A magician down on his luck has offered to sell his tricks in the streets of the Bulgarian town of Pleven. Gaggi, wearing a worn magician's costume and top hat, raised 200 levs (€100) by revealing the secrets of several tricks.
However, he failed to attract a buyer for the details of an illusion by the American magician David Copperfield, which he claimed he knew.
Meanwhile more than 800 people applied for a job as janitor at Edison Junior High School near Massillon, Ohio.
Barry Mason, director of business operations for the local schools, told a local TV station: "it struck me that a number of folks were in their late 40s, to even 50s and 60s that were coming in and applying for this position."
The job pays $15.37 (€12) an hour, with benefits, in a county where unemployment is over 10 per cent. (Reuters)
Sleepy drivers revived with chilli
Police in China are spicing up drivers with raw chilli in a bid to stop them falling asleep at the wheel, a newspaper said yesterday.
Police in the Chongqing region have started serving drivers chilli peppers at highway service stations, holding to the traditional Chinese belief that people often feel more sleepy in spring, the Chongqing Evening News said.
"It's really good to have some hot peppers when you are tired from driving," van driver Chen Jun was quoted by the newspaper as saying. "They make you alert."
China's roads have long been among the most dangerous in the world due to overloaded and speeding trucks and drivers who switch lanes without signalling and often ignore traffic lights. (Reuters)
Somali couples share wedding
Twenty-one couples have shared a joint wedding in Somalia, where the traditional lavish celebrations are increasingly unaffordable at a time of economic slump.
The function was held on Tuesday at a hotel in Hargeisa, capital of Somalia's breakaway region of Somaliland, and was arranged by Telsom, a telecoms company that employs all the bridegrooms.
The Horn of Africa region is staunchly Muslim, so the men and women celebrated separately.
The expense of a traditional wedding, especially when economic times are hard, is driving some young Somalis to leave their homeland.
"One of the reasons why the youth migrate is weddings are expensive, and I appeal to the community to simplify marriage by reducing the cost," Sheikh Mohamed Sheikh Omar Dirir, one of the area's most prominent religious leaders, told guests. (Reuters)
The 'curse' of Colonel Sanders
Japanese baseball fans in Osaka hope to have lifted "the curse of Colonel Sanders" when a statue of the Kentucky Fried Chicken founder rose from the sludge of a local river after a quarter century.
When the city's Hanshin Tigers won the national championship in 1985, ecstatic fans hurled the fast food icon into a river to honour their team's bearded US slugger and home run king Randy Bass, saying he resembled the Colonel. However, since that crazy night the team's fortunes have sunk as fast as the life-sized statue. The Tigers never won another national championship, in a streak of ill fortune that has become known as "the curse of Colonel Sanders".
Local fans now hope all that will change after construction workers recovered the statue - minus his glasses, but just in time for the start of the baseball season next month. The discovery was celebrated in national headlines and television news bulletins. (AFP)
'Bad bankers must ask God's pardon'
Unscrupulous bankers responsible for unleashing the global financial crisis should ask for forgiveness from God, a leading US cardinal said yesterday.
"The economic crisis is rooted in the lack of respect, on the part of the leadership of the world, towards other people," Cardinal James Francis Stafford told Vatican Radio.
"Bankers should assume moral responsibility and ask God for forgiveness for these complex sins," said Stafford, former archbishop of Denver and one of the highest-ranking Americans in the Vatican. (Reuters)
No 'Put in', no Eurovision
Georgia said yesterday it was pulling out of the Eurovision Song Contest in Moscow this May because organisers have banned their song - which takes a swipe at Russia's ex-president and current Prime Minister.
Georgians have vilified Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin since last year when Georgia and Russia fought a five day war against Russia over the pro-Moscow rebel region of South Ossetia.
"Our song... does not contain political statements and the public broadcaster is not going to change the text of the song and refuses to go to competition in Moscow," the head of production at Georgia's state broadcaster, First Channel, George Chanturia, told a news briefing. (Reuters)