A Watusi bull named Howdy Doody sits in the passenger seat of a car owned by Lee Meyer on Wednesday, Aug. 30, 2023, in Norfolk, Neb. The car that Meyer has been driving in parades across the area for years has half the windshield and roof removed to make room for his bull to ride along.

NORFOLK, Neb. — A car driving with a bull in it was pulled over by police in northeast Nebraska’s biggest city.

Don’t worry, he didn’t steer.

Norfolk Police Capt. Chad Reiman said it didn’t take long for officers to track down the modified Ford Crown Victoria sedan with a bull riding shotgun after a 911 call about it driving on the main highway entering the city of roughly 24,000 Wednesday, Aug. 30.

“We didn’t have a full understanding of it until we saw it,” Reiman said.

The car that Lee Meyer has driven in parades across the area for years has half the windshield and roof removed to make room for his bull, named Howdy Doody, to ride along. A yellow metal cattle gate serves as the passenger side door — allowing for the Watusi bull to be tied up — and a set of longhorns serves as a hood ornament.

“It wouldn’t go far without being noticed for sure,” Reiman said.

A video of the traffic stop shot by News Channel Nebraska spread quickly online.

A sign on the side of Meyer’s car from a parade in Burwell late last month declared that Howdy Doody’s eye-catching ride was judged the Best Car Entry in Nebraska’s Big Rodeo Parade.

Reiman said Meyer told him that when he went to that parade, he drove Howdy Doody in a proper trailer, so it wasn’t clear why he decided to load the bull into his car Aug. 30 and drive the 36 miles from his home in Neligh to Norfolk.

Reiman said Meyer wasn’t headed to a parade Aug. 30. Meyer didn’t answer his home phone Thursday morning so he couldn’t be reached immediately for an explanation.

But his wife, Rhonda, told the Norfolk radio station that shot video of the traffic stop that Howdy Doody has been Meyer’s “friend and buddy” ever since he got him eight or nine years ago.

Videos of Lee Meyer driving Howdy Doody around can readily be found online from 2017 and 2019.

Rhonda Meyer told US92 that “Lee thinks he’s a movie star” after the video of his traffic stop went viral, but that he’s also a little shy.

Meyer said Howdy Doody is like a member of the family now, but she wasn’t always wild about how much her husband spent on the bull over the years.

“The amount of money that he’s spent on this whole darn project between the car and the bull I could’ve had a brand new kitchen,” Rhonda Meyer said.

Reiman said there were clearly some traffic violations related to Meyer’s car, but the officer let him off with a warning as long as he turned around and took Howdy Doody home.

“We’ve never dealt with anything quite like that before,” Reiman said.

Burning Man flooding strands tens of thousands at Nevada site; authorities are investigating 1 death

RENO, Nev. — Tens of thousands of people gathered for the Burning Man festival remained stranded in the Nevada desert on Sunday, Sept. 3, after storms that swept through the area, as authorities investigated a possible death and worked to open exit paths by the end of the Labor Day weekend.

Organizers closed vehicular access to the counterculture festival and attendees trudged through mud, many barefoot or wearing plastic bags on their feet. The revelers were urged to shelter in place and conserve food, water and other supplies.

The Pershing County Sheriff’s Office said a death happened during the event but offered few details as the investigation continued, including the identity of the deceased person or the suspected cause of death, KNSD-TV reported.

On their website, organizers encouraged participants to remain calm and suggest that the festival is built to endure conditions like the flooding. They said cellphone trailers were being dropped in several locations Saturday night and that they would be briefly opening up internet overnight. Shuttle buses were also being organized to take attendees to Reno from the nearest town of Gerlach, a walk of about 5 miles from the site.

“Burning Man is a community of people who are prepared to support one another. We have come here knowing this is a place where we bring everything we need to survive,” the organizers said in a statement. “It is because of this that we are all well-prepared for a weather event like this.”

Celebrity DJ Diplo posted a video to Instagram on Sept. 2 showing him and comedian Chris Rock riding in the back of a fan’s pickup truck. He said they had walked 6 miles through the mud before hitching a ride.

“I legit walked the side of the road for hours with my thumb out,” wrote Diplo, whose real name is Thomas Wesley Pentz.

Vehicle gates will not open for the remainder of the event, which began on Aug. 27 and was scheduled to end Sept. 4, according to the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, which oversees the Black Rock Desert where the festival is being held.

More than one-half inch of rain is believed to have fallen on Sept. 1 at the festival site, located about 110 miles north of Reno, the National Weather Service in Reno said. At least another quarter of an inch of rain is expected Sept. 3.

The Reno Gazette Journal reported organizers started rationing ice sales and that all vehicle traffic at the sprawling festival grounds had been stopped, leaving portable toilets unable to be serviced.

Riders in various states of undress cruise Philadelphia streets in 14th naked bike ride

PHILADELPHIA — Hundreds of people in various states of dress — or undress — set out Saturday, Sept. 2, for a ride through some of Philadelphia’s main streets and sights for the 14th Philly Naked Bike Ride.

The annual ride, which started in 2009, is billed as promoting cycling as a key form of transportation and fuel-conscious consumption. It is also meant to encourage body positivity. Organizers stress, however, that participants aren’t required to ride completely in the buff, telling them to get “as bare as you dare.”

The course, roughly 13 miles this year, changes annually but generally passes city landmarks. This year, bikers went by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, site of the steps featured in the “Rocky” movies, the historic City Hall, tony Rittenhouse Square and the South Street entertainment area. The ride was to end at Independence Hall.

Garry J. Gadikian, from Atlantic City, New Jersey, speaking in Fairmount Park at a pre-race get-together, said the ride was something he had wanted to do for years.

“It’s a very freeing experience, and definitely something that you should do once in your life for that freedom,” he said before joining about 100 fellow participants who were having their bare flesh adorned with body paint and glitter.

Christopher Jordan, who works in information technology in New York City, also joined the ride for the first time. He said he thought it was “more than just about taking the clothes off.”

“It’s just feeling comfortable with your own body and it’s OK to look at other people too, compare or not compare or just see how other people feel comfortable in their own bodies,” Jordan said.

Organizers said the ride wasn’t limited only to bicycles. Scooters, e-bikes, rollerblades, skates, skateboards, and even joggers were also welcome, although motorized bikes and scooters were asked to watch their speed. Organizers also point to a code of conduct that bars any kind of physical or sexual harassment.

“Having a column of nude cyclists extending blocks behind, blocks through the city, and causing a decent amount of disruption, interrupting dinner hour” helps show how many cyclists the city has — telling drivers “they need to share the road,” said Wesley Noonan-Sessa, an event facilitator who regularly rides his bike in Philadelphia.

But, he said, he thinks the naked element also helps in “desexualizing nudity.”

The ride used to be held in September, often in temperatures around 70 degrees Fahrenheit, but enough of the naked riders mentioned feeling chilly that it was moved to August beginning a few years ago. The 2020 ride was called off because of the pandemic.