Uncle John’s Unstoppable Bathroom Reader by Bathroom Readers’ Institute Page B

staging one of their fans’ favorite events: the Sausage Race. Dressed up as a bratwurst, a hot dog, an Italian sausage, and a Polish sausage, four Brewer employees raced around the infield. But as they passed the opposing team’s dugout, Pittsburgh Pirate first baseman Randall Simon reached out and playfully whacked one of the runners with his bat. The employee fell to the ground, causing another runner to fall, too. The costumes were padded, so the victims received only minor knee scrapes, but Simon was taken from the park in handcuffs, charged with disorderly conduct, and fined $438.
    Apology: An embarrassed Simon later called the injured sausages—Mandy Block and Veronica Piech—to personally apologize. Block, the Italian sausage that took the hit, accepted the apology and asked for an autographed bat from Simon—the one that he used to hit her. (She got it.)
    I APOLOGIZE IN YOUR GENERAL DIRECTION
    Incident: In an exhibit called “The Roman Experience,” the Deva Museum in Chester, England, invited visitors to stroll through streets constructed to look as they did during Roman times. Hoping to provide an authentic experience, staff added an odor to the Roman latrines. They got one called “Flatulence” from Dale Air, a company that makes aromas for several museums. Unfortunately, it was too authentic: several schoolchildren immediately vomited.
    Apology: Museum supervisor Christine Turner publicly apologized, saying, “It really was disgusting.” But Dale Air director Frank Knight was somewhat less contrite. “We feel sorry for the kids,” he said, “but it is nice to see that the smell is so realistic.”
The world’s youngest-ever mother was five years old and lived in Peru in the 1950s.

CRÈME de la CRUD
The best of the worst of the worst .
    W ORST MATADOR
“ El Gallo” (Raphael Gomez Ortega), an early-20th-century bullfighter
    El Gallo employed a technique called the espantada (sudden flight) that was unique in the history of professional bullfighting—when the bull entered the ring, he panicked, dropped his cape, and ran away. “All of us artists have bad days,” he would explain. His fights were so hilarious that he was brought out of retirement seven times; in his last fight in October 1918, he claimed he spared the bull because “it winked at him.” (The audience thought it was a big joke, but Ortega’s relatives didn’t—his brother was so ashamed during that last fight that he entered the ring and killed the bull himself…just to salvage the family’s honor.)
    WORST DRUG-SNIFFING DOG
    “Falco,” at the County Sheriff’s Office, Knoxville, Tennessee
    In August 2000 David and Pamela Stonebreaker were driving through Knoxville in their recreational vehicle when sheriff’s deputies pulled them over for running a red light. The cops were suspicious and called for backup: a drug-sniffer named Falco. The dog sniffed outside the vehicle and signalled “positive,” so deputies immediately searched the inside of the RV…and found more than a quarter ton of marijuana.
    But in court, the Stonebreakers’ attorney challenged the search—the dog couldn’t be trusted. It turned out that between 1998 and 2000 Falco had signalled “positive” 225 times and the cops found drugs only 80 times. In other words, the dog was wrong nearly 70% of the time. Falco, the defense argued, was too incompetent to justify searching vehicles based on his “word” alone. The judge agreed and the Stonebreakers (their real name) went free.
    LEAST-WATCHED TV SHOW IN HISTORY
    “In 1978 an opinion poll showed that a French television program was watched by no viewers at all. The great day for French broad-casting was August 14, when not one person saw the extensive interview with an Armenian woman on her 40th birthday. It ranged over the way she met her husband, her illnesses, and the joy of living.…The program was broadcast in primetime.”
    — The Incomplete Book of Failures , by Stephen Pile
The thyroid