Republished from The Week, here are seven of the most controversial commandments:

1. Do Not Plant Too Many Roses
A Rancho Santa Fe, California, homeowners’ association targeted Jeffery DeMarco for exceeding the prescribed number of rose bushes allowed on his four-acre property. When DeMarco balked, the HOA levied monthly fines, threatened foreclosure, and ultimately defeated DeMarco in court. After a judge ruled that the willful rose enthusiast had violated the community’s architecture design rules, DeMarco was forced to pay the HOA’s $70,000 legal bill — and lost his home to the bank.

2. Do Not Use “Inconsistent” Shingles — Even After a Plane Destroys Your House
After a plane crashed into the Sanford, Florida, home of Joe Woodard, killing his wife, Janise, and their infant son, he decided to rebuild a new home on the same lot. But his reconstruction came to a screeching halt when his HOA informed him that he’d positioned the new structure unacceptably and failed to achieve a perfect shingle match with his neighbors’ homes. Threatened with a lawsuit, the grieving widower told a local reporter that he’d hoped to change things up to avoid “reliving” painful memories — but eventually capitulated to the unsympathetic HOA.

3. You Must Carry Your Dog at All Times

Pamela McMahan, a geriatric who walks with a cane, was fined $25 every time she failed to carry her cocker spaniel through the lobby of her Long Beach, California condominium, which stipulates that pets’ feet must never touch the floor of common areas. “There are just too many things going on in the lobby,” said Stormy Jech, the building’s assistant property manager. “The dog might jump on someone or go to the bathroom.” After racking up hundreds of dollars in fines, McMahan was forced to move.

4. Do Not Post a “For Sale” sign
When Denise Hicks placed a “For Sale” sign in front of her Lebanon, Tennessee, residence, the Spence Creek homeowners association quickly reprimanded her for a breach of contract, citing a rule prohibiting signs, banners or billboards. Ultimately, Hicks was forced to display her realtor’s signs in her home’s windows, hidden from view.

5. Do Not Offer Your Homeless Granddaughter Shelter
Assuming guardianship of their six-year-old granddaughter, Kimberly, after her drug-addict mother was ruled unfit, Jimmy and Judy Stuttler brought the child to live with them in their Clearwater, Florida, retirement village. Since Kimberly was not technically “over 55″ or arguably “retired,” the alarmed HOA tried to force the girl out. Attempting to move, the Stuttlers failed to sell their home even after slashing its price from $250,000 to $129,000 and were eventually sued by the HOA. Kimberley’s fate is now in the hands of the courts.

6. You Shall Maintain a Consistently Green Lawn
The Beacon Woods Civic Association in Bayonet Point, Florida, took 66-year old resident Joseph Prudente to court for failing to properly maintain his lawn after a $600-per-month increase to his adjustable rate mortgage threw him on hard times. Though Prudente was ultimately jailed for failing to resod his lawn, other members of the community took pity on the faulty landscaper, and paid for new sod, flowers, mulching, and functioning sprinklers. Their charity was enough to spring their elderly neighbor from the slammer, but Prudente still faces court and association fines.

7. No Smoking — Even in Your Own Bathroom
HOAs’ ban on smoking in all public areas — including balconies, patios, courtyards, and swimming pool areas — has recently been extended into residents’ homes. Citing the negative health effects of secondhand smoke, multiple court hearings have ruled in favor of HOAs. As Realty Times points out, “The Constitution does not guarantee Americans the right to smoke in their homes….”

What’s really quite pathetic about these ridiculous rules is that 2,3 & 7 would apply to my own HOA.

Members of the ship’s crew saw the man suddenly run out of his cabin with his hands covering his ears, and shouting, “I can’t stand it any longer.” They initially thought he was suffering from an ear injury and went to help him but found he was unhurt.

“While we were still puzzling over the this, his wife ran up and continued nagging him,” said a crewmate. “The husband covered his ears again and said, “I need a break,” before jumping over the side into the rushing river.

“We immediately found lamps to light up the water but found nobody. The possibility of survival can be zero.” However, later that night, police found the man who had managed to swim about 2km across across the broad river.

“I felt I was dying, but even that’s better than my wife’s nagging,” he reportedly told the police.

The couple were reunited the following morning at the local police station where Zhou’s wife promised to give up her habit of nagging him.

Environmental enforcement officers backed by Mexican navy personnel closed off hundreds of feet of powder-white coastline in front of a hotel accused of illegally accumulating sand on its beach.

While this may seem ironic or even idiotic, keep in mind that Mexico spent $19 million to replace Cancun beaches washed away by Hurricane Wilma in 2005. However it seems that much of that sand pumped from the sea floor has since washed away, leading some property owners to build breakwaters in a bid to retain sand.

“Today we made the decision to close this stretch of ill-gotten, illegally accumulated sand,” said Patricio Patron, Mexico’s attorney general for environmental protection. “This hotel was telling its tourists: ‘Come here, I have sand … the other hotels don’t, because I stole it.”‘

Patron said five people were detained in a raid for allegedly using pumps to move sand from the sea floor onto the beach in front of the Gran Caribe Real Hotel. The hotel is also suspected of illegally building a breakwater that impeded the natural flow of sand onto other hotels’ beaches, he said.

So if thought it was okay to take or in the eyes of Mexican authorities – steal sand in Cancun, think again. You may just find yourself the subject of a crime scene.

Original story at Fox News.

Magdalena believes the teenager conceived from stray sperm after taking a dip in the hotel’s mixed pool. She is now seeking compensation from the hotel.

I am curious as to whether the mother came up with this idea or the daughter. At any rate – sperm in a swimming pool? How did sperm get in there in the first place and if the little guys did, how did they find their way up… well you get the picture.

A travel industry source said: “The mother is adamant that her daughter didn’t meet any boys while she was there. Yeah right.

“She is determined to go ahead with the case.”

Tourist authorities in Warsaw, Poland, have confirmed they received the bizarre complaint.

All I got to say is good luck with that one.

The official police report says the sons, ages 22 and 29, jumped Shannon Monday night after he hit one of them. They pinned him down until their mother ordered them to let him go. The father says he then decided to use his own brand of discipline on his sons and that’s when he got his gun.

Shannon admits he fired his .38, but says he didn’t aim it at his sons and would never actually shoot them. Shannon is out of jail on bond on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

My question is, “Why in the hell are two men who are 22 and 29 still living at home?” Okay, maybe the 22 year old but the 29 year old man? Kick him the hell out.

If both sons don’t leave now after their father, who is pretty old, fires a gun as a measure of discipline, they are pretty dumb. Likewise, if the father continues to allow them tobum off him after he spent time in jail, then he is pretty dumb as well.

They are in fact sending him a Katcha Bug Humane Bug Catcher, a device that allows users to trap a house fly and then release it outside. Are you serious?

“We support compassion even for the most curious, smallest and least sympathetic animals,” PETA spokesman Bruce Friedrich said Wednesday. “We believe that people, where they can be compassionate, should be, for all animals.”

I guess they are serious!

Personally, I think it’s great – that is the president swatting the pesky intruder. If there was ever a creature as worthless and invasive to mankind, the fly is it. I’ve killed plenty in my time and although I did not vote for Obama, I sure applaud his killing of the pest.

I also now realize more than ever how ridiculous an organization like PETA is. Sure they might champion worthy causes but humanity for flies? Please!

And to show just how much I enjoyed the president’s response to the intruding fly, here is the actual video clip of the killing itself. Enjoy unless of course you are some kind of strange and bizarre fly lover.

The woman told Army Radio that she bought her elderly mother a new mattress as a surprise on and in doing so threw out the old one, only to discover that her mother had hidden her life savings inside.

When she went to look for the mattress it had already been taken by garbage men, she said. Subsequent searches at three different landfill sites turned up nothing.

The Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot published a picture of the woman searching through garbage at a dump in southern Israel.

Yitzhak Borba, the dump manager, told the radio station that his staff was helping the woman, saying she appeared “totally desperate.” He said the mattress was hard to find among the 2,500 tons of garbage arriving at the site every day.

He said he increased security at the site to keep would-be treasure hunters at bay.

For her part, the woman who threw out the mattress said it could be worse. “People have to take everything in proportion and thank God for the good and the bad,” she said. yeah, that’s easy for her to say – she didn’t lose her life savings. I would imagine the daughter’s next responsibility if the money isn’t found is to support her mother for the rest of her days.

And while the video may be staged, we are not far off from this in “real” culture. I give you the “Rise of the Idiots” or as we like to call them here – Dipnoids.

In a most recent story, one North Texas family says they found Jesus in a cheese snack.

Inside a 99-cent bag of Cheetos brand cheese snacks, Dan Bell and his wife Sara found something unique.

Sara recalls the discovery. “I was putting them in my hand and I had eaten most of the ones in my hand, and one was left lying there. And I said, ‘Oh my gosh, look at this. It really looks like a person in a robe praying.’”

Dan looked over. “I said, ‘Wow, it does look like a praying Jesus.’”

The couple nicknamed it “Cheesus.”

And here is the photo of the holy Cheeto itself.

Dan says his first reaction was, “Let’s put this on eBay. How much do you think we should ask for it? It could be 25 cents, could be 25 dollars. If it’s only 25 cents, we’re just going to eat it.”

For now, they are keeping “Cheesus” in a plastic box.

Original story at cbs11tv.com.

Check it out for yourself.

Lost Dog!

PLEASE HELP!!

When: 04/11/09

Sightings: 2 on Parkside – 4/11/09 on Apollo Way and 4/16/09 in the wash by Enchantment

Description:

• Male
• Smooth Coated Collie
• Short hair
• Red Merle which some people describe as light brown, tan, buff, sorrel, or orange.
• Lots of white – neck, chest, all 4 legs, down the face, tip of tail
• 2 full blue eyes
• Small almond shaped eyes
• Tall
• Thin
• Narrow chest
• Very straight back
• Long tail

BY NOW HE COULD LOOK TERRIBLE – VERY, VERY THIN, BONES PROTRUDING ON RIBS, HIPS AND SHOULDERS, PROBABLY DEHYDRATED, PROBABLY WEAK, MAY EVEN BE INJURED!!!!

HE IS NOT AN ABUSED DOG – - PLEASE TRY TO GET HIM HOME!

Not wearing collar.

PLEASE CALL US…

PLEASE call us if you have heard any coyote “celebrations” so we can look for any remains.

PLEASE call us is you have found found any animal remains. We can identify him, even by a small patch of hair; he has course, slightly kinky hair, and we would know if it was the right shade of orange.

PLEASE call us if you called the pound/sheriff/police to pick him up — THAT’S GREAT!

PLEASE call us if you are nursing him back to health.

PLEASE call us if you saw him.

PLEASE call us if you have ANY info !!!!!!!!

623-XXX-XXXX

GOD BLESS YOU !

=============================

I’d like to point out that I do not find humor in the fact that someone may have lost their dog – hopefully they find him. I did find a bit of humor in the detail of this letter itself including the mentions of “coyote celebrations” and the fact that they would be willing to identify their poor dog by his fur. That’s why I thought I’d post it here.