To get these issues free by email each week, click here to open a subscribe form. (Or cruise around the web site to see more samples, archive, and info on our terrific book collections of thousands of past stories.)
Since 1994, this is the 1604th issue of Randy Cassingham’s...
| 9 March 2025: When My Baby Smiles at Me | Copyright ©2025 https://thisistrue.com |
The Myasorubka: For years, western media have talked about the Russian “meat grinder” — the tens ofthousands of inexperienced Russian troops being killed in their country’s invasion of Ukraine. This year, to celebrate International Women’s Day, which is a popular holiday in Russia, Vladimir Putin’s United Russia Party in the northern Murmansk region went on a public relations blitz to show how much they care about the mothers of fallen soldiers, visiting them, trailed by photographers, to give them gifts to celebrate their “strength of spirit and the love you put into bringing up your sons” —bouquets, and nice new meat grinders. After an online backlash, angry Party officials in Polyarniye called the criticism “callous and provocative interpretations” of their intent. (RC/AFP) ...Outraged defense, outraged defenestration — what’s the difference?
Culinary Invasion: The nutria is an invasive species of rodent disrupting marshland ecosystems around the Gulf Coast, in the Pacific Northwest, and in the Southeastern U.S. During this year’s National Invasive Species Awareness Week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a public advisory telling Americans how they can help. The slogan: “Save a Swamp, Sauté a Nutria.” As in, cook it. “Their meat is lean, mild and tastes like rabbit,” they say. This year’s Louisiana NutriaRodeo in Venice demonstrated how versatile the meat is. “They made tacos, they made gumbo, they made sloppy joes using fresh nutria meat,” event organizer Robbie Carter said. “Tastes like chicken.” (MS/New York Times) ...Which apparently tastes like rabbit.
Drunk Driver Finds his Apple Watch has been watching him. The interesting key discovery behind the A.I. revolution. Prosecutor has a “Perry Mason” style triumph in court. British school headmaster has a boneheaded solution to a common problem. Fertility clinic screwed up so bad, even I think they should be sued out of existence. Someone steals the oddest thing from a restaurant. Cops warn school game is dangerous and could lead to someone getting shot ...and then a student got shot.Woman takes revenge on her ex-boyfriend in such a stupid way, she ends up in jail. Wait... what just went for a crazy price at auction?! Premium always has a lot more stories, has no outside advertising, and comes with some extra benefits, not the least of which that you are part of the community that makes it happen. The best part: you get to choose how much to pay (with a minimum). Join today and get all the newstories on Monday!
Diving In: A pothole opened up on a road near Castle Camps, Cambridgeshire, England. After around eight months, James Coxall and his family had “a bit of funwith it.” Using rags, shoes, wood, and old clothes, they made a pair of legs and put it in the puddle the pothole had become, to look like someone was submerged upside down with only the legs sticking up. He shared the photo in local Facebook groups, and it got media attention not only around the U.K., but even in Canada. The local county council fixed the pothole and said people should file pothole reports online. Now, Coxall is getting requests to borrow the legs. “I don’t know about that,” hesaid, “but as I’m a carpenter, I might try something else — like the Titanic or a submarine.” (AC/BBC) ...Coxall is one artist unlikely to run out of space to exhibit his works.
Clbuttic Obliviocy: Under President Trump’s orders, around 100,000 military website postings, photos, news articles, andvideos are being removed to erase any mentions that “promote diversity, equity and inclusion.” Not just the Tuskegee Airmen, the heroic Black fighter team in World War II. Not just U.S. Marine Corps Pfc. Harold Gonsalves, a Portugese-American awarded the Medal of Honor after diving on top of a hand grenade to save his commanding officer and another Marine. And not just the entire page, “Women’s History Month: All-female crew supports warfighters”. But also, now, references to a certain B-29Superfortress bomber, the first aircraft to drop an atomic bomb, which helped end World War II, because of the plane’s name, emblazoned on its nose. It was named for the mother of its pilot, Enola Gay Tibbets. (RC/AP) ...“Sad to see the history and culture of our great country being ripped apart with the removal of our beautiful statues and monuments. You can’t change history, but you can learn from it.” —Donald Trump, 2017
Is There Anything the Dew Can’t Do?
Woman Murdered Roommate, Poured Mountain Dew on Herself to Prevent Police from Getting DNA
WKRC Cincinnati headline
Did You Find an Error? Check the Errata Page for updates.
This Week’s Contributors: MS-Mike Straw, AC-Alexander Cohen, RC-Randy Cassingham.
Stories This Week were Written/Edited at sea after leaving Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, a few hours after Carnival festivities ended. Sounds like fun, but several Residents of my ship were robbed in the street, with one being beaten when he resisted. At least Associated Press has a terrific photo spread of the finals, significantly outdoing the one that the BBC published.
Long-Time Readers (and those who are very keyed-in with certain history) already know what “clbuttic” means (ref. the “Clbuttic Obliviocy” story). If not, you’re in for a treat in addition to an education. The treat is a True video from way back in 2008, Clbuttic Mistake. Be sure to keep watching after the end. It’s only 105 seconds total.
Myasorubka: Russian for “meat grinder.” Yes, I could have looked up how to render it in Cyrillic, but I’m tired so I’d probably mess it up anyway, soI’ll insert a close-up photo of the box instead.
It’s also the Story of the Week so you can easily share it) from Telegram, Mastodon, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, and/or Facebook, or grab from any of those to post elsewhere.
The Headline of the Week’s story was reported from Ohio, but the event happened in (ta dah!) Florida. Unfortunately I didn’t find a Florida-based headline that was as good as WKRC’s. The 37-year-old woman was in police custody for questioning and asked for the soda, then dumped it over her head to contaminate the evidence on her body — her 79-year-old roommate’s blood. Didn’t work.
Now and then when I mention the Headline of the Week in this space, someone will write to ask what I’m talking about: “WHAT headline of the week?” Every week, for 1,604 issues now, after all the stories, there’s a headline. You know it because it says something under it like “WKRC Cincinnati headline” (emphasis added). It’s got a slug, such as “Is There Anything the Dew Can’t Do?”, but there’s no story — just a headline. Summary: every week there’s a separate headline after thestories, and I call it the Headline of the Week. In the books, they signal the end of that week’s batch of stories, and help break up the gray blocks of text.
I suppose most of you know all of this, but I get the “What headline?” question often enough that I thought I’d mention it. Plus, if you haven’t actually been reading the headline, you miss part of the content. And if you don’t read the Author’s Notes (which is, um, this section), then you’ll miss that you might be missing some of the content.
Do You Use an Email Forwarder? That is, say, from Yourname @ Yourdomain.xzy to, for instance, a gmail address? Worse, do you use such to receive your True subscription? If so, you should stop immediately, and a new post in my blog explains why: Why You Don’t Want to Use Email Forwarding.
If you don’t use them, carry on, nothing to see here. Unless you just want to know why because you’re a little nerdy. 🙂
Ten Years Ago in True: You Take One Down, and Pass It Around.
This Week’s Sunday Reading: Some of the weird reasons people give as to WHY they wish to unsubscribe from the newsletter. Unusual Unsubscribes.
No Honorary Unsubscribe yet this week. Out of energy.
Basic Subscriptions to This is True are Free at https://thisistrue.com. All stories are completely rewritten using facts from the noted sources. This is True® (and Get Out of Hell Free® and Stella Awards®) are registered trademarks of ThisisTrue.Inc. Published weekly by ThisisTrue.Inc, PO Box 666, Ridgway CO 81432 USA (ISSN 1521-1932).
Copyright ©2025 by Randy Cassingham, All Rights Reserved. All broadcast, publication, retransmission to email lists, web site or social media posting, or any other copying or storage, in any medium, online or not, is strictly prohibited without prior written permission from the author. Manual forwarding by email to friends is allowed if 1) the text is forwarded in its entirety from the “Since 1994” line on top through the end of this paragraph and 2) No fee is charged. I request that you forward no more than three copies to any one person — after that, they should get their own free subscription. I appreciate people who report violations of my copyright.
To get True delivered to you every week, click here to open a subscribe form.