Arthur Black over at Parksville Qualicum Beach News has written an amusing article about the common gangster movie concept of fitting a victim out with ‘cement shoes,’ for the purposes of not only disposing of the victim, but also of disposing of his or her body in a convenient way as well.

His take on whether or not it has ever happened in real life is that he hasn’t been able to find a credible reference for any historical examples, and he puts this down to a belief that gangland assassins simply don’t want to mess around with complexities of convincing someone to hold still while you pour cement over their feet. So much simpler to kill them in a more direct way, and dispose of the body [1] when convenient, right?

Interestingly enough, Mark ‘Chopper’ Read [2] – a self-proclaimed ex-gangland enforcer in Melbourne, Australia – once appeared on Australian television making the claim that he had, in fact, murdered a man using pretty much this method.

His quote (you can see it extracted here), was:

‘It took us hours to get him in [3], the bastard. He kept climbing out.’

Of course, Chopper Read has been accused more than once of embellishing his gangland experiences, and since no-one (at least publicly) followed up on this claim it’s anybody’s guess whether or not it truly happened.

To read Arthur Black’s article, visit: Two feet equals six feet under, and other urban legends

Photo courtesy of julianrod

Footnotes:

1.	Perhaps by weighing the body down with cement weights.
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2.	Sometimes credited as ‘Reid’ instead of ‘Read’.
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3.	…to the cement mixer.
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“ALL DOGS GO TO HEAVEN,” the first picture reads, but the second is quick to disagree: “ONLY HUMANS GO TO HEAVEN READ THE BIBLE”.

So begins what appears to be a rather quirky theological debate about the souls of dogs (and eventually of rocks!), carried out entirely on church signs.

But, we ask ourselves, is it real? Did the religious communities represented by Our Lady of Martyrs Catholic Church and Beulah Cumberland Presbyterian Church really go to war with each other over whether or not pets can go to paradise?

As it happens, the answer is no, they didn’t…

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Barry Williams, Supreme Universal Skeptic Of The 12th Magisterial Order [1], has sent in another interesting variant of the infamous Nigerian Scam.

As Barry mentions in his email:

Murray

I despair for the continuing deterioration of literacy among barristers admitted to the bar in the UK.

Barry

I can understand Barry’s emotional distress, since the email asks you to believe that it has been sent by a barrister located in the UK, while simultaneously being pockmarked with a truly impressive variety of misspellings and grammatical errors.

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Footnotes:

1.	And owner-operator of the Barry Williams Blog.
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If you’re a fan of scary stories about the Bloody Mary ritual, you might enjoy resonanttantei’s fun retelling of a group of friends calling on Bloody Mary, and the terrifying results.

You can read the full story at: “Bloody Mary Bloody Mary Bloody Mary….oh crap” (note: language may be a little unsuitable to some in some places).

After a while, we summoned up our courage and went back to school, went into the bathrooms and of course, since I’m the “Legend Tripper” I had to say what we do.

I liked resonanttantei’s idea of being a “Legend Tripper”, and while I don’t know exactly what he intended to convey with the term, I thought it was perhaps meant to be a way of describing someone who’s something of an expert in various legends, but who also may be just a little bit unpredictable with it as well.

Jake being the bravest, looked up and his eyes went BIG. I looked up as well, I gasped and I almost screamed. Cori took her hand and covered mine. “Don’t scream, don’t..” She said to me.

Photograph courtesy of peskymac

Okay, so maybe I’m a little odd, but for some reason I can’t help thinking it’s going to be a good day when I discover that someone has forwarded a new variant of an urban legend or superstition or scam email to me.

So, oh yes, imagine my excitement when I discovered two new variants in my inbox this morning! [1]

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Footnotes:

1.	I didn’t actually jump up and down and clap my hands, if that’s what you’re imagining, but I definitely did smile and also possibly did rub my hands together and say, “Aha! The game’s afoot!”, or something equally silly.
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