Newsfeed eating up lies

I heard a funny story this morning about a guy in Australia who took a "sick day," but got busted because his boss read his Facebook status: "Kyle Doyle is not going to work, f..k it i'm still trashed. SICKIE WOO!"


I laughed out loud when I heard it, thinking, "See? This is exactly what they told us in college about the professional backlash possible in putting dumb crap on social networking sites."(Thanks, Prof. Brown!)

An e-mail, presumably between Doyle and his boss, surfaced on the Internet shortly thereafter: The boss asks the 21-year-old AAPT worker for a medical certificate to prove he deserved the day off, and he writes back saying he did not need a medical certificate for one day's leave. The boss then discloses his proof behind the doubt, and Doyle says, "HAHAHA LMAO epic fail. No worries man."

This story is all over the damn Internet... but now it appears that the now-famous Kyle Doyle might have been framed! [DUN DUN DUN]

"Following an investigation into AAPT's email records, we can confirm the email exchange between two of our employees ... never occurred." -- statement from AAPT.

It appears that either someone set Doyle up--even his mother is vouching for him. Yeah, set up or he set this up to get his 15 minutes of fame, mmm? Either way, pretty comical.

As of this morning, Doyle's status reportedly read: "trying to hide :-/" and he had received at least 175 personal messages regarding the incident.

Close out that tab, mate

An Australian man who had heart broken was drowning his sorrows in alcohol, only he probably could have literally drown his sorrows and himself in the amount of beer he was consuming per week.

Michael Leary, a father of four, was spending an average of $972 a week on beer after breaking up with his partner five years ago, according to the Northern Territory News. (And P.S. that's about enough to buy 2,500 bottles of beer per month)

Authorities figured the construction worker had a problem when he was charged a few months ago with drunk driving...for the seventh time--no? You think he's got a problem?? The man was not sentenced to jail time, but has been banned from drinking or even holding a beer for 12 months.

Leary earns approximately $2,000 a week gross - or about $1440 after tax, according to the court. About $150 goes to rent, $150 on buses and taxis and $50 on his phone. The rest? Beer.

What's funnier is that the while in court, the judge made fun of the guy's taste in beer, saying, "(That is) poor judgment on two counts there -- drinking that much and drinking Melbourne Bitter."

It's kind of like the Australian version of Natural Light. Like drinking $1,000 worth of Natural Light. Come to think of it: I think I have a friend who might get along with Mr. Leary pretty well...

Snake: 'Chihuahua muy tasty'

This is gut-wrenching: A 110-pound python ate a family dog as the family's two children watched Monday in Australia.

The scrub python, a breed that stalks and kills small wild animals, set its sights on the family's terrier-Chihuahua crossbreed and devoured it as a 5-year-old and 7-year-old watched.

The snake showed up in the dog's bed a few days earlier, but no one contacted the zoo to come get it out of there. On Monday, all that could be seen of the dog was its hind legs and tail sticking out of the python's mouth.

How freaky is that picture?!

The snake was brought to a zoo, and was reportedly still digesting the dog Wednesday.

In attempt to stop the snake, a woman threw plastic chairs at it. Yeah, smart.

Santa doing ho stuff, cuz there he ho again

A training course for department store Santas and the like has recently caused an uproar in Australia after recommending that Santa edit his age-old catchphrase: 'ho, ho ho!'

Westaff, a recruitment firm that supplies hundreds of Santas across the country, has told its trainees that the "ho ho ho" phrase might scare children and --gasp!-- could even be derogatory to women.

Instead, the Santas were encouraged to say 'ha, ha ha!'

"Part of our advice to our Santas is that they should be mindful of children having their first Santa experience. We ask our Santas to try techniques such as lowering their tone of voice and using 'ha, ha, ha' to encourage the children to come forward and meet Santa. We wish you and your family a very merry Christmas."--Sari Hegarty, Westaff's national Santa coordinator

So ridiculous. 'Ho' isn't even a slang in Australia! I'm sorry, but as a four-year-old kid, a huge fat man in a red suit maniacally laughing at me would have sent me running, maybe into the arms of a creepy man calling me a 'ho.'