But for this story we’ll go there.

A grandmother in Kent county, England, recently told a local newspaper that she can no longer sleep at night in her flat (that’s Brit-speak for “apartment,” for our uncultured American audience) because a ghost as been showing up in the night and groping her.

“It’s like an octopus,” the former nursing home assistant told the paper. “People are going to think I am mad but it is as real as the day to me.”

For her part, her 16-year-old granddaughter thinks she must be kidding.

A local husband and wife team of spirit mediums have been called in, proclaiming they’ll “envelope [the ghost] in a ‘vortex of light’ and send it to the ‘other side.’”

“Sometimes [spirits] need to alleviate some stress,” said the better half of the ghost-hunting duo, as to why the apparition in question might have decided to bother this particular victim.

No one involved seems to be onto the obvious answer: That the ghost is the spirit of one of the perverted old men from a nursing home in which the victim once worked, and whose crush on the victim carried into the afterlife. (For those in our audience who’ve never seen The Benny Hill Show, the Brits are not remotely as stuck up sexually as we are in our priggish country. Cheeky!)

On the other hand, it’s also possible that the woman in question is simply hallucinating, judging from a recent study which reveals that people who report to have been abducted by aliens may in fact have just been having a vivid dream.

In his book The Terror That Comes in the Night, folklorist David J. Hufford estimates that about 15 percent of people report being assaulted in their sleep by an unknown entity at some point in their lives – but that this is often the result of ordinary brain functions, and that the specifics of the attacks are shaped by the victims’ belief systems.

Benjamin Radford, deputy editor of Skeptical Inquirer magazine, explains that the experiences reported by the Kent county granny are not at all uncommon in history, and that such reports likely gave birth to that wicked creature of medieval lore so popularized by South Park: the succubus, a she-demon which sexually attacks men as they sleep.

Anyway, one thing’s for sure: the local Methodist Minister, who was approached by the woman for help in the matter and told her that in his opinion the offender is a lost spirit, thinks there’s nothing he can personally do about the ghoulish groper. “I am neither a trained counsellor nor from a church with a tradition of exorcism such as the Catholic Church,” he said. “It is very difficult to know how to respond.”

How about responding by telling her to see a doctor? Would that have made too much sense?

Here are some of the other so-called advancements which the group thinks are realistically possible by the year 2021. (You can access the entire list, via pdf, at this link.) If you think the modern world is already mind-numbingly stupid, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

Reverse-Engineering the Human Brain. These geeks envision a world in which we uncover all the mysteries of how the human brain functions, and then build systems which mimic our own cognitive abilities. Great! That’ll create jobs. Instead of having to hire a psychiatrist to complain to about how shitty your life is, you’ll be able to just whine to a computer screen. Can you imagine? That’s exactly what we’ll need in the future, isn’t it: a population of A.I. Fox News viewers. We can already see the trailers for the movie….

Citizen Science Projects. NASA’s budget cuts got you in the dumps? Worried that our efforts to reach the ”final frontier” will be forever on hold? According to the Institute For The Future, by 2021 people could be funding their own space missions! Wanna go in with Bill O’Reilly on a study to figure out what makes the tides go in and out? (Never mind that we’ve long known the answer – and it ain’t the “Guy in the Sky.”) No problem! Some rich guy with too much time on his hands will fly to the moon in his very own private spacecraft and beam you back images through your own personal satellite. Just be sure to TiVo Monday Night Football.

Space-Time Cloaks. Wish you could think of a way to loot third-world countries without having the pesky United Nations jump all over you for it? Learn to camouflage the act with your very own invisibility cloak! (Okay, we admit we don’t really understand how this is supposed to work – but we’re sure Halliburton will figure it out.) The IFF says that, with these cloaks, you’ll be able to conceal entire world events!

Create New Life Forms from Scratch. Want your own T-Rex? Or think that movie Weird Science presents your best hope for scoring with an older woman? Not only might we be able to build such life forms from nothing – but it’ll be inexpensive, too! (And, yes, they think this could all happen by the year 2021.)

Interestingly enough, the group does not envision a year 2021 containing flying cars – perhaps because they think we’ll all be too drunk to drive them. But no worries: If all these other musings hold true, someone will no doubt privately finance such a project and fly them over ungoverned waters. You always wanted a burial at sea, didn’t you?

And sex while still in your Halloween costume (or, perhaps, half-in) is surpassed in hotness by only a select few things. But let the kids have the stupid haunted houses, will ya? We all know that fear is an aphrodisiac, but grown-ups who can stomach it can make use of slightly scarier stuff to get the juices flowing in their nether regions. Here are some of the more disturbing ones, from associatedcontent.com (warning: if you’re about to take a bite of your dinner, you might want to set it aside for a moment):

1. Bat Meat. You heard right. If the thought of eating the flesh of something that you ordinary wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole and gloves on makes you horny, this is probably right up your alley (no pun intended). Forget about tweaking the thermostat to raise the temperature; in Indonesia and Malaysia eating bat meat is a common way to turn up the heat in the boudoir. “The rodent-like body, the leathery wings, the creepy teeth…” Yum! Hungry yet?

2. Rhinoceros Urine. To the perverts out there, this probably isn’t much of a stretch. Hey, whatever floats your boat, right? But finding a rhinoceros isn’t exactly like finding one of Charlie Sheen’s ex-girlfriends. Instead, head to India or Nepal, where people won’t look at you funny if they see you carrying a baggie full of this aphrodisiac as you walk back to your hotel room. (In fact, it’s long been used in these countries as way to get one’s motor running.) While there, visit the Kathmandu Zoo, where you can buy the stuff in the gift shop. Think this is what Bob Seger was singing about? Just make sure to drink it while it’s fresh!

3. Big-Bottomed Ants. No, this is not the title of an unreleased Queen song – folks in the country of Columbia use a local ant species called “atta laevigata” to get all hot and bothered before bedtime! They even give them as wedding gifts! Note, though, that (wait for it…) only the queens can be eaten. (See what we did there?) And the grapevine says they taste best after being roasted in the oven. Outta the way, chicken breast!

4. Snake Blood. If you ever wanted to spend a night partying like a heavy metal rock star, I guess this is one way to do it. Asian lore dictates that snake blood is one of the best aphrodisiacs on earth! And guess what else? The poisonous varieties are preferred! (The venom isn’t bad for you unless you’re bitten.) Your local bartender will stir it right into your rhinoceros urine cocktail if you’d like! Add a little rice for consistency, and you’ve got a sex-starting-smoothie! For the tough guys (or gals) out there, sucking the stuff straight from a fresh puncture in the snake’s tail is the way to do it. That’s supposed to cause  extra sexual skills. But don’t order the five course meal before chugging this mix: its effects should cause you to feel the change within ten minutes.

5. Reindeer Antlers. We know – this one’s a little too close to the heart for most people, what with the images of Christmas it probably conjures up and all. But, seriously, does any one of the above options fail to churn your stomach? In Scandinavia, reindeer antlers are collected and ground into powder, which is then dissolved in boiling water and swigged a couple of hours before boom time. Its effects on the love muscles are reputed to be so strong that shop owners in China are known to pay small fortunes to import it. Whether you leave the Santa suit out of it is your call.

Finally! A reason to endure the airlines!

1. Don’t let your toddler handle sharp knives during pumpkin carving. Wow. Deep! And you thought you knew everything about child rearing! If you’re one of the folks out there who encourages their kids to run with scissors, this one’s for you. Remember, parents: blades and babies don’t mix!

2. Don’t put lighted candles where your kids can get them. Ever heard that one about how you shouldn’t give your 4-year-old matches? Probably not, if you’re reading these tips. Note to stupid parents out there: Fire is bad, unless used for cooking. Got it? After all, if you’re fortunate enough to still have a home in this economy, the last thing you need is for your rugrat to burn it down.

3. Don’t decorate your kid’s costume with sharp objects. Wait, I think I saw something like this somewhere else… Oh, yeah – it was in number 1 above. Sharp things and children go together like bourbon and orangutans. Or something like that. How many times do you need to hear it? On a similar note, if you missed number 2 above or can’t make the leap to deduce from it this kernel of genius, here’s another one: make sure the kid’s costume is flame-resistant. And, while you’re at it, don’t make the costume so long that your little tyke can trip over it when they walk. We know this is a lot of info for one point, so give yourself a minute to digest all of it before moving onto the next one.

4. Don’t paint a devil’s face on your 3-year-old. “Whiskers or tiger stripes” are ok, but scary is a no-no. And refrain from putting a mask on the kid’s face, no matter how much you’re sick of watching little Sasha’s nose run. It may block her vision and cause her to trip over that crack in the sidewalk – or that extra-long store-bought princess gown costume you wrapped her in because you glossed over point number 3.

5. Bring a flashlight if you take the kids trick-or-treating at night. Seriously. If you need to be reminded of this, maybe sterilization is the best option for you.

6. Inspect your children’s candy stash before they tear into it. Remember number 1 above: Razor blades are bad for growing gumlines. Similarly, if you find a little ball or bag of marbles in your kiddo’s cache, don’t let them eat it. You don’t want to spend your Halloween late-night in the emergency room with all the other parental duds, do you? Didn’t think so. On that note, don’t let your kids eat any goodie that’s been tampered with or that was made by someone you don’t know well. Poison is bad for developing bodies and minds. Follow the same advice when keeping your own home candy stash, and your children might stand a chance!

Now that you’re all boned up, drag the kid out there and knock on some doors!

According to what I am sure was a scientifically meticulous study done by the hard working people at YourBabyDomainName.com, two out of every twenty-five parents have baby name remorse, an increase of three percent since the studies of previous years. Can you say “first world problems” three times fast, Anakin and Leia, Jacob and Bella?

We all sit and wait for the celebrities we love to hate to finally admit they feel like idiots for choosing names like Apple, Pilot Inspektor, Audio Science, Moon Unit and Diva Thin Muffin. Seriously. Unfortunately, it seems to be simply poor schmucks who named their kid Ottoline and ended up calling her Sparkle who get saddled with all the regret. What is the world coming to, people?

I myself am a near victim of name regret. My parents were, in fact, going to name me Melissa. Fortunately for me, they were lucky enough to meet another Melissa with me in utero and realized that they would have to destroy me and start all over again if anyone ever dared to call their daughter by this other Melissa’s nickname, Missy. I shudder at the thought. There are absolutely no nicknames for Melissa that rhyme with ‘sex.’ I don’t know what I would have done with myself!

Since the study showed that half of respondents felt they were swayed by stupid media and fashion trends, and another third thought their name was original when they picked it but later discovered that other people had the same “unique” idea, one can’t be faulted for wondering aloud if the remaining 17% of folks are just ridiculously indecisive about something that you’re not really allowed to be indecisive about in the real world. After all, a toddler who gets her name changed every year for her birthday is going to be pretty high maintenance, not to mention identity confused!

Pamela Redmond Satran of baby name website nameberry.com told the Daily Mail, “We also see baby name regret in parents who listen too much to the advice of others, who cave in to family pressure to name the baby after grandpa, for instance, or who give up on a name they love because the in-laws make fun of it. They often wish they had listened to their own hearts.”

There are a lot of things I might let my in-laws have their fair say in, like world politics and economics, what we’re having for Christmas dinner, or whose car we should take on our next cross-border shopping spree. What I intend to name my next child? Not one of those things.

Do you have baby name regret? If you feel stupid for the name your baby ended up with after the dust and placenta settled, we want to hear your story!

Students considered the woman’s desire for sexual activity during the hookup to be the result of either alcohol or wild spontaneity, while they considered the male’s desire to hook up to be the result of his “guy instinct” or a prior plan. The takeaway from the study appears to be that “girls like to get some, too.” Eureka! And you thought science was stupid!

Unfortunately, another study shows that most college students don’t even know what the term “hooking up” actually refers to, and that most students are more talk than action when it comes to “hooking up” at all. This study finds that college students consider “hooking up” to include mere kissing and not even sexual intercourse. Seems kinda prude to me. About the only constant among the students was their perception that sexual activity outside of a serious relationship was usually alcohol-driven. Still believe the children are our future, Whitney Houston?

It’s hard to believe that, given today’s pop culture, college kids can have varying opinions on the definition of the “hook up.” Maybe, given that the college-aged brain is not fully developed and teenage stupidity is rampant to begin with, they just have a hard time remembering what they saw the last time they sat in front of the TV. Or maybe it’s just that their last hookup involved such mind-blowing sex that it knocked certain dictionary entries from their memory banks. Either way, it would be nice if they’d just shut up about it: The study also found that, the more these kids talk about their wannabe hot make-out sessions, the more it becomes socially accepted for them to do so. But who wants to hear stories of lame nineteen year-olds awkwardly trying to figure out how to kiss? I mean, I’m sure it gets them all sweaty and bothered – and probably has a similar effect on some pasty-white skinned male adults who spend most of their time in their basements with their DVD players and stacks of bargain-bin porn – but, as Elaine said on Seinfeld, give me something I can use!

More bad news: It seems, contrary to researchers’ expectations, higher education leads to a stronger belief in ghosts and paranormal phenomena, such as haunted houses. Excuse me? Isn’t this the kind of belief that higher education is supposed to beat out of young, impressionable minds? So, college is teaching students to believe in telepathy and possession by the devil, but it’s not teaching them the difference between kissing and sexual intercourse?

With population growth slowing due to the recession comes the real possibility that the next generation will contain fewer college students. I suppose this is a good thing?

If not, here are a few good reasons to start. Things are often even more stupid and disgusting than they appear!

Berry Ridiculous

Blueberry muffin from Tim Horton’s (or wherever you buy your blueberry muffins in America… Starbucks?) or a bowl of General Mills Total Blueberry Pomegranate cereal? Your blueberries may not be blueberries at all, but rather “a concoction of sugar, corn syrup, starch, hydrogenated oil, artificial flavors and — of course — artificial food dye blue No. 2 and red No. 40″ found in bagels, muffins, cereals and breads made by big name companies across the continent. If you want to get some fruit in your diet, eat a blueberry, not a bagel.

“Freshly” Squeezed Stupid

Have you ever freshly squeezed an orange, or been to a tropical area and had someone freshly squeeze a liter of orange juice for you? Ever noticed that while each glass is delicious and alive, it tastes a little bit different each time, depending on the variety and ripeness of the oranges, the soil they were grown in, the air and the rain.

Ever wonder how companies manage to make “freshly squeezed” orange juice that all tastes the same? The secret is not GMO oranges or even pasteurization. After the oranges are “freshly squeezed” the juice is stored in sealed containers and completely stripped of every bit of oxygen. This allows them to store the juice for up to a year… and it also completely removes all of the taste, since the flavor molecules have been effective destroyed. All that’s left is sugar water. To this sugar water, artificial “flavor packs” created by perfume and flavor scientists are added to give each brand a unique taste, and doesn’t have to be labeled on the ingredients because the chemicals are “derived from orange essence and oil” and so somehow is supposed to be naturally occurring in fresh OJ. Hmm.

You’ve Got Wood

Alright, folks, now it’s really time to check your fridge and your cupboards: ice cream, shredded “cheese” products, syrup, waffles, white bread, Weight Watchers food (!), cereal, pastry, pre-made meals in bowls of just about any kind, McDonald’s and other fast food, cookies and frozen desserts, pudding, even Nestle brand hot “cocoa” mixes. If you see the word “cellulose,” please throw the food away (in a Food Bank donation box, ideally) and pick up something smarter. Why?

Cellulose = wood. From trees. Or cotton.

Cellulose can serve as a good source of dietary fiber for people who don’t eat enough fruits, vegetables or whole grains, Ms. Slavin says. The USDA’s most recent dietary guidelines recommend young women get 28 grams a day of fiber and young men consume 38 grams.

People who don’t eat fruits or vegetables? Seriously? Even if I didn’t believe that whole grains are poisonous, this puts America’s ridiculousness into a whole new light.

The Toronto Star published a short article listing the twenty most ridiculous travel complaints ever heard, as reported to Thomas Cook and the Association of British Travel Agents in a recent survey of patrons of local agents. We are officially doomed as a species. Officially.

Here are some of the best (yes, ten of the twenty stupidest things count as ‘the best,’ and even that was hard). Do people not read the things they’ve written and then smash their own skulls against a wall or something? I mean… really?

“We booked an excursion to a water park but no-one told us we had to bring our swimming costumes and towels.”

The water park does not have gambling and strippers, nor do we give away free bikinis with entry. We apologize for not being Vegas.

A woman threatened to call police after claiming that she’d been locked in her hotel room by staff. In fact, she had mistaken the “do not disturb” sign on the back of the door as a warning to remain in the room.

I think this might be the most confusing thing I’ve heard in a very long time. Seriously? I’m desperately resisting the urge to assume that she’s blonde. Be grateful for your anonymity, my dear delicate idiot.

“The beach was too sandy.”

I’ll admit it, I’ve lived on a beach for a month and I know how this feels. Sometimes there’s just too much sand. But maybe some self-censorship would save your reputation with your travel agent, eh?

A guest at a Novotel in Australia complained his soup was too thick and strong. He was inadvertently slurping the gravy at the time.

By this I take it that the restaurant staff, despite there being no language barrier, sat and watched the man drink gravy for his entire stay without mentioning it to him? I guess I just hope he doesn’t have a heart condition to go along with his idiot condition.

“No one told us there would be fish in the sea. The children were startled.”

I just can’t…. I mean really? Even if it weren’t completely incomprehensible that you would not realize that there are things that live in the sea, you’ve really never heard the one about how there are so many “fish in the sea”? Where did you think that came from, exactly?

“It took us nine hours to fly home from Jamaica to England, it only took the Americans three hours to get home.”

Damn those Americans for living so close to Jamaica. I hate it too, I know. Planes suck. But, unless your travel agent is also an immigration agent, I don’t think  there’s much he can do about it. Sorry.

And the last best:

“I compared the size of our one-bedroom apartment to our friends’ three-bedroom apartment and ours was significantly smaller.”

“The brochure stated: ‘No hairdressers at the accommodation.’ We’re trainee hairdressers — will we be OK staying there?”

“There are too many Spanish people. The receptionist speaks Spanish. The food is Spanish. Too many foreigners now live abroad.”

“I was bitten by a mosquito, no-one said they could bite.”

Now hold on just one tiny second here. They do have mosquitoes in England, right? RIGHT?!? OMG! Whew. Thank you, internet. All is well in the world again.

Seriously, if you were just “making out,” perhaps you could have kept it in your seats. Sure, the attendant might ask you to ease up a little if you start to get all handsy, but come on now… you can’t make it from LA to NY without some T&A?

2. In case it wasn’t clear after that little stunt you pulled after The Office’s big gay kiss, just because Steve Carrel gets some laughs with it on TV does not mean it’s a good idea for you to do it at work!

Doctors and even secretaries at NYU Langone Medical Center were so convinced that longtime pediatric nurse Kristen Haight was a 41-year-old virgin, they repeatedly urged her to hop in the sack, she claims in a $45 million lawsuit claiming her medical records weren’t protected.

She alleges that pediatric neurosurgeon Dr. Jeffrey Wisoff repeatedly referenced “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” movie, and reassured her that sex is “like petting something furry for the first time.”

If that was a come on, Doctor, you should know that “small and furry” hasn’t exactly been great a selling point since Alice & Wonderland was published. If you’re not a virgin yourself, it’s still fair to say you haven’t had sex (for free) in at least four decades.

3. Ever gotten the wrong response when you asked someone if an outfit made you look fat? Try being forced to do it in front of some random dude who has to size you up in order to fit you into a pair of bra and panties. Seriously.

Thanks to the strict segregation laws in [Saudi Arabia], women have been banned from working in sales or using fitting rooms. That means that women buy thongs and negligees from male salesman who size them up by looking at them. In one recent incident, a woman asked for a 32C padded bra, and the salesman told her, “No, you’re not a C.”

Dude. You might as well have told her that you didn’t serve “her kind” in your establishment, so she could come back with her crew of bra salesladies to kick your butt out, Pretty Woman style. Probably wearing a different dress, though. ”In 2008, financial adviser Reem Asaad launched a campaign to allow women to work as clerks in lingerie stores. Thanks to her efforts, shops have been ordered to switch to female employees by the end of the year.” Take that, sales jerk! They took ‘yer jobs!

4. Does birth control make you stupid? Well…. a recent study from UC Irvine suggests:

Women using hormonal contraceptives for as little as one month remembered more clearly the main steps in [a] traumatic event – that there had been an accident, that the boy had been rushed to the hospital, that doctors worked to save his life and successfully reattached both his feet, for instance. Women not using them remembered more details, such as a fire hydrant next to the car.

So, without birth control we can remember all the little details, like the environment in which an event took place. With birth control, women were “better” at remembering things that actually happened. What does that even mean? That some of the women who weren’t on birth control were also smoking too much pot that day and couldn’t remember whether it was little Timmy’s hands or feet that needed re-attaching? WTF?

Planking gets expensive, and coning is so over.

I don’t think I need to reiterate that planking is one of the dumbest inventions of the modern world, but now it’s not just stupid… it’s painfully stupid. In the wallet.

In what is (probably) the world’s “first workplace planking prosecution” ever, two men have been fined $1500 each by a court in Australia for planking at work and posting stupid planking photos to Facebook. Somehow, very mysteriously, those Facebook photos found their way into the hands of WorkSafe inspectors who determined that planking is not up to workplace safety codes. Yes, not just a stupid planking story, but a stupid Facebook firing too! It’s got everything, really.

“This prosecution isn’t about planking, it’s about workplace safety,” Mr. McQuillen said.

“The workplace isn’t a playground and forklifts are not toys to be played with.”

Mr. McQuillen said the men, when asked their reasons for doing it, both replied: “Stupidity”.

Shouldn’t honesty count for something?

And, right here in the land of the free, folks are taking a stand against ridiculous internet meme pranks, too!

The gone-viral video is a bit of a mystery. Did the lovely blonde really not know what the drive thru manager was talking about, or was their coning plan completely foiled? Either way, Anonymous McDonald’s Manager, we salute you.

When weirdos attack – vampires and dance troupes are freaking out!

Setting the scene: a 69-year-old man spies a confused young blonde get out of a car at a gas station and try to call for someone to pick her up. He invites her to join him as he sits up in his motorized wheelchair on the porch of an abandoned Hooters, and promptly falls fast asleep, no doubt dreaming about the good old days. He wakes up to the crazy chick babbling something stupid about being a vampire and trying to bite his face off! Bleeding and in a shock, he hot-wheels it out of there and to the gas station, where he reports the incident.

When the police arrived on the scene, they found 22-year-old Josephine Rebecca Smith “… half naked and covered in blood, but uninjured. They said she had no idea what happened or why her clothes were off. Ellis said she was dressed when he last saw her, police said.” Despite her vampire strength and skills of manipulation, the police managed to arrest her and charge her with aggravated battery on an elderly person, the court setting bail at $50,000. Better hope she has some rich vampire friends before it’s time to go out into the yard!

And, while the rumor that they are probably vampires has yet to be started, New Mexico local street dance troupe the Zinsations has been opening up a can of whoopass too, this time at least not on senior citizens. No, it is Facebook bullies who are taking the brunt of the brutality this time.

So, just how hard are New Mexico street dance groups? The eldest is an 18-year-old Police Athletic League boxer… and the only guy who was still left standing got away with having his backpack stolen and a strong right hook to his already injured-and-in-a-sling arm. Watch out, So You Think You Can Dance judges! These dancers are badass!