December 1998: Vol. 78, No. 1December 1998: Vol. 78, No. 1They melt in your mouth--not in your ear
The answering machine at the Needles' house announces: "You've reached the home of the famous ear-flipping brothers."
After all, Ben and Mark Needle hold the Guinness World Record for flipping the most M&Ms from one brother's ear into the other's mouth--16 in one minute, to be exact.
 Ben (at left) and Mark Needle earned a spot in this issue's Bones section of weird and wacky goings-on by setting a world record for flipping the most M&Ms from one brother's ear into the other's mouth. The feat took place on the set of "Guinness World Records." |
Here's the schtick: Ben, a UGA sophomore, sits in a chair about three feet behind his brother Mark, a senior at Marietta's Walton High School. Mark folds in the top of his ear, inserts an M&M into the crevice between the fold and his head (yellow is the preferred color) and, pop! launches it.
The M&M flies through the air and Ben snaps his jaws around it like a well-trained puppy.
"My brother had seen someone folding his ear in on 'America's Funniest Home Videos,' and tried it himself," recalls Ben. "Then one night I saw Stupid Human Tricks on 'Letterman' and thought, 'Why don't we try to do this?'"
They named themselves "The Crazy Ear-Flipping Boys," and commenced practice.
"We weren't very good at first, and we didn't have much time to rehearse," says Ben. But they put together a videotape and got invited to "Letterman"--the same night as Cindy Crawford!
Since their TV debut, the Needles have been on "Guinness World Records" and have gotten a call from "Real TV," a show which features videotapes of strange and amazing things. But when "Jenny Jones" and Globe magazine came calling, mother Karen Needles stepped in. "Globe magazine is a sensationalist tabloid magazine and 'Jenny Jones' is trash TV," she says. "I want to protect my kids."
Besides, the Needle boys say they already have all the attention they need from Cindy Crawford.
"She thought our trick was disgusting," Ben says. "But basically, Cindy Crawford wants us. She thinks we're cool in an icky kind of way."
 FINALLY, A NICE WORD ABOUT KUDZU Some scientists want to eradicate the ubiquitous kudzu vine that covers the southeast like a lumpy green blanket. But horticulture expert Jake Tinga has a better idea: Eat it. A plate of baked kudzu roots tastes just like sweet potatoes, says Tinga, a retired UGA professor who considers the shoots to be an inexpensive substitute for asparagus. "You can go out after a rain, cut the tips off, bring it to a boil, throw the water away, bring it to a boil again, and put hollandaise sauce on it," Tinga told the Washington Post. "It's full of vitamins." |
After The Red and Black featured the new club "Hangin' Out Naked" on its front page, GM decided to report on the organization as an example of students' diverse extracurricular activities.
"To me, it [hangin' out naked] is just about being comfortable with yourself," founder Brian Davis told The Red and Black about the new nudist club, whose membership stands at two--Davis and a female friend. "But it's also a great way to make good and close friends."
GM contacted Davis to get more of the skinny, but he declined to reveal the naked truth. Still, we want to advise him of some potential recruits to the Hangin' Out Naked brigade:
Uga V, one never ashamed to bare it all; 16 UGA cheerleaders who were suspended after some drank beer and skinny-dipped during Labor Day weekend; and a few key SGA members, who also dipped some skin during a student government conference in South Carolina.
Suds 101
"It's been a while since we last met," says the professor to his class. "There must have been a lot of beer between now and then."
"Yeah," a voice rings out from the back of the room. "We've been studying!"
If this conversation sounds out of place in the classroom, it's not. This is Brian Nummer, owner of the Athens Brewing Company, talkin' shop with students in his Food Science 2020 class, "The Art, History, and Science of Beer."
Class activities do not include "tastes great/less filling" debates, brawls between Bud drinkers and microbrew snobs, or discussion of UGA's most recent ranking among the nation's top party schools. Instead, Nummer, who holds a Ph.D. in microbiology, uses his knowledge of chemistry, entomology, and sociology to teach a delicious brand of beer history.
Did you know that Kloster Weihenstephan, an 11th century abbey that held the first German brewery charter, is the home of today's preeminent German brewing school? Or that medieval monks drank 5-10 liters of beer a day? Or that Louis Pasteur began studying pasteurization by investigating what made French beer spoil faster than German beer?
"It's knowledge you couldn't get in any other class," says Jonathon Jones, a junior computer science major. "The trivia will be a lot of fun to use at bars. But considering beer goes back to the beginning of history, it's also something to take seriously."
That doesn't mean there isn't any room for the inevitable wisecrack. "Study session this Thursday night at the brew pub," one dedicated student shouts as class ends. "And Friday night and Saturday
In true "Springer" style, students brawl on tube
The night before UGA students Jeff and Alan appeared on "The Jerry Springer Show," they strolled the streets of Chicago, digesting a free prime rib dinner and taking in the sights and sounds.
Less than 12 hours later, Alan was beating Jeff about the head on national TV after learning Jeff was sleeping with his girlfriend Beth, also a UGA student.
Like Shakespeare, Springer unveiled the lies one by one, revealing that Jeff's girlfriend Kelly had also been sleeping with somebody else. A love triangle? This was a love parallelogram.
And in true "Springer" style, the foursome was ultimately left with no choice but to curse and exchange blows on-camera. Bleep. Pow. Bleep. Pow.
"The show does things to you," says Jeff. "I didn't think Alan was going to fight. He went a little wild, but it was totally cool."
Nor did the women sit idly by. Each threw punches that would have connected if not for the interference of Springer's henchmen.
The foursome was booked in early October, after Beth called the show with news of their tangled web. At that time, Springer's producers talked with both Beth and Jeff to ensure they weren't making up a story. Some people would do that, you know, just to get on the show.
Despite the bad blood so evident on stage, the four UGA students are good friends once again, Jeff vouches. He says the folks in the segment before his--who repeatedly threatened to maim each other--also got chummy after the cameras were turned off.
"I urge everyone not to believe everything they see on TV," he says.
Section by Jena McGregor and Laura Wexler