemical and biological agents. "You wouldn't believe the interest we have gotten," said Dr. Cappy Rothman, medical director of California Cryobank, which advertises up to a year's free storage. "We now have about 40 troops in the past two or three weeks who have gone out of their way to store their sperm before they go to war."

Why They Call It Dope

After someone called police in Surrey, British Columbia, then hung up, officers responded to the house from which the call was placed. According to the Vancouver Sun, an unnamed 60-year-old woman who answered the door told the officers that she had heard that if she dialed 911 she would get a recording informing her if the police were tapping her phone. After assuring her that such wasn't the case, the officers found "a reasonably sized marijuana-growing operation" in the house, and arrested the woman and three men.

Crime in Search of a Motive

Authorities in Davenport, Iowa, reported that a man wearing a 12-can beer box over his head with eyeholes cut into it walked into a food store and sprayed produce with a fire extinguisher. Tony Fuhrmeister, the store's assistant director, said that the 13-second assault cost nearly $20,000 because all the produce had to be destroyed, and extra store personnel worked eight hours to clean up the mess.

Fringe Benefits

Italian prosecutors charged 67 air traffic controllers with regularly leaving their posts at Milan's Linate airport to play soccer, shop or attend parties. The prosecutors conceded that no crashes or other incidents resulted from the controllers' absences.

Drooling in Anticipation

Anti-bacterial chemicals formed by the saliva of nursing calves could become essential ingredients of toothpastes and antiseptic creams, according to researchers at Westgate Biological of Dublin. Director Mike Folan told New Scientist magazine that the chemicals, which help protect newborn calves while their immune systems develop, create a protein residue that when added to toothpaste slowed the build-up of dental plaque by two-thirds.

Necktie Party

Paul Connick Jr., the district attorney for Jefferson Parish, La., reprimanded two assistant district attorneys for attending a hearing in a capital murder case wearing ties decorated with a hangman's noose and the Grim Reaper. Defense attorney Clive Stafford Smith accused Donnie Rowan and Cameron Mary of making light of the possibility that his client could get the death penalty if convicted. "They were a joke," Connick explained, "although a poor joke."

Little Things Mean a Lot

Police in the Philippines accused Arnel Orbeta of shooting Eduardo Cristomar, 40, who challenged the men at a drinking party in Antipolo City to show their penises to determine whose was the biggest. Officer Joseph Pueblo said that Orbeta immediately unzipped his pants and showed his organ, but Cristomar responded by laughing at Orbeta and refused to show his penis. Orbeta pulled a gun and shot Cristomar several times.