Feburary 8, 2002

News That Isn't

A little advice for all you job-seekers out there: always be on time to the

interview. Never bring up salary until the gig's been offered. And finally

— and this is a biggie — when you're filling out that application

and you come across the question, "Sex?" For the love of God, resist the

urge to answer, "Yes."

Really now, it's common sense, innit? Well, apparently it's not common

enough. According to Washington Post columnist Bob Levey, one

unnamed fool in the D.C. area who'd reached his third job interview with an

also-unnamed dot-com committed just that basic blunder not too long ago,

with not-so-positive results. According to Levey, the applicant figured

hey, in the world of iEmployment, anything goes, right buddy? "I

didn't think it would hurt to have a little fun," said Mr. Sex-Yes. "This

was the world of high tech, where they say it's important to have fun. I

though it couldn't do any harm." Uh, apparently he thought wrong. The

company turned him down for the job, and now he's suing them for — no

kidding — discrimination against light-heartedness. Guess there's no

law barring discrimination against idiots.

God Spay the Queen

Somewhere along the line, the British got saddled with a reputation for

abject sexlessness, and no amount of

TARGET="_TOP">rigged polling

overturn that image. And while we here at This Week in Sex haven't a

clue from whence this rep arose — hey, all the Limeys we know

are plenty sex-positive — we do know this: whoever's spreading the "No

Sex Please" rumors hasn't had a look lately at the U.K.'s animal

kingdom.

Just look at all the four-legged firecrackers roaming the petting zoos and

pig farms of the Mother Country. There's

TARGET="_top">Sooty

impregnated twenty-four guinea sows in one guinea-tacular evening in late

2000. And there's Rex, the

thirty-six-stone stud pig who lost his job last month not 'cause he

wasn't a big enough breeder (twenty-five ladies a week enough for you,

pal?) but because he was too big — at five hundred porky pounds, Rex was

crushing his mates. Now comes Monty, the English bull terrier who was

stolen from a Scottish kennel and put to work for five harrowing days as,

yes, a stud dog. According to the Daily Record of Glasgow, thieves

broke into the hound-dog Hilton through a skylight and snatched the pooch,

whose owner was on holiday with his girlfriend. Because of his breed,

police figured Monty was headed for the dogfights, but when he was found

less than a week later, he had lost weight and was exhausted —

apparently from a five-day sexual bender. And according to a veterinarian

with the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, now

that ol' Monty's had a taste of the good life, he's having a hard time

readjusting to celibacy. "Their temperaments change when they're bred for

the first time," says the vet. "Monty is out of character. He is listless

yet restless and is constantly looking for other dogs." Yep — kinda

brings ya right back to your first time, don't it?

Bad Cop, No Schnitzel

In our experience, you can't put nothing past a cop. They stare at you

through those reflective sunglasses, steel-faced and stoic, and no matter

how good your excuse is (and we've had some great excuses, boy),

they always give you the damn ticket. So we've got one question: Why

can't we ever run into some Austrian cops while going fifty-five in

a school zone?

To explain: An elite crew of police officers from the southern Austrian

town of Graz was demoted to routine patrol duty this week after it was

discovered that they were duped into posing nude — save for their

guns, handcuffs and nightsticks — for a wall calendar. Duped, you ask?

How does someone dupe a cop into posing nude for a calendar? Well,

apparently it's not that hard. According to a Reuters report, one Josef

Steinhuber, businessman, invited the officers, all of them part of a

special security force called Cobra, to participate in the calendar, which

he said was designed as a public relations tool for the department. (Uh

huh.) Naturally, they were wary — 'cause when you're a copper, people

are always trying to trick you into posing naked for calendars, and usually

it's a bad idea — but this Steinhuber fellow was crafty. He assured

the Graz police superintendent that his plan had the blessing of the

Interior Ministry, who are the folks in charge of deciding such things.

Apparently not the questioning sort, the superintendent reportedly okayed

the shoot at that point, going so far as to offer up the use of a sports

hall — as well as the guns, cuffs and other assorted police

accessories featured in the photographs. Alas, it turns out that the

Interior Ministry hadn't actually given its approval for the

calendar (shock!), and now there are reportedly 350,000 copies of

"Explosive Cops 2002!" floating around southern Austria, rendering the Graz

police department a laughing stock on the streets. "I think my colleagues

were tricked," said Graz police director Franz Stingl, demonstrating an

admirable grasp of the obvious. Added another cop, who went unnamed in the

report, "To call them naive would be flattering them." Maybe so. But it

sure seems like the right word . . .

Quotes of the Week

"[I'm] built like a stallion, just right for riding."

— Godfather of Soul James Brown, allegedly, to model and

former employee Lisa Agbalaya. Agbalaya is suing Brown for $1 million for

sexual harassment and wrongful termination.

"I'm a church-going man . . . I ain't got no time for that."
— Brown, denying the allegations under oath.

"I am not gay. I love my wife and I love my family."

— Emilio Estefan, Jr., Latin music mogul and husband to

Gloria, upon filing his a $1 million defamation lawsuit against an actor

who alleged Estefan had sought sexual favors from him.

Did we miss any sex in the news? Send the story to tips@nerve.com.