An Australian woman believed to have invited her former in-laws over for lunch only to serve them highly poisonous mushrooms claims she knew nothing about the poisonous ingredients and had no reason to hurt her guests.

Two weeks ago, Erin Patterson, a 48-year-old woman from Leongatha, near Melbourne, invited her ex-husband’s parents to her house for lunch. She and her ex had reportedly split on ‘amicable’ terms, so she and her former in-laws still maintained a friendly relationship. Gail and Don Patterson arrived with another couple, Heather, Gail’s sister, and her husband Ian. The meal was uneventful, but a few hours later, the two elderly couples started complaining about gastrointestinal problems. Around midnight, the symptoms had become so severe, that they were taken to a hospital in Melbourne. Unfortunately, a few days later, three of them passed away, while Ian Wilkinsons was left fighting for his life, awaiting a liver transplant. Meanwhile, Erin Patterson exhibited no symptoms whatsoever.

Read More »

An Atlanta man who lost his house after the city tore it down by mistake is now facing a lawsuit to have the entire property foreclosed unless he pays the $68,000 demolition costs.

Everett Tripodis’ property in Atlanta’s historic West End is now an empty lot, but until a few months ago he actually owned a home there, one that the city demolished without so much as a warning. Technically, they did send out letters notifying the owner that the property had been labeled unfit for habitation, but they sent them to the wrong address, in a different zip code, about 1.4 miles away. Tripodis and his mother had bought the century-old house as an investment and had been working on remodeling it when the city decided to tear it down. To make matters worse, the city of Atlanta is now suing the owner of the property and threatening to foreclose on the empty land unless he covers the cost of the demolition, $68,000.

Read More »

An 8-year-old Bolivian boy ended up in the hospital after allowing himself to be bitten by a dangerous black widow spider in order to become like his favorite superhero, Spider-Man.

The incident occurred in the municipality of Vichuloma, near the city of Oruro, in Central Bolivia. The 8-year-old child, whose name has not been revealed by the media, was reportedly playing near a river close to his house when he turned a big rock and discovered a black widow spider. Without realizing the consequences of being bitten by a highly-poisonous spider, he grabbed the arachnid and put it on the back of his hand, in the hopes of being bitten. He got his wish, and then headed home, where he began experiencing symptoms like body aches and intense muscle spasms. Initially, the boy didn’t say anything to his mother about the spider bite, but after about three hours of agony, he said that he had been bitten by a colorful spider.

Read More »

The embarrassing performance of a Somali athlete during the women’s 100-meter race at the World University Games in Chengdu, China prompted a public apology from the African country’s sports minister.

It takes an abysmal athletic performance to warrant accusations of “defaming the name of a nation in the international arena,” but then again, the run of Nasra Abukar Ali during the women’s 100-meter race last week has been dubbed as the slowest in an official tournament. In a video that has gone viral on social media, the Somali athlete can be seen starting sluggishly out of the blocks, as the other competitors burst forward, and she quickly gets behind so fast that she doesn’t even show up on the camera following the race. Abukar Ali crossed the finish line in 21.81 seconds, more than 8 seconds slower than the second-last runner, and more than 10 seconds behind the winner of the race.

Read More »

Two women and a teenage boy were found dead after they ventured into the mountains to live off the grid using only knowledge from YouTube tutorials.

The partially mummified bodies of 42-year-old Rebecca ‘Becky’ Vance, her 14-year-old son, and her sister Christine, 41, were recently discovered by a hiker at a camp site in Gunnison National Forest. Last summer, Becky had convinced her son and her sister to go live off the grid, in the wilderness, disconnected from a society that she no longer felt they belonged to. Unfortunately, despite having watched hours of off-grid survival videos on YouTube and on TV, they had very little experience in outdoor survival and did not really prepare enough before venturing into the wilderness. When they were discovered, they had not managed to build a shelter other than a tent and had little more than canned food and ramen noodles for supplies.

Read More »

An American woman recently set a new world record for the world’s loudest burp by a woman after belching at a measured 107.3 decibels.

The previous Guinness record for the loudest burp by a woman dated back to 2009 when Elisa Cagnoni of Italy managed a 107-decibel belch. It was an impressive achievement, but now her record is history. Kimberly “Kimycola” Winter, a young woman from Maryland who has mastered the art of burping, recently visited a “dead room” at iHeartRadio where she managed to release a monstrously-loud burp that beat Cagnoni’s record by 0.3 decibels. Before her historic attempt, Kimycola prepared her body by eating breakfast and drinking coffee and beer. The tried and true combination apparently played a pretty big part in breaking the 14-year-old record.

Read More »

An Indonesian woman is lucky to be enough after surviving a crocodile attack for 90 minutes before finally being rescued and taken to a hospital.

On July 27, Falmira De Jesus, a 38-year-old palm oil plantation from Indonesia’s West Kalimantan Province, was collecting water from a shallow, greenery-covered stream in Ketapang Regency when she was suddenly attacked by a crocodile lying in wait. As the woman approached the body of water, the giant reptile leaped up from the foliage, grabbed her leg, and dragged her into the water. Somehow, Falmira managed to cry for help and fight the crocodile long enough for her plantation co-workers to arrive and help her. Viral footage shows the brave woman with only her head above water as she literally tries to hang on for her life to wooden poles extended in the water by her co-workers, while others prod the water with sticks to discourage the crocodile.

  Read More »

A Hungarian man temporarily became a rich man, after the company he worked for accidentally paid him 367 times more than he had actually earned. And when the employer asked for the money back, he refused to pay.

The unnamed man, who hails from Hungary’s Somogy County, briefly worked for a company in Kaposvár but his employment was terminated during the trial period. For his short stint at the company, he stood to earn 92,549 forints, which amounted to 238 euros ($260), but in a feat of incredible generosity, his employer wired him 367 times that amount. Actually, it was just a huge mistake caused by the fact that the man had provided an Austrian bank account, so the salary had to be paid in the local currency, euros. Only instead of converting the forints to euros, they sent the lucky man 92,549 euros instead…

Read More »

Finding a property for $50,000 in Georgetown, Washington, where the median price is $1.6 million can be considered a major bargain, but what if that property is a crumbling wall?

Last month, a realtor at Keller Williams Capital Properties posted a listing for a property in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington D.C. for just $50,000. The photo featured in the listing showed what seemed to be a row house at the end of a block, but the price didn’t really make sense. Homes in the neighborhood sell for over $1.5 million, and this one was in a really nice area, just a 10-minute walk away from the riverfront and close to trendy shops and restaurants. A lot of people were excited to see a property they could actually afford to buy, but their hopes were crushed when they realized that the listing wasn’t for a home, but for the partial wall of one, and a crumbling wall at that…

Read More »

The mayor of Huehuetán, a town in the Mexican state of Chiapas, has come under harsh criticism for hiring strippers to entertain his male constituents during this year’s Father’s Day celebrations.

It’s been over a month since this year’s Father’s Day, and while most of us have already forgotten all about it, the men of Huehuetán will probably remember this year’s festivities for a very long time. And it’s all because of a surprise from Mayor Manuel Ángel Villalobos, who decided that it would be a good idea to offer the men of his town something truly memorable – a lewd strip show. A poster promoted online before Father’s Day invited the males of Huehuetán to the local auditorium on June 17 for a special event featuring “a show, surprised, and presents,” but mentioned in red lettering that “no children” and “no women” were invited.

Read More »

A Chinese man turned up at the emergency room of a Zhejiang hospital with the screw base of a light bulb sticking out of his mouth, after trying one of the dumbest online challenges imaginable.

On July 25th, firefighters at the Yuyao City Fire and Rescue Brigade, in Zhejiang, China, were confronted with one of the most bizarre rescue cases yet. A local man, referred to only as Mr. Chen, burst into their station and tried to explain something to them. However, the man’s mouth was covered with a t-shirt, and instead of words, he only seemed able to utter muffled sounds. After removing the makeshift mask, the reason for his unusual speech became obvious – he had an LED light bulb sticking out of his mouth and was trying to get help removing it. Unfortunately, that proved too difficult a task for the firemen.

Read More »

A heartless couple in India was reportedly arrested for selling their 8-month-old baby to buy an iPhone 14 and make Instagram reels while traveling.

Last week, Indian media reported the shocking case of a young couple from West Bengal who were so obsessed with Apple’s newest handheld that they sold their toddler in order to buy one. Jaydev and Sathi Ghosh started attracting the attention of their neighbors in North 24 Parganas when they started traveling around the state and flashing their brand-new Apple iPhone 14. The couple had been known to earn a meager monthly income and had often struggled financially in the past, so the drastic change didn’t make any sense, especially since it had coincided with the mysterious disappearance of their 8-month-old son, something that Jaydev and Sathi didn’t seem at all concerned with…

Read More »

An unemployed man in Russia managed to live out his dream of being a traffic policeman by putting on a fake police uniform and going on patrols with actual traffic inspectors for two months.

Tired of sitting around all day, Viktor, a 48-year-old unemployed man from Russia’s Stavropol Region, bought himself a realistic-looking police uniform and joined the ranks of law enforcement officers in the village of Pyatigorsky. Relying on his traffic inspector attire, great acting skills, and enviable self-confidence, the man patrolled the streets of Pyatigorsky, actively stopping negligent drivers and educating them on various traffic rules. It is unclear why Viktor chose this specific profession, or whether he actually took any bribes from motorists during his voluntary service, but his career was short-lived. Two months after joining the ranks of the Stavropol traffic police, his cover was blown.

Read More »

Food scientists have created a machine that uses that uses pressurized carbon dioxide to turn a liquid ice cream mix into a cold, creamy treat in just three seconds.

The new way to create ‘carbonated ice cream’ patented by Syed Rizvi, professor of food science engineering, and Michael E. Wagner, Ph.D., is very different from traditional ice cream. The latter usually involves a dairy-based mix flowing through a heat-exchanging barrel until it starts to freeze, while the newly-patented method has highly pressurized carbon dioxide passing over a nozzle and drawing in the liquid ice-cream mix. When the carbon dioxide goes from extremely high pressure to a lower pressure, it instantly cools the ice cream mix to about minus 70 degrees C, turning it into the frozen treat we all know and love. This is known as the Joule-Thompson Effect.

Read More »

A young girl from the Indian state of Bihar kept cutting the power in her entire village so she could meet a boy from a rival village without anyone seeing them together.

The people of Bettiah, a village in Bihar’s West Champaran district, had been on edge for over a week due to the unusual power outages that seemed to occur almost every night. The total darkness created perfect opportunities for thieves, so people appealed to the electricity company to fix their network, but its representatives reported no infrastructure issues. No one could understand what was going on until one night, when some of the locals stood watch in the village and caught a young couple meeting under cover of darkness. It turned out that the local girl, Priti Kumari, had fallen in love with Rajkumar, a young man from a rival village, and she kept cutting the power in the while village to keep the relationship a secret.

Read More »