MONDAY, MAY 21 This week of alleged Christian terrorists, show-off suicides, and blackened Japanese feet kicks off today with the mysterious saga of Michael Schreck, the 47-year-old Issaquah jogger whose disappearance last Friday set off a massive search of Cougar Mountain Regional Wildland Park, on whose wooded trails Schreck had reportedly gone running prior to his vanishing. Details on the search come from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which reports the furious two-day effort commenced the morning after Schreck's wife called police to report her husband's failure to return from his Friday-morning jog. For the duration of the rainy weekend, more than 100 searchers scoured 11 square miles of the park on foot and horseback and with dogs, while the King County sheriff's helicopter scanned from the sky; the search was called off Sunday evening around 9:00 p.m. "On Sunday night, we knew [Michael Schreck] wasn't on Cougar Mountain," said King County sheriff's Sergeant John Urquhart to the P-I. "What we didn't know was (a) where he was and (b) what he was doing." Tonight King County police and the world at large got something of an answer as Schreck showed up alive and well at his family's Issaquah home with a truly remarkable story, conveyed to the media by a two-paragraph typed statement. Short story shorter: After slipping off a trail into a ravine Friday, Schreck was knocked unconscious until Monday morning, when he came to and began making his way back home. When deputies interviewed the returned Schreck, he appeared in perfect health. "No injuries, no bumps or bruises," said Sergeant Urquhart. "He said he fell into a ravine and he's been unconscious since then. We're going to take his story at face value." Not everyone's being so gracious, and Schreck's tale continues to be assailed by flabbergasted citizens. Among the key unanswered questions (the Schrecks have remained suspiciously mum since Michael's miraculous return): What kind of fall knocks someone unconscious for three fucking days but leaves no visible bumps, scrapes, or bruises? How did Schreck manage to fend off hypothermia by covering himself with leaves and branches if he was unconscious? And after emerging from the ravine and beginning his nine-mile trek home, why didn't he stop for help at the nearby Lakemont Fire Station? So far, no answers, and police aren't insisting on an investigation. Still, stay tuned.

TUESDAY, MAY 22 We continue with the one-week anniversary of the death of Jerry Falwell, commemorated today in Lynchburg, Virginia, with a hoopla-ridden funeral for the dead Bible molester and the arrest of a first-year student at Falwell's Liberty University for allegedly plotting to bomb the proceedings. Details come from ABC News, which reports the alleged bomb plotter—19-year-old Mark David Uhl of Amissville, Virginia—told authorities he'd brought his homemade bombs to stop protesters from disrupting Falwell's funeral. Tragically, the headlining protesters were from none other than Fred "God Hates Fags" Phelps's Westboro Baptist Church, and the blessed foiling of the bomb plot turned what could have been a historic explosion of bigot-on-bigot violence into a basic cautionary tale about the threat of Christian terrorists. Uhl remains held without bond in the Campbell County Adult Detention Center on suspicion of manufacturing explosive devices.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 23 If cable television has taught us anything, it's that Japan is freaky. This meaningless cultural assumption was confirmed today by this impressive sighting sent in by Hot Tipper Tim in Tokyo. "Hot Tipper Nick's recent sighting of a compulsive shaver on a Tokyo train has nothing on what my wife and I saw in Shibuya Station this week," writes Hot Tipper Tim. "Tokyo has a relatively invisible homeless population—most of them have carefully constructed blue tarp tents under bridges, but some sleep in the train stations, and many of them have hygiene standards that suggest mental illness. There was no question about the old man we saw sitting in the middle of the hallway, his shoes off, stretching out his toes...." From here, Hot Tipper Tim describes what he and his wife saw, in language that, inadvertently or not, fits perfectly into the pattern of haiku:

His toes were moldy

Really really moldy. Black.

Like mushroom moldy

Thank you, Tim, and thank you, Japan.

THURSDAY, MAY 24 The week continues with a much more disturbing sighting by Hot Tipper Mark in the Market, who was enjoying a gorgeous waterfront morning of bloody marys and grub at Lowell's when he saw an old man in a wheelchair roll himself out on the pedestrian sky bridge connecting the market to a parking garage. "Then he hoists himself up and does a face-plant five stories down," reports Hot Tipper Matt. "Every tourist in the joint got to watch CSI unfold as chest-pumping attempts failed to revive said jumper." Matt's right: A call to a somber yet friendly fellow at the medical examiner's office confirmed the death-by-plunging, which was officially attributed to "skull, rib, and pelvic fractures, with lacerations of the brain and aorta due to blunt force injury of the head and torso," and ruled a suicide. R.I.P., elderly jumper, and thanks for surviving and sharing, Matt.

FRIDAY, MAY 25 "Is it bad that I think of you whenever a stranger grosses me out?" asks Hot Tipper Katie. "Anyway, recently I was alone on a flight from Denver to PDX with my 11-month-old son asleep on my lap, which restricted my in-flight entertainment to whatever I could accomplish without the use of my arms. I alternated between glimpses of the sex positions the woman in front of me was reading about in Cosmo and the teenage girl across the aisle using the back of her video iPod as a mirror while popping the zits on her face for the good part of an hour. I love coach."

SATURDAY, MAY 26 Last week, Last Days shared Hot Tipper Todd's sighting of the Chrome Sheriff—aka the Beekeeper, aka the Duct-Tape Guy—urging readers to share any info they may have about the beguiling duct-tape-encased street dweller. Responses have been coming in steadily, from history briefs ("From 1998 to 2000, he wore a sandwich board with Spanish writing on it and road-race bibs like the kind marathon runners wear") to notes of commiseration ("Thanks for letting me know I haven't been hallucinating this guy") to touching remembrances ("I was entering Scarecrow Video and he gracefully held the door open for me—with his face mask, flowing trench coat, and good manners, he seemed to embody noble chivalry in an increasingly self-absorbed and dehumanizing world"). Thanks to all who've weighed in; send further input to lastdays@thestranger.com.

SUNDAY, MAY 27 Nothing happened today, unless you count Sasquatch! or Folklife or SIFF, which you should. Nevertheless, we're out of room.

Send Hot Tips to lastdays@thestranger.com.