A 14-year-old Japanese girl committed suicide by mixing laundry detergent and cleansers, then unwittingly poisoned 90 of her fellow neighbors with the pungent waft as a result.

The girl’s suicide Wednesday night was part of an expanding string of similar deaths that experts say have been encouraged by Internet suicide sites.

A 31-year-old man outside Tokyo killed himself inside a car early Thursday by mixing detergent and bath salts, police said. A local police spokesman refused to give further details, but Kyodo News agency reported the man put a sign reading “Stay Away” on the car window.

Reports of another similar case emerged Thusday afternoon when a 42-year-old woman in Nagoya, central Japan, was found dead in a bathtub. According to Kyodo, there was toilet cleaner and bath powder nearby, along with a sign outside that read, “Poisonous gas being emitted. Caution.”

Internet suicide sites?! What the hell is wrong with us? Not to mention, what the hell is wrong with Japan?

Japan’s government has long battled to contain the country’s alarmingly high suicide rate. A total of 32,155 people killed themselves in 2006, giving the country the ninth highest rate in the world, according to the government.

Suicides first passed the 30,000 mark in 1998, near the height of an economic slump that left many bankrupt, jobless and desperate.

The government has earmarked $220 million for anti-suicide programs to help those with depression and other mental conditions.

Last year it set a goal of cutting the suicide rate by 20 percent in 10 years through steps such as reducing unemployment, boosting workplace counseling and filtering Web sites that promote suicide.

It’s a good thing we’re too distracted by Lost and Britney Spears to be anywhere near the top 10 most suicidal countries. America Wins again!

Mom, Dad, don’t read this one. Do you ever have those times in your life where it seems like you keep seeing the same random things? Like that week where every time I had to stand in line for something, there would be a group of retarded people in front of me, taking FOREVER to place their orders and pay for their shit. EVEN when I had gone out of town. That was annoying and I’m glad it’s over. But this week it seems like everything comes back to The Dick…

It started with HBO’s Real Sex episode my roommate and I watched. The focus was strap-ons. Captivated, we both agreed that we couldn’t die without partaking in strap-on fun. Add it to my list of things to do.

Then I kept having these strange dreams about inverted penises… Then everything began to look phallic to me. My boss’ speakers pique my curiosity… just yesterday, someone randomly brought up the pervertedness of The Little Mermaid… I hesitantly ate sausages last night… And this morning I read this:

Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men’s penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft.

Reports of so-called penis snatching are not uncommon in West Africa, where belief in traditional religions and witchcraft remains widespread, and where ritual killings to obtain blood or body parts still occur.

Rumors of penis theft began circulating last week in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo’s sprawling capital of some 8 million inhabitants. They quickly dominated radio call-in shows, with listeners advised to beware of fellow passengers in communal taxis wearing gold rings.

Purported victims, 14 of whom were also detained by police, claimed that sorcerers simply touched them to make their genitals shrink or disappear, in what some residents said was an attempt to extort cash with the promise of a cure.

“You just have to be accused of that, and people come after you. We’ve had a number of attempted lynchings. … You see them covered in marks after being beaten,” Kinshasa’s police chief, Jean-Dieudonne Oleko, told Reuters on Tuesday.

Police arrested the accused sorcerers and their victims in an effort to avoid the sort of bloodshed seen in Ghana a decade ago, when 12 suspected penis snatchers were beaten to death by angry mobs. The 27 men have since been released.

“I’m tempted to say it’s one huge joke,” Oleko said.

“But when you try to tell the victims that their penises are still there, they tell you that it’s become tiny or that they’ve become impotent. To that I tell them, ‘How do you know if you haven’t gone home and tried it’,” he said.

Some Kinshasa residents accuse a separatist sect from nearby Bas-Congo province of being behind the witchcraft in revenge for a recent government crackdown on its members.

“It’s real. Just yesterday here, there was a man who was a victim. We saw. What was left was tiny,” said 29-year-old Alain Kalala, who sells phone credits near a Kinshasa police station.

That sucks!!!!! Stay the eff away from my man!

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

I will never be able to masturbate again. THANKS INTERNET!

In an attempt to break a world record for most hours flying using party balloons, a Brazilian Roman catholic Priest, suspended by 1,000 helium balloons, is now missing. His aim was to raise money to build a rest-stop church for truckers.

Even on my best day I couldn’t make this shit up.

Wacky news story of the day or sign of the impending apocalypse? Either way, this is why I listen to the BBC in the morning:

“Father Adelir de Carli lifted off from the port city of Paranagua on Sunday, equipped with a parachute, thermal suit, satellite phone and a GPS device.

A sea and air rescue operation is under way after he lost contact with port authority officials late on Sunday.

He wanted to break a 19-hour record for the most hours flying with balloons.

Father Carli was hoping to raise money to fund a rest stop for lorry drivers in Paranagua, one of Brazil’s major ports for agricultural products.”

Yeah, I don’t think I have anything else to add. Complete lyrics to Jimmy Webb’s “Up, Up and Away” and a full wikipedia synopsis of The Flying Nun after the jump. (more…)

People across Arizona and Florida reported seeing strange light formations in the sky last night. Phoenix, of course, is already known for strange unexplained lights in the sky, with 1997’s Phoenix Lights phenomena being amongst the more infamous recent UFO events. Someone call Whitley Streiber and ask him what’s up.

Some people might find it shocking that 58% of music in the US isn’t paid for but hey - that means 42% of music IS paid for in the US!