Now for Something Completely Different...

It took almost a decade for a practical joke to pay off for Dr. Robert Woo, an oral surgeon in Auburn, Wash.

After preparing dental implants for his assistant, an ardent advocate of caring for abandoned pot-bellied pigs, Dr. Woo temporarily inserted two boar tusks in her mouth while she was under sedation and took pictures that everyone in the office found hilarious--except the implantee.

She sued and was awarded $250,000, which his insurance company refused to pay. Now the State Supreme Court has ruled for Dr. Woo in his suit against the company. He will get $750,000 in damages and attorney fees as well as reimbursement for the $250,000 he paid the employee, thus rewarding the good doctor with half a million yuks for his sense of fun.

No word of who got custody of the boar-tusk pictures, but it's good to know there is indemnity for being a jerk.

The Silly Season Is Early This Year

In my prehistoric newspaper days, the “silly season” was late summer when the real world was on vacation, and editors filled space with offbeat stuff that would otherwise never qualify as news.

This week’s Washington Post has one that would be a classic in any era--about a D.C. judge who is suing his neighborhood dry cleaner for $65 million over a pair of disputed pants. The courtroom scene, which is pure Marx Brothers, recalls Groucho’s reminiscences about his father, a tailor who didn’t believe in taking measurements and therefore had to go into hiding from all his old customers.

If the D.C. judge had run across him, he would asking for a $1 billion in damages.