Free The Darwin Awards Countdown to Extinction by Wendy Northcutt

University (2008), http://tinyurl.com/y56s4xj

CHAPTER 7
    WOMEN: WILL SHE OR WON’T SHE?
    “Sorry about your loss. On a brighter side, you could have lost this one . . .”
    —Fan mail snark
     
    Women are evolution’s greatest gift. They nurture, protect, and educate their offspring, ensuring survival of the next generation. In fact, female Darwin Award winners are incredibly rare! But they do appear from time to time, and we’ve collected seven of these elusive elegies here.
     
    Double Dip • She Talks Faster Than She Walks • Wetting the Bed • Missed (but Not Missed By) the Bus • A Clear Lesson • Epitaph—She Liked Feathers • Pill Pusher
     
    For more female contenders, see:
Not Even Half-Baked, p. 17,
Christmas Light Zinger, p. 188,
and Medieval Mayhem, p. 238.

Darwin Award Winner: Double Dip
    Confirmed by Darwin
    Featuring a woman, water, alcohol, and a moped
     
     
    3 JUNE 2009, NORTH CAROLINA | Greensboro was inundated with four inches of pouring rain in two hours, stranding cars on flooded roads. Rosanne T., on her moped, was not deterred. She hopped on and drove to a convenience store where she “possibly had a beer,” according to her mother, before deciding to blunder home through the storm.
    “My moped has two rubber wheels, Mom, I’ll be fine.”
    North Carolina does not require a license to drive a moped.
    Ms. T. had acquired hers two years previously after a DUI conviction.
    The highway patrol had blocked off several roads that were flooded, including Rosanne’s path home. But she rode right past the officer and the barriers, lost control of her vehicle, and fell into the swollen creek below. The officer retrieved rope from his vehicle and proceeded to haul her from the water, saving her from potential doom.
    He then interviewed the woman, presumably inquiring about her motives for speeding through a police roadblock during a flash flood. When the officer returned to his patrol car to call in the incident, Rosanne took the opportunity to escape— by jumping back into the creek!
    The officer attempted to rescue her again, but alas, it was too late.
    The victim’s mother speculated that her daughter’s motivation for jumping into a flooded creek was to rescue her drowning moped. “She loved that thing.”
     
    Reference: news-record.com , Greensboro, NC, wxii12.com

    Reader Comments
     
    “Just because you have two rubber wheels does not mean you cannot drown . . .”
    “North Carolina’s finest . . . First-ever woman to become a finalist for the Darwin Awards.”
    “First woman ever!! Are we honored or what?! NOT!”
    While North Carolina does not require a license to operate a moped, if a person is caught driving any vehicle (moped, golf cart, tractor, bicycle, etc.) on public roads while intoxicated, the state (and many states) will be able to prosecute for a DUI conviction.

Darwin Award Winner: She Talks Faster Than She Walks
    Confirmed by Darwin
    Featuring a woman, car, and machismo
     
     
    30 MAY 2009, LOUISIANA | Backseat drivers beware! Annoyed at how slowly her boyfriend was driving, Tamera B., twenty-two, encouraged him to pick up the pace so she could get to work on time. Joking that it would be faster to walk to work, she opened the door of the pickup truck and stuck her foot out—before falling out the open door to her death. Whoops!
    But wait! Was her complaint valid?
    Nope. Deputies of the jurisdictional sheriff’s office stated that the truck was traveling at “highway speed” on I-12 at the time of the incident. Her death was ruled accidental.
     
    Reference: New Orleans Times-Picayune , Nola.com

    Reader Comment
     
    “A small consolation—she got the last word!”

Darwin Award Winner: Wetting the Bed
    Confirmed by Darwin
    Featuring a woman, water, weather, and machismo!
     
     
    27 OCTOBER 2009, ARKANSAS | Thirty-year-old Ms. Devan-LeAnn of Shongaloo, Louisiana, was visiting Lake Erling with a male friend. Recent bouts of heavy rain had resulted in a