Valley Ho High-Heeled Assault

I just love this one due to the hotel name....

Valley Ho High Heeled Assault


Escort bludgeoned hotel valet for calling yellow cab instead of sedan

MAY 12--A female escort wielding a high-heeled shoe is facing an assault rap after she allegedly used the footwear to beat a valet bloody outside the Hotel Valley Ho in Scottsdale, Arizona, according to police. Jennifer Thomas, 26, was arrested early yesterday in connection with the Monday night attack on the 27-year-old male victim, who was injured after Thomas hit him in the head with the shoe. The heel's tip struck his scalp, "causing him to begin profusely bleeding," according to Scottsdale Police Department reports. "The gash was consistent with the size of the bottom of a high heel shoe." The unprovoked assault apparently was triggered after Thomas--who was wearing a miniskirt and had been drinking in the upscale hotel's bar--asked the valet to call her a cab. When a "standard Yellow Cab" arrived, Thomas, pictured in the mug shot below, became irate, saying, "I'm not fucking getting into that. Who do you think I am?" She added that hotel employees "should know I need a sedan." After a second vehicle was summoned--this time a Lincoln Town Car--Thomas removed a shoe and, "without prompt," took a "violent swing" at the valet. Though the man slipped the first blow, "before he could react again the woman used the same heel, held in her right hand, and hit him on the left side of the head." Directing the Lincoln's driver to "go, go, go!!!," Thomas fled the scene in the fancier ride, but was collared a few hours later at her Phoenix apartment. Following her arrest, which was first reported by the Scottsdale Arizona News blog, Thomas "confessed to the assault," but "claimed she was provoked by hotel staff," according to investigators. An arrest report, which lists Thomas's occupation as "upscale companion escort," notes that she was charged with assault, disorderly conduct, and possession of an invalid driver's license, all misdemeanors. The victim, who was "crying, shaking and talking loudly" when interviewed by cops, was treated at the scene by paramedics, but declined transport to a hospital.

Size Matters

For Airport Security, Size Matters

Cops: New high-tech screener triggered fight over manhood insult

MAY 6--A Transportation Security Administration screener is facing an assault rap after he allegedly beat a co-worker who joked about the size of the man's genitalia after he walked through a security scanner. The May 4 confrontation involved Rolando Negrin, 44, and other TSA employees who had previously taken part in a training session at Miami International Airport, according to the below Miami-Dade Police Department reports. Negrin, pictured in the mug shot at right, and his co-workers had been training with new "whole body image" machines--the controversial kind that provide very revealing images of a traveler--when Negrin walked through the scanner. "The X-ray revealed that [Negrin] has a small penis and co-workers made fun of him on a daily basis," reported cops. Following his arrest, Negrin told police that he "could not take the jokes anymore and lost his mind." After work Tuesday evening, Negrin confronted fellow TSA screener Hugo Osorno in an airport parking lot. Negrin wanted to "resolve a problem," and get Osorno, 34, to "finally respect him." Instead, Negrin allegedly pulled out a police baton and began striking Osorno, while demanding an apology. A witness told cops that Negrin told Osorno, in Spanish, "Get on your knees or I will kill you and you better apologize." When Negrin, wearing his TSA uniform, arrived for work yesterday, he was arrested on an aggravated battery count and booked into the Miami-Dade lockup. Osorno, police reported, suffered "bruises and abrasions on his back and arms" during the attack.

I Will Kill You With My Bare Hands

I have a great affinity for crazy people in general, but crazy famous people?!?! LOVE 'EM! So I'm loving this:


Russell Crowe is set to capture America's heart all over again when Robin Hood hits theaters in two weeks. But let us not forget: Russell Crowe is crazy. Some exclusive excerpts from a new book remind us just how crazy.

The following excerpts are taken from

The Men Who Would Be King: An Almost Epic Tale of Moguls, Movies, and a Company Called DreamWorks
 by Nicole Laporte, which will be released May 4. Her chapter on the making of Gladiator contains these tidbits about what it's like to work with Russell Crowe. First, his negotiation style:

"You motherfucker. I will kill you with my bare hands."



"Hello?" Branko Lustig said, confused and barely awake; it was, after all, 3 a.m. in England.


"You motherfucker," the speaker repeated.


"Who's on the phone? Who is this?" Lustig demanded.


When Russell Crowe identified himself, the genuinely terrified Lustig, one of the producers of the about-to-be-filmed Gladiator, hung up and called Steven Spielberg in Los Angeles.


"Steven," he said. "I'm leaving. Russell wants to kill me. I'm leaving."


Having survived a concentration camp, Lustig was not taking any chances.


Crowe, not yet Russell Crowe, but still just another verkakte Australian coming off a sleeper (L.A. Confidential), was sour because he believed DreamWorks was low-balling his assistants on their per diems. Rather than raise this grievance at a mundane daylight hour, Crowe opted for a more dramatic statement, a tactic not unknown in these parts. The actor's recent behavior had been erratic, just like everything else on the project.

Next, a surly and apparently hung over Russell comes to a script meeting at Ridley Scott's production facility one morning. He insults the recent script changes and walks out. Ridley Scott finally tracks Crowe down and gently ushers him back to the meeting:

Finally, Crowe materialized—unrepentant and sans affability. If Scott's pep talk had any effect, it seemed to have lodged deep in the actor's subconscious. Crowe played along, but refused to summon a scintilla of good humor. He didn't so much recite his lines as growl them in a deranged accent that flitted between indeterminate continents of origin. More absurd was Oliver Reed's delivery. Even though his lines were as long as haiku, he filled them with dramatic flourishes. Having recently renounced drinking, he said that the only thing he was chugging was lemonade, but the question was just what he was mixing in the stuff.


"My oold frrriend," he read, puckering his lips and rolling his r's with all the pomp of a 17th century thespian.


Crowe, in turn, chewed up monologues, spitting out each and every poisonous syllable.


Screenwriter John Logan, who has lovingly crafted many of these lines, watched in horror. He scrawled four words on a piece of paper: "Kill me! Kill me!"


A month later, after filming in England, the shoot moved to Ouarzazate, Morocco – a town near the Sahara Desert, where Hollywood has traditionally gone for its sword and sandal needs (Lawrence of Arabia was filmed in the area). Crowe's mood did not improve. Twice, he had walked off the set. Even when he was supposedly having "fun," Crowe was a puffy pain. After challenging members of the crew to a foot race, and losing, he would mutter for days, "I would have won, but I can't run in the sand in sandals."



Heh! And finally, an inside look at the ferocious working style of the world's greatest actor (Russell Crowe):




Never were Crowe's spirits more in flux than when he was to read the climactic, "And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next" scene, in which his character, Maximus, removes his helmet and reveals his identity. It was only the most seminal line in the entire movie, and yet Crowe was convinced that it was ridiculous – overwrought, puffery that no man would ever be caught dead saying, least of all a brawny, sword-carrying killer standing under the unrelenting African sun. Scott was one of the few people who seemed to understand Crowe, that underneath all that volatility was a very scared actor who needed to feel safe. Rather than blow up at him, Scott waited until the tantrum subsided. Then he agreed to shoot the scene the way Crowe preferred.


After doing the take, Crowe still looked dissatisfied. "Let me see the other script again," he said to Scott, referring to the loathed revision. After studying the page stonily, he shrugged. "Well, we might as well try it."


And so, the scene was reshot. Everyone agreed it was brilliant. Everyone, that is, but Crowe. "Russell, what's the problem?" Scott asked, finally showing a hint of exasperation. "It worked."


"It was shit," Crowe repeated, "but I'm the greatest actor in the world and I can make even shit sound good." And with that he marched off.

Terms Of Endearment

A woman I worked with was having an affair with a male coworker.  She thought it was 'loooove'  while he wanted nothing more that an occasional *bleep* (bleep added by me, although I have no problem with words like *bleep*, or *bleeping* or *bleepity-bleep*.  I just don't want to offend anyone else who may be less crass than me.  Or who may be reading at work).

One day she found out the 'terms of endearment' he was referring to her as when he spoke to other male coworkers.  They included slam piece, easy lay, etc.  Spreads as easy as warm butter was my favorite.  (Sorry, I couldn't bleep these.  'Cause they're kinda funny.)  She ran over to his cubicle crying, and grabbed whatever she could reach on his desk and hurled it at him.  Coffee (while still in a mug), cellphone, random papers.  I think the stapler probably hurt the worst.

They were both summoned to the boss's office, and given a lecture on proper work demeanor and inter-office dating.  As far as I know, they have never spoken to or even looked at each other again.

Well, THAT must have made for a tension-free office environment, no?

I'm sure all the rest of the ladies in the office were lining up to date him.  What girl doesn't swoon at being called slam piece?

Never heard that warm butter one before, JerryCola45!

In The News: The Weirdest of 2009

We will end this year and quite possibly run into the next  (what can I say, it was obviously a very weird year) with some crazy work stories that made headlines:

Steven Reid, a 23-year-old hotel cleaner in Scotland, just wanted a day off of work. Rather than asking for one, Reid claimed he had been assaulted. To convince his boss, he took a razor from his pocket and repeatedly dragged it down his face. He also picked up a boulder and repeatedly hit himself on the head and body. He went to the police station to report "the assault." When asked about the incident, Reid said, "Looking back, I should have just phoned work and asked them for the day off." (BBC News)

Aw c'mon, just ASKING for a day off wouldn't be nearly as fun!  Now I have to go and find myself a large boulder and a razor and I will be right back...

Sailing, Takes Me Away...

Back in the 80s to 90s, I was a crew member on a very large cruise ship, and I can tell you that the passengers have absolutely no clue what happens below deck. 

I'm sure this part can't be occurring anymore, with stricter environmental guidelines in place and hefty fines, but late at night we used to dump our garbage off the ship right into the ocean.  Big black bags of it, just coming right off the back of the ship.

But I'm sure this part still happens: the crew and entertainment workers are like one big incestuous family.  We had our own bar on a lower deck, nothing like the ones the passengers go to - ours was (and I'm sure still is)  a bare bones, low class gin-mill type of place.  The crew gets drunk just about every night, and you never knew who would wind up in what bed or who they would wake up next to.  What makes that even more raunchy as I look back on it is that the crew stayed in rooms of 2 or 4 people each.  So there was no privacy for these shenanigans. There were even occasions when a crew member might manage to rotate through all four beds and all four roomates in one drunken night.  The top billed members of the entertainment groups would usually have a single room, and people would hook up with them not due to attraction, but for the chance of a night of privacy.

The drunken fights were pretty legendary, too. 

The better looking male crew members (alas, I was not one of them) would have women passengers throwing themselves at them.  From the very young to the very old, it seemed a badge of honor to 'get' a crew member.  These male crew members were used to this, and used to have a standard line of "I've never gotten together with a passenger before, but you, I couldn't resist."  (Insert major gagging and barfing sounds here.  Thanks.)  Of course, little did the women know they were just one of hundreds, maybe thousands to hear the same routine.

Ah, we were young and crazy.

Young, crazy, and most likely disease-ridden with livers ready to go on strike.

Hope you had huge supply of condoms and penicillin in those days, CruisingMan.

Small Birds And Big Men

Two guys I work with have an intense football team rivalry going on. One is insane about the Giants, the other is equally loony about the Eagles.


One Monday after watching their teams play Sunday, the two of them got into a heated argument. This argument eventually became a screaming match until the Eagles fan took a swing at the Giant guy. Then it was all out war, rolling on the ground fighting like their lives depended on it - all while dressed in suits and ties. A bunch of us broke up the fight, and the men retreated to their offices with their bloody noses and bruises.

The best part is that these were two VPs of a mediation company - we are supposed to defuse situations, not ignite them.

I find this one even funnier if you go back and reread it assuming that the eagles guy is a fan of our fine feathered friends and the giants guy is enamored with people of huge stature. Heh.

We appreciate you punting this one our way, TeddyG.!  (Yeah, I know.  That was bad.  Hey, I try.)

A Compilation of Crazy

Yeah, it's 6 minutes of your life you'll never get back, but go for it anyway.

The Candy Ass is Blind Drunk

Tony sent us this little gem....

Joe and his lush friend Sean went drinking one night during their break on the night shift. Joe came back into work all beat up. Later on Sean came back to work all beat up. They finally realized that in their drunken stupors that they had been fighting each other. Sean was always calling everyone a "Candy Ass". I guess Joe got pissed off.

How drunk DO you have to be to not know you're fighting your co-worker?!?!