Coffin Conversations - by dementia

A Social Insurance Agency official who had been arrested for stealing a purse from a locker at the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry, stole a total of 1.6 million yen in 28 instances of theft in the ministry and the Environment Ministry, as he needed money for hair growth treatment, police said Wednesday.

Keiichi Ogawa, an accounting section official, stole the money from January through March from lockers at the government building that houses the SIA and the health and environment ministries, they said.

Ogawa, 28, reportedly used 3 million yen for laser therapy for hair growth and to purchase an expensive scalp massage machine.


After borrowing money from a consumer finance company to make the payments and falling deeper into debt, he stole money in the ministry building to pay back the funds, police said.

Ogawa was arrested on April 12 on suspicion of stealing a purse containing 3,000 yen from a woman's locker in the health ministry section of the government building.

When police arrested him, they found a notebook in which he had written the date and time when he successfully stole money. After the investigation, the police confirmed he committed 28 thefts.

Ogawa went to a beauty salon near his home in Saitama for three years, and spent more than 2 million yen on scalp massage and laser therapy. He also bought a 300,000 yen scalp massage machine and hair growth tonics that cost 50,000 yen each.

A Norwegian political party has chosen its candidate for a local election in Sarpsborg -- a man who has been dead for a year and a half.

The Christian Coalition Party's list of 13 candidates also includes five people who have asked to be removed from the list, Aftenposten reported Friday.

"We have never received a list like this before," said Sarpsborg Mayor Jan Engsmyr. "There is no preparation done here. The party should pull itself together and take this more seriously. Scraping together some names and sending in a list is fully legal, but it is customary to ask people first if they want to be on it."


The Christian Coalition Party's leader for Ostfold County, Kai Spydevold, said the party's nomination process is sound, but a mistake was made in nominating the dead man.

Deputy party leader Morten Sveven said he planned to call the family of the deceased candidate to apologize.

Granny Feng's tom cat has sprouted two hairy 4ins long wings, reports the Huashang News.

"At first, they were just two bumps, but they started to grow quickly, and after a month there were two wings," she said.

Feng, of Xianyang city, Shaanxi province, says the wings, which contain bones, make her pet look like a 'cat angel'.

Her explanation is that the cat sprouted the wings after being sexually harassed.

"A month ago, many female cats in heat came to harass him, and then the wings started to grow," she said.

However, experts say the phenomenon is more likely down to a gene mutation, and say it shouldn't prevent the cat living a normal life.

Crime doesn't pay, but being antisocial does.

A dungeon-themed tourist attraction in Britain is offering free admission to anyone who has been issued an "antisocial-behavior order" for having committed a misdemeanor.

Mick Jagger was once involved in a bizarre Amazonian marriage ritual, which involved allowing bees to sting his penis, it has been claimed.

A woman who tried to steal a fetus by knocking her pregnant neighbour unconscious with a baseball bat and cutting her abdomen was sentenced yesterday to 22 to 50 years in prison.

Religiously strict Saudi Arabia can’t have traditional Western-style beauty contests, but there was a pageant in April in remote Guwei’iya, about 75 miles from Riyadh - a beauty contest for camels. More than 250 owners brought more than 1,500 camels to be judged by such standards, said one organizer (according to a Reuters dispatch), as “the nose should be long and droop down” and “the ears should stand back, and the neck should be long” and “the hump should be high, but slightly to the back.” Prizes included more than 70 SUVs.

A man has been jailed after robbing a bank to pay for a breast operation for his transvestite lover.

A new adult entertainment website could be termed aural sex – because it is tailor-made for blind people.

The X-rated site features erotic stories read out by scantily-clad women. Users can also listen to graphic descriptions of saucy photos.

In a hitherto unpublished essay, Frey, who died in 1957, wrote of his first meeting with Hitler in 1915: “A pale, tall man tumbled down into the cellar after the first shells of the daily evening attacks had begun to fall, fear and rage glowing in his eyes.

A Ponca City college student says she cannot believe someone stole her $100,000 prosthetic legs. 19-year-old Celeste Ready lost both her legs in a car accident. She woke up one morning this week, and the prosthetics were gone.

A British man who went on a wild spending spree after doctors said he only had a short time to live wants compensation because the diagnosis was wrong and he is now healthy -- but broke.

A 9-year-old boy who complained of an earache was a little surprised when the doctor told him that a pair of spiders had tried to make a home out of him.

Three women teachers were among six people arrested yesterday accused of sedating and sexually abusing children as young as 3 at a school near Rome.

The best-known goat in Sudan has died months after being "married" to a man in the South Sudan capital, Juba, the BBC has learned.

An adventurous tabby took an unexpected trip this week, after slyly crawling into her keeper's luggage and clearing lax Canadian airport security, local media said Wednesday.
Mary Martell unwittingly traveled 1,400 kilometers (870 miles) from Saint John Airport on Canada's Atlantic coast all the way to Toronto, then to Niagara-on-the-Lake by car with the live cat in her suitcase.
She told public broadcaster CBC the bag was scanned at the airport, but she was not stopped and it was eventually loaded into the airplane's cargo bay.

Police in Germany had to call in a locksmith to break into jail when the lock on a cell broke, trapping a prisoner inside, authorities said on Wednesday.

New Yorker Daniel Edwards has made a sculpture called ‘Paris Hilton Autopsy’ which shows the heiress dead with her legs spread. Pet Chihuahua Tinkerbell is shown resting its front paws on her breasts. The sculpture also has an open abdominal icavity with removable life-size internal organ, which visitors to the exhibition may take out if they put on a pair of gloves. The artwork will be unveiled on May 11 in New York.