What a Weird Week Show: Cocaine in the Cheese and Rocks in the cookies. Fri July 28, 2023.

Hi Friends, I'm Scott. This is What a Weird Week, a show where we count down the top ten Weird News stories of the Week. Like and subscribe to the podcast, see the shownotes blog and check us out on YouTube. Find everything at Shownotes.page.
This is Season 4, Episode 44 first published on Friday July 28, 2023:

... btw, here's the latest video episode...
Here's the Top Ten:
❿ Cocaine cheese in the news
- US Border Security officers were in the news this week after a cocaine seizure in Texas where the cocaine was hidden inside wheels of cheese.
- it was almost 18 pounds of cocaine that was being cheese-smuggled.
- You don't hear of that so much... cocaine being smuggled via dairy products... the CNN article mentions some other smuggling attempts like the ol' drugs in the wheelchair trick, and drugs in the ice cream machine (I guess that one is almost a dairy-smuggling connection).
See https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/07/23/us/cocaine-cheese-seized-texas-border/index.html
❾ That's the way the cookie crumbles... rocks in the cookies recall story...
- Trader Joe's (US grocery store) is recalling some cookies because of rocks risk.
- not something you see every day.
- did somebody drop them on the ground? no. no they did not.
- if you have Almond Windmill Cookies and/or Dark Chocolate Chunk and Almond Cookies in your pantry, do not eat.
- a lot of the news sources don't get into what happened... often times  something like this occurs during the harvest process... maybe the almond harvest was rocky this year...
See https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost.com/2023/07/24/trader-joes-recalls-cookies-because-they-may-contain-rocks/amp/
Bonus: Here's a link about weird stuff that gets into food sometimes... https://www.percipio-training.co.uk/weird-things-found-in-food/
- most common thing that gets into food is hair... other complaints on-record include batteries, a live frog, a baked mouse found in a loaf of bread and a person's fingertip. That one was found in ice cream. That write-up also gets into complaints that were just an attempt to get money from a company... like the 2005 case where someone put a finger in their bowl of chilli to try and get compensation. The coroner was able to prove that the finger hadn't been cooked in the chilli. They found out that the husband of the chilli bowl lady had purchased the severed finger from somebody for a hundred bucks. In that one, the husband and the wife both went to jail and they estimate the fraud cost the restaurant chain 20 something million in damages to reputation and legal fees, etc. 
❽ Should you let your pooch sleep in your bed? From a recent Study Finds piece... no. No you should not. 
- pooch owners, I don't have a dog in this race... but according to Dr. Faith Coleman in the article, it is less healthy to let your pooch sleep in your bed with you...  Dr. Faith says she 'could not find a single veterinarian who was in favor of letting dogs on the bed.'
Paraphrasing here, but it seems like there aren't any health benefits that can be backed up by studies looking into the effects of dogs sleeping in your bed... but there are studies that seem to indicate negative effects .. 
-  Sleeping with you can make behavior problems worse for your pooch... 
- dogs have potential to bring parasites or bacteria into your bed...
- there are more things Dr. Faith mentions...  
If you love having Dennis the Dog in your bed with you, don't even read the article, you'll probably just get mad at Dr. Faith. 
❼ 16 Psyche is back in the news. It's happening you guys! icymi, we talked about this mission on the WAWW Show before... now it's official, NASA has a launch window (Oct 5th) to send a probe/ space ship to 16 Psyche, the asteroid that may destroy the global economy! They think the asteroid contains precious metals worth ten thousand quadrillion dollars! *some people think it's not worth anything... NASA wants to go to there to find out for sure.
It's exciting, but it'll take 4 years for the NASA ship to reach the asteroid, so... wait and see.
❻ A computer chip with built-in human brain cells made the news this week... partly because they are combining computer chips with brain cells, and partly because the project has received military funding... (opinion)
- Monash University (Australia) developed this little brains and chips project... which I think should've been called Brains n Chips... their name is Dish Brain. Idk, I think my name is better (opinion). Here's a quick rundown of how to get sweet military funding dollars via brains and chips research.
- step one... grow some human and mouse brain cells in a lab...
- step two... combine brains and  electrodes into a semi biological chip...
- step three... teach it to play a very basic computer game in five minutes (it learned to play pong in five minutes!)
- kick back and wait for that sweet sweet military grant action...
- instead of silicon-based computer chips, brain cell-based chips might be the wave of the future for AI... they have the potential to learn faster and hasten the robot uprising. *citation needed re uprising.
Some day there might be robots with brain cells you guys...
❺ a good news story here to counterbalance the thought of robots with brain cells becoming our overlords... it was World Emoji Day earlier this month and Emojipedia has  shared the most-used emojis of the year so far... some of the top ones are the heart at number three, then the sideways laughing with tears of joy face... then number one is 'you're so funny that tears come pouring down my face' face... 
- this becomes a good news story because for the most part, we are using positive-emotion emojis... so that seems to indicate that we are feeling positive these days... 
BTW, in September, the new batch of emojis will include a lovely lime. So start thinking of limemoji uses now!
❹ Update to the Taco Wars story... it's Taco Peace! Taco Peace in Our Time!
- icymi, a restaurant named Taco John's had the rights to the term 'Taco Tuesday and Taco Bell has been leading the charge to have 'Taco Tuesday' declared a universal phrase that no one should own (or everybody should own)...
- when we last checked in, it seemed as though Taco John's and Taco Bell were gonna let the court decide... then...
- Taco John's has decided to let the world have Taco Tuesday. Taco Bell has issued a statement of thanks.
They close by saying, 'when tacos win, we all win.'
- Taco John's has also issued a challenge to other taco restaurants to turn this into an opportunity to donate to charity.
What a great ending! 
❸ Red Hot Flaming Passion World Record! Headline from GWR 'Habanero pepper eating couple lock lips to break record for hottest kiss'.
- it was a man and woman from Ontario (Canada)... they were in the news this week after they each ate a hot pepper and then kissed for 15 minutes... that's a world record.
- official record is 'longest habanero pepper kiss.'
- it looks like a pretty passionate kiss.
- they're already planning on a different pepper and a longer kiss.
See 
❷ If you get caught public smoking in Hong Kong, you're gonna face a weird punishment... 
- the Health Minister in Hong Kong suggests that if you see someone smoking against the rules, you should stare at them disapprovingly.
- quote from article "When someone takes out a cigarette at a restaurant, everyone on the premises can stare at that person. I do not believe that person would dare to hit back at everyone at the restaurant as they are simply staring."
- do you think that would work where you're at? Staring to curb certain crimes? I want to live in a world where staring makes us all want to be law-abiding... but idk.
 
🏆 HM Cap'n Crunch is getting his uniform fixed.
- Cap'n Crunch makes a delicious cereal, but the Cap'n himself, the official spokescap'n for the cereal which features his name, had a wardrobe malfunction going on and it is getting fixed...
- from Food & Wine: "The gold stripes on his sleeves are below his rank. Despite his decades of distinguished service fighting off the dreaded Soggies or sailing into your bowl as part of a balanced breakfast, Cap'n Crunch has been wearing a coat sporting three bars - reserved for the lower rank of commander instead of the four bars befitting of a captain."
- They're fixing the stripes and it got some press so, honorable mention to the Crunch Publicity Team.
- btw, Cap'n Crunch cereal is 60 years old this year!
 
❶ Mustard candy is in the news...
- in advance of National Mustard Day (Aug 5th) French's Mustard has announced a colab with Skittles... it's not candy-flavored mustard (might've been pleasant) ... it's mustard-flavored Skittles.
- to reiterate: Skittles that taste like mustard.
- free snack size packs of mustard Skittles are available for limited time... you can enter to win some at https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/frenchs-announces-limited-edition-mustard-skittles-301884525.html *usually these are USA only contests but I put in my Canadian address and it seemed to work. Fingers crossed you guys!!
If you scrolled this far, you're my favorite. Here's the Stream...
❿❾❽❼❻❺❹❸❷🏆❶
on