Quick Takes

Tactless sales tactic

It may be the last thing patients of the Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre’s cancer ward wanted to see: an advertisement for a funeral home. But managers at the Barrie, Ontario, hospital allowed a funeral home ad on a parking garage gate for cancer patients. “It was very upsetting for all of us,” Lori Waltenbury, who was taking her aunt to chemotherapy, told the Toronto Star. “She was really disheartened [by it].” Waltenbury complained, to no avail, and finally posted a picture of the advertisement on Facebook on Sept. 29. The post was shared 11,000 times and generated a response from the hospital. A spokeswoman said the hospital had apologized to Waltenbury and taken the sign down.

Pothole publicity

Angered by the road conditions on her way to work, a Thai woman protested potholes by taking a bath in one. The acclaimed Thai model Palm donned a shower cap and robe before wading into a few large potholes in a road in the nation’s Tak province. As pictures of her protest circulated on social media, the ensuing publicity inspired copycats to take their own pothole baths in the Southeast Asian nation’s degraded roads. Within days of Palm’s protest, the governor of Tak announced that repairs on the potholes would begin immediately.

Outlaw for a morning

At the age of 102, Edie Simms can finally cross another item off her bucket list: getting arrested. Police in St. Louis took the elderly Simms into custody at a local senior center—at her request—on Sept. 30. Though Simms didn’t break the law, St. Louis police were willing to handcuff her and treat her to a ride in the back of a police cruiser all the same. She returned to the senior center before midday bingo, and the local television station KTVI asked her whether she enjoyed her arrest. “Oh yes,” she said. “Handcuffs and all.”

Trick shot

Des Moines, Iowa, police pulled over a fleeing suspect with the help of an unwitting partner: the suspect himself. Police say 24-year-old Taylor Parker managed to shoot out his own tire during a high-speed chase on Sept. 29. Officials say Parker tossed a shotgun out the window, and when the gun hit the ground, it fired off, blowing a hole in Parker’s tire. An officer caught and arrested the suspect when he fled on foot. Police report that the man was apprehended with a “significant quantity” of methamphetamine drugs.

Flood of opinion

A typo on C-SPAN caused one Virginia woman’s cell phone to (as the kids say) blow up. During the Sept. 26 presidential debate, the cable political network inadvertently plastered Tripp Diaz’s cell phone number on-screen, asking viewers to comment on Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton’s performance. Inundated with responses, Diaz’s phone fielded more than 13,000 text messages and 600 calls. “I thought my phone was broken or hacked,” Diaz told WJLA. The flood of texts didn’t cost Diaz—she has unlimited texting—but she said she had to put the phone on airplane mode to sleep.

Rooster on the run

If Henry Gaston can’t catch his rooster by Oct. 26, he’ll face a fine and a very angry judge. On Sept. 26, Pittsburgh Municipal Court Judge Oscar Petite Jr. gave Gaston one more month to catch a rooster on his land that has been driving neighbors crazy for years. Before granting Gaston’s last chance, Petite grilled the Pennsylvania property owner for his failure to catch the bird. Gaston pleaded with the judge, saying the animal is not his and noting his previous attempts to poison the rooster have failed. The judge suggested trapping the animal with a net before granting Gaston one last continuance.

Police impression

In the future, John Angelini may want to pick his targets more carefully. Authorities say the 51-year-old Baltimore man was impersonating a police officer when he attempted to pull over a real police officer on Sept. 28. A Montgomery County Police detective reported that Angelini pulled behind his unmarked police cruiser in a Ford Crown Victoria and then blared a siren. When the plainclothes detective failed to stop, Angelini then drove away. After the detective determined Angelini’s car was not an official vehicle, the detective pulled him over and arrested him for impersonating an officer.

Holiday trappings?

How confusing can the Russian language be? Officials with a Russian charity are upset after a typographical error at a print shop left 1 million leaflets accidentally advocating for killing beavers. According to Mercy Capital foundation spokesman Ivan Makarov, the Russian-language Christmas leaflets were supposed to read, “Do good!” but instead came back with “Exterminate beavers!” printed on them. Makarov said the printing shop is refusing to fix the error by printing new leaflets, claiming that no one will notice the typo. The charity is preparing a lawsuit to recoup the roughly $6,000 it paid for the print job

Don’t bet on it

In one bout at the 2016 Rio Olympics, Irish boxer Steven Donnelly was both a winner and a loser. Bored—and apparently lacking confidence—before an Olympic boxing match this summer, Donnelly placed a bet with a bookmaker that he would lose his bout with Tuvshinbat Byamba of Mongolia. The bet against himself proved foolish, however, as the 28-year-old Donnelly ended up beating Byamba on a split decision. The International Olympic Committee reprimanded Donnelly and two other boxers for betting on fights. But the committee didn’t give harsher penalties because, it said, the men were unaware of Olympic rules against sports betting and had “no intent to manipulate any event.”