Yep, This One is From Texas (Where Else?)

A tiny Texas school district is scrapping a homecoming tradition in which boys dress like girls and vice versa after a parent "complained about what she regarded as the event's homosexual overtones."

The homecoming tradition is known as "TWIRP DAY" ("The Woman Is Requested to Pay"). It gave boys and girls a chance to reverse social roles and let older girls invite boys on dates, open doors and pay for sodas. As a substitute, the school has decided on "Camo Day," with "black boots and Army camouflage to be worn by everyone who wants to participate."

Mother Delana Davies explained the danger behind the seemingly innocuous tradition: "It's like experimenting with drugs," she said. "You just keep playing with it and it becomes customary…

If it's OK to dress like a girl today, then why is it not OK in the future?"

I...... And All I Got Was This......

Kosher Hot Dog

"Ultra-Orthodox California rabbi Nachum Shifren, 53, cuts a dashing figure on the beach at Malibu, where he is the legendary surfer 'Shifty,' easily spottable on 20-foot waves by his long beard, according to a September profile in the San Diego Union-Tribune." [Quote is from News of the Wierd, referring to the Union-Tribune article].

In his spare time (he says he is ready to ride 24/6,allowing for the Sabbath), he has conducted "Passover surfaris" and beach bar-mitzvahs, and his lectures on Deuteronomy include the observation that "surf punks" paddled out into the Red Sea during the Jews' exodus from Egypt. "[T]he whole religious experience," he told the reporter, "the outer body experience, is encompassed in the act of surfing."

Surfer pushes away attacking shark

By The Associated Press
Seattle Times

EUREKA, Calif. — A surfer who was bumped off his board and attacked by a shark was able to push the animal away and paddle back to shore.

Brian Kang, 38, was 200 yards offshore Thursday, waiting for a wave in a popular surfing area near Eureka, when the shark knocked him into the water. The shark came back toward him as he tried to climb back onto the surfboard.

"It just came out of the blue," Kang said from his hospital bed, where he was being treated for gashes on his hip, knees and thumb. "I pushed it away with my hands."

Kang said he never got a good look at the shark, but another surfer spotted a 3-foot dorsal fin, which would indicate a great white shark.

The shark attack was the second along California's northern shore in recent months.

A great white shark estimated to be 17 feet long killed a man in August near Fort Bragg as he was diving for abalone.