European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 07, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Leapfrogging through the news Dave Barry what s wrong with this country aside from Light Beer is that americans Don t know anything about foreign affairs. Your average american can Teven answer Basic questions about geography such As. 1. In which direction docs the Nile River flow 2. What can the letters in great Britain be rear ranged to spell answers 1. Downhill 2. Big Titan  tragically we americans Are too Busy sitting. Around watching worthless juvenile mind rotting to situation comedies such As Dave s world monday nights lbs Check your local listings to learn about foreign affairs. This is bad because what happens abroad can greatly affect our lives. For example if tensions were to mount again in the Middle East fighting could break out and it could escalate to god forbid nuclear War and this would almost definitely affect our to reception. This is Why today i m going to present a foreign news update starting with an important Story from the sept. 2 times of India sent in by Alert Reader tapas Chakraborty. This article which i am not making up states villagers of Kha Juria in Sanjam District worshipped a Frog on monday to please the rain god Indra As the dry spell continued to delay  the article further states that a big live Frog tied with a Bamboo stick was carried by Vil lagers who roamed in and around the Village chant ing couplets in Honor of the wife of lord  the article does not give the exact wording of the couplets. Probably they went something like we need rain your wife is Gre there s a Frog let s cultivate the article also does t state whether this Effort resulted in rain but i m sure it did. If you re a rain god arid you have people waving a Frog around and chanting about your wife you re definitely going to dump something on them. But whether or not it worked the Point is that the villagers of Kha Juria did something about their problem. They did not just sit Back and wait for the other Guy to worship the Frog. We need More of that kind of gumption in this country. Take the econ omy. People have been whining about the Economy for years but nobody does anything about it. I m not saying we could get the Economy going again by worshipping a Frog. Please do not take me for a total idiot. We have a huge Complex Economy and we d need a much larger amphibian such As a Manatee or if he is available sen. Edward Kennedy. Speaking of frogs Many Alert readers sent in an associated press report concerning an incident in Manchester n.h., which is not technically a foreign country but you la want to know about this incident anyway because it involves a woman who opened a bag of pretzels and pulled out a prct2el with a one Inch Frog baked onto it. The a sent out a photo graph showing the actual pretzel and sure enough there s a Frog sort of welded onto it looking crouched and ready to hop away except that frogs become very poor hoppers after being subjected to the pretzel baking process As has been verified in countless Laboratory experiments. My first thought when i saw this article was that maybe the Frog had been put there on Pur pose. We live in an Era of increasingly Complex snack food variations such As Jalapeno Cheddar n onion Graham crackers now with Avo Cado it s entirely possible that marketing experts at the pretzel company were simply enhancing their product line now with frogs. But apparently that was not the Case with these pret Zels so the woman took them Back to the food store which gave her a handsome baked Prince. No seriously the store gave her a refund so All s Well that ends Well. But that does not mean we should relax not with these alarming cheese related developments that Are taking place in England. I refer to a May 26 up Story sent in by Alert Reader Clyde Morgan which begins fourteen people were injured taking part in the annual double Gloucester cheese rolling  i am Stilt not making this up. The article states that this race takes place every year and it involves rolling Large round slabs of cheese Down a Hill with individual cheeses reach ing speeds of up to 50 Kilometres per  last year 27 people were injured. The question is what if this kind of Semi deadly activity catches on in this country i personally am not worried because i live in South Florida which is extremely Fiat plus even if you could get a Large cheese rolling Down Here passing armed motorists would blow it to Smithereens. But what if people Start rolling cheeses in say Colorado what if you get one of those big babies hurtling Down a Rocky Mountain straight toward. To pick a worst Case scenario a John Denver concert. Friends around the campfire and everybody s Hii eee splat is that the kind of nation you want your children to grow up in me too. To vex \ we. It i ant mrff61v5t Dier o 0 0 a _ a i1 Page 28 sunday november 7,1993