http://www.redorbit.com Oddities http://www.redorbit.com/modules/news/images/tools/rss_logo.gif http://www.redorbit.com An animatronic version of President Barack Obama has joined its predecessors in the Hall of Presidents at Walt Disney World in Florida. The exhibit reopens this weekend after its first makeover since it opened in 1971, CNN reported. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715698/animatronic_obama_at_disney_world/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 22:33:06 -0500 Oddities Wisconsin's Government Accountability Board has drawn criticism for a new logo that some say resembles the symbol for anarchy. The logo, which was designed by Cricket Design Works of Madison, Wis., features an A inside a circle, similar to the traditional symbol for anarchy but with http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715684/wis_agency_logo_resembles_anarchy_symbol/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:56:37 -0500 Oddities A South Bend, Ind., theater that retains bullet holes from a 1934 bank robbery by John Dillinger is due to be auctioned online, the auctioneers said. The State Theatre, formerly called the Blackstone Theatre Vaudeville House, was purchased by an evangelical pastor three years ago as a venue for Christian entertainment but is now being auctioned due to the threat of foreclosure, the Chicago Sun-Times reported Friday. The building sustained bullet marks to its marquee and terracotta facade during a June 30, 1934, shootout between Dillinger's gang and police following the robbery of South Bend's Merchants Bank. The auction of the theater, scheduled for July 16-30, is being handled by NAI The Vaughan Co. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715683/dillingerdamaged_theater_to_be_auctioned/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:34:35 -0500 Oddities Scotland has the highest skin cancer rate in the United Kingdom due to widespread unsafe tanning practices, British medical experts said. The Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain said a YouGov survey of more than 1,000 Scots found one in five respondents had participated in binge, or excessive, tanning, while four in 10 said they had tried tanning with cooking oil, moisturizers or other substances not approved by medical experts, The Glasgow Herald reported Friday. This is a serious issue. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715677/experts_warn_scots_against_binge_tanning/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:30:39 -0500 Oddities The Alaska Department of Transportation said a dog that escaped from its kennel at an Anchorage airport was recaptured two days later. Roger Wetherell, a spokesman for Anchorage Ted Stevens International Airport, said the Australian miniature shepherd, Fesgahi, escaped from its kennel about 3 p.m. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715682/dog_found_two_days_after_airport_escape/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:11:58 -0500 Oddities U.S. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715681/weather_channel_nixes_smooth_jazz/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:09:06 -0500 Oddities A travel Web site has picked the Pasadena, Calif., Doo Dah Parade as the top quirky parade in the United States. VirtualTourist.com chose the Pasadena parade, which is famed for its barbecue and hibachi marching grill teams, for the No. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715680/web_site_picks_top_five_quirky_parades/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 18:06:44 -0500 Oddities A Stockholm, Sweden, museum said a decorative Mongolian silver crown that was stolen in 1984 has spent more than 20 years in police storage. Officials with the Museum of Ethnography said the crown, part of a Mongolian woman's costume, disappeared during a power blackout in 1984 and was not seen again until the Swedish Police Service stumbled upon it during renovation of its main Stockholm offices this year, The Local reported Friday. Police said the crown was found in a bag that was confiscated from a burglar more than 20 years ago. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715679/stolen_crown_found_at_police_station/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:49:01 -0500 Oddities Officials at Utah's Hogle Zoo said a capuchin monkey thought to be among the world's oldest has died from cancer in its jaw. Zoo spokeswoman Holly Braithwaite said the monkey, Jocco, died in its sleep June 13 and a sign has been placed at the monkey's habitat to inform his friends, http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715678/old_monkey_dead_at_utah_zoo/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:41:33 -0500 Oddities Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has been selected as winner of the 2009 Sitting Duck Award, the National Society of Newspaper Columnists announced Friday. The award is given annually to the person who provides the best material for columnists facing deadlines. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715650/columnists_name_palin_sitting_duck/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 16:15:26 -0500 Oddities A 51-year-old man bit his wife during an argument about custody of a dog, police in suburban Chicago said. Donald Paul, 51, of St. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715652/police_man_bit_wife_during_dog_argument/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 16:12:55 -0500 Oddities Organizers of a Georgia career expo said the event has been canceled due to a lack of available jobs at the companies planning to attend. Marietta City Council member Anthony Coleman said the Marietta/Cobb Career Expo, which had been planned for the autumn at the Cobb County Civic Center, http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715651/career_expo_called_off_due_to_job_shortage/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 16:00:40 -0500 Oddities Officials at the Legoland theme park in Carlsbad, Calif., said plans for a Michael Jackson tribute have been put on permanent hold due to legal issues. Legoland spokeswoman Julie Estrada said Thursday the planned Jackson exhibit, which was due to open Friday in the park's Miniland Southern California, has been permanently canceled due to unresolved legal issues, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported Friday. It's a legal thing, that's pretty much all I can say, Estrada said of the factors involved in canceling the exhibit. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715649/legoland_abandons_jackson_tribute_plans/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:36:42 -0500 Oddities A Canadian man drove into Montreal Friday to deliver 2,500 pairs of white underwear to homeless men as part of his cross-country Underwear Tour. Brent King, 41, is an engineer who lives in Calgary, Alberta. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715648/man_crosses_canada_handing_out_underwear/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:25:52 -0500 Oddities Canada's annual Calgary Stampede got under way Friday as divorce consultants prepared for their own surge in unhappy couples after the 10-day event. Billed as the world's biggest outdoor rodeo event, the Alberta city goes into party mode, which Karen Stewart, founder of Fairway Divorce Solutions, told Sun Media leads to a lot of infidelity. It's the sexual undertones, the alcohol, the letting loose, she said. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715647/divorce_rate_rises_after_calgary_stampede/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 13:17:57 -0500 Oddities A Canadian radio station north of Toronto is offering a $1,000 reward for a pig blimp that slipped its tether and began floating toward the nation's capital. The mishap occurred Wednesday during Canada Day celebrations at a lakeside park, the Toronto Sun reported. Red-faced promotions http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715594/pig_blimp_floated_then_swine_flew/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 08:32:06 -0500 Oddities A housecleaner was so shocked by the dirt in the English hospital ward where she was a patient, she said, she got out of bed and began dusting and mopping. Tereza Tosbell used hand towels from the bathroom and anti-bacterial cleaner she found at the foot of her bed in Colchester General Hospital, The Daily Mail reported Thursday. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715531/patient_scrubs_down_dirty_hospital_ward/index.html?source=r_oddities Fri, 03 Jul 2009 00:54:44 -0500 Oddities After an Ohio police chief agreed to retire, officials released video showing him making out with a female officer while they were transporting a prisoner. Timothy Escola, police chief in Perry, and Janine England, a part-time police officer, were taped by the dashboard camera in a police cruiser, The Canton (Ohio) Repository reported Thursday. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715510/dashboard_cam_catches_cops_making_out/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 23:58:28 -0500 Oddities A Pennsylvania man who donated a box of old baseball cards to an inner-city church in Philadelphia learned later they were worth about $35,000. The Rev. Kevin Lawrence of St. Malachy Church gave David Smith, who lives in suburban Berwyn, the chance to take the cards back. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715509/baseball_cards_bring_windfall_to_church/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 22:10:59 -0500 Oddities A British business consultant said he was able to improve a firm's productivity by convincing office staff to work for one day in the nude. David Taylor, a self-proclaimed business psychologist, said he was called in to help onebestway, a design and marketing company in Newcastle, England, after the company began losing money and had to fire six workers this spring, The Sun reported Thursday. Inviting an organization to go naked is the most extreme technique I've used, Taylor said. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715482/office_workers_asked_to_go_naked/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:52:18 -0500 Oddities The owner of a New Orleans T-shirt shop said the grassroots movement to elect actor Brad Pitt as the city's next mayor is sounding less and less crazy. Josh Harvey, owner of shirt shop Storyville, said the first Brad Pitt for Mayor T-shirt was made by a Tulane University professor who invited the store to use his design, WSDU-TV, New Orleans, reported Thursday. Harvey said the T-shirts have some people thinking Pitt -- who filmed The Curious Case of Benjamin Button in the city and runs a non-profit dedicated to the post-Katrina rebuilding effort -- would actually make a good mayor for New Orleans. Brad Pitt is someone who's really done a lot for the City of New Orleans and the more people are talking about it. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715483/tshirts_demand_pitt_for_new_orleans_mayor/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:20:07 -0500 Oddities A British group that lobbies for clear use of language has slammed a 102-word sentence in a letter by the country's police chiefs as gobbledygook. The Plain English Campaign said the sentence -- composed by the Association of Chief Police Officers in response to the British government's Green Paper on policing -- stands a good chance of winning the campaign's Golden Bull award in December, the Daily Mail reported Thursday. This sort of business gobbledygook is pretty much inexcusable now, said Marie Claire, a spokeswoman for the Plain English Campaign. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715481/uk_police_chiefs_wrote_102word_sentence/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:08:39 -0500 Oddities Fans, audience members, cast and crew of the Broadway musical Rock of Ages set a world record in New York for the largest air guitar jam session. The event Wednesday, which directly followed a matinee performance of the five-time Tony Award nominated musical, involved 810 people strumming along to music on imaginary guitars. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715480/rock_of_ages_breaks_air_guitar_record/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 17:56:00 -0500 Oddities Police in Connecticut said a Sasquatch sighting reported by a motorist turned out to be a teenager in a gorilla costume. Authorities said a woman driving on Unquowa Road in Fairfield called police at about 10:30 p.m. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715479/conn_sasquatch_a_costumed_teen/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 16:58:44 -0500 Oddities Experts said a popular YouTube video of a moving, slimy mass in a Raleigh, N.C., sewer depicts a colony of tubifex worms or invertebrates called byrozoan. http://www.redorbit.com/news/oddities/1715475/experts_disagree_on_youtube_organism_id/index.html?source=r_oddities Thu, 02 Jul 2009 16:53:07 -0500 Oddities