Doofus Of The Day #611

Sometimes doofidity takes on dimensions so excruciatingly embarrassing, so absolutely laden with 'suck and fail', that one can only look on with awe as mistakes lead their perpetrators epically astray. Such an incident has just overtaken a TV news reporter in China.

WARNING:  Contents at the linked page are emphatically not safe for work!!!

The Shanghaiist reports:

Xi'an Up Close, an investigative journalism programme ... has become a national laughing stock after airing a report on June 17 on a "mystery mushroom" which was discovered by villagers in a rural part of the city.

Residents of the Liucunbu village on the outskirts of the capital of the Shaanxi province say they came across a strange fungi-like object as they hit bedrock while drilling a new well. The perplexed villagers decided to call up their local TV station for help, which sent intrepid reporter Ye Yunfeng to their sleepy little hamlet to get down to the bottom of things.

. . .

Reporter Ye then begins to describe the curious object as the camera pans in on it. "As we can all see, this looks like a type of fungus, on both ends of which you'll find mushroom heads."

"On this side, you can see what looks like a pair of lips," she adds. "And on that side, there is a tiny hole which extends all the way back to this side. The object looks very shiny, and it feels really fleshy and meaty too."

"I've done my own research on the internet," says the afore-mentioned villager. "It's a type of lingzhi mushroom, called the taisui." [Editor's note: Taisui refers to 60 celestial generals named in the Chinese zodiac.]

Without skipping a beat, reporter Ye chimes in with her own research, saying this type of lingzhi is generally found in the Shaanxi region deep underground and is hence rarely seen. "When the Emperor Qin Shi Huang was on the hunt for the secret to longevity," she elucidates, "it is said he discovered this lingzhi was the answer."

Eagle-eyed viewers who saw the report on Sunday immediately identified the mystery mushroom as a double-headed masturbation toy ...

There's more at the link, including photographs and a video clip.  For obvious reasons I'm not going to embed them here!  Bold print is my emphasis.

How on earth is she ever going to live down a mistake like that?  Any report she broadcasts in future will immediately attract a barrage of catcalls (the nature of which I leave to your imagination).  I suspect her career in broadcast journalism hasn't just come to a screeching halt - it's gone into reverse . . .





Peter