Broadcaster fined over killing a rat on TV show (Reuters)
Reuters - British broadcaster ITV pleaded guilty to animal cruelty and was fined by an Australian court on Monday after a rat was killed and eaten on the reality TV show "I'm a Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here."
A tough act to swallow (Reuters)
Reuters - An Australian performance artist set a new Guinness World Record on Monday by simultaneously swallowing 18 swords, each nearly as long as two and a half rulers.
No dressing down for banker in TV supermodel email blunder (Reuters)
Reuters - An Australian banker who became an internet sensation after he was caught on live television viewing images of a scantily clad supermodel on his computer will keep his job, Macquarie Bank said Friday.
Critics trash McDonald's nationalist food bid (Reuters)
Reuters - Fast food chain McDonald's has teamed up with the Italian government to cook up a hamburger with a national twist, but the unusual initiative is giving some food lovers cultural indigestion.
Ancient dialect extinct after last speaker dies (Reuters)
Reuters - One of the world's oldest dialects, which traces its origins to tens of thousands of years ago, has become extinct after the last person to speak it died on a remote Indian island.
Reuters - A Chinese woman is seeking extensive plastic surgery to look like U.S. actress Jessica Alba, mainly because she hopes to win back her boyfriend who she said always wished she looked more like the Hollywood star.
Banker red-faced over racy photo (Reuters)
Reuters - A red-faced banker has been caught looking at racy near-nude photographs on his computer, with his actions broadcast live on Australian television.
Drunk driver had 49 children in 16-seat taxi (Reuters)
Reuters - A South African minibus taxi driver five times over the legal blood alcohol limit at breakfast time was arrested on Wednesday for transporting 49 children in a 16-seat vehicle.
Teenager fights off shark with board (Reuters)
Reuters - A 14-year old New Zealand girl has been praised for fighting off a shark with her boogie board after it had bitten her. The shark bit Lydia Ward on the hip as she was standing in waist-deep water on a beach near the southern New Zealand city of Invercargill on Monday, the Southland Times newspaper reported.
Reuters - Would the Black Eyed Peas persuade you to shop at Target or Eric Clapton lure you to switch to T-Mobile?
Bestiality ban to cut video source (Reuters)
Reuters - The Internet potentially will lose one of its main sources of bestiality videos under a ban approved Tuesday by the upper house of the Dutch parliament.
Reuters - When doctors and staff realized that a cat living in a U.S. nursing home could sense when someone was going to die, the feline, Oscar, was portrayed as a furry grim reaper or four-legged angel of death.
Reuters - The UK government launched plans on Monday to halve the number of smokers by the end of the decade and said it would consider removing branding from cigarette packets and banning cigarette vending machines.
Tribe brings back dead with "clothing" ritual (Reuters)
Reuters - Members of the Hanunuo Mangyan tribe in the Philippines do not leave their dead in the grave for long, digging up the remains of loved ones in an unusual revival ritual that itself is slowly dying out.
China sees sexual frustration causing social problems (Reuters)
Reuters - Sexual frustration amongst migrant workers in China's booming southern province of Guangdong is leading to a host of social problems and must be tackled, state media on Saturday cited a local official as saying.
Priest checks fingerprints for mass attendance (Reuters)
Reuters - A Polish priest has installed an electronic reader in his church for schoolchildren to leave their fingerprints in order to monitor their attendance at mass, the Gazeta Wyborcza daily said on Friday.
Reuters - Elizabethan theater-goers chomped on an exotic array of foods while enjoying the latest plays of the day, new evidence found at the sites of Shakespearean playhouses in London suggests.
