Weird News

Money for babies

A legislator in Texas is proposing that pregnant women who are considering abortion be offered $500 in exchange for not ending their pregnancy.

Republican Sen. Dan Patrick, a conservative radio talk show host, said the money might convince women to have the baby and give them up for adoption.

At a legislative conference, Patrick said 75,000 abortions were performed in Texas last year. He said if he changes the minds of 5 percent of those women, it would create 3,000 lives, almost as many as the United States has lost in Iraq.

The legislature has yet to vote on Patrick’s bill, which would make the payment state law.

Critics say such legislation violates state and federal laws against buying babies, which Patrick described as “typical ridiculous criticism.”

Planned Parenthood of Texas’ political director said the proposal “is very cynical and insulting to women and their families.”

Stolen secrets

Three New Jersey shoplifters got away with almost $12,000 worth of women’s underwear.

The two men and one woman used bags with anti-theft equipment to rob the Victoria’s Secret store in Jersey City’s Newport Center Mall.

Surveillance cameras caught the thieves red-handed, jamming undergarments into large bags and brazenly passing by staff and other customers.

Police reported that the trio took more than $6,900 worth of panties and more than $4,900 worth of bras.

According to its Web site, Victoria’s Secret’s bras retail at about $30 to $50, and their panties cost between $5 and $20.

Wanted: Real men

Canadian company Harlequin Enterprises, the world’s largest romance novel publisher, is looking for real men rather than models to pose for its book covers.

A Toronto casting call for “real men” resulted in around 200 guys lining up to strut their stuff for the representatives of the publisher.

“We’re looking for some guys that are not your usual models, but have that iconic look that women go for – sexy, sensitive, beautiful and fit,” said Harlequin spokeswoman Marleah Stout. “We want real men … exactly what you think in your mind when you’re fantasizing or imagining that ideal man.”

Harlequin sold 131 million books in 94 countries last year, and estimates that one-third of American women have read one of its publications.

The company had been using modeling agencies to supply the men for its cover art, but readers had begun to complain about the young, thin bodies on the cover clashing with the brawny older men described inside the books.

Shots for shade

An angry Japanese man expressed his disdain for a new apartment building across from his house by shooting about a dozen bullets at it with a competition rifle.

The man, who was arrested, was upset that the new 11-story building kept his house in the shade.

Taking matters into his own hands after feeling his complaints were not taken seriously, the man shot at the building from a window on the third floor of his house.

No one was injured, but walls, railings and lights on the apartment building were damaged.