KEY POINTS:
Phone Fingers keep iPhone screens clean.
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A reader writes: "You might be intrigued by a segment of the sports component of the One News news on Saturday evening. The TVNZ reporter said of the influx of English fans for the World Cup final that 'people are saying it's the biggest English landing in France since Dunkirk'. At best, Dunkirk in 1940 marked a lucky exit by the British Armies from Continental Europe. Perhaps the reporter considers that the French win over the All Blacks was their biggest victory since Waterloo."
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A kidnapped Colombian dog held for ransom has been recovered after his abductors dropped him off at a veterinarian's office, saying he needed a bath. When no one came to pick up the German shepherd, the office contacted police, who identified the dog as Aldo de Fescol, snatched last month from his home in a rich Bogota neighbourhood while his owners were away. Not one cent of the US$350,000 ($470,875) ransom was paid, police said. Aldo was in healthy condition but two of his kidnappers were wounded in a shootout with police who ambushed them at a fake meeting staged to pay the extortion money. More than 3000 Colombians are held captive, most by the drug-running leftist rebels. (Source: Reuters).
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A woman returned home to a house full of smoke after a crystal ball set fire to her lounge. Firefighters said the crystal ball on the window sill had refracted sunlight on to the curtains. A spokesman for the Dorset Fire and Rescue Service, said: "The conditions were just right with a low, strong October sun."
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A British engineer ended up judging the Miss Siberia beauty contest, appeared on national television and shook hands with the Russian President after being mistaken for an international rock star. Neil Smith, 52, was working at a steelworks in Siberia when he assumed his unexpected celebrity status. Confusion arose when something was lost in translation during a conversation he had with a wealthy hotel owner through an interpreter. "One minute I was just getting on with my job and the next I was getting the red carpet treatment," said Mr Smith, from South Yorkshire. Although he explained he once played bass guitar in a club band, he was to be publicly presented as a rock star contemporary of the Rolling Stones. (Source: Telegraph.co.uk).
