Interesting & funny news from around the world, Интересные и забавные новости со всего мира

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Man wins $3 million lottery prize due to forgetting his lunch

A Missouri Lottery player won a $3 million jackpot from a ticket he only bought as a result of forgetting his lunch.

The man told Missouri Lottery officials his wife called him to tell him he had forgotten his lunch at home, so he stopped at the Schnucks grocery store on Vogel Road in Arnold to find something to eat.

The player said a $30 Millionaire Bucks scratch-off ticket caught his eye.

"I normally don't play the $30 tickets, but since I had $60 that I had won earlier on some other Scratchers tickets, I thought, 'Why not?'" the winner recalled.

The man scanned his ticket and discovered he was a $3 million top prize winner.

"I was completely surprised! I didn't think I had won," he said. "Then I saw all the zeros!"

The winner said he the first thing he did was call his wife back.

"I like to play jokes," he said. "It took a little convincing for her to believe me!"

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California man prepares pineapple in record-breaking time

A California man showed his love for his favorite fruit by breaking the Guinness World Record for the fastest time to peel and slice a pineapple.

Concord resident Rich Ellenson donned a pineapple-print shirt and matching shorts to take on the challenge, finishing with a time of 17.85 seconds.

Ellenson's time was just shy of 10 seconds faster than the previous record, which stood at 27.07 seconds.

"I love pineapple," Ellenson told Guinness World Records. "It's my favorite fruit. Every weekend I'll buy three and eat one a day in a single sitting."

Ellenson said his love of pineapples sometimes brings him discomfort.

"I have learned the hard way that pineapple contains bromelain, which is an enzyme that tenderizes meat. All of which means if you eat too much pineapple, your tongue will be tenderized. Ouch," he said.

Ellenson said it took him eight attempts to successfully break the record.

"Ironically pineapple No. 8 wasn't the tastiest and had a bruise on a small bit of its fruit, but I'm happy with it for sure," he said.

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Diver off the coast of Barbados finds ring lost in 1977

A man whose class ring from an Ontario university fell into the ocean in 1977 was reunited with the item on his 83rd birthday thanks to a diver's surprise discovery.

Alex Davis said he was diving with his metal detector near Miami Beach in Barbados in mid-October when he found a ring buried underwater.

The McMaster University ring bore the year 1965 and the initials "FMP," so Davis contacted the Hamilton school for help finding its owner.

Karen McQuigge, McMaster's director of alumni engagement, searched through the database with her team and identified the ring's likely owner as Morgan Perigo, who had graduated with a math degree in 1965.

McQuigge reached out to Perigo, who revealed he had lost his ring into the ocean during a family trip to Barbados in 1977.

"One day I took my younger son and waded into the ocean. He was knocked over by a wave, so I reached to grab hold of him. He pulled on my hand and my Mac Alumni ring came off," Perigo said in an email to the school. "We searched for it but were unsuccessful."

David sent the ring to its owner via FedEx and it arrived on the evening of Perigo's 83rd birthday.

"What a wonderful, unexpected 83rd birthday present," Perigo said.

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A library book that was 51 years overdue is finally back in its rightful place in the Worcester Public Library, all thanks to the keen eyes of a Boston resident.

Worcester Public Library's only copy of "The Early Work of Aubrey Beardsley" was discovered somewhere in Boston and brought to the Cambridge Public Library, who realized the book wasn't theirs, and contacted the library in Worcester.

Alex London, the genealogy and local history librarian with the Worcester Public Library, got the call.

"I was contacted by a librarian at the Cambridge Public Library," he said. "Someone had come into the library with the book and they were able to save it from essentially being thrown away."

"The book was borrowed in 1973, with a return date of May 22, 1973," London said, adding it's the longest overdue book he's seen returned during his employment with the library.

Most outstanding library books are lost in attics and basements, London said, and often found when someone is moving, someone dies or during a deep clean.

Published in 1899, the book was added to the library's collection that same year.

"It's a rarity that someone found this," he said. "but not only that they found it, but that it is in such good condition."

The book had been overdue for so long, it missed the modern digitization of the library, effectively removing the title from the library's catalog altogether.

The library in Worcester no longer charges overdue fines for books but will still send out reminders to those who do not return items.

"The WPL's mission is to make services and information available to everyone, and they believe that charging overdue fines goes against that mission," the library states on its website.

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Dangling fox rescued from wooden fence in Texas

Animal rescuers in Texas came to the assistance of a fox that apparently attempted to scale a wooden fence and ended up dangling by its caught leg.

The Austin Animal Center said on social media that animal protection officers responded to an address where a fox was found with its back leg stuck in a fence.

"Thankfully there was a table right there, so not all the weight was on its leg," the post said.

The animal center said the fox is currently at a wildlife rescue and will get a thorough examination from a veterinarian before being released back into the wild.

The center said members of the public did the right thing by not attempting to help the fox themselves, as a Texas state law mandates that any foxes that come into physical contact with unauthorized humans must be euthanized and tested for rabies.

"It's important to remember that foxes are a high-risk rabies species. For the health of yourself and the animal, please do not touch it," officials wrote.

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Rhode Island man amasses world's largest collection of energy drink cans

A Rhode Island man with a passion for caffeine earned a Guinness World Record for his collection of 1,019 energy drink cans.

Tiverton resident Joel Spears, aka CaffeineMan on YouTube, submitted evidence of collection to the record-keeping organization in January, and he announced this week that has finally received official confirmation that he possesses the world's largest collection of energy drink cans.

"I never thought I would have a Guinness World Record for anything," he told WJAR-TV. "The channel started being successful and I just kept collecting cans, and at one point, I said, 'I wonder how many I have.' Counted them all up and it ended up being a world record."

Spears, who started his YouTube channel to review energy drinks about six years ago, said applying for the record was a surprisingly involved process.

"I had to videotape the whole entire thing, I also had to take pictures of each and every can, and what was the time-consuming part was, I didn't know that they needed an itemized list of every single can, so that took me a long time to type up the itemized list," he said. "It was a long process but it was worthwhile."

Spears, who said he usually drinks one or two energy drinks each day, said his favorite is the Swedish Fish flavor of Ghost Energy Drink.

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Suspected tar balls on Sydney beaches actually poop-filled 'fatbergs'

Mysterious black balls that washed up on Sydney, Australia, beaches were initially suspected to be tar balls but turned out to be miniature "fatbergs" containing human feces.

The black balls were first spotted on Bondi Beach on Oct. 16, and similar balls were found on other city beaches in the ensuing days.

New South Wales environmental officials said they were initially suspected to be tar balls resulting from an unknown oil spill, but testing has now confirmed they contain cooking oil, soap scum, industrial chemicals, drug residue, hair and human feces.

Researchers said the balls are miniature "fatbergs," sewer-blocking accumulations of fat, grease and sewage.

"They smell absolutely disgusting, they smell worse than anything you've ever smelt," University of New South Wales Associate Professor Jon Beves, who led the investigation, told 9News.

He said the contents of the balls "pointed us to sewage and other sources of urban effluent" as their source.

Sydney Water said officials are not aware of any issues with the city's wastewater.

The New South Wales Environmental Protection Authority is continuing to investigate.

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Pet python missing for two months found at Chili's

A large ball python found slithering in the parking lot of a Chili's restaurant in North Carolina turned out to have been an escaped pet missing for two months.

The Shallotte Police Department said on social media that officers apprehended the slithering suspect outside of the local Chili's eatery.

"We believe this may have been someone's pet and got loose," police wrote.

The female snake was later returned to her owner, local resident Christen Schiel.

"That beautiful snake is my baby girl, Una," Schiel told WECT-TV. "She is the best snake anyone could ever have and I've been missing her deeply for the past two months."

Schiel said Una is now recovering from her time on the loose.

"She has rubs or burns on her which I'm gonna treat tonight with some iodine and Polysporin and she was very dehydrated," Schiel said. "I had to give her a little bath with electrolytes in it and she was just chugging water but other than that she's a happy girl."

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WWE fan breaks world record for entrance music expertise

A British YouTube star and professional wrestling superfan showed off his knowledge by breaking the Guinness World Record for the most WWE wrestlers identified by their entrance music in one minute.

Newcastle resident Ross Tweddell, who reviews wrestling shows for YouTube channel Cultaholic, told Guinness World Records it was a "dream come true" to put his expertise to the test and identify 20 wrestlers by their entrance music in one minute, beating the previous record by two.

"This job of mine, covering the world of wrestling all year round, means I have no choice but to be the most dedicated person in the world when it comes to all facets of the wrestling business." Tweddell told the record-keeping organization.

"The ability to identify wrestling themes quicker than any wrestling fan who has ever lived was solidified in my head as we made our way through the eras doing 'identify that wrestling theme after only one second of audio' quizzes on YouTube," he said.

He said the record is a source of immense personal pride.

"My record may not be impressive enough to be printed in the next edition, but at least I can now print off my certificate and stick it in the back [of the Guinness World Records book] with glue," he joked.

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A “very rare” 77-year-old slice of the cake served at Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip’s wedding sold for £2,200 ($2,800) this week, according to auction house Reeman Dansie.

The cake, which no longer looks edible, survived for almost eight decades since the wedding day on November 20, 1947.

It is still neatly packaged in a small box with the silver insignia of a then-Princess Elizabeth stamped on it and an elaborate doily inside.

This box kept the cake safe as it was sent from Buckingham Palace to Marion Polson, the housekeeper at Holyrood House in Edinburgh, Scotland, as a gift from the royal couple.

Alongside the cake, Polson received a letter from Elizabeth thanking her for “such a delightful wedding present.”

“We are both enchanted with the dessert service; the different flowers and the beautiful colouring will, I know, be greatly admired by all who see it,” read the typewritten letter, which is signed by Elizabeth.

“This is a present which we shall use constantly, and whenever we shall think of the kindness and good wishes for our happiness which it represents.”

Elizabeth and Philip’s wedding cake was an extravagant, nine-foot tall (2.7 meters) creation, which weighed 500 pounds.

It was decorated with both families’ coats of arms and sugar-iced figures of the couple’s favorite activities. It yielded 2,000 slices for guests, hundreds more that were sent to charities and other organizations, and one tier that was kept for a then Prince Charles’ christening.

A few of these slices have also survived the decades and been sold at auction, like one in 2013 that fetched £1,750 ($2,300), according to auction house Christie’s.

Meanwhile, cake served at Charles and Princess Diana’s wedding and then kept in plastic wrap in an old cake tin similarly sold for £1,850 (then $2,565) at an auction in 2021.

That 40-year-old cake slice featured a coat-of-arms colored in gold, red, blue and silver, a silver horseshoe and leaf spray, as well as some white decorative icing.

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