Weird, Wired News

Drunk broke into flat to cook pork chops 

A New York state man has been arrested for breaking into an apartment and cooking pork chops while drunk. The 37-year-old, of Glen Falls, New York state, has been charged with burglary and criminal mischief, reports the Post Star. 

The resident of the apartment came home in the early hours of the morning to find the man in his bathroom. Pork chops were cooking on the stove and a smoke alarm had been ripped down from the kitchen ceiling. The intruder had apparently lived in the apartment building in the past. 

The resident knew him, but only by his first name. Glens Falls Police Captain Kevin Conine said the man was drunk when officers arrived to arrest him. 

Drink driver blamed Shania Twain 

A drink driver escaped conviction in Canada because he believed Shania Twain was helping him to drive. Matt Brownlee was arrested after police spotted a pickup truck speeding along a busy street in downtown Ottawa. The 33-year-old told psychiatrists that he believed the country singer was helping him drive, reports CBC News. A judge ruled Brownlee was not criminally responsible because he suffers from delusions that female celebrities communicate with him telepathically. He could now be detained in hospital, released under supervision or given an absolute discharge. 

Smoking Is Bad for You 

Still More Reasons Not to Smoke, Beyond What the Surgeon General Told You: In February, the cigarette of a 46-year-old woman in Parkersburg, W.Va., accidentally set fire to her long hair, and she later died at the West Penn Burn Center in Pittsburgh, Pa. Also in February, Dennis Crouch, 53, who had earlier chased his wife with a knife during an argument in Daytona Beach, Fla., resisted police when they arrived, provoking one officer to fire her Taser, which struck a cigarette lighter in Crouch's shirt pocket, setting fire to his upper body. (His burns weren't serious.) 

Man dies after plummeting into large hole that opened beneath his home 

ALTA, California (AP) - It was like a scene from a horror film: A 27-year-old man plummeted into a gaping hole that suddenly opened beneath a house, trapping him beneath foundation rubble and killing him. Authorities say the home, built in the 1980s, may have been sitting atop a decades-old underground mine. Recent rains could have softened the ground under the home, in an isolated area near Lake Alta. "It's unbelievable," Placer County Sheriff's Department spokeswoman Dena Erwin said. "From the front of the house, it's absolutely normal. 

Then, in the middle of the house, is this enormous hole." The victim was awake and on the ground floor about 9:30 p.m. Friday when the concrete foundation near the kitchen gave way, sending him plunging into to the ground, Erwin said. Rescuers had trouble reaching him because the ground began to shift, creating an unsafe situation for work crews. Authorities returned to the home Sunday to try and remove the man's body, though geologists were still testing the house's soundness. The man's identity hadn't been positively established.