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Death, Taxes and Indians
By Devin D. O'Leary
AUGUST 24, 1998:
Dateline: India--Viagramania continues worldwide. A young
couple in Bangalore, India, has announced plans to market a new
clothing line called "Viagra." Priya and Gautam Puri
are both former fashion models and the brains behind Priya Apparels,
which will market the Viagra shirts. The 100 percent cotton shirts
will cost between 525 rupees ($12.35) and 695 rupees ($16.35)--just
slightly less than the actual impotence drug costs on the Indian
black market (an estimated $18.80 per pill). The government has
yet to authorize the sale of Pfizer Pharmaceutical Company's Viagra
drug in India. The fashion-minded Puris launched the new clothing
line last Monday with the slogan, "What the World Wants Today."
It is not known whether the shirts are marketed toward males with
erectile dysfunctions or just anyone familiar with the "Viagra"
name.
Dateline: Sweden--A Swedish teacher who stripped naked
in front of her class has won a legal battle after being "unfairly
dismissed." The unnamed teacher was fired last year after
shedding her underwear in front of a women's class at Kristinehamn's
adult education college. The ecdysiast educator told Karlstad
court in central Sweden that she decided to teach her class in
the buff to "strengthen her students' self-confidence."
The court ordered the woman's former employer, Varmland City Council,
to pay 1,150,000 crowns in damages.
Dateline: Lithuania--A recently discovered
alcohol pipeline from neighboring Latvia may share at least part
of the blame for a sharp drop in profits reported by Lithuania
alcohol producers. Last week, police near Vilnius, Latvia, seized
the small country house of a former border guard after several
days of close surveillance. The police discovered a wellspring
of contraband alcohol flowing from a plastic pipeline that stretched
3 kilometers across the border into Latvia. The Lithuanian government
announced a step-up in their fight against alcohol smuggling after
excise taxes for the first half of 1998 fell some 139 million
litas ($34.8 million) short of last year.
Dateline: Russia--The provincial Russian town of Naberezhniye
Chelny in central Russia has ordered all pet owners to stop their
dogs barking between the hours of 10 p.m. and 8 a.m. and to stay
off the booze if they want to take them for a walk. Drunken owners
of barking dogs who fail to comply with the new measure face a
fine of 15 rubles ($2.40). The Russian news agency Interfax reports
that there are 4,500 registered dogs in the town.
Dateline: Florida--Speaking of drunken pet owners, two
men in Clearwater, Fla., were charged with animal cruelty after
smuggling a parrot and a snake into a local nightclub. One man
was accused of choking his parrot, the other of dunking the bird
five times into a
margarita. Animal cruelty carries up to a $5,000 fine and a year
in jail. The parrot, Woody, is recovering at an animal shelter.
Dateline: Nevada--Actress Debbie Reynolds' bankrupt
hotel and casino in Las Vegas, Nev., went on the auction block
last week and walked away with an unlikely new owner. The Debbie
Reynolds Hotel & Casino is now the property of the World Wrestling
Federation. Although Reynolds said several times in the past that
she was willing to license the use of her name to the casino's
new owner and to continue performing at the venue, it seems unlikely
the Singin' in the Rain star will be appearing at the casino
alongside such WWF superstars as Stone Cold Steve Austin and The
Undertaker.
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