Paperweight collector's hobby turns out to be disastrous
It is not what most would consider a dangerous hobby.
But a glass paperweight nearly cost one collector his life after it caught the sun's rays and set his home on fire.
Matthew Williams, who has collected paperweights for seven years, woke to find his flat burning around him.
He believes the blaze was caused by one of three paperweights he had placed on his bedroom windowsill. Mr Williams had bought the ornaments from a charity shop for £9.99.
He said: 'If I hadn't woke up when I did, the fire would have spread and I would have died. I would never have got past the fire.
'I used to have my paperweights sitting on the windowsill and dotted around the house but they're packed away now. I'm not taking any risks with them.
'They acted like a magnifying glass and projected the sun's rays on to a plastic bag, which then caught fire. It's unbelievable.
'Even after the fire had been put out. the paperweights were still 50c.'
Matthew is not the first person to discover the dangers of keeping a paperweight by the window - a YouTube video shows a paperweight magnifying heat onto a wooden sill, causing the wood to slowly begin to burn.
Firefighters recorded the cause of the blaze at Matthew's home as 'radiated heat' and warned that people should be aware of the threat of the suns rays reflecting through their glass ornaments.
Music wakes grandfather from coma
am Carter lost consciousness after contracting severe anaemia but was brought back to life when '(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction' was blared into his ears.
The anthem was the first single the retired baker from Stoke in Staffordshire ever bought, released in 1965 when he was just 17.
Despite only being given a 30 percent chance of survival, he woke from his coma after his wife Eva, 65, took the doctor's advice and played him his favourite tunes through a set of earphones.
After three days of listening to the local Stoke station Signal 2, his eyes opened as soon as he heard the sound of Mick Jagger's vocals and Keith Richards' guitar riff.
Sam said: “I can't remember much from being in a coma, but I do remember that when that song came on it took me right back to when I was a youngster.
“I could remember how excited I was to get it down at the record shop. “I suddenly had a burst of energy and knew I had a lot more life left in me and that's when I woke up - to the sound of the first song I ever bought.”
Grand theft auto sales halted
Distributors of Grand Theft Auto suspended sales in Thailand after a teenager allegedly killed a taxi driver in a bloody frenzy, re-enacting scenes from the blockbuster video game.
Police who caught the 18-year-old at the scene said he confessed to having planned the attack to find out if robbery was as easy as depicted in the violent game. Phalawat Chinno, who played the game obsessively for hours every day, bought two knives and chose his 54-year-old victim carefully as he believed he would be too old to fight back, police said. The secondary school student said the killing was a robbery that went wrong. The Thai distributors of Grand Theft Auto, which recently launched its fourth edition, has asked shops to withdraw copies from sale and video arcades to suspend the game.
Three years ago the families of two police officers and a police switchboard operator gunned down in the US filed a multi-million pound lawsuit in Alabama against the game's makers and distributors. The victims were shot by an 18-year-old who played the game constantly. Thai investigators said that Phalawat-who allegedly spent eight hours choosing the pair of knives for the attack-had confessed to being inspired by Grand Theft Auto, which allows players to adopt the role of an urban criminal and engage in often violent and destructive, and sometimes murderous, crime sprees.
Babies born 8/8/8 at 8.08; weigh 8 pounds, 8 ounces
Meet Hailey Jo Hauer and Xander Jace Riniker, both born at 8.08 am on 8/8/08, weighing 8 pounds, 8 ounces, in neighbouring states.
Xander, born at St Luke's Hospital in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, is the eighth grandchild for his mother's parents. And he's not the only one in his family with an unusual birthday: His two-year-old brother, Kael, was born on 4/5/06.
Lindsey Hauer thought staff at Lake Region Hospital in Minnesota were joking when they told her the time of her daughter's birth. And then she got a call from the birthing suite noting Hailey's weight.
Barbadians slam discovery, naming of tiny snake
SAN JUAN (Puerto Rico): A small snake has sparked a big debate in Barbados.
Residents of the wealthy Caribbean nation have been heating up blogs and clogging radio airwaves to vent their anger at a US scientist, who earlier this week announced his “discovery” of the world's smallest snake and named it “Leptotyphlops carlae”, after his wife Carla.
“If he needs to blow his own trumpet ... well, fine,” said 43-year-old Barbadian Charles Atkins. “But my mother, who was a simple housewife, she showed me the snake when I was a child.”
One writer to the Barbados Free Press blog took an even tougher tone, questioning how someone could “discover” a snake long known to locals, who called it the thread snake.
“How dare this man come in here and name a snake after his wife?” said the writer who identified themselves as Margaret Knight.
The man she refers to is Penn State University evolutionary biologist S. Blair Hedges, whose research teams also have discovered the world's tiniest lizard in the Dominican Republic and the smallest frog in Cuba.
Hedges said on Friday that he understands Barbadians' angry reactions, but under established scientific practice, the first person to do a full description of a species is said to have discovered it and gives it a scientific name.
No haircut for 50 years
The pensioner hasn't had a trim for more then fifty years. In fact, the last time she had her hair cut was 1953 when she was photographed beside the Lily of the Valley her father was helping to grow especially for the Queen's wedding bouquet.
When she saw the picture, she hated it so much she vowed never to cut it again. And she has stuck to her word despite having to spend two-and-a-half hours to comb her hair, 45 minutes to wash it and 24 hours for it to drip dry.
German woman spends decade in Palma's airport
More than 20 million travellers pass through Palma de Mallorca's airport each year and at first glance Bettina could be just another tourist waiting for a flight home. But she never checks in.
The 48-year-old German has been living at the airport - known as Son Sant Joan - for 10 years, pushing her three suitcases, a blanket, a pile of books and her white cat, Mumu, around with her. Referred to in the airport simply as "the woman with the cat", Bettina has become as much a part of the airport as the planes and runways.
Her story recalls the Tom Hanks film The Terminal, which was reportedly inspired by the story of man who lived at Charles de Gaulle airport near Paris for 18 years after his documents were stolen.
Bettina, who refuses to disclose her full name, is from a small town in southern Germany. She arrived in Mallorca more than 10 years ago for a new start after a relationship ended and she lost her office job. She landed odd jobs working as a waitress then helping in a kitchen, but the dream of living in the sun turned sour. "Suddenly there was no work because they only give jobs to Spaniards," she told the local newspaper. "I wanted to work in Mallorca but I got stranded here."
With no job, home or money, she began living in the airport, where she gets by on the kindness of friends or strangers. "One friend brings me something to eat twice a week. Sometimes people give me a bit of money as well, but I don't ask anyone for anything."
Amid the bustle of the airport, Bettina is often seen quietly reading, dressed smartly in jeans and a sweatshirt. She cleans herself and her clothes in the toilets, while departure lounge seats serve as beds. But she has no desire to return to Germany. "No way. Life is better for me here."n
