Boom!

Just as the Brazilians are trying to reach the 25-million mark in handing out condoms, and just as we're resurrecting our own sophomoric remarks about Maryland's Cucumber People, we learn that condoms actually can be used to cause explosions. All I can say is: "Ouch!" And: "Do the Brazilians realize the danger they're unleashing?" And: "What happens when Al Qaeda gets hold of some condoms?"

The Boston Globe reports:

A former waitress at a Brockton strip club who says she was tired of being mistreated by men allegedly mailed explosive packages to Bridgewater State College, strip clubs, a motorcycle gang, Fox 25, and KISS 108 radio station, according to court documents unsealed yesterday.

Kimberly Lynn Dasilva, 40, of Hull, who hosts sex toy parties and sells adult gift baskets from an Internet site, was arrested Friday night after FBI agents and State Police raided her home and found letters hidden in the ceiling tiles of her bedroom that allegedly linked her to the mailings last September.

Dasilva told the agents that she sent the packages, which contained condoms filled with Drano and gasoline, and that she didn't think they would explode, even though she had learned from the Internet that the items could cause an explosion when combined, according to an FBI affidavit filed in US District Court in Boston. None of the packages, which were sent last September, exploded.

The single mother of two teenagers told the agents she was always being hurt by men and she "couldn't take it anymore," the affidavit says.

To cause an explosion, apparently, you have to mix the Drano and gasoline, which she had packaged separately. Dasilva sent packages with filled condoms to Bridgewater State College's admissions office, as well as to "Alex's, a strip club in Stoughton; The Foxy Lady in Brockton; The Outlaws motorcycle club in Taunton; Fox 25 in Dedham; and KISS 108 radio station in Revere, to the attention of the popular disc jockey Matt Siegel." The plot was uncovered when the package sent to Bridgewater State College began to leak.

David Tillinghast, chief of police at Bridgewater State College, said fluid had leaked from the package and the admissions building was evacuated for several hours while the State Police Bomb Squad and Hazardous Material team was called in to investigate.

A note inside the package said, "Boom." State Police later determined that the material wasn't toxic. Still, Tillinghast said, the incident caused "quite a distraction right at the beginning of the school year."

Dasilva's most recent run-in with men was with a boyfriend of seven months, and the relationship apparently didn't work out. You know how that goes, right? Boy meets girl; boy mistreats girl; girl mails exploding condoms to innocent people.

Anyway, while the Globe couldn't reach the ex-boyfriend for comment, the Enterprise (South of Boston) managed to do so. The result is classic journalism:

Her ex-boyfriend described DaSilva as "very expensive" and that she "has a wild imagination and has imagined a variety of things which have never occurred," according to court papers.

The boyfriend, William Gauss who once lived in Hyde Park in Boston, "described DaSilva as paranoid," the affidavit noted.

What I say is: "Get this guy a job as a psychiatrist."

But leave the explosives work to the FBI:

An FBI bomb technician found that if the two substances were to combine and combust, the resulting gases if contained in an air-tight container "could result in a low-level explosion," according to the court papers.

Finally, if you think I'm immature for writing about this story, consider this: I got it via Howard Bashman, who wrote, "Safe-sex can be a blast."