Honolulu Lite

CHARLES MEMMINGER

ALO-HA FRIDAY

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Searching for sanity
in the fast lane

Wait a second. We just killed off a stupid, expensive photo-enforcement program to stop speeders. Now the governor, who was a big supporter of the ill-fated van cams, is RAISING speed limits around the island. It seems a bit petulant, like he's saying: "All right, you people don't want to drive a safe speed, fine. We'll raise the speed and you can go out there and kill yourselves for all I care. But when you die in a fiery pile up on the H-3 freeway, don't come running to me."

Personally, I don't want faster speed limits. That will just encourage other knuckleheads to keep getting in my way. They should putter along in the right lane where they belong.

Now the news:

One small cluck for man

BEIJING (Reuters) >> Three chickens successfully hatched from a batch of eggs that orbited the earth 108 times aboard China's third unmanned spaceship.

The cosmonaut chickens were born in a university laboratory from eggs carried on the seven-day space flight.

(The event was hailed as a major breakthrough in China's "Poultry in Space" program and the biggest rocket success since the launching of the first Intercontinental Ballistic Mallard.)

Warming up for Viagra

COLOMBO (Reuters) >> Sri Lankan health authorities launched a search for imitations of the male sex drug Viagra after being alerted to a couple of spelling errors on the packaging.

Boxes of some of seized fake pills contained the word "warming" instead of "warning" and "contradiction" instead of "contraindication."

(A cartoon figure of an overly endowed rabbit saying "Hubba Hubba, Bubba!" was also a clue.)

Sandwich is whale-done

SHIMONOSEKI, Japan (Reuters) >> Whaleburgers are huge in this port city. Pods of people are lining up to buy the sandwiches featuring whale meat in a barbecue sauce stuck between two slaps of pressed rice. Whale hot-dogs are also selling well.

Ironically, the store selling the whaleburgers is a short taxi ride from where the International Whaling Commission will meet to discuss limiting the hunting of whales.

(Surprisingly, the fried Whale Nuggets are not proving popular with consumers of the endangered marine mammal meat.)

Honolulu Lite on Sunday:

They are calling it an environmental disaster: Savage armies of "Crazy Ants" are devouring millions of migrating land crabs on Australia's Christmas Island. But if your island is overrun by millions of land crabs, are ants really the problem?

Quote me on this:

"If stupidity got us into this mess, then why can't it get us out?" -- Will Rogers

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Charles Memminger, winner of National Society of Newspaper Columnists awards, appears Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. E-mail cmemminger@starbulletin.com

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