‘Suspicious powder’ scare in Washington blamed on crows
EDMONDS, Washington: A fire spokeswoman says blame the crows for a “suspicious powder” scare at Washington state intersection that detoured traffic for more than an hour. Snohomish County Fire District 1 spokeswoman Leslie Hynes tells The Daily Herald that a hazardous materials team responded Tuesday to a report about an unknown white powder in the roadway in the town of Edmonds. A witness finally told the crew that a couple of crows were to blame. Hynes says a woman was going jogging when she noticed the birds dragging a bag of white flour. Hynes says the woman took the bag away from the birds, put it in a garbage can and kept running. It took firefighters about an hour to clear the scene. Says Hynes: “Two crows and a two-alarm hazmat incident.”
US man’s ‘confession’ obituary goes viral
LOS ANGELES: A US man’s self-written obituary, in which he reminisces about the good times — and makes a few confessions, including never having earned the Ph.D. he claimed in life — has gone viral. Val Patterson, who died of throat cancer last week, professed his abiding love for his wife and remembered the joy of being young in Utah. But he also admitted to some things he shouldn’t have done. “As it turns out, I am the guy who stole the safe from the Motor View Drive Inn back in June, 1971. I could have left that unsaid, but I wanted to get it off my chest,” he said in the obituary in the Salt Lake Tribune. “Also, I really am not a Ph.D. What happened was that the day I went to pay off my college student loan... the girl working there put my receipt into the wrong stack, and two weeks later a Ph.D. diploma came in the mail.
Kitten survives 6,500-mile trip in China-US container
LOS ANGELES: A three-month-old kitten is recovering in California after surviving a journey across the Pacific in a shipping container from China, without food or water, officials said Tuesday. The orange-and-white animal has been named Ni Hao, or Hello in Mandarin, after being found when the container was opened last week, following the two-week, 10,450-kilometer trip from Shanghai. At first he was too weak to stand, but the shorthaired kitten is finally taking its first steps — and officials are now seeking a local cat-lover to adopt him. “Ni Hao greeted the medical team with his first meows this morning and is attempting to stand,” said Marcia Mayeda, head of the Los Angeles Department of Animal Care and Control. In theory he has to remain in quarantine for 60 days, but he “may be allowed to finish the quarantine period under the care and supervision of a foster family if his health continues to improve,” said Mayeda. It was not immediately clear how the kitten got into the container.
George Michael ‘woke from coma with different accent’
LONDON: British singer George Michael has revealed that he woke from his three-week coma talking in the broad West Country accent spoken in western England. London-born Michael, who almost died of pneumonia at the end of last year, said he was unable to revert to his usual accent for two days after gaining consciousness and his family feared he would be stuck with the new one forever. “I swear this is true,” the 49-year-old told London’s LBC radio station on Tuesday. “I came out of my coma talking in this West Country accent.” Michael said that as he opened his eyes, doctors asked him if he knew who he was — to which he replied, “King of the world?” in the distinctive West Country burr. “The doctors were worried that I had this condition where some people wake up speaking French or some language they learned at school,” he said.
n Compiled from agencies
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