 I'm Darren Marlar and this is your Daily Dose of Weird News. Queen Elizabeth apparently has a secret code that she uses to escape awkward conversations. When Her Majesty is done talking to a guest, she simply moves her handbag from one arm to another, and her aides swoop in to end the conversation. Okay, I see what you're doing with the handbag there, Queenie Lady. I wasn't done talking with you, yo bag! Climbing the corporate ladder could be setting your health up for a big fall, according to a recent survey. Researchers found when people are handed a promotion, they suffer 10% more mental strain. So when offered a promotion, next time just politely turn down the additional responsibilities and just ask for the raise in pay instead. In Monroe, Washington, someone donated an old ice chest to Goodwill, not realizing the whole thing was packed with marijuana. They are trying to track down the donor and looking for someone with an incredibly large bummer. The military is developing drones with the ability to make lethal attack decisions without human input. If your name is Sarah or John Connor, you might want to consider a name change. Kale is getting a makeover. To develop a new variety of kale tailored to American palates, a horticulture professor from Cornell University College of Agriculture and Life Science are soliciting consumers kale reflections – the good, the bad and the ugly. The scientists at the college have been working with kale for years, so they decided to see if they can develop strains that consumers will want to eat. It's simple, yeah, you make kale taste like chocolate. MasterCard is experimenting with a payment feature in Brazil and Mexico that allows people to authenticate their payments with a selfie. Oh, just kill me now. Patrick Stewart says he uses marijuana daily to help him with arthritis symptoms. Stewart says the two years ago in Los Angeles he was examined by a doctor and given a note which gave him legal permission to purchase from a registered outlet cannabis-based products which he was advised might help the orthoarthritis in both of his hands. When he needs a refill, he just uses cerebro to log into the Walgreens website. The Trump administration's budget proposals includes billions for his proposed southern border wall while cutting funding for programs like Meals on Wheels. Hey, how about you keep Meals on Wheels and just build the wall with the leftover sandwiches? A recent study says parenthood is linked to a longer life. Not in actual years, parenthood just makes life feel like it's taking longer. If you miss cuddling with your kitty during the day while at work, there's now a solution. Me Fur Perfume New York-based fragrance company Demeter is now selling kitten fur, which it claims captures the olfactory essence of the warmth and comfort of that perfect spot just behind a kitten's neck. Wow, you smell so great tonight! Oh yeah, that reminds me, I need to clean out the kitty litter box. Japan has opened restaurants called Owl Cafes where people can pet the owls while they eat lunch. And if you pet the owl too hard and it dies, well then they'll pluck it, fry it up and serve it with a side of biscuits and gravy. A robot is playing a leading role in a British stage production. Not a single critic has dared give it a bad review. According to a poll of U.S. adults, more than a third feel that the most frightening small creature is the snake, followed by rats, spiders and cockroaches, and then divorce lawyers. Saudi Arabia unveiled its first-ever Girls Council but didn't allow any girls at the event. Oh well, baby steps, right? Boy babies, of course, but still. New research shows young people who become sleep-deprived by using the internet into the small hours are much more likely to become mentally ill later in life. Lack of sleep may help explain the puzzling increases in mental illness among young people in recent decades. And regularly staying up late to surf the internet and chat on social networking sites could be one reason young people are sleeping less according to the research. The study of about 20,000 young people found that those who slept fewer than five hours a night were three times more likely to become psychologically distressed, which explains the content of 86% of all late-night Twitter posts. Scientists are warning that the microfibers from our athletic wear are making their way to the ocean where they are harming sea life. And honestly, is there anything sadder than seeing a dolphin trapped in a pair of yoga pants? A new study finds that the brain continues to be active for several minutes after the body has been declared clinically dead. So there's something to look forward to in our final minutes. Yippee. He may be a convicted murderer, but that does not mean he has to be bald and prison dagnabbit. In New Zealand, Philip John Smith's hairpiece was taken away when authorities recaptured him after he fled the country. He was accused of being the toupee as part of his disguise, but he argued that his toupee was an artwork essential to his self-esteem and a high court judge in Auckland agreed, ruling that his fundamental right to freedom of expression was ignored. Smith is serving a life sentence for murdering the father of a boy he had previously sexually abused. He also has a string of other convictions including extortion, aggravated robbery and sexual offenses. But he'll get to where his toupee in prison. Oh, happy day. The Secret Service revealed that it took a full 17 minutes the other day to catch that White House intruder. There's a picture of him making himself comfortable in the oval office with his feet tucked under him on the couch. According to a recent study, men have to work harder deciphering what women are saying because they use the auditory part of the brain that processes music, not human voices. It's not the pitch of the woman's voice, but rather the vibration and number of sound waves that cause the problem. At least I think that's what my wife told me. You know, honestly, I wasn't really listening. Cheech Marin has written a new memoir. Seriously, who would think that he would be able to remember enough to write a book? It's no secret Americans are drinking less soda. Now, that trend is starting to take its toll on the restaurant industry. A recent report by the NPD Group found that over the past five years, Americans ordered 4% fewer beverages at restaurants, a whopping 2 billion fewer servings. Well, if Pepsi wants to start sending me free cans on a daily basis, I'll be happy to try and pick up the slack on that. The State Department is warning U.S. students about the dangers of spring break travel to Mexico. This warning has been brought to you by the State of Florida Tourism Office. Don't overcook your French fries and toast. A new study by UK's Food Standards Agency measured the amount of acrylamide, a cancer-causing toxin, in roasted potatoes, fries and toast prepared in the home. The FSA's chief scientific advisor said the new research showed the need for roast potatoes and fries to be cooked to only a light golden color, and that bread should be toasted to the lightest color acceptable. In fact, rather than use a toaster for your bread, they suggest boiling it. In China, 43-year-old Song Tao has been busy lifting 22 pounds worth of water buckets using only his eyelids. He's been performing the very impressive and extremely painful-looking stunt for the last 26 years, and he's credited with founding the Art of Eyelid Bucket Lifting. Song explains, I met a teacher who passed on the bucket lifting skill. I slept with the buttons on my eyes for half a year, then I was able to perform on stage. He uses a homemade contraption which is made of two buttons, some string and two metal hooks. He squeezes the big buttons under his eyelids on top of his eyeballs and attaches the other end to the string of the bucket handles. If it makes you feel better, he does sterilize the buttons before every performance to prevent an eye infection. No, that doesn't make me feel better either. Movie actor and longtime Cheers star Woody Harrelson says he has stopped smoking marijuana. California marijuana dispensaries aren't sure how they plan to deal with the financial loss. Tom Brady's stolen jersey from this year's Super Bowl has been recovered. After being found in Mexico in the possession of a member of the international media, the NFL says the game-worn jersey from Super Bowl 51 and another jersey missing from Super Bowl 49 were retrieved after an investigation led by the FBI. Mexico, eh? So you still think we don't need that wall? The latest Forbes list of the world's billionaires shows President Trump plummeting more than 200 spots from last year with his estimated worth diving $1 billion. So to the surprise of the entire world, it appears Trump running for president might have been a bad idea. A brown tabby cat is being hailed as a hero after she pounded on a door and alerted her family to dangerously high levels of carbon monoxide in their Wisconsin home. In all actuality, the cat just wanted to get into the room to use the litter box, but it makes them feel better to call her a hero. Why not? You may find this hard to believe, but apparently there is a belief circulating in the NBA that the earth is flat. Seriously. Kyrie Irving of the Cleveland Cavaliers first revealed his flat-earth beliefs last month, and now retired basketball player Shaquille O'Neal has come out on the world's flat closet. In an episode of his podcast, broadcast late February, but only recently picked up by the media, Shaq said, What? The earth is flat. Shaq, what are you talking about? The earth is flat. No, it's not. Yeah, it is. No, it's not. Yes, it is. No. Listen. It's not. There's three ways to manipulate the mind, which you read, what you see, and what you hear. Okay. Experiences. In school, first thing they teach us is, oh, Columbus discovered America, but when he got there, it was some fair-skinned people with the long hair smoking out of peace pipes. So what does that tell you? Columbus didn't discover America. He found where some other people already lived. I'm just saying, when I drive from Florida to New York, flat. New York to Seattle. It's not flat. Seattle down to LA. It's not flat. It's not flat. It's a square. That's what it is. Then again, this guy thought the movie Kazam was going to be huge, so we probably shouldn't trust his instincts. Norway knocked Denmark out of the number one spot when it comes to the world's happiest country. Of course, when Denmark heard the news, it bummed them out so much they dropped from two to the five spot. In an interview with Fox News, President Trump said he might not be president if it wasn't for Twitter. Four years from now, he'll be saying he would still be president if it wasn't for Twitter. In Pine Grove, Pennsylvania, 40-year-old Thomas Jones had to be taken by police to a hospital after a rather incredible feat. Jones apparently jumped from the back of a garbage truck, landed in a snowbank and slid down onto the road where he managed to then get run over by the same garbage truck. Idiot level expert. In Italy, a guy held up a post office. Postal employees quickly locked the door after the man fled and watched in amazement as he got into his car, sat there for a moment and then ran back to the door. Seeing it locked, he began to shout for them to please let him in because he left his car keys inside. He was still banging to be let back in when the police arrived. Russia's anti-corruption czar says the cost of the average bribe there has jumped 75%. How would he know unless someone bribed him? At which point you probably shouldn't be the anti-corruption czar. The Weather Channel says it will name a winter storm next year Colbert for late-night TV hosts Stephen Colbert. Which seems quite appropriate for a guy who blows a lot of hot air. A New Zealand river is the first in the world to be granted the same rights as humans. Man, I am glad this is New Zealand. If this was the U.S., the river would have the right to bear arms and that just sounds dangerous. Only half of Canadians want to deport people who are illegally crossing into Canada from the U.S. and a similar number disapprove of how Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is handling the influx. Have you thought about building a wall? After students from Pleasant Run Elementary School in Indianapolis won a robotics challenge recently, several competing students were heard shouting, Go back to Mexico! Huh, I had no idea robots were Mexican, did you? Trump loyalist Roger Stone, who is under investigation for possibly colluding with the Russians to defeat Hillary Clinton, has a Richard Nixon back tattoo. Question, how many tattoo parlors do you have to visit before you find one that has Richard Nixon in the catalog of choices? Bullfighter Antonio Romero was gored by a bull during a recent bout in Mexico City. The bull's horn ended up 11 inches up Romero's rectum causing severe injuries. Yeah, you think? On Tuesday, President Trump signed a nearly $20 billion funding bill for NASA, setting the goal of putting humans on Mars. First to go, everyone working at CNN and MSNBC. San Diego's Stone Brewing has unveiled a beer made with treated sewage water. The recycled water pail ale is called Full Circle. Stone's CEO, Pat Tierman, says, This particular water will just help us not require so much natural water to come in and give us a more reliable source. So for us to be able to reuse, that's part of our mantra. That's part of what we do. It's like the old saying goes, you can't buy beer, you can only rent it. And apparently, you can rent it again and again. In Maplewood, New Jersey, a fifth grade teacher thought it would be a good idea to have a slave auction where white kids sold black kids. Oh, correction, make that former fifth grade teacher. There is no coming back from this one with your job intact. FBI Director James Culley confirmed Monday that his agency is investigating possible ties between Donald Trump's campaign and the Russian government. A Trump spokesperson said that the two sides never shared ties or any other clothing. Those packets of wildflower seeds Cheerios is giving away to help grow flowers for honeybees. Turns out, in some states, those seeds are considered noxious, invasive and illegal. So be glad you don't work in the General Mills Promotions Department and our in tomorrow morning's emergency meeting. Police in Delaware picked up a 21-year-old Octavio Lopez Hernandez on his third driving under the influence arrest after he was found passed out in the drive-through lane of a McDonald's. Master Corporal Mark Hoffman, a Dover police spokesperson, said in a news release that Lopez Hernandez was arrested around 1 a.m. Saturday after police were called to the restaurant. He was taken into custody without incident and charged with third offense DUI, a felony. Sounds like somebody's got a serious drinking problem. The Philadelphia man is suing a New York City bar, saying he was refused service because he was wearing a Make America Great Again hat. OK, actually, I have to side with the bar owners on this one. I mean, not because you're a Trump supporter, but because it's impolite to wear a hat at the table. Next week Wells Fargo will become the first major bank to upgrade all of its ATMs so that you can use your cell phone to withdraw money. Just think you might dial a wrong number and still hit the jackpot. The new Samsung Galaxy S8 will have Samsung's version of Siri called Bixby. OK, now, if it's the voice of Bill Bixby, you'll want to pass. I mean, you do not want to get that guy angry. You wouldn't like him when he's angry. They struck a deal with the cast of The Big Bang Theory, and so it will stick around for two more seasons and then wrap things up. Good thing. I mean, another couple of years and we'd have had stories about Sheldon living in a nursing home. North Korean tyrant Kim Jong-un has released a propaganda video showing a U.S. aircraft carrier being blown up and a bomber shot down in flames. OK, now, now it's getting serious. North Koreans are learning Photoshop. Facebook has introduced a new feature called Town Hall to get users more involved in the political process. Finally, it's about time Facebook created a way for us to talk politics. Trouble in Pennsylvania, where state troopers in Shile Keel County say a 23-year-old woman claimed she shoveled the snow out of a parking spot only to have her 43-year-old neighbor's husband park his pickup in it. Well, the two women started arguing over the issue. That led to pushing, punching and, ultimately, yes, pulling each other's hair. Both were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct. It sounds to me like legislators need to get on the ball as soon as possible and pass a bill to outlaw snow. An Oregon woman is being accused of leaving seven children at her home daycare center while she went to a tanning booth. It's not as irresponsible as it sounds, though. I mean, she did strap them all down with duct tape before leaving so they wouldn't get into trouble. Parents at a Florida school called Innovative Park Middle School want the name changed because of the acronym IPMS. The school hasn't even opened yet. And already they're creating trigger warnings. You know, I would comment about how stupid it is to make this an issue. But you got to admit that as long as it probably took them to come up with the name and all the iterations, they probably tried out before settling on this one. You'd think somebody might have written down the acronym at some time just to see what it looked like. Because of the current bread shortage in Venezuela, the government has taken over all of the country's bakeries. Government bread. Gee, you know, that sounds like it's going to be some tasty stuff. French authorities called to a robbery location and found the suspected thief stuck in a hole he'd made with a hammer in a store window. When police arrived, they found the man half in and half out of the hole. You know, why can't all criminals be as courteous to law enforcement as this guy? I mean, to capture themselves. Facebook is apparently testing a feature called send a wave. It allows people to send their nearby friends a waving hand emoji to say hello and help them beat up. And if you ignore your waving friend, well, they can poke you to get your attention. You'll like this one. Two babies were born in a South Carolina hospital in rooms right next to each other. The parents of the respective babies have never met and their babies were born just 18 hours apart. The baby's names Romeo and Juliet. No kidding. Morgan and Edwin Hernandez welcomed Romeo into the room at 2.06 p.m. Sunday, then 18 hours and eight minutes later, Christiana and Alan Schifflett announced the delivery of Juliet. The baby's names had been chosen long before they were born. But after the coincidence was realized, the parents called a photographer in to take pictures of the babies laying side by side. Romeo's mother says it's funny because we didn't even name him Romeo after Shakespeare. We named him after a singer named Romeo Santos that my husband and I both love. Juliet's mother said we had picked the name out months ago. We wanted a J name to go with our son's name Jonas. We picked Juliet because we were watching the TV show Psych and the character's name is Jules. Sears and Kmart might not have enough money to stock their shelves. The company that operates the department store chain warned this week that it faces substantial doubt about its ability to stay in business unless it can borrow more and tap cash from more of its assets. Hey, you know what? They should go to Walmart, buy a bunch of cheap stuff and stock their shelves with that. There you go. Problem solved. White House spokesman Sean Spicer's press conferences have become must watch TV with ratings that sometimes even beat soap operas like The Bold, The Beautiful and General Hospital. Plus, the acting at the press conferences is a lot more believable. English teachers are shaking their heads in dismay. Only 43 percent of U.S. adults read at least one book of literature last year, that is novels, short stories, poetry or plays, making a three decade low, according to a report from the National Endowment for the Arts. It is the long, steady decline of literary reading, laments the Washington Post. The ADA has been tracking adult reading and arts participation since 1982, when the literature reading rate was an impressive 57 percent. The survey counts only those books read for pleasure, not because they were required for work or school. In an attempt to capture the broadest possible range of leisure reading, there was also no distinction made between physical books and books read on e-readers, such as the Amazon Kindle. We do read tweets, though. How about you create pretty pictures of war and peace and then send out the entire novel 140 characters at a time? Pay less shoe stores are said to be getting ready to file for bankruptcy as soon as next week, perhaps allowing people to pay less isn't such a great business strategy after all. If you want to be happier, cancel your Facebook account. That's the conclusion from a Danish think tank that insists quitting Facebook will not only make you happier, but also less angry, less sad and less worried. The Happiness Research Institute in Copenhagen, Denmark found that after only seven days away from Facebook, those users reported feeling happier, less sad, less worried, less angry and less depressed. For more information, you can read the whole article on my Facebook page. If you like this video, please give it a thumbs up and be sure to subscribe if you want to see more. And click that little bell next to the subscribe button to be notified when I post new videos. This episode is made possible in part by my Patreon supporters. For daily news of WeirdNews.com, I'm Darren Marlar.