A Massachusetts woman may have succumbed to "snowball rage."
Marie Needs, 48, was picking up her daughter at Andover High School (search) last Wednesday afternoon when a snowball struck her car. Then another. And another.
Needs yelled at the kids throwing the snowballs, then got out and chased them — with a tire iron.
More snowballs pelted her, and she went back into her car to get her pepper spray (search).
While all this was going on, student Joey Cataldo, 16, came out to the parking lot to find Needs' Honda blocking his car.
He asked her to move her car, but she refused, and after a short argument, she pepper-sprayed him in the face.
"She kept telling me just to not say another word," Cataldo told the Boston Globe.
Needs pleaded not guilty to assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, assault with a dangerous weapon and carrying a firearm (the pepper spray) without proper registration.
"Mrs. Needs was the victim here," her attorney told WCVB-TV of Boston. "The evidence is going to show that there are a number of men and women at the school who have a game ... throwing snow at people who come to pick up their children."
Needs was released on her own recognizance and told to stay away from Cataldo.
— Thanks to Out There reader Greg M.
Man Loses Battle for Astroturf Lawn
MARCO ISLAND, Fla. (AP) — City officials have ended a turf war with a homeowner over artificial grass in his yard with a ban on the synthetic landscaping.
The Marco Island City Council (search) voted 4-2 on Monday night to prohibit artificial turf and synthetic turf materials.
In December, Ed Ehlen installed a synthetic green cover across his waterfront lot to conserve water.
Tests the city conducted found that heavy rains and flooding would dislodge rubber pellets in the turf, which city officials said could then float into the city's sewer system and canals, threatening birds and fish.
The turf, made popular by professional sports franchises in the 1970s, has been banned by neighborhood associations in Clearwater, Tampa, Las Vegas and Hilton Head, S.C.
Ehlen's attorney, Lou Amato, argued the fake grass was not an environmental concern.
"The product is odorless, it doesn't float, it's simply not toxic and it's not carcinogenic," Amato said. "We're not talking about a huge discharge of materials to cause a nuisance. That's what's illegal."
OGDEN, Ark. (AP) — An allegedly drunken bicyclist wound up getting a ride to jail after a state trooper saw him take a clumsy spill at a state highway intersection.
Don Evans, 46, was riding where U.S. 71 and Grand Street intersect early Saturday when he fell from his mountain bike onto the highway pavement.
Trooper Jamie Gravier was about 50 feet away.
"He was pedaling through the intersection of Highway 71 at the Grand Street crossover and fell off the bike. The pedals kept hitting the kickstand and he couldn't keep it up. He was in the middle of the southbound lanes of traffic," Gravier said.
"I saw it happen and thought 'Lord, don't let someone come around the curve.' I turned on the emergency lights and positioned the car to warn motorists. Fortunately nobody was coming or he would have been run over," Gravier said.
Gravier took the man to the hospital, where he was treated and released. He was then taken to the jail and charged with public intoxication.
New Yorkers Miffed at Not Winning Game
NEW YORK (AP) — Lucky 13 turned out to be not so lucky in New York.
Hundreds of people showed up at the Daily News' midtown Manhattan offices on Monday, angry over an apparent misprint in one of the winning numbers in the newspaper's scratch-match game.
Vanessa Dover, a 62-year-old painter's wife, thought she had won $100,000.
"We were all celebrating Saturday night, jumping around; the grandkids were screaming," Dover said. "We got up the next morning and the dream was dead."
The Daily News includes a seven-game ticket in its Sunday edition. Every day, it prints a list of 10 numbers to be scratched off the corresponding day's game, out of 15 possible spaces.
If three of the revealed spaces show the same dollar amount, the contestant wins that money.
In Saturday's game, the number 13 was printed instead of the correct number, 12, in the list of scratch-off numbers.
The Daily News apologized to readers for publishing the wrong number and said it was putting up more than $1 million in cash as a prize pool for those affected by the error.
A special drawing will have five $100,000 winners, five $10,000 winners and 12,790 other cash winners, the newspaper said in a statement Monday.
LA PORTE CITY, Iowa (AP) — Stu Hemesath has earned $29.95 — as a prom date.
The high school senior from La Porte City auctioned himself off as a date on the Internet auction site eBay on Thursday. He will accompany Rachel Kay, 17, to her Cedar Falls prom.
The two say they have never met.
Hemesath said the idea just came to him as he was "thinking about proms and stuff."
"I came to school with a thought in my head, and I told my friends," he said. "They thought it was the coolest thing in the world, so I decided to go for it."
Hemesath posted pictures of himself and a description to secure some bids — which came from people as far away as Alaska.
"That's pretty far," he said. "She was really interested. She showed me her picture, but it was just too far away for it to be a possibility."
Compiled by FOX News' Paul Wagenseil.
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