Foxy??

Urban fox spotted trying to break into upstairs window

A homeowner was stunned when he spotted this urban fox trying to break into his neighbour's house - through an upstairs window.

A wily urban fox was spotted trying to break into a house in south London.
The crafty animal was spotted clawing at the frame of a bathroom window at a terraced house in East Sheen.
Local resident Paul Aynsley snapped the fox as it stood on the roof of his neighbour's extension.
Retired Mr Aynsley, 61, said: "We have a lot of foxes round here, but I was surprised to see one on the roof - I didn't know foxes climbed.
"It was like it was trying to break in or stare through the bathroom window."
The fox was snapped around 9am on Thursday morning close to opera superstar Katherine Jenkins' £6m home.
Paul added: "The fox went round the corner and then disappeared. I don't know how the hell it got up there in the first place.
"It really is strange."
Complaints of urban foxes invading gardens have been growing as they lose their fear of humans, pest controllers have warned.
New fortnightly bin collections, leaving rubbish bags piling near houses, are being blamed for helping bring the once-shy creatures closer to people's homes in search of food.
Pest control companies warned that call-outs from members of the public to deal with foxes had surged in recent years.
In 2012 feral foxes attacked two twin baby girls who were mauled in their cot at their home in Hackney, east London.
Britain’s urban fox population is widely estimated to be about 30,000 but some experts believe it could be as high as 50,000.
At present local authorities have no legal requirement to control urban foxes even when residents complain.

An Intelligent Geordie??

Sunderland is UK's 'brainiest city'

A survey of intelligence has found that Sunderland is the UK's 'brainiest city'.

Quizfactor.com, the UK's largest quiz site, undertook the research by asking residents of each city 30 questions from a variety of categories. They included: Sport, Art & Literature and History & Politics.

Questions included 'How many points are scored for a converted try in Rugby Union?', 'What is the smallest planet in the solar system?' and 'What is the collective noun for a group of emus?'.

The results found that the cleverest city was Sunderland, who got 71% of answers correct. Exeter and Preston secured second and third place respectively with 68% and 65%.

However, residents of Norwich only scored 35%, meaning they came at the bottom of the table. Peterborough and Edinburgh completed the bottom three with 43% each.

Rick Eastman, marketing director of Quizfactor.com, said: "This was the definitive general intelligence test for the UK; Sunderland did very well to come out on top."

The survey also proved that hair colour has no reflection on intelligence. Blonde, black and red-haired people all scored 54% whilst brunette and grey-haired scored 53%.

Over 5,000 UK residents from 30 cities took part in the survey.

Caveman On The Loose!

'Naked caveman' accused of terrorising Texan mountain walkers

A 'naked caveman' has been accused of terrorising a small Texan community amid reports he chased a group of hikers away from his mountainside home in the nude.

Residents living near McKelligon Canyon in El Paso say they live in fear of the mysterious man who claims to have been lodging in a remote cave on the mountain for the past three years.
One local told KVIA they 'didn't feel safe' around the bearded occupant, while another claims to have regularly seen him bathing in the laundry room of an apartment complex at the foot of the canyon.
Last week, a group of mountain walkers who stumbled across the shelter claim a naked man sprang from the cave and chased them down the mountainside.
The man has denied the accusations however, claiming 'busy bodies' made up the stories about him running around naked.
'If that's true, where's the pictures?' he told KVIA. 'If that's true, what tattoos does he have? What is he built like? It's stupidity.'
He claims he is not the only resident on the mountain, saying: 'People come out here to barbecue; people come up here to sleep and camp out.'
The cave dweller supports himself by donating blood plasma and through gifts from the public.
Local authorities have said they would investigate the claims to see if his mountainside home is legal.

All In A Name??

Man named Thomas Cook gets free holiday

A man who shares the same name with travel agency Thomas Cook has received a free holiday to France.

However, it wasn't Thomas Cook who provided the trip to Paris but a competitor.

Cook initially posted on Thomas Cook's Facebook, saying: "Seeing as I share the exact same name as your huge company, and because of this I have been ridiculed for as long as I can remember, I think it's only fair that you help compensate for this by giving me one of your lovely holidays.

"A weekend to Paris would do just fine."

The Thomas Cook agency - despite being encouraged by other Facebook users - declined.

Instead, competitors lowcostholidays.com emailed Cook and offered him the holiday.

They told Cook: "Here at lowcostholidays.com, we completely sympathise with your suffering and if your name was 'lowcostholidays.com', we would certainly have accepted your request to be sent away on a weekend in Paris.

"So how about we send you on that weekend in Paris?"

Cook accepted the offer.

Unlucky For Some??

David and Joanne are the unluckiest names

Research has found that David and Joanne are the unluckiest names in the UK and that people with those monikers are most likely to suffer personal injury.
So according to case data released by a UK-based firm of personal injury solicitors anyone named David or Joanne should take extra care when leaving the house in the morning.

The data, released by the team at Edwards Hoyle, aimed to discover trends amongst personal injury claims, and looked into the most common names, ages and occupations of personal injury claimants they’ve dealt with over the past two years.

A spokesperson for Edwards Hoyle said: "We thought we’d take a look at who is most likely to claim based on names and years of birth. David and Joanne topped our charts as the most likely names to suffer some form of personal injury."

And it's extra bad news if you are a Fishermen called David … that's the unluckiest profession.

The most common names of male victims of personal injury:
1) David
2) James
3) Stephen
4) Andrew
5) Chris

The most common names of female victims of personal injury:
1) Joanne
2) Emma
3) Clare
4) Karen
5) Lisa

The top 5 most risky professions
1) Fishermen
2) Farming
3) Oil/ Gas Workers
4) Construction
5) Lorry Driver

A Dead Loss??

Van Stolen with 12 Coffins, 12 Bodies Inside

The van was stolen when the driver went inside for a few minutes to wash his hands

German thieves picked up more than they bargained for in a heist just outside Berlin Sunday night when they stole three vans — one of which was loaded with 12 coffins, complete with corpses.

The cargo, en route to a crematorium in Meissen, Saxony, disappeared from an industrial parking lot while the van's driver was inside washing his hands, reported the German news website The Local.

"The driver did everything right," a company spokesman told German newspaper Die Welt, adding that he had even locked the van before walking away.

"We have not found the bodies yet," police spokesman Peter Salender told NBC News.

He added that one of the other vans had been recovered in Poland. A spokesman for the Frankfurt am Oder state prosecutor's office said the case fit the profile of a string of recent van thefts and that the vehicles were probably destined for eastern Europe, reported the French newspaper Le Figaro (link in French).

"The perpetrators were probably not intending to steal 12 bodies," another spokesman for the prosecutor's office said.

Naked….Cover-Up!!

Austrian museum forced to cover up naked posters

A museum in Austria has been forced to cover up hundreds of male genitalia on posters advertising an exhibition after complaints from outraged Viennese.

Residents of the Austrian capital took exception to the large full-frontal photograph of three French football players used to advertise an exhibition on the naked male form at the city's Wiener Leopold Museum.
The three players, wearing nothing but socks and boots, and with a football between their feet, had appeared on 250 billboards across the city.
Complaints flooded in, with some describing the posters as "pathetic" and "pornographic", and one angry local lady even threatening to paint over the offending parts unless action was taken. The museum reported that most of the complaints came from women.
"We don't want to disturb either children or adults, and if it's clearly something people don't want to see then we have to respect that," a museum spokesman told the newspaper Wiener Zeitung.
"But the men are clearly not sexually aroused so we thought it would not cause offence.
"Our aim wasn't to be provocative, and we regret causing any offence," he added.
Featuring French footballers of three different ethnic backgrounds, the picture had originally been used to champion multicultural France, but the Wiener Leopold Museum thought it would make an appropriate advertisement for its exhibition on naked men.
But the posters will soon sport a waste-high oblong of paint to cover the sources of Viennese discontent while any advertisements near schools will be removed.
Despite the furore surrounding the posters the museum said it would retain a massive sculpture of a reclining male nude entitled "Mr Big", which lies outside the museum. A spokesman for the Wiener Leopold said that so far Mr Big had attracted no complaints and instead "was being used much like a children's playground".

Take Your Time!

Man receives university diploma 40 years after enrolling

A German man has received his university diploma after spending nearly 40 years studying.

Werner Kahmann, from North Rhine-Westphalia, began his degree at the Cologne University of Applied Sciences in 1973 and graduated earlier this year. During his time at the institution, he took a total of 68 exams and had the potential to complete 63 semesters of tuition, reports local paper the Süddeutsche Zeitung.

Kahmann said that it took so long for him to complete his engineering diploma because he "de-matriculated and re-matriculated three times between then and now".

"If I had moved to Cologne I would have just got my studying done," said the 61-year-old, who instead decided to commute in from the nearby town of Siegburg, where his girlfriend, football club and bowling team were all based.

Kahmann first decided to put completing his diploma on hold after breaking his leg playing football. He suspended his studies for a second time in 1984 after the birth of his daughter and took time out to help raise her.

"Then in 2004 when student fees were introduced, I de-matriculated again," he explained.

In 2011, the German fee system changed and Kahmann returned to university once more. He completed his remaining units and earned his diploma a year later, even though the university no longer ran the course he had enrolled in.

"There are downsides to being a graduate though," he said, mentioning "paying for public transport and not getting reduced tickets for the zoo" among his biggest complaints.

Despite taking so long to graduate, Kahmann has managed to find work as a freelance engineer and draughtsman since 1978.

"My daughter told me recently that she, aged 27 and with a brilliant job, wants to go and study," he said. "I just told her that she should see it through to the end."

Hot Stuff??

Man cooking a squirrel starts apartment block fire?

Authorities in the US have said a blaze that spread through an apartment complex may have started due to a resident trying to cook a squirrel with a propane torch.

Fire Chief Jim Kohsel told Mlive.com that the resident, who has not been named, planned to eat the animal and was burning off its fur at the building in Ottawa Country when a fire broke out.

The fire was so severe that it spread to the roof of the Michigan complex, causing many people to lose their homes.

Fire Chief Kohsel said that eight apartments were destroyed and many others damaged.

No residents were hurt, but a firefighter broke his toe while trying to put out the blaze.

The American Red Cross has arranged temporary shelter and clothing for affected residents.