Strange Yet True Stories of 2008

Pepe Le Meow
A Pennsylvania cat lover got a smelly surprise when a neighbor's cat turned out to be a frightened skunk. Not only did the skunk spray the woman, but it ran into her Mount Carmel home. It took about several hours for emergency services officials to get the putrid pest out of the house.
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Historic Mistake
Two grammar-conscious vigilantes fighting against typos everywhere defaced a 6-decade-old, hand-painted sign at Grand Canyon National Park. But when it comes to marking up historic signs, the law says that good grammar is a bad defense. The two were sentenced to probation and banned from national parks for a year.
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A Capital of the World
Adolf Hitler's grand plans for world domination didn't stop with the extinction of the Jews. If the Nazi leader had had his way, it would have included transforming Berlin into the "capital of the world." Historians, after combing three vast tunnels opened recently under central Berlin, detailed Hitler's plans for a super city, dubbed "Germania." The city would have come complete with a vast underground network that would have included roads and a rail system. Above the surface, were plans for a series of huge buildings that would have rivaled the architecture of cities like Paris and Rome.
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Not Just Hanging Around
The morning commute got a little hairy after a slippery wild simian monkey showed up at a Tokyo train station. A standoff between police and the monkey developed at the Shibuya Station when about 30 cops, some with nets, chased the animal as commuters snapped photos with their cell phones. The monkey escaped and is currently still at large.
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Still Standing
He wanted to be known as a stand-up guy, even in death. To fulfill his last wish, the body of 24-year-old Angel Pantoja Medina, who was found dead underneath a bridge in Puerto Rico, was propped upright in the living room of his mother's San Juan home. A local funeral home used a special embalming treatment to keep the body standing upright for his three-day wake.
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Not-So-Sweet Surprise
A German candy story took the meaning of a sugar high to a whole new level when it was discovered that the shop's treats were laced with hallucinogenic mushrooms and marijuana. Police nabbed the 23-year-old owner of the shop and shuttered the place, leaving some to get their sugar fix elsewhere.
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Bumpy Landing
An elderly woman fell down a baggage chute after placing herself, rather than her bags, on the baggage belt. The woman, preparing to depart from Stockholm’s Arlanda Airport for Germany, misunderstood instructions and lied down on the belt and was swept off to the baggage handling center. There is a silver lining though: She managed to catch her flight.
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An Imperial Splash
It was loss of face -- and then some -- when a Western man decided to go skinny dipping in a moat ringing Japan's Imperial Palace. The man attracted a huge crowd in a busy Tokyo business district, and also the ire of two policemen who had to chase him in row boat and deflect the rocks and water the skinny dipper threw their way.
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A Wee Home Remedy
Who knew infant urine worked as an anti-inflammatory? World Boxing Council heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko evidently swears by it. The Ukrainian boxer didn’t pull any punches about the way he soothes his fists after a big fight when he admitted wrapping his hands with his 3-year-old's urine-infused diapers to reduce swelling. He says he got the idea from his grandmother.
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Bozo in the Buff — all year long!
Multiple sclerosis is no laughing matter. But 16 graduates from the San Francisco's Clown Conservatory, looking to raise money for the disease, have managed get in some giggles by letting it all hang out.
The group unveiled its 2009 naked clown calendar, which features the jolly jokesters posing in nothing but their birthday suits.
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