1. The Stella Awards [15.01.03; Ata Ivanov]
 2. George W. Bush [27.01.03; Ilia Gueorguiev]
 3. Bricklayer's Accident Report [29.01.03; Boris Georgiev]
 4. Divorced Barbie [30.01.03; Boris Georgiev]
 5. Technical Support for everybody [27.01.03; Ilia Gueorguiev]

The Stella Awards

It's time once again to consider candidates for the annual Stella Awards."
The "Stella's" are named after 81-year-old Stella Liebeck who first spilled hot coffee McDonalds on herself and then successfully sued McDonalds! Her case inspired awards for the most frivolous, yet somehow successful, lawsuits in the U.S. The following are this year's candidates:

1. Kara Walton of Claymont, Delaware, successfully sued the owner of a night club in a neighboring city after she fell off the bathroom window down to the floor, knocking out her two front teeth. This occurred while Kara was trying to sneak through the ladies room window to avoid paying the $3.50 cover charge. Kara was awarded $12,000 and dental expenses.

2. Jerry Williams of Little Rock, Arkansas, was awarded $14,500 plus medical expenses after being bitten on the buttocks by his next door neighbor's beagle. The beagle was actually on a chain in his neighbor's fenced yard. The award was less than Jerry had sought, perhaps because the jury felt the dog might have been provoked by Jerry, who had been repeatedly shooting at it with a pellet gun.

3. 19-year-old Carl Truman of Los Angeles whether or not $74,000, plus medical expenses, when his neighbor ran over his hand with a Honda Accord. Carl apparently didn't notice there was someone at the wheel of the car as he tried to steal the hub caps.

4. A Philadelphia restaurant was ordered to pay Amber Carson of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, $113,500 after she slipped on a soft drink and broke her coccyx (that's a tailbone, folks). The soda was on the floor because Amber had thrown it at her boyfriend 30 seconds earlier.

5. Terrence Dickson of Bristol, Pennsylvania, finished robbing a house and then tried to leave by way of the garage. Terry was not able to open the garage door because the automatic door opener was malfunctioning. He
couldn't reenter the house because the door connecting the house and garage locked when he pulled it shut. Since the family was then on vacation Terry became locked in the garage for eight days. He subsisted on a case of Pepsi and a large bag of dry dog food. Terry sued claiming this situation caused him undue mental anguish, and a jury agreed to the tune of $500,000.

6. Kathleen Robertson of Austin, Texas, was awarded $780,000 by a jury when she broke her ankle in a furniture store by tripping over a toddler who had been running around the store. The store owners were understandably surprised at the verdict, considering the toddler was Kathleen's own son.

7. This year's favorite could easily be Mr. Merv Grazinski of Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Merv purchased a brand new 32-foot Winnebago motor home. On his first trip, he drove onto the freeway, set the cruise control to 70 mph, calmly left the drivers seat and went into the back to make a cup of coffee. Surprisingly, the RV left the freeway and crashed! Merv sued Winnebago for not advising him in the owner's manual that he couldn't really do this. The jury awarded him $1,750,000 plus a new motor home. The company actually changed its manual on the basis of this suit, just in case there were any other complete morons buying recreation vehicles.

George W. Bush

"Ariel Sharon of Israel is a Man of Peace"
George W. Bush

"General Musharraf of Pakistan is a Democrat"
George W. Bush

"The inhabitants of Greece are the Greecians"
George W. Bush

"The French don't have a word for 'Entrepreneur'"
George W. Bush

"The vast majority of our imports come from outside the country."
George W. Bush

"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure."
George W. Bush

"I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future."
George W. Bush

"The future will be better tomorrow."
George W. Bush

"We're going to have the best educated American people in the world."
George W. Bush

"I stand by all the misstatements that I've made."
George W. Bush

"We have a firm commitment to NATO, we are a part of NATO. We have a firm commitment to Europe. We are a part of Europe."
George W. Bush

"A low voter turnout is an indication of fewer people going to the polls."
George W. Bush

"For NASA, space is still a high priority."
George W. Bush

"Quite frankly, teachers are the only profession that teach our children."
George W. Bush

"It isn't pollution that's harming the environment.  It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it."
George W. Bush

"It's time for the human race to enter the solar system."
George W. Bush

Bricklayer's Accident Report

Dear Sir:

I am writing in response to your request for additional information in Block 3 of the accident report form. I put "poor planning" as the cause of my accident. You asked for a fuller explanation and I trust the following details will be sufficient.

I am a bricklayer by trade. On the day of the accident, I was working alone on the roof of a new six story building. When I completed my work, I found that I had some bricks left over which, when weighed later were
found to be slightly in excess of 500 lbs. Rather than carry the bricks down by hand, I decided to lower them in abarrel by using a pulley, which was attached to the side of the building on the sixth floor.

Securing the rope at ground level, I went up to the roof, swung the barrel out and loaded the bricks into it. Then I went down and untied the rope, holding it tightly to ensure a slow descent of the bricks.

You will note in Block 11 of the accident report form that I weigh 175lbs.

Due to my surprise at being jerked off the ground so suddenly, I lost my presence of mind and forgot to let go of the rope. Needless to say, I proceeded at a rapid rate up the side of the building. In the vicinity of the third floor, I met the barrel which was now proceeding downward at an equal, impressive speed. This explained the fractured skull, minor abrasions and the broken collar bone, as listed in section 3 of the accident report form. Slowed only slightly, I continued my rapid ascent, not stopping until the fingers of my right hand were two knuckles deep into the pulley.

Fortunately by this time I had regained my presence of mind and was able to hold tightly to the rope, in spite of beginning to experience a great deal of pain.

At approximately the same time, however, the barrel of bricks hit the ground and the bottom fell out of the barrel. Now devoid of the weight of the bricks, that barrel weighed approximately 50 lbs. I refer you again to my weight.

As you can imagine, I began a rapid descent, down the side of the building.

In the vicinity of the third floor, I met the barrel coming up. This accounts for the two fractured ankles, broken tooth and several lacerations of my legs and lower body.

Here my luck began to change slightly. The encounter with the barrel seemed to slow me enough to lessen my injuries when I fell into the pile of bricks and fortunately only three vertebrae were cracked.

I am sorry to report, however, as I lay there on the pile of bricks, i pain, unable to move, I again lost my composure and presence of mind and let go of the rope and I lay there watching the empty barrel begin its
journey back down onto me. This explains the two broken legs.

I hope this answers your inquiry."

Respectfully, Steve

Divorced Barbie

Robert was driving home from work when he suddenly realised he had forgotten his eight-year old daughter's birthday. He pulled off the freeway at the next intersection, and lucky found a toy store.

Running into the store, which was just about to close, he panted "Give me a Barbie!"

The sales lady looked bemused. "There are many Barbies to choose from" she said. "For example, we have Princess Barbie for $19.99, Ballet Barbie for $19.99, Skating Barbie for $19.99 Working Woman Barbie for $19.99, Pilot Barbie for $19.99, and Divorced Barbie for $350."

"How come Divorced Barbie costs so much more than all the other Barbies?" asked Robert.

"Oh that's easy" answered the sales lady. "Divorced Barbie comes with Ken's house, Ken's furniture, Ken's car and Ken's boat!"

Technical Support for everybody

Dear Tech Support:
Last year I upgraded from Boyfriend 5.0 to Husband 1.0 and noticed a slowdown in the performance of the flower and jewellery applications that had operated flawlessly under the Boyfriend 5.0 system. In addition, Husband 1.0 uninstalled many other valuable programs, such as Romance 9.9, and installed several undesirable programs such as AFL 7.4 and NBA 3.2.Conversation 8.0 also no longer runs and Housecleaning 2.6 simply crashes the system. I've tried running Nagging 5.3 to fix these problems, but to no avail.
What can I do?
Signed, Desperate

Dear Desperate,
First, keep in mind that Boyfriend 5.0 was an entertainment package, while Husband 1.0 is an operating system. Try to enter the command: C:/ITHOUGHTYOULOVEDME, and install Tears 6.2. Husband 1.0 should then automatically run the applications Guilt 3.3 and Flowers 7.5. But remember, overuse can cause Husband 1.0 to default to such background applications as Grumpy Silence 2.5, Happy Hour 7.0, or Beer 6.1. Please remember that Beer 6.1 is a very bad program that will create SnoringLoudly.WAV files. DO NOT install Mother-In-Law 1.0 or reinstall another Boyfriend program. These are not supported applications and will crash Husband 1.0. They could also potentially cause Husband 1.0 to default to the program Girlfriend 9.2, which runs in the background and has been known to introduce potentially serious viruses into the Operating System. In summary, Husband 1.0 is a great program, but it does have a limited memory and can't learn new applications quickly. You might consider buying additional software to enhance his system performance. I personally recommend Hot Food 3.0 and Single Malt Scotch 4.5.

Good Luck.

Dear Tech Support:

Last year I upgraded from Girlfriend 7.0 to Wife 1.0 and noticed that the new program began unexpected child processing that took up a lot of space and valuable resources. No mention of this phenomenon was included in the product brochure. In addition, Wife 1.0 installs itself into all other programs and launches during system initialization, where it monitors all other system activity. Applications such as Poker Night 10.3, Drunk Boys Night 2.5 and Saturday Football 5.0 no longer run, crashing the system whenever selected. It seems I cannot keep Wife 1.0 in the background while attempting to run some of my other favorite applications. I am thinking about going back to Girlfriend 7.0, but uninstall does not work on this program. Can you help me, please!!!

Thanks,

Joe Luckystrike

Dear Joe,

This is a very common problem men complain about but is mostly due to a primary misconception. Many people upgrade from Girlfriend 7.0 to Wife 1.0 with the idea that Wife 1.0 is merely a "UTILITIES & ENTERTAINMENT" program. Wife 1.0 is an OPERATING SYSTEM and designed by its creator to run everything. It is unlikely you would be able to purge Wife 1.0 and convert back to Girlfriend 7.0. Hidden operating files within your system would cause Girlfriend 7.0 to emulate Wife 1.0 so nothing is gained. It is impossible to uninstall, delete, or purge the program files from the system once installed. You cannot go back to Girlfriend 7.0
because Wife 1.0 is not designed to do this. Some have tried to install Girlfriend 8.0 or Wife 2.0 but end up with more problems than the original system. Look in your manual under "Warnings-Alimony/Child Support." I
recommend you keep Wife 1.0 and just deal with the situation. Having Wife 1.0 installed myself, I might also suggest you read the entire section regarding General Partnership Failures (GPFs). You must assume
all responsibility for faults and problems that might occur, regardless of their cause. The best course of action will be to enter the command C:\APOLOGIZE. In any case avoid excessive use of the "Esc" key because
ultimately you will have to give the APOLOGIZE command before the operating system will return to normal. The system will run smoothly as long as you take the blame for all GPFs. Wife 1.0 is a great program, but very
high maintenance. Consider buying additional software to improve the performance of Wife 1.0. I recommend Flowers 2.1 and Chocolates 5.0. Do not, under any circumstances, install Secretary With Short Skirt 3.3.
This is not a support application with Wife 1.0 and is likely to cause irreversible damage to the operating system, especially for those of you who have not completely uninstalled Girlfriend 7.0 from their system.

Best of luck,

Cash Ondelivery