The good
In the wake of her departure from the superintendent’s seat for Des Moines Public Schools, Nancy Sebring has recently announced she will be making a comeback by running for office. She’s kicking off her campaign for governor with a waffle breakfast at the St. Hypocrethius Episcothic Church at 6662 Morning Star Drive in Des Moines, where she says she will “reveal all” with regard to last year’s sexually-explicit and highly personal emails between her and her lover that led to her premature resignation from the district. “I believe in starting with a clean slate, and I plan to run on a platform of kept promises,” Sebring said in a press release. We’ll definitely be in attendance — and not just because we like waffles.
Well, our days of calling him The Mustache are over. At a press conference discussing the overpopulation of wild boars in southern Iowa, Gov. Terry Branstad sported a freshly-shaved face, sans the Burt Reynolds flavor savor for which he’s been endearingly identified for decades. When asked why he finally decided to leave the mustache in 1976 and catch up to modern times, Branstad admitted it wasn’t by choice, but rather an awkward mixup involving his wife’s hair removal product. Handsome, though!
The bad
Crazy couponing housewives have gotten completely out of hand. Tanya Forrester, 34, of Grimes, took her thrifty shopping too far when she pulled a gun on a Sam’s Club employee last week. She threatened to shoot check-out clerk Frank Low, 92, after he told her the coupons she was trying to use were expired. Security was immediately alerted when Low pressed an alert button under the counter. But before they arrived to apprehend Forrester, she had snagged a Bic lighter from the check-out lane and burned every item she had intended to buy, using the coupons as kindling. Nothing ignites a fire like an economy-sized case of tampon supers.
The NCAA State Wrestling Tournament proved to be a lucrative event for the Greater Des Moines Area, but not so much for one Cresco family. The Raldish family are close friends with key event organizers, and while son and University of Oregon wrestler Johnny Raldish, 20, earned a seventh-place finish at the tournament, his mother and father graciously volunteered to help with event operations. While his parents were manning the concessions, they lost track of their 5-year-old son, Skip. They were forced to return to Cresco for work and school without the boy and left the search to local police. Finally last week a Wells Fargo Arena maintenance man heard the muffled cries of what turned out to be Skip rolled up in one of the wrestling mats. He had gone without food or water for four days. That’ll shut a kid up.
The ugly
Members of the infamous Westboro Baptist Church paid Iowa a visit last week to protest at local Easter Egg hunts and fellowship breakfasts around central Iowa. For the most part, church-going Iowans went about their business and tried to ignore the hateful hecklings of the protesters who carried signs stating “God hates pancakes” and “Bunnies are the devil.” But when two dozen Westboro Baptists marched in on an Easter Egg hunt at the St. Vincent Old English Church on East 34th Street in Des Moines, they didn’t walk out. No police were called to the disturbance, and when the paramedics eventually arrived on scene, no suspects were in the area — just 26 Westboro Baptist Church members left for dead, barely breathing and suffering from serious wounds from what authorities have deemed “one helluva beat-down” by East-siders. According to reports, one had a boot in his ass. Literally. Ouch.
Police were called to an Urbandale apartment last week where a fed-up girlfriend finally took a stand against her quick-shooting boyfriend. Candice Brunes, 20, had reached her limit with boyfriend Lloyd Duke, 63. Brunes accused Duke of consistent premature ejaculation followed by a load of excuses for why he couldn’t finish her off. Frustrated, Brunes thought spiking her boyfriend’s milk of magnesia with an overdose of Viagra would remedy the problem. The hasty decision proved to be fatal for Duke, who is slated to be buried as soon as funeral directors can get the coffin closed. APRIL FOOLS
