If you’ve ever been a “regular” at a bar or other gathering place, you know that sooner or later all of the other bored people around you are going to entertain themselves by opining and speculating on your life since they don’t particularly like their own. Most people just ignore such gossip, find themselves a new watering hole or take up a hobby, like boating, to help them unwind.

I’m guessing one Czechoslovakian couple wishes they’d done that, too:

A Czech couple who decided to take a DNA test to squash persistent pub gossip and prove that their 10-month-old baby was their own got a nasty surprise.

The couple, from the southeastern town of Trebic, had some doubts about the child as her hair was blonde and they both had dark hair. Fellow drinkers’ suspicions got on their nerves.

But the test showed neither of the parents had the same DNA as the baby, Czech news agency CTK reported Wednesday, suggesting a mix-up at the hospital.

Authorities were looking into the case.

If their legal system’s anything like ours, the lawsuit against that hospital’s going to pay for them to start their own bar.

But that doesn’t get their biological baby back, does it?

What would you do if you were in their place: raise the child you’ve thought of as your own for 10 months, or try to find the one that’s actually yours?

Medical marijuana users in California will now have to satisfy their munchies in a lawful fashion like the rest of us now that the Feds have shut down Tainted, Inc.

The company, which sold “enhanced” products like pot-laced candies and BBQ sauces, was the subject of a DEA raid yesterday. Agents found 460 marijuana plants and various products scheduled for shipping to California and Seattle; Vancouver, British Columbia; and Amsterdam.

Although California state law authorizes marijuana use for medical purposes, Federal law does not.

This isn’t the first California-based “enhanced” candy company shut down by the DEA. Earlier this year the owners of “Beyond Bomb” — an Oakland-based company that produced candies such as “Stoney Rancher” and “Rasta Reese’s” — pleaded guilty to marijuana charges in federal court.

A Belgium resident, tired of the bickering between Flemish and Walloon politicians, decided it was time for the whole country to go… to the highest bidder on eBay. The listing read, “For Sale: Belgium, a Kingdom in three parts … free premium: the king and his court (costs not included).”

Of course, the winning bidder would also have to take on the country’s $300 billion national debt, but they’d save a fortune with free delivery.

Officials at eBay pulled the auction after someone actually bid $14 million.

Happy birthday wishes to Winnie Langley on her 100th birthday… and her 170,000th cigarette.

Ms. Langley began smoking just days after WWI broke out in June 1914. She was seven — that’s right, 7 — years old at the time. Since then, she’s smoked five cigarettes a day, a habit she says many people took up around that time to help them calm their nerves.

Smoking wasn’t considered a nasty habit back then as it is these days. “There were not all the the health warnings like there are today when I started. It was the done thing.”

Langley has outlived her husband, Robert, as well as her son, Donald, who passed away two years ago at age 72.

She has no intention of quitting, either.

As to why she’s never suffered any of the health problems attributed to a long-time smoking habit, Langley says the answer is simple: she’s never inhaled.

Today is National Relaxation Day. I’d celebrate by remaining in my PJs all day, but I did that on Monday. Skipping chores and oversleeping’s out, too: that was me yesterday.

Since our local weatherman is predicting this to be the hottest day of the summer thus far — over 101 F, they say — it’s just too hot to do much in the way of celebrating National Relaxation Day.

A nap? Sure, I’d love one but it’s our first week back-to-homeschool so chances are I won’t get that chance. Yoga? A long, solo walk this evening? A little time puttering around in the garden? Nah, that all sounds like work to me and that, really, is the antithesis of relaxation.

But wait, isn’t it also National Failures Day? See, now, that’s something I can celebrate: my failure to do anything to mark National Relaxation Day. Or does such a celebration mean actually having succeeded at failing and, therefore, having violated the spirit of National Failure Day?

Oh, the mind. It reels.

Maybe I ought to head back to bed.

The cicadas are coming! The cicadas are coming! This time, they’re known as Brood XIII.

It sounds like a bad horror movie. But it’s actually the name of the billions of cicadas expected to emerge this month in parts of the Midwest after spending 17 years underground.

The red-eyed, shrimp-sized, flying insects don’t bite or sting. But they are known for mating calls that produce a din that can overpower ringing telephones, lawn mowers and power tools.

What a gross bug. I hates them, even if they’re supposedly delicious cooked in a quiche. Luckily, my state’s not due for their 17-year crop until 2015… by which time I plan to move to a state that’s just been through their periodic swarm. Kim, who lives in Illinois, isn’t going to be so lucky, though.

Well, perhaps that should be in the past tense:

Pre-Islamic Middle Eastern regions were home to mysterious snake cults, according to two papers published in this month’s Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy journal.

From at least 1250 B.C. until around 550 A.D., residents of what is now the Persian Gulf worshipped snakes in elaborate temple complexes that appear to have been built for this purpose, the studies reveal. [...]

Most of the snakes were depicted with triangular heads and scales, which Benoist said suggests “a viper species, which is striking, as they are venomous and therefore dangerous.”

Indeed.

Remember when science used to be, well, a science? Now it seems as if scientific reports are little more than flim-flam jobs. Take today’s report on the link between prostate cancer and multivitamin intake:

Men taking multi-vitamin supplements often may increase their risk of death from prostate cancer, according to a new study published in the May 16 issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

But experts caution that the study could not establish a causal relation between the risk and use of multivitamins, meaning multivitamin use does not necessarily raise the death risk associated with prostate cancer.

In other words: scientists made money reporting absolutely nothing.