THE MAGPIE:An American man has been arrested after shooting his lawnmower because it would not start.
56-year-old Keith Walendowski from Milwaukee, Wisconsin was arrested and charged with possession of a short-barrelled shotgun or rifle and disorderly conduct. Walendowski could face a fine of up to £5,500 and six years and three months in prison, if convicted.
A local retailer said the gunshot damage could affect the warranty on the lawnmower. "Anything not factory recommended would void the warranty," Dick Wagner of Wagner's Garden Mart told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
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A German family has bought a tank to use for shopping and day trips. Joachim Schoeneich from Neu Anspach bought the six-tonne British-built Fox tank with a disabled 30mm gun and three-inch thick armour for €30,000.
"We take the tank to go shopping and little trips," Schoeneich told reporters. "It is a bit hard to find a parking place, but we get right of way at every junction."
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An 80-year-old former British Olympic hurdler has been banned from running the wrong way up escalators in an English department store.
Peter Hildreth represented Britain in the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki and again in Melbourne in 1956 and Rome in 1960. His best performance was reaching the semi-finals in Helsinki.
As part of his Olympic training in the 1950s he used to run up the escalator on the London Underground. "I started doing it last month because I was turning 80. People did not see me do it to start with, I must have done it three or four times. But at the top of the escalator in Elphicks [in Farnham, Surrey] is the women's underwear department and the woman who runs it told me to stop because it was dangerous."
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Truckers have crashed into Amanda Sandland's cottage in Bodfari in north Wales 15 times because her narrow country lane shows up on many satellite navigation systems as a handy shortcut.
The trucks have caused considerable damage. Sometimes the truckers have driven off, leaving her to foot the bill. Her 18-year-old daughter Jemma moved out after the latest incident when a truck came within feet of her bedroom.
"It is very stressful, very traumatic," Sandland said. "The point of impact was so close to my daughter's bedroom that she is understandably terrified."
New statistics show that more than a third of sat-nav users in the UK have been directed along a hazardous country road.
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Former pest exterminator Theo Rosmulder owes his life to bugs after turning to them for food while spending four days lost in the Western Australian outback without any food, water, matches or global positioning equipment.
52-year-old Rosmulder, a gold prospector, managed to survive by eating termites and other insects before local aborigines happened upon him.
The insects and termites had provided him with a small amount of protein and moisture.