Germany or Florida: and the dog day edition winner is

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a tie!

Longtime blog pal Johnny Yen and relative newcomer Eebie have tied for first place with an impressive 14 correct answers each. Second place goes to Canadian vixen Barbara of Bad Tempered Zombie.

We have a four-way tie for third place with 10 correct answers each. Tenacious S nearly grabbed the number 3 spot for herself, but misjudged the nature of question 17. Cap'n Ergo played the bold "all Florida" gambit, and the blogger to whom I owe everything, Melinda June, let solo possession of third place slip through her fingers with the equally bold "Wisconsin" ploy. Finally, Beckeye slipped in with a last-minute entry that I caught just as I was going through my Google news alerts before bedtime.

Well done, all of you!

And now, on to the answers...

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The eldest and I had a long conversation about the intuitive skills needed to determine whether a story hails from Germany or Florida. It's not a science, it's an art. As I've stated before, here and here, there are often subtle cultural clues that you can look for. For instance:

Sausage=Germany
Crack cocaine=Florida
Fetish or weird sex=Germany
Nudity=Germany
Cannibalism and/or body parts=Germany (Is this where Wisconsin gets it?)
Domestic violence=Florida
Pitbulls and/or gunplay=Florida
Religious zealotry=Florida
Incest and morbid obesity can go either way.

These are useful guidelines, but as you'll see they're not always reliable. Some times you just have to go with your gut.

1) A man was convicted of sending unsolicited photos of his penis via cell phone to a woman. The investigation did not reveal any reason for the digital gift. GERMANY

2) Police found a bag of crack cocaine concealed in the folds of belly fat on a 400 pound man. FLORIDA



Granted, in that black tee shirt and jacket combo he does have kind of a euro-trash Bond villain look to him, but with the crack cocaine he's all Florida, baby!

3) A woman arrested for drunk driving was also cited for not securing her 1 year old child in a car seat. Her beer was safely buckled in, though. FLORIDA

I was really happy to see that everyone got this one correct. I mean, come on.

4) Police investigated a domestic disturbance after an angry anti-smoker used a fire extinguisher to put out his girlfriend's cigarette. GERMANY

5) Two bartenders were convicted for serving at least 44 shots of tequila to a 16 year old boy, leading to his death. GERMANY

The article also mentioned schnapps, but if I'd included that it would have been a dead giveaway as a Germany story. Or maybe Wisconsin.

6) This group of soldiers has become flabby and unfit. GERMANY

7) A woman was accused of sexually assaulting her daughter with a chili pepper after beating her with an iron and and the iron's cord. FLORIDA

Tough call--the creepy sex says Germany, but the chili pepper and domestic violence say Florida.

8) A police officer was attacked by a group of 50-75 bystanders at a water park when he tried to arrest a teenager. FLORIDA

Do they have water parks in Germany? Now, if the story had said "police officer attacked by a group of 50-75 nudists"... then you might have to go for Germany as your answer.

9) A woman trying to steal cow manure fell into the manure pit and fled the scene. Naked. GERMANY

10) A woman battered her boyfriend with a toilet seat after she caught him smoking rock cocaine in the bathroom. FLORIDA

Again, classic Florida: crack cocaine + domestic violence.

11) A 46 year old man was arrested for striking his mother in the head with three pounds of sausage during an argument. FLORIDA

Now this was a tricky one. Normally sausage=Germany, but Florida generally leads in the domestic violence category.

12) A woman called police to her home after her "increasingly intoxicated" friend wouldn't stop talking to her about her personal problems...for 30 hours. GERMANY

See, Europeans are more polite. No way a Floridian would've lasted that long without turning a pit bull loose on the friend, or shooting her.

13) A man lost money at a strip club and called police. He was not satisfied with the response, so he called again and asked for different officers to respond. He was arrested. FLORIDA FLORIDA FLORIDA

Strip club=Florida. They have brothels in Germany, so there's not as big a need to blow your money on lap dances. Also, there's something uniquely Floridian about calling the police on yourself.

14) Ten military projectiles and an air-to-ground rocket were discovered on the grounds of a school. Other WWII era munitions have been discovered in the area in the past, and now everyone's wondering how much other unexploded ordinance is buried underneath all the homes that were built in the area. FLORIDA

OK, this was a trick question.

15) A car thief, attempting to escape police, drove his car into a field and bailed out. He ran into nearby woods in an attempt to escape, but was attacked by wild pigs and captured by police. GERMANY

16) Police discovered a man sitting in his van, in a wooded area, behaving suspiciously. When he gave permission to search the van, police found a collection of women's sonograms, a blond wig, rope, knives and a machete. And 18 human teeth in a film canister. FLORIDA



Another tricky one. Creepy guy in a van with knives and rope and a wig says Florida, but the collection of human teeth says Germany. Or maybe Wisconsin.

17) A man committed a robbery, and as he left the scene accepted a lift from some strangers. The strangers robbed the man, and he reported the theft of his theft proceeds to police, and got himself arrested. FLORIDA FLORIDA FLORIDA

See # 13 above. The lovely and intelligent Tenacious S read a little too much into this one. She interpreted the bad guy's actions as hitch hiking, which led her to guess Germany. Not an unreasonable conclusion, but put yourself, if you will, in the Floridian mindset. The robber comes out of the 7-11, sees some kindred spirits hanging around the parking lot, maybe drinking a 40 or hitting the pipe, or just letting their pit bulls out of the truck to take a leak. He thinks he's gotten lucky, because of course he didn't plan his robbery far enough in advance to include a getaway car. The people he approaches smell his desperation and promptly victimize him. Florida 7-11 parking lots are a Hobbesian nightmare like that.

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Thanks for playing everybody. Have a great weekend!