Subscribe | UPI Odd Newsletter Subscribe Intelligence analysts believe that Saddam Hussein is alive and hiding out somewhere in Iraq. The reason he's been able to Advertisement avoid the searches of Task Force 20 -- which includes the Army's Delta Force, the Navy's counterterrorism squads, and the CIA -- is that he found a place they'll never think to look: the weapons- of-mass-destruction storage facility. * Taipei 101 will be the tallest skyscraper in the world when it's completed in Taiwan's capital next year, beating out the current leader by 165 feet, according to the Wall Street Journal. (That would be the Petronas Towers in Malaysia.) Not to be outdone, the World Financial Center in Shanghai will be even taller than Taipei 101 when it's completed in 2007, but Hong Kong and Seoul claim their towers -- still in the planning stages -- will be even higher. Once the Japanese architects get financing for a Advertisement bulding called X-Seed 4000, the contest is likely to be over. That building would rise two and a half miles, higher than Mount Fuji. The elevator would require a condom. * Heidi Fleiss, the ex-con Hollywood madam, gets turned back at the border every time she tries to go to Canada. On May 18 she landed at the Vancouver airport to film an infomercial for a "sexual enhancement cream," but was denied admission to the country. Then on June 11 she headed for Toronto to sign her new book, "Pandering," and appear on a celebrity talk show, but once again immigration authorities told her she was not welcome in Mooseland. What's really interesting about this is that prostitution is legal in Canada; their only problem with Heidi, according to an official who wished to remain anonymous, is that "she's just groady." * Iyman Faris, an Ohio truck driver, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for conspiring to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge by cutting its suspension cables -- something that experts say is virtually impossible. Before carrying out the attack, Osama Bin Laden also intended to buy the bridge and take out a hefty insurance policy on it. Advertisement * Seven Iranians set themselves on fire in European capitals, and the Paris police detained 100 people to prevent further attempts by the Mujahedeen Khalq to light themselves up. The group, whose goal is the overthrow of the Islamic government in Iran, apparently misread a memo instructing them to ignite the revolution. * Ticlopidine, a drug that costs $100 a month, is supposed to prevent strokes in blacks, but researchers in Chicago released results showing that it works just about as effectively as . . . aspirin. Many people will continue to use it, however, as it has a cooler name. * A panel advising the Food and Drug Administration gave preliminary approval for the use of a growth-hormone drug called Humatrope to be prescribed for short children who are going to need a little help getting up to 5-foot-3 for men, 4-foot-11 for women. This is going to be hell on carnivals. * The scandals at the New York Times now include dead people. A Pulitzer Prize subcommitte has been appointed to determine whether the 1932 prize awarded to Times correspondent Walter Duranty should be revoked because of complaints that he ignored the famine in the Ukraine. What if the prize is in his coffin Advertisement with him? * A new birth control pill called Seasonale limits the menstrual cycle to four periods a year. Women take active pills for 84 days, followed by seven days of placebo pills to trigger menstruation. The only known side effect is that the 33-day PMS period can include actual fire-breathing. * Dr. Robin Moore-Steele has patented grooved women's panties called "Ruby LaRue" that stimulate sensitive sexual parts with every movement of the pelvis. They're expected to make actual males obsolete within six years. * The Tennessee legislature banned porn movies on video players in cars. Two hands on the wheel at all times. * Cheeta, the last chimpanzee to star in a Tarzan movie, celebrated his 71st birthday in Palm Springs, where he was declared "oldest chimp in the world" by the Guinness Book of World Records. Cheeta paints and plays the piano for Dan Westfall, the caretaker who adopted him from Tony Gentry, Cheeta's animal trainer, after Gentry's death. It should be noted that anyone who can still paint OR play the piano in Palm Springs is considered young. * Zyness O'Haver and Sallie Warren were married at the Oklahoma City courthouse after living together for 77 years. Advertisement Three of their four grandchildren showed up at the ceremony at which 95-year-old Zyness married a younger woman. (Sallie is 94.) Relationship experts say that, in a case like this, with extensive pre-marital sex, the marriage usually falls apart in a matter of a few years. * Hookers in Spotsylvania, Va., give discount rates to high school students, according to police who busted a massage parlor. It explains all that missing lunch money. * Jose Rivera was cremated May 9, 1996, but his ashes were discovered seven years later in the hair dye section of a KMart in West Covina, Calif. The remains from his hair looked great. * Paul Tay of Tulsa was arrested for riding his bicycle with a giant inflatable penis on the back, throwing a bottle at the windshield of a car that swerved toward him, and committing the crime while wearing a bulletproof vest, which is a violation of the body-armor law. What did they expect him to do, take a bullet for his penis? * New Salem Missionary Baptist Church of Birmingham, Ala., fired its pastor, the Rev. Stanley B. Hall Sr., for calling a mandatory service at kickoff time on Super Bowl Sunday. When Advertisement three deacons and three trustees failed to show up, they were dimissed as deacons and trustees. Hall is now suing to get his job back. If successful, he could take the pulpit again around World Series time. * Five hundred students were evacuated from Herbert Elementary School in Chicago after two mothers got into an argument in the lobby and one of them used pepper spray, causing officials to activate the school's fire alarm. Four children and four adults were treated at the scene. Six others were taken to the hospital, treated and released. Two others said "Mooooooommmmm! Why did you dooooooooo that? So embarrrrrrrrrasssing!" * Dick Smothers Jr., son of the famous comedian, has become an actor in porn movies and owner of an adult entertainment Web site. Smothers explained that he has "an incredibly overactive libido" and now wants to become "the Orson Welles of porn," eventually starring, writing, directing and doing the music for X-rated projects. To which we say: the music? Porn music? Now THAT'S a goal that can create some good in the world. * A 60-year-old man apparently took the words "petting barn" way too seriously when he was arrested for bestiality at the Advertisement Canada Agriculture Museum in Ottawa after receiving oral sex from one cow and one calf in the very public area. Where's PETA? Those are some desperately deprived animals. * When the ARO Campulung car factory in Romania announced layoffs, employees came up with an idea to save their jobs. One hundred men offered to donate sperm and pay the money to the company. The math didn't work out, though. Each of the workers would have needed to donate sperm 400 times to raise enough money, and the price of Viagra made that impractical. The factory still has to pay $20 million in debts and fire 1,000 workers, besides which their wives have been very grumpy lately. * Scenes from domestic life: * Teenager Pablo Hernandez of San Jose, Calif., decapitated a dog, a bird and his mother, then called 911 to tell police what he had done. He was sorry. * Joe Bob Briggs writes several columns for UPI. Contact him at [email protected] or through his Web site, joebobbriggs.com. Snail mail: P.O. Box 2002, Dallas, Texas 75221.
