What I Learned From Magazines This Week

At least ten people have been shot by their dogs since 2004, usually in hunting accidents. 

(AARP Bulletin, January February 2016)

If somebody phones you claiming to be with the IRS, it's a scam. The real IRS will only open communications with a taxpayer via the U.S. Postal Service.

(AARP Bulletin January/February, 2016)

Due to a delivery mix-up, a man recently received a FedEx package containing a tumor instead of a Kindle. 

(Time, January 25 2016)

When boxing pro Alicia Napoleon was the only girl on her high school wrestling team the other schools circulated a petition asking that she be kicked off the team because she beat the boys and make them cry.

(New York Magazine, January 11, 2016)

A Kentucky man was arrested last July for shooting down an anonymous  drone that was hovering over his daughters in the sky about his back deck. 

(The Atlantic, November, 2015)

Groups of couples rarely engage in “electrifying” dinner party conversation. (Town and Country, February 2016)

Within a few decades, spaceflight could make it possible for international travelers to get from New York City to Tokyo in 90 minutes. 

(The Atlantic, November 2015)

Charles Schultz's favorite character to draw? Linus.

(The Atlantic, November 2015)

Giraffes sleep just 20 minutes a day.

(Reader's Digest, February 2016)

Hospital staffers sometimes place bets on patients. Guess the Blood Alcohol is a common game, as is predicting the injuries of patients arriving via ambulance, and betting on the outcomes of risky procedures.

(Reader's Digest, February 2016)

Cartoonist Al Capp described the Peanuts characters in the early, more freewheeling days of the strip as “good mean little bastards eager to hurt each other.”

(The Atlantic, November 2015)

If humans were to live on their own on Mars for centuries, scientists believe that they'd evolve to become taller, with weaker hearts, less body hair and smaller teeth.

(The Atlantic, November 2015)

When asked by an interviewer in 1976 if she was “waving the flag for women's lib,” Glenda Jackson replied, “Waving it? I'll poke it in your eye if I have to.”

(Entertainment Weekly, Special Oscar Guide 

According to boxing pro Alicia Napoleon, knocking another person out is “the most beautiful, electrifying feeling. Imagine being in love, and so happy, and then times that by a million.”

(New York Magazine, January 11, 2016)

(Roz Warren is the author of OUR BODIES, OUR SHELVES, A COLLECTION OF LIBRARY HUMOR.)