Projo Offbeat Blog

If you're a bicyclist, you don't want to share the road with a hybrid car.

And you definitely don't want to share the road with the driver of a hybrid car who has the bad driver gene, which is said to exist in 30 percent of the driving population, except in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, where it's prevalent in 90 percent of drivers.

A disturbing new study by the National Transportation Safety Board takes the shine off all those do-gooders in their Insights and Priuses. The study concluded that hybrid cars strike bicyclists or pedestrians more often than conventional cars do.

Now some people chalk it up to the hybrids being quieter and suggest they need to be equipped with noise makers. (I think the sound of birds chirping or waves crashing would be appropriate.) But at least one writer hints that the high accident rate is the product of jealous tree huggers trying to bump off two groups that rank higher in the eco-friendly pecking order.

I'd like to think it's more innocent than that. I'd like to think that those dangerous drivers were just day-dreaming about saving piping plovers or hugging Al Gore.

And maybe they all have the bad driver gene. Another study recently showed that people with a certain gene variant performed 20 percent worse on a driving test.

The research suggests that some people are born bad drivers. (We all know kids who were always crashing their scooters into the kitchen table.) According to researchers, 30 percent of us have this gene variant. (Although none of us would admit to it, since we're all great drivers, right? It's all those other guys with the bad driving genes.)

The research means that there's a 30 percent chance that the guy who cut you off on the way to work this morning just couldn't help himself.

I bet you still don't feel bad about cursing him.

First we we got the bighorn sheep look, a hair style that left fashion models looking surprisingly similar to bighorn sheep.

Then we got the book hat, a smart look that enables fashion models to look brainy and maybe even absorb some knowledge by wearing books on their heads.

After that, we were treated to the garden hat, and discovered that wearers didn't have to leave their beautiful flower displays at home, but could tote them around on their heads and, if theirs was a vegetable garden, maybe even reach up for a healthy snack.

And now we see the sure-to-be-popular pastry hat (or, at least in one case, the pastry mask.) Above are a few that were displayed Sunday at the Tokyo Sweets Collection 2009 in Tokyo, Japan.

All of these look fashionable and tasty but my favorite is the wedding cake hat on the right. The most practical of all, a wedding cake hat would ensure that the bride could get around to see everyone at the reception.

"Hi, thanks for coming. Would you like a piece of cake? Here, just grab a slice from the top of my head."

Or if the bride and groom are the types who like to play the wedding-cake-fighting-game, it would give the bride a distinct advantage in that she could simply head butt the groom.

The Associated Press reports that a woman in South Korea has passed the written exam for her driver's license after 950 tries.

Cha Sa-soon, 68, succeeded after taking the test almost every day since April 2005.

Good for her, but would you want to catch a ride with her?

Or even drive on the same road?

In an apparently unrelated story, a driver in Oklahoma sideswiped an 8-foot, 4,500-pound elephant that had escaped from a circus.

Cha Sa-soon was not driving.

AP Photo
This screen grab released by ABC and "America's Funniest Home Videos", shows a dog in a tree from "America's Funniest Home Videos."

A exhaustive 19-year study has proven what most sensible animal lovers already knew: Dogs are the funniest animals of all.

But the study did turn up some surprising findings. It claims that cats are the second funniest. It also suggests that monkeys are overrated in the humor department.

The "study" bases its conclusions on prize winners from "America's Funniest Home Videos."

The story explains, "Dogs are a clear winner as the funniest animal - especially wiener dogs, Chihuahuas and pugs - judging by payouts from the series, which begins its 20th year on ABC next month.

"In the show's first 19 years, 260 animal videos have won $2.2 million for their videographers. More than half those winners (136) have been dogs for $1.4 million in prize money. There have been 34 cat champs making $210,000," the AP reports.

Dogs. Of course. But cats? Anything that takes itself as seriously as a cat clearly has no sense of humor. Cats aren't funny at all. In fact, I'm sure cats would be offended if they realized that anyone found them funny -- and then they'd show even more attitude and even less humor, if that were possible.

Nearly as surprising is the poor showing by monkeys. Monkeys ranked well behind cats. They also fell behind squirrels and birds. (Okay, talking birds can be funny, but how many times can they repeat that joke?)

Monkeys have starred in movies, television shows, kids books. Who doesn't laugh at "Curious George?" And yet viewers of this popular TV show ranked their videos right down their with clips starring such side splitters as goats, mice and whales.

Card makers think monkeys are funny too. Whenever I go to the store to look for a birthday card, there's no shortage of birthday cards showing monkeys doing funny things like wearing diapers, drinking beer or riding a bike. I usually fall for one of them and send it off figuring it will bring a chuckle to a friend or a family member.

I notice that I don't receive as many birthday cards as I used to. Now maybe I know why.

A comfortable recliner is great, but what guy wouldn't want a recliner he could drive to the local bar? I wonder if the man in this story has met the Ohio man who was charged with drunken driving after crashing his motorized bar stool.

The chair

DULUTH, Minn. (AP) -- A Minnesota man has pleaded guilty to driving his motorized La-Z-Boy chair while drunk. A criminal complaint says 62-year-old Dennis LeRoy Anderson told police he left a bar in the northern Minnesota town of Proctor on his chair after drinking eight or nine beers.

The driver

Prosecutors say Anderson's blood alcohol content was 0.29, more than three times the legal limit, when he crashed into a parked vehicle in August 2008. He was not seriously injured.

Police said the chair was powered by a converted lawnmower and had a stereo and cup holders. (This guy had to have been the envy of all the other guys in the neighborhood.)

Sixth Judicial District Judge Heather Sweetland stayed 180 days of jail time Monday and ordered two years of probation for Anderson. His attorney, David Keegan, did not immediately return a call for comment.

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Information from: Duluth News Tribune, http://www.duluthsuperior.com

Sure, most of us have probably wanted to backhand a karaoke singer at some point in our lives, but judging from this story, I'm thinking these women took it just a little too far:

STAMFORD, Conn. (AP) -- Police say a woman singing karaoke in a Connecticut sports bar was attacked by six other women who didn't like her performance.

Five of the women were arraigned on assault and other charges on Wednesday in Stamford Superior Court. The other woman appeared in court Monday on the same charges.

Police say the Sept. 23 attack on the 25-year-old woman from Port Chester, N.Y., happened during karaoke night at Bobby Valentine's Sports Gallery Cafe in Stamford.

Authorities say the six women, all under the legal drinking age of 21, knocked the singer to the floor, punched her and pulled her hair. The victim suffered bruises and a chipped tooth.

The victim has said she was singing "A Dios Le Pido" by Colombian superstar Juanes when the violence began.

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Information from: The Advocate, http://www.stamfordadvocate.com

The Top 10 signs (from relatively recent news stories) your marriage might hit a few bumps.

• 10 You star in a reality television show like Jon and Kate, Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown, Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey, the Hogans...


• 9 You marry a reality TV "star" just weeks after meeting her.


• 8 You're Chris Evert's third husband.


• 7 Your wife finds out you really weren't hiking.


• 6 You come from Nevada, where a lot of those those quickie weddings are apparently followed by quick divorces.


• 5 You picked up your future wife's $3,000 bar tab on the day you met.


• 4 Your wife fires a gun at you after discovering that you bought a more expensive Christmas gift for your alleged mistress.


• 3 Your once-loyal friend proposes a book revealing that you promised your alleged mistress that you'll marry her after your wife dies of cancer.
• 2 You come from Oklahoma, the state where you're most likely to run into somebody who has been married three or more times.



• 1 Two words: secret bedroom