A dog has been found abandoned at a railway station along with a suitcase filled with his belongings.
The Scottish SPCA is keen to trace the owner of shar pei-crossbreed Kai, who was discovered tied to a railing outside Ayr station on Friday.
He was accompanied by a case containing items including a pillow, toy, food and bowl.
£3 million lottery . . . it could be you
A search is on to find a mystery ticket-holder who has not yet claimed their lottery winnings of more than £3 million.
The Lotto prize of £3,062,272 belongs to a ticket bought in the Stirling Council area for a draw last month.
The winner matched five numbers and the bonus ball in the quadruple rollover draw on Wednesday December 17. The winning numbers on that date were 2, 19, 24, 33, 35, 46 and the bonus ball was 12.
Protection for the Cornish pasty
Cherished delicacies such as the Cornish pasty will not fall victim to international imposters, after fears a pact between Europe and America could threaten the product were allayed.
A selection of products currently benefit from geographical indications, a distinctive sign used to identify it as originating from a certain place. The list includes the Cornish pasty, Roquefort cheese and Parma ham.
Traffic police pull mass sickie
Were hundreds of Roman traffic police who called in sick on New Year’s Eve playing truant? Inspectors have been dispatched to find out.
Nearly 85 per cent of some 900 traffic officers scheduled to work did not turn up as revellers jammed streets and 130,000 flocked to a free outdoor concert. Most cited illness, while about 10 per cent claimed they were donating blood. Public works ministry inspectors have begun checking them for doctor’s certificates.
Mayor Ignazio Marino claims the stay-at-homes were protesting against his new policy to give raises only to harder workers. The new year’s ill humour may have been contagious: Naples rubbish collectors and Bari bus drivers also called in sick in droves on New Year’s Eve. They are also under investigation.
Lightning strikes for celebrity cobra
A white monocled cobra which briefly became a national celebrity after it roamed a Southern California neighbourhood for several days last September now has a new name.
San Diego Zoo told the Los Angeles Times that the cobra will be called Adhira, which in Hindi means lightning.The newspaper said Adhira came in first in an online poll to find a name for the venomous snake which was captured in Thousand Oaks and, after a period of quarantine, joined the zoo’s reptile house.
Adhira received 4,612 votes, beating Sapheda (white), Krima (cream), Cini (sugar), Moti (pearl) and Sundara (beautiful). Selected by the cobra’s keepers, the names were meant to reflect the South East Asia region where cobras are native.
New flight route is plane daft
A new flight between the capitals of Austria and Slovakia may be the world’s shortest with less than 20 minutes in the air. But considering the ride to the airport and check-in time, it may be faster to take the bus.
The Vienna-Bratislava flight by Air Berlin subsidiary Niki launches on April 1 and will cover less than 50 kilometres (30 miles). State broadcaster ORF called it the shortest commercial route in the world.
But it is a 15-minute drive to the airport from central Bratislava, and 20 minutes from Vienna. That and early arrival for check-in mean the intercity bus trip of about an hour should be quicker – and definitely a lot cheaper. Niki officials say the flights make sense for those taking connecting flights from Vienna.