Cheating controversy follows World Conker Championship [News of the Weird] – Reading Eagle
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At the annual World Conker Championship in Southwick, England, on Oct. 13, veteran player Dave Jakins, 82, won the men’s tournament, the Associated Press reported. (Conkers is a traditional game played using the seeds of horse chestnut trees threaded on string; players try to strike and break each other’s conkers.) But controversy followed when Jakins was found to have a steel conker in his pocket. His opponent, Alastair Johnson-Ferguson, said his own conker “disintegrated in one hit” after Jakins struck it.
“He was very closely watched by four judges,” said St. John Burkett, chair of the event’s organizing committee. “It looks like it was absolutely impossible for him to cheat.”
Jakins has denied cheating.
An unnamed woman in Kitsap County, Wash., admitted to authorities that she’d been feeding about “a dozen” raccoons in her yard over the past 35 years, The New York Times reported. Several weeks ago, more raccoons started showing up, and on Oct. 3, the homeowner had to call 911 when about 100 animals arrived and became more aggressive.
“Anytime she comes out of her house,” said sheriff’s department spokesperson Kevin McCarty, “they swarm her until she throws them food. … The new ones showing up scare her.”
The woman fled her home, and local trappers were going to charge $500 per animal to remove the raccoons. So the state department of fish and wildlife stepped in, suggesting that she simply stop feeding them.
“The raccoons appear to have started dispersing now that they are no longer being fed,” the department said.
When cops in Portland, Ore., pulled over a 1994 Ford Taurus that had been stolen on Oct. 9, they met Reginald Reynolds, 35, and Mia Baggenstos, 37, along with their toys: a loaded .357 Magnum, a bag of methamphetamine, $1,360 in cash, three white pills that Baggenstos said were OxyContin and a meth pipe. The Smoking Gun reported that a vehicle search yielded more meth, two scales, and a “brown bag that said on it, ‘Definitely not a bag full of drugs.’” Inside, they found more meth — a total of about a half-pound. Both were charged with multiple felonies.
In early October, The New York Times reported, passengers aboard a Qantas flight from Sydney, Australia, to Tokyo were treated (or not) to an R-rated film with “sexual material and brief graphic nudity” on their seat screens — and it couldn’t be turned off. Because of technological problems, passengers weren’t able to choose their entertainment, so the crew queued up “Daddio,” starring Dakota Johnson and Sean Penn, and let it run for about an hour before switching to something more family-friendly.
“It was super uncomfortable for everyone,” one Reddit user wrote.
“We apologize to customers for this experience,” a Qantas spokesperson said.
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