So if you're going to have a Bad Day, you'd think having it while doing God's work might make it a tad less bad, right?

Wrong.

Wrong at least, when your idea of doing God's work involves carrying around poisonous snakes.  Just ask Pastor Jamie Coots of Middlesboro, Kentucky.

Oh wait...  Right.  You can't.  

Because he's dead.

Turns out the Kentucky Pastor, who was a BIG fan of using poisonous snakes in his religious ceremonies, found out the hard way this past weekend that believing in the power of God really wasn't a guarantee that God wouldn't use that power to let one of his deadly fanged creations bite him.  Even worse ( a concept which is tough to imagine once you've been bitten by a venomous serpent), the Pastor choose to decline emergency medical services when offered.  It's not clear why he did this.

Perhaps he believed it was God's will.

Perhaps he thought God was just messing with him.  

Maybe he just forgot the legless slithering animal with the needle-sharp fangs was lethal.

Maybe he felt uncomfortable having strangers touch him.

Whatever his reasoning, the outcome speaks for itself, which is more than can be said for the preacher, who these days isn't saying much to anybody...

...unless they're wearing wings.

It's doubtful there's really ever gonna be a GOOD day, when your primary means of employment involves a workday regimen made up of dishing out creamed corn and mystery meat to non-appreciative middle-schoolers.

It's even more dubious when your work day ends in handcuffs because besides making sloppy-joes, you've been making death threats to your non-appreciative co-workers because they don't like the bake of your cookies.

Yeah.  Burned cookie rejection.  That's what we're talking about here.  

Congratulations BEANTOWN!!!  In Daily Bad terms, it's you, ...Boston!...that is currently  the 2014 breakaway leader in bizzaro Daily Bad behavior!

And that, faithful reader,  is thanks to the so far unidentified New Year's Eve reveler who had her toe bitten off at an admirably raucous New Year's Eve celebration in the city's endlessly entertaining neighborhood of Dorchester.

(Wow.  I remember when the measurement of a good party was whether or not you got cocktail wieners.)

At this point it still remains unclear exactly what transpired, but a report published on myFoxboston.com does mention a sexual advance by one female upon another, an exception taking boyfriend, at least two fistfights, and a suddenly unhappy host, biting off the toe of a suddenly un-welcomed guest. 

Now THAT is how you kick off a New Year!  With blood, pain, 9 toes, and a closet full of shoes that no longer fit!

Public safety officials were quick to point out that this was an isolated incident and  not an act of terrorism.   "However..." said one first responder, "You can never be too careful.  We therefore activated all regional S.W.A.T. teams and deployed six official armored assault vehicles plus an old street sweeper with bunch of auxiliary cops hanging off of it.  We code-named the operation "Pedicure".  We are happy to report it was a complete success.  No further toe bitings have occurred."

A good day for freedom! 

A Bad Day for toe hate!

Rule #1 to avoiding a Bad Day when you're an FBI agent:  Don't leave unattended valuables plainly visible in your car.  They might get stolen.

And by car we don't mean your personal ride, we mean your "government owned" car.  And by "valuables", we don't mean that five-year-old Tom Tom you've been too cheap to update, or the graduation present IPod from your parents that you loaded with all your Napster bootlegged Dave Matthews recordings, or the wrap around Oakley sunglasses you wear when you want everyone ...(translation: high school girlfriend)... to know, really know ...(just in case she was wondering)... that you're now an FBI agent but not the kind that just looks up stuff on the Internet.  You're "tactical" too.

You know, like Jon Hamm in The Town.

No, we're not talking those kinds of valuables, we're talking valuables as in your bulletproof tactical FBI vest and, oh yeah, your FBI issued Colt-M16-A1 assault rifle and your FBI issued HS-Precision Pro-Series 2000 sniper rifle too.

THOSE kinds of valuables.

But for some unfortunate agents working out of the Boston FBI office, that rule was broken recently, and a Bad Day was born.  A Bad Day "G-Man Style"...as in "Gee man, getting our stuff stolen, ...really sucks, dude!"  Seems some sticky fingered, small time parked car thieves hit the jackpot when they reached into a couple of idle vehicles and got away with the items described above.  Either that, or some highly motivated ax grinding bad guys out there really know how to make a good guy look bad.

For it's part, the Bureau has promised to devote it's resources to solving the crimes, even going so far as to offer a $20,000 reward. 

With results!  As of this morning, fingerprints retrieved at the scene have led to the recovery of the weapons and identification of at least one person of interest.  For the good of all, including the agents, we wish them success.  We really do.  Public safety is at stake.

But man, given the notorious nature of departmental dystopia when it comes to federal/local relationships, we'd be lying if we didn't admit we would have loved to have been sitting in with the lucky lowly local cop who got to take that report.

...(sigh) 

When it comes to authoring The Daily Bad, you just never know.

Sometimes there isn't a good story to be found anywhere, and sometimes they just drop out of the sky right in front of you.  Right on to the court.   Dressed like a furry. 

Literally.

In an exquisitely entertaining turn of events that unfolded at a recent professional basketball game between the Denver Nuggets and the Portland Trailblazers, "Rocky", the much beloved Denver Nuggets foam encrusted mascot, gave the attending Denver fan devotees more than their money's worth in the department of sporting event psyche trauma, when he slowly descended from the Pepsi Center arena rafters in what turned out to be a state of total unconsciousness.  Descended, that is, until his lifeless form crumpled onto the basketball court, a frightening, flaccid, foam covered heap.  The audience, understandably, was stunned.  Worse yet, because his cable harness made it appear that he was hanging by the neck, many audience members began to believe they had just witnessed either a really creatively crafted suicide, or a good old fashioned lynching.  As it turns out (to the disappointment of some), the cable was actually connected to a hidden body harness, and "Rocky", despite his vacant stare, had only passed out, not strangled.

It's still not clear what actually happened, or why the furry fellow fainted.  Theories abound.  It may have been a medical condition (Mascotosis).  He may have been hypnotized, shot with a poison dart, suffered an allergic reaction, been practicing unlicensed transcendental meditation, been bitten by an asp, or had been caught in the midst of a spontaneous auto-erotic asphyxiation experiment.

My personal belief is that he was simply hungover.

I mean, really...like who among us has never cracked a bottle of Jagermeister only to find themselves at work the next day hanging forty feet above 20,000 people, attached to a steel cable?

At any rate, "Rocky" was revived and removed from the arena, apparently no worse for the wear, although it is likely his costume required cleaning.

Denver Nugget management reportedly has so far made no compensatory offers to ticket holder who may now be suffering from PTSD as a result of the experience.

However, "Rocky", being the super mascot that he is, rallied himself after the game to offer a consoling Tweet of reassurance to his many distraught fans, most of whom are expected to have nightmares for the next several years.

Who says American teenagers are self-centered?  Who says America's young people are lacking empathy?  Who says contemporary collegians have forgotten how to write?

Certainly not the emergency room medical staff at St. Lukes Hospital in Tempe, Arizona, where some Arizona State University frat brothers recently distinguished themselves with an impressive display of humanistic responsibility and written communication skills that may have just saved one of their friends his life.

How?

By anonymously dumping their "having-a-Bad Day" buddy in an emergency room wheelchair with a Post-It note stuck on him explaining that his lack of consciousness and dwindling pulse rate might have something to do with the 20 shots of tequila he had just ingested.

See?  Neighbor looking out for neighbor.  The leaders of tomorrow.  This is why the terrorists will never win.

Now..., switching to a Bad Day scenario that involves some slightly less heroic behavior (but is no less entertaining), we come to the case of one Amanda Bynes, who once upon a time was considered an actress/celebrity, but more frequently these days is regarded mainly as a train wreck.

...Like that never happens with former child stars.

Bynes is making court appearance headlines this week after she was arrested in NYC for reckless endangerment.  Specifically: for throwing a bong out the 36th story window of her high rise apartment.  Seems the cops came a knockin' on her door after the apartment building management called to complain that the former child star had been rolling joints and smoking weed in the lobby of her building.  Bynes allowed the officers into her smoke filled apartment whereupon a delayed reaction moment of paranoid clarity ensued, whereupon further, she is alleged to have picked up a bong that was sitting on her kitchen counter, and throwing it out the window...an act that she apparently was hoping wouldn't strike the two police officers standing in front of her as odd, because, you know, ...it's New York.

She further claimed that it wasn't a bong, it was a "vase".  Again, apparently hoping to skate by on the oft used "Hey, everybody throws vases out their windows here in New York" argument.

The police were not impressed.

A street level search for the marijuana missile turned up no bong, a fact that Bynes is claiming proves her innocence.  However, civil authorities are continuing to press their prosecution, reasoning that because it was a loaded bong, and in fact, "It's New York", it was probably snatched out of mid air, stolen, and smoked before it ever hit the ground.

And what Bad Day chronicle would be complete without yet another story about a bunch of American tourists getting themselves stranded on an Iceland iceberg...While sitting around a dinner table?

As ABC News reports, the near tragedy occurred (near tragic because dessert was for all intents and purposes...RUINED!) when an two adventurous bon vivant couples set up a dinner table on a portion of Icelandic glacier in the Fjallsarlon glacial lagoon, in an apparent attempt to illustrate to the world just how FABULOUS they were.

Unfortunately for them, Mother Nature returned the gesture by illustrating how fabulous SHE is, by providing a sudden gust of arctic wind strong enough to break off the patch of glacier they were grandstanding on, sending it floating off into the lagoon.

One of the attendees managed to leap to shore just in time, and was able to summon help.  All three of the stranded diners were eventually rescued.

No injuries were reported.  However, Kielbasablog has learned that two of the group are reportedly showing symptoms of PTSD, directly as a result of the event.  According to sources, the psychological trauma occurred when the threesome ran out of safe small-talk dinner topics, and one diner attempted to salvage the conversation by mentioning that he was a personal financial planner and detailing the advantages of investing in fixed rate annuities.  He also openly admitted to having a poster of Mitt Romney on his bedroom wall,  a disclosure which resulted in a brutally prolonged and awkward silence.

Confided one of the victims, "At that moment, I was praying for a Polar Bear to come and eat me."

Now class...as we all know, for politicians, there are Bad Days, and then there are UBER-Bad Days, ...and guess who just had a whole week of UBERs?

Wow.  So many hands.  Let's see...  Who should I choose to answer?  Alright....  You there.  Front row right.  ...Wearing the tri-corner hat and the britches.  What's your answer?

CORRECT!!!

It is in fact, our old buddy, President Barack Obama!  The de facto leader of the free world who at the moment is increasingly likely to go down in American history as "The Great Resuscitator" for his amazing ability to breathe real life back into the right wing nut bag American Tea Party movement that had mercifully just begun to show signs of suffocating on it's own spew, but now finds itself completely reinvigorated with a full set of lungs and newly cleared airway. 

Yup.  Barack Obama, whose muddled meddling policy administrators, in their bombastic missteps regarding the make-believe Benghazi "scandal", the actual very legitimate IRS scandal, and the appalling Department of Justice Associated Press leak investigation scandal, have somehow managed to provide the far right an ideological Heimlich maneuver and simultaneously do something no one else in Washington has been able to do for forty years.  Get everybody to agree on something!

Unfortunately for you, Mr. President, that something is:  That you are SCREWED!

You and your team have actually managed to simultaneously tick off the left, the right, the center, the press, everybody who voted for you, everybody who voted against you, and most especially, Hillary Clinton, who is now going to have to spend the next three years custom crafting a presidential campaign designed mostly to disassociate herself from you!  

And by you we do not mean "you" the pioneering, color barrier breaking, healthcare reforming, Osama killing, multi-cultural centerist modern American hero.  We mean "you" the death drone dealing, tax abusing, free press compromising, Syria waffling, business hating outsider who is currently only succeeding in validating every tyranny-paranoid, conspiracy theorizing, tinfoil-hat-wearing closet racist out there,  Which is pretty much completely opposite the place we were hoping you would take us to when we got our asses to the voting booth and elected you.

Oh well.  There's always next week.  As long as you don't make any dumb photo-op blunders.  You know, like making a Marine hold an umbrella over you like you're Michael Jackson.  Avoid things like that and you should be fine.

Wait.  What?

Oh.  Right.

Next!

Okay, so occasionally we here at The Daily Bad fall a little behind.  We break our promises.  We don't keep up with our creative content obligations. We get a little flumoxed, a little constipated, and the juices just don't flow.

Which apparently has not been a problem shared by at least one unique individual who likes to spend his creative spare time at home in...(ironically)...Watertown, Connecticut...filling one gallon plastic jugs with his urine. 

Local authorities discovered the jugs...300 of them ....in the course of a residential well-being check at the man's house.

(Yes, this is what qualifies as news these days, at least here on the Internet.)

According to a story in the Danbury News-Times, (since re-reported via Yahoo! News), lucky employees of the Connecticut Department of Energy & Environmental Protection (DEEP) were brought in to assess the man's living conditions, and ended up having to coordinate the daunting task of removing 300 containers of vintage bottled wee-wee, ...a fact that is likely to become a popular negotiating point between current DEEP employees and their senior management during all future performance reviews.

Not surprisingly, authorities are expected to treat the discovery as a mental-health issue, and no criminal complaints are anticipated.

Even less surprising, this season's local demand for farm-stand fresh lemonade in family-size one gallon containers has seen a precipitous decline in recent weeks.

Asked by Kielbasablog for comment, one area produce manager, requesting anonymity, quipped: "I don't think there's anything to worry about.  I'm still drinking it.  ...I boil it first, but I'm still drinking it."

From the "I begged you to leave him with a sitter" department, comes this AP reported story about a shipload of dice rolling passengers who thought they were on their way for a quick, carefree, three night dream getaway gambling cruise to the Bahamas, but instead found themselves making an unexpected oceanic u-turn after a 14-month old fellow voyager fell down and went boom aboard ship.  At first it seemed the little tyke could be treated on board, but cruise line officials, who in recent years have become somewhat sensitive about the criticism they've been receiving whenever people die on their ships, soon decided to err on the side of caution and turn the boat back to port when it became clear the injuries were serious.  A good decision for the kid and a good day for the cruise line, who showed responsible behavior.  Not such a good day for the hard luck other passengers though, who had their pre-holiday gambling micro-vacation unexpectedly interrupted by the klutzy toddler who decided to take a twenty foot header on to the Lido Deck. 

All the way back to Port Canaveral just to save the life of a baby???  For Christ sakes Cruise Director Julie...get your priorities straight!!!  I'm holding a Royal Flush!

And as bad a day was had by the above mentioned ocean voyagers, it was nothing compared to the Bad Day experienced by one very unfortunate moose who gambled and lost when he wandered onto a rural stretch of Vermont roadway, and ended up being struck by not one, not two, but THREE speeding motor vehicles, ...all three vehicles sustaining significant damage, with one ending up on it's roof. 

Remarkably only one person suffered minor injuries. 

As for the moose, let's just say his friends and family are seeking donations to fund a memorial scholarship created in his name.

Authorities have not yet been able to explain why the moose was on the highway or determine in fact whether his wanderings were accidental.

Friends have described the moose as recently having been depressed.

Speaking off the record, an associate commented, "There was a reindeer.  It was complicated."

And then of course it wouldn't be the Christmas season without at least one Bad Day news story about somebody dressed like Santa Claus getting jacked by a bunch of cops.
Ho Ho Ho.
According to the Huffington Post, this year's entry comes courtesy of officers with the Texas Department of Public Safety who took an Austin man into custody for creating criminal mischief when he was caught defacing public property on the grounds of the Texas State Capitol.  At the time, he was allegedly writing words in chalk on the sidewalk and inviting passersby and children to join him, words that expressed wishes for a better world.  Words like "community" and "peace".  Ostensibly, we are supposed to believe here that in HIS mind, Santa Claus believes that the best way to achieve world peace is by scribbling inspirational messages in front of the Texas State Capitol on the sidewalk, in chalk.  Because as everyone knows, the Texas state legislature is a hotbed of social activism when it comes to policy initiatives promulgating international global world peace. 

This is Texas we're talking about.  The state that gave us Rick Perry.

Making the crime (and the resulting arrest) seem all the more silly was the fact that it was conveniently witnessed and publicized by a member of Occupy Austin, who was more than happy to post a video capture of the event.  Wow.  What a coincidence.  An Occupy member just happened to be there with a camera.  Not that we would EVER suspect the kids in the Occupy movement of manipulating a news event to serve the purposes of their famously unfocused agenda.  (That would require planning.  Not exactly an Occupy hallmark.)

More likely, Santa's criminal behavior has more sinister roots.  We suspect video games, and of course, gay reindeer marriage.

Bah.  Humbug.

All right then...let's start this daily dose of The Daily Bad by raising the bar of badness ...slowly.

Slow because it seems a pair of very slow gentlemen in Morocco thought they could help a friend satisfy his yearning to travel to Spain, by using the immigration fast lane...the one without the usual encumbering and bothersome details like visas and passports.  Their solution was to employ a disguise.  Not a rubber nose and wig, mind you, but seat springs and vinyl.  To accomplish this they removed the upholstery foam from the front seat of their motor car and replaced it with their wander-lusting friend.  They then attempted to drive the vehicle casually through a Spanish border checkpoint pretending that their friend was the passenger seat.  To further the effect, one of the men actually sat on the stowaway, and did his best to project an air of Moroccan nonchalance.
Apparently,  projecting Moroccan nonchalance while sitting on an illegal immigrant disguised as a car seat is more difficult than it might seem.  Border authorities quickly became suspicious of the uncomfortable looking rider and insisted on investigating further.  All it took was one investigators hand slid between what he mistakenly thought were seat cushions, and the jig was up.
According to a report published originally the U.K.'s Telegraph, and recirculated via Yahoo News, the Moroccans were arrested, and the stowaway was taken to a detention center where he is making lots of new friends who all want to sit on him.

And perhaps if federal police finding your best friend under your ass disguised as your car seat doesn't strike you as a particularly Bad Day, then how about your son finding your ex-boyfriend...LIVING IN YOUR ATTIC???

Would that qualify?

Well just ask Tracy, a Rock Hill, SC mother of five who thought the mysterious noises that had been coming from her attic for two weeks straight were an animal, or at worst, a ghost.

Until she sent her son and nephew up to investigate.  According to reports in the Charlotte Observer and on local news stations, what they found was not a possum, not a poltergeist, but, there among piles of blankets and plastic cups of human waste, was the former boyfriend of Tracy, whom she had dumped ten years before.

Some fellas just can't let go.

The man came down from the attic, offered no explanation, smiled, and left.  He has since disappeared and police have been unable to locate him.

Tracy has since changed her locks.

But, if your definition of a Bad Day is less about attic squatting ex-beaus who don't appreciate your privacy, and more about barnyard residents who don't appreciate your cooking, then the baddest day of this Bad Day batch has to be that of the 69-year-old Coquille, Oregon farmer who went out to slop his hogs last week but ended up being eaten by them instead.

Last seen heading out to feed his animals, the man's partially eaten remains were later discovered in a hog pen by a family member who went looking for the farmer after he failed to return from his chores.

Though leaning towards the likelihood of an accident, investigators so far have not been able to determine a specific cause of death.  In a statement to The Register-Card, however, the local district attorney indicated that the possibility of foul play is being investigated as well.  Hampering the investigation is the lack of human witnesses and the refusal of any of the other barnyard animals to officially go on the record. 

Stymied by this barnyard code of silence, frustrated investigators are rumored to be looking into a previous incident where a 700lb sow allegedly bit the farmer after he stepped on her piglet.  Authorities have been quick to downplay any rumors of barnyard gang involvement or terrorist activity, but off-the-record they concede the possibility of revenge, or a crime of passion.  Added one observer, "...Or it could just be that he tasted really good.  Anything's possible.  They're animals."

People of America!  We know you don't want to hear this, but you've got to stop inappropriately touching those pigs.

According to a recent study published in the August 2012 edition of The Journal of Emerging Infectious Diseases (which, by the way, is worth a subscription for the centerfolds alone), there has been an alarming uptick this year, in the number of confirmed cases of H1N1...otherwise known as Swine Flu.  The increase has occurred most dramatically among humans who have spent time in near proximity to pigs at state fairs, particularly in the mid-western states of Indiana and Ohio.  According to data collected by Minnesota veterinarian researcher Dr. Jeff Bender, the rate of porky infection is up five-fold.  Out of 57 pigs tested, 11 (19%) were infected.  According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 158 cases of swine flu were reported in the first week of August alone.

Speaking to The Star Tribune, Dr. Bender expressed his opinion that regarding the state fair outbreaks, humans, not pigs, were most likely to blame.  "Our suspicion is there probably was an exhibitor who brought it in and shared it with the pigs."

Even without a specific definition of what "sharing it with the pigs" means, that is one very disturbing Bad Day scenario, especially for those mid-westerners who can't seem to pass a pig on the way to the tilt-a-whirl without groping it.
God knows what's going on down at the corn dog booth.

Next, leave it to Yahoo News.

We've got civil war in Syria, American soldiers getting killed by police in Afghanistan, drought in the plain states, skinhead hate killers shooting up Sikh temples, not to mention the most contentious presidential election in 44 years, yet, Yahoo News (that's Yahoo News, the online incarnation of ABC News) has decided that it's priority journalistic responsibilities include the reporting of......

...exploding toilets.

Not that razor sharp shards of porceline-death, shredding our nether regions  isn't a valid concern.  It is.  And not just amongst lefty-socialist-deficit loving-sissy-pooh-poohs, either.  Even real men like Ann Coulter have a genuine concern.  It's valid. 

(...Include me in that latter group.  Toilets terrify me.  It's why I wear a diaper.)

But, we wonder, even among the most Freudian misfit anal retentive dweebazoid malcontents of American disenfranchisement, are exploding toilets that justifiable a story? 

Are they???

Well, thanks to Yahoo/ABC News, we now know, they are!

Consider this quote-ably fresh headline content ripped raw from the August 17th front pages of Yahoo News:

"Ticking time bomb in your bathroom?  Exploding toilets prompt recall."

That's right, gang.  Your shitter is a ticking time bomb.  The Bad Day life experience has now reached right into your bathroom.  And Yahoo News has run right in there with it.  Yahoo is reporting that The Consumer Product Safety Commission has received no less than 304 complaints regarding exploding toilets devices involving the Flushmate III Series 503 toilet flusher, including 14 "impact or laceration injuries".  As a result,  2.3 million of the Flushmate III Series 503 toilet flushers are under recall.

And you thought bin Laden was a threat!  Well right now, it's Lethal Weapon 2, you're Danny Glover, ...but somebody just told Mel Gibson you're Jewish, so you're screwed. 

Bet you didn't know you were in so much danger, did you?  Well, you are.

But don't fret.  Yahoo/ABC is on the case.  Expect to see an expanded follow up investigative series sometime soon.  Just as soon as they can refocus their on-line energies from their other explosive story; a California woman who is suing Santa Monica for $1.7 billion dollars because their parking meters make her sick.

Kaboom.