Honolulu Lite

CHARLES MEMMINGER

‘AloHa Friday’ tries
to find the right type

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Start typing here. That's the sentence I face every week as I pull together "AloHa Friday" for your enjoyment. The sentence "Start typing here" is part of the computer template formatted for this column. It's a way to assure that the font and type size are correct every time. But it also seems to be some kind of a put-down, as if producing "AloHa Friday" is simply a matter of typing. I resent that. I don't completely disagree with it, I just resent it. Let me tell you, it's not that easy to write 18 lines of riveting commentary. Make that 19.

And now the news:

Elvis dead? Wanna bet?

LONDON (Reuters) >> British gamblers are still convinced that Elvis has not left the building. It may be 25 years since the King of Rock 'n' Roll died, but bookmakers still take bets on Elvis Presley being alive.

"We have just taken a bet of 50 pounds ($76.58) at odds of 1,000 to 1 that Elvis is still alive," a spokesman for one bookie said. "We take scores of bets each year. I know he would be an elderly gent ... but with a six-figure payout ... we'd be the ones all shook up if he does appear."

(Elvis probably is waiting until the odds get a hell of a lot better before he shows up and collects the dough.)

Death upsets this lady

BERLIN (Reuters) >> A retired cleaning lady has finally managed to convince German bureaucrats she is alive -- two months after an office blunder listed her as dead.

"At first it was amusing, but there came a point when it wasn't funny," said Vjekoslava Smajic, who has lived in Germany for 33 years. After a computer listed her as dead, Smajic's health insurance, pension and bank account were canceled.

The nightmare ended when she produced a medical certificate verifying she was alive.

(London bookies paid 25 to 1 to all those who bet she wasn't completely deceased.)

Getting ahead in surgery

CAIRO, Egypt (Reuters) >> Egyptian police have arrested a man who performed brain surgery on a number of people even though he had only a primary school education.

The 40-year-old bogus doctor saw 200 patients a week and operated on some of them. The fate of his victims was not known.

(Patients became suspicious when he referred to cranial brain matter as "the marbles.")

'Honolulu Lite' on Sunday:

Prostitution is the only profession where practitioners have to learn both the tricks of the trade and the trade of the tricks. Getting them to stop is something else altogether. Catch "Honolulu Lite" on Sunday as we attempt to untangle this harlots' web.

Quote Me on This:

"We live in a world where pizza gets to your door before the police." -- Jeff Marder

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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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