Saturday, December 17, 2011

Bear living in New Jersey Man's Basement: How did that happen? by Kate Johns

My husband sent me a story the other day of how a bear was hibernating in a New Jersey man's basement.
Here's a snippet of the story: The 550-pound bear that was found hiding out in a New Jersey basement had been living there for weeks.
Frank Annacone, 85, never imagined that a bear would move in with him.
“I could have ended up lunch for that big guy,” he said, still expressing disbelief.
Annacone learned about his roommate yesterday from Dave Cornine, a cable technician who had come over for a repair job in the basement.
“I heard the growl, I thought what is that noise,” Cornine said.
Cornine turned around and saw an enormous black bear waking up in the corner. He didn’t stick around to make friends with  the bear.
“I just freaked out, threw my tools, ran out of the basement,” he said.
When Animal Control officers attempted to trap the bear he took off, leading them on an hour-long chase.
After reading this story, I had many questions: how can anyone not notice a bear living in the basement? What kind of basement did this man have, that the bear could just walk in?
How could you not hear a bear making noise in your basement? All I can figure is this 85 year old man, was hard of hearing. He must have a basement that leads to the outdoors, or has a very large, loose door leading to the outside. Either that or Frank is this side of senile, and needs to live somewhere a tad bit safer, because if a bear can get into his house, just imagine who or what else can LIVE in his basement----rent free, without his knowledge.
My last question; does Frank ever go downstairs?

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Mixed-up Christmas Gifts

One Christmas I remember fondly when my older family members were still alive, and my relatives were still talking to one another was the mixed up Christmas gifts story. My Grandmother and I gave the wrong gifts to other family members.

The mixed up Christmas gift story goes like this:

I was working a job in retail to make money before getting married to my longtime boyfriend. Usually the manager scheduled me to work Christmas Eve. But this year, he must have been feeling his tiny black heart, becoming bigger allowing me to leave two hours before closing time.

Leaving the store, I remembered that I still had several people to buy gifts for. I had not bought anything for my sister's husband or my brother's girlfriend. I figured it would be a nice thing to buy them each a gift.I searched the store high and low looking for a gift for each person. Not having much of a selection  in the clothing department, I selected a more expensive one of a kind ornament from Hallmark for my brother's girlfriend. Realizing that my brother's girlfriend was Jewish did not deter my purchase. I knew my brother and his girlfriend were living together and they put a tree in their apartment. I figured they could use this pretty ornament on their tree.
Moving to the front of the store, I looked through the cologne aisle, selecting a bottle of cologne for my brother in law.
My brother picked up our Grandmother and our Grandfather from their homes, on his way to my parents' home.

When it came time to open presents, my Grandmother who at this time was about 89, handed out similar looking boxes with the same ornamental wrapping paper she lovingly adorned each. All ten of us happy to be together family members opened our gifts. I ripped off the wrapping, opened the box finding nothing inside. As I sat there, kind of stunned, alternately thinking, Grandma doesn't love me anymore, to Grandma is getting forgetful in her old age, I was trying my best to not give away what I didn't get for Christmas. My brother yelled from across my parents large living room, "What'd you get Kate?"
Okay, so what was I supposed to do now? I was holding a box with nothing in it. My brother's girlfriend sat there stunned looking at her ornament acting like it was a hot pan about to light up in her hands. My brother in law, started laughing because he had opened his gift, and as he showed us the gift I gave him, it was aftershave, not cologne. He yanked on his beard, saying "Thanks Kate, but I'm keeping it for awhile."
I apologized saying, I haven't seen you for a year, and my sister never mentioned you had grown a beard."
My brother started laughing very loudly and showed everyone what he got from our Grandmother, he had three black socks in his box, while my brother in law's from my Grandmother had only one black sock.
We all started laughing loudly, and my brother threw Ken his other sock making a matching pair.
At dinner my still red faced Grandmother said, she must have left my gift at home. I told it was okay, that it didn't matter, we all forget things from time to time.

Monday, December 12, 2011

Four Really strange, but true news stories

Has the world gone completely and utterly nuts in the last couple of days?
Here are four really strange, but true news stories:

1. The lady making meth at a Walmart store. When I saw this one on TV, I could not believe it. A woman was spotted on surveillance cameras six hours after she had been making methampethamine at a Walmart store in Tulsa, Oklahoma. What had me perplexed was why didn't anyone notice a person opening drug packages at Walmart, standing in a store aisle for six hours, mixing drugs together? That is sad, that no one noticed this happening. Store personnel did not notice what was going on. Customers did not notice anything out of the ordinary either? Where exactly could this woman set up her drug making shop? Did she grab what she needed on a shelf, sit down in a Walmart store  chair, and start mixing meth?

2.Another incredibly strange story that happened over the weekend, was this one in Pennsylvania. Seems that one guy wanted time off from work so badly, he faked his Mom's death. This guy faked her death , including faking an obituary so he could get some time off from work, for Christmas.(Maybe his boss is Ebeneezer Scrooge.) His mom found out, and walked into the newspaper office, telling the owner to cut it out. She told him she was very much alive. Thinking someone isn't getting any presents from Santa this year!

3. A 94 year old woman left 13 million dollars to her cat. Before she died in December of 2011, in Italy, Maria Assunta told her assistant she was a very lonely old woman. She was so lonely in fact, she scooped a stray cat from the streets of Italy, making Tommasso her soon to be wealthy kitty. Having noone else to give the money to, Assunta left her money to Tommasso making certain her assistant takes care of the cat for the rest of it's life.

This kitty is only one of several lucky pets who became millionaires due to their elderly owners leaving them entire estates due to having no relatives or long lost relatives. The richest pet currently is Gunther IV a German Shepard who was left 372 million dollars by his eccentric, German  Countess several years ago.

4.Strange news stories continue with total strangers paying off K-mart lay aways for other people because they want other people to have a Merry Christmas. When one lady tried doing this in Target, saying, "Pay it forward, " she was thrown out of Target and Walmart due to store employees thinking she was nuts. Oh well, K-mart customers benefited instead! Copyright (c), 2011, written by professional author Kate Johns.