A short time ago, Dick Wulf posted this years nominees for the Darwin
Awards.  I was fascinated to discover that, in the same emailbag, was
another copy -- but significantly different.  I decided to wait a while
before posting it, but here it is...

For your (additional) reading pleasure.


>Subject: Darwin Award nominees for 1997 
>
>Official Winner of Darwin Awards Announced! 
>
>THE DARWIN AWARDS Date: Friday, 12 September 1997 6:32 PM 
>	The Darwin Award is made each year to the person who has managed to kill
>themselves  (and therefore prevent the survival of their genes - hence
>Darwin!) in the most bizarre way imaginable. Previous winners have included
>the man killed when the vending machine he was trying to extract a can of
>Coke from fell on him, and last years aviator who strapped a JATO (Jet
>Assist Take Off.  This story was a real scream.  I think I have already told
>this one to most of you.)  module to his car and lit the blue touchpaper.
>
>NOMINATIONS
>
>#1 - [AP, Mammoth Lakes, CA] A San Anselmo man died yesterday when he  hit a
>lift tower at the Mammoth mountain ski area while riding down the slope on a
>foam pad, authorities said. David Hubal, 22, was pronounced dead at
>Centinela Mammoth Hospital. The accident occurred about 3 a.m.,  the Mono
>County Sheriff's Department said. Hubal and his friends 
>apparently had hiked up a ski run called Stump Alley and undid some yellow
>foam protectors from the lift towers, said Lieutenant Mike Donnelly of the
>Mammoth Lakes Police Department. The pads are used to protect skiers who
>might hit the towers. The group apparently used the pads to slide down the
>ski slope and Hubal crashed into a tower. It has since been investigated
>that the tower he hit was the one with its pad  removed.
>
>#2 - [AP, St. Louis, MO] Robert Puelo, 32, was apparently being disorderly
>in a St. Louis market. When the clerk threatened to call police, Puelo
>grabbed a hot dog, shoved it in his mouth, and walked out without paying for
>it. Police found him unconscious in front of the store; paramedics removed
>the six-inch wiener from his throat, where it had choked him to death.
>
>#3 - [UPI, Spain] To poacher Marino Malerba, who shot a stag standing  above
>him on an overhanging rock-and was killed instantly when it fell on him.  
>
>#4 - [Associated Press, Kincaid, W. VA] A man at a party popped a  blasting
>cap into his mouth and bit down, triggering an explosion that blew off his
>lips, teeth and tongue, state police said Wednesday. Jerry Stromyer, 24, of
>Kincaid, bit the blasting cap as a prank during a party late Tuesday night,
>said Cpl. M.D. Payne. "Another man had it in an aquarium, hooked to a
>battery, and was trying to explode it," Payne said. "It wouldn't go off and
>this guy said, "I'll show you how to set it off."  "He put it in his mouth
>and bit down. It blew all his teeth off, his tongue and his lips," Payne
>said. Stromyer was listed in guarded condition Wednesday with extensive
>facial injuries, according to a spokesman at Charleston Area Medical
>Division. "I just can't imagine anyone doing something like that," Payne said.
>
># 5 - [UPI, Portland, OR] Doctors at Portland's University Hospital said
>Wednesday an Oregon man shot through the skull by a hunting arrow is lucky
>to be alive, and will be released soon from  the hospital. Tony Roberts, 25,
>lost his right eye last weekend during an initiation into a men's rafting
>club, Mountain Men Anonymous, in Grants Pass, Ore. A friend tried to shoot a
>beer can off his head, but the arrow entered Roberts' right eye. Doctors
>said had the arrow gone 1 millimeter to the 
>left, a major blood vessel would have cut and Roberts would have died
>instantly. Neurosurgeon Dr. Johnny Delashaw at the University Hospital in
>Portland said the arrow went through 8 to 10 inches of brain, with the tip
>protruding at the rear of his skill, yet somehow managed to miss all major
>blood vessels. Delashaw also said had Robert tried to pull the arrow out on
>his own he surely would have killed himself. Roberts admitted afterwards
>that he and his friends had been drinking that 
>afternoon. Said Roberts, "I feel so dumb about this." No charges have been
>filed but the Josephine County district attorney's office said the
>initiation stunt is under investigation.
>
>6 - [AP, Arkansas] A woman named Linda went to Arkansas last week to visit
>her in-laws, and while there, went to a store. She parked next to a car with
>a woman sitting in it, her eyes closed and hands behind her head, apparently
>sleeping. When Linda came out a while later, she again saw the woman, her
>hands still behind her head but with her eyes open.   The woman looked very
>strange, so Linda tapped on the window and said,  "Are you okay?" The woman
>answered "I've been shot in the head, and I am holding my brains in. " Linda
>didn't know what to do; so she ran into the store where store officials
>called the paramedics. They had to break into the car because the door was
>locked. When they got in, they found that the woman had bread dough on the
>back of her head and in her hands.  A Pillsbury biscuit canister had
>exploded, apparently from the heat in  the car, making a loud explosion like
>that of a gunshot, and hit her in the head. When she reached back to find
>what it was, she felt the dough and thought it was her brains. She passed
>out from fright at first, then  attempted to hold her brains in!
>
>#7 - From a radio program, a true report of a happening in Michigan,  USA. A
>guy buys brand new Jeep Grand Cherokee for $30,000 and has $400+  monthly
>payments. He and a friend go duck hunting and of course all the lakes are
>frozen. These two Atomic Brains go to the lake with the guns,  the dog, the
>beer, and of course the new vehicle. They drive out onto the lake ice and
>get ready. Now, they want to make some kind of a natural landing area for
>the ducks, something for the decoys to float on. In order to make a hole
>large enough to look like something a wandering duck would fly down and land
>on, it is going to take a little more effort than an ice hole drill. Out of
>the back of the new Grand Cherokee comes a stick of dynamite with a short,
>40-second fuse. Now these two Rocket Scientists do take into consideration
>that if they place the stick of dynamite on the ice at a location far from
>where they are standing (and the new Grand Cherokee), they take the risk of 
>slipping on the ice when they run from the burning fuse and possibly go up
>in smoke with the resulting blast. So, they decide to light this 40-second
>fuse and throw the dynamite. Remember a couple of paragraphs back when I
>mentioned the vehicle, the beer, the guns and the dog? Yes,  the dog: A
>highly trained Black Lab used for retrieving, especially things thrown by
>the owner. You guessed it, the dog takes off at a high  rate of doggy speed
>on the ice and captures the stick of dynamite with 
>the burning 40-second fuse about the time it hits the ice. The two men yell,
>scream, wave arms, and wonder what to do now. The dog, cheered on, keeps
>coming. One of the guys grabs the shotgun and shoots the dog. The shotgun is
>loaded with 8 duck shot, hardly big enough to stop a Black Lab. The dog
>stops for a moment, slightly confused but continues on. Another shot and
>this time the dog, still standing, becomes really confused and of course
>scared, thinking these two Nobel Prize winners have gone insane. He takes
>off to find cover, (with the now really short fuse burning on the stick of
>dynamite) under the brand new Cherokee.  BOOM! Dog and Cherokee are blown to
>bits and sink to the bottom of the lake in a very large hole, leaving the
>two candidates for Co-leaders of  the Known Universe standing there with
>this "I can't believe this happened" look on their faces. The insurance
>company says that sinking a vehicle in a lake by illegal use of explosives
>is not covered. He had yet to make the first of those $400+ a month payments.
>
>AND THE WINNER John Pernicky and friend Sal Hawkins, of the great state of
>Washington, decided to attend a local Metallica concert at the Amphitheater
>at Gorge, Washington. Having no tickets (but 18 beers among them) they sat
>in the parking lot, and after finishing the beer, decided that it would be
>easy enough to hop over the nine-foot high fence and sneak into the show.
>The two friends pulled their pickup truck over to the fence and the plan was
>for John--100 pounds heavier than Sal--to hop over, and then assist his
>friend over the fence. Unfortunately for John,  there was a 30 foot drop on
>the other side of the fence. Having heaved himself over, he found himself
>crashing through a tree. His fall was abruptly halted by a large branch that
>snagged him by his shorts.   Dangling from the tree, with one arm broken,
>John looked down and saw a 
>group of bushes below him. Figuring the bushes would break his fall,  John
>removed his pocket knife and proceeded to cut away his shorts to free
>himself from the tree. When finally free, John crashed below into Holly
>bushes. The sharp leaves scratched his entire body and now being without his
>shorts, he was the unwilling victim of a holly branch penetrating his rectal
>cavity. To make matters worse, his pocketknife proceeded to fall with him
>and landed three inches into his left thigh. 
>Seeing his friend in considerable pain and agony, Sal decided to throw him a
>rope and pull him to safety. However, weighing about 100 pounds less, he
>decided the best course of action would be to tie the rope to the pickup
>truck. This is when things went from bad to worse. In his drunken state, Sal
>put the truck into the wrong gear, pressed on the gas, and crashed through
>the fence, landing on and killing his friend.   Sal was thrown from the
>truck, suffered massive internal injuries and also died at the scene. Police
>arrived to find a pickup truck with its driver thrown 100 feet from the
>vehicle and upon moving the truck, a half naked man, with numerous
>scratches, a holly stick up his rectum, a knife in his thigh, and a pair of
>shorts dangling from the tree branches 25 feet in the air.
>
>

Jeff and Belinda Smith - WilderLands Hold        <*))))))<
===================================================
 "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, 
 committed people can change the world...

 "Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has!"
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Beaverton, OR     <http://www.teleport.com/~thehold>