I didn't think anything could top the parents who left their pre-teens home alone while they went off to party in Vegas, but this story just might be the one to do it. According to the Chicago Tribune, Shannon Cook, a 25-year-old from the Chicago suburbs left her children who ranged in age from 9 months to 3 years all alone while she went off to watch a taping of the Jerry Springer show.

She has now been sentenced to 30 days in jail and lost custody of her kids, all for a crime in which she and her boyfriend left the kids in their apartment at about 3 p.m. and did not return until nearly 1 a.m. the following day. Cook told authorities she thought she would return earlier. But apparently the fighting between they gay strippers who told their 400-lb girlfriends who like to roll around naked in mud while taking their children to get DNA tests to prove the gay stripper WASN'T the father just went on and on and on and on.

Thanks to Hollyrhea in the Windy City for the tip.