KEY POINTS:
After giving up on the Auckland property market, Ange extended her search to Hamilton. "I had heard houses were more affordable down there. And a brief search revealed I can get a house for the price of a cheap bite in Ponsonby."
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A Bosnian mechanic spent seven hours fixing a hospital machine in order to have his kidney stone removed, a newspaper reported. Slobodan Mocevic asked for tools to fix the lithotripsy machine after his operation in the small town of Kasindol, near Sarajevo, had been delayed because the apparatus had broken down. "I was desperate, I could not have waited for another minute," he said. (Source: Yahoo News)
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The blood-curdling screams of a four-year-old killed hundreds of chickens in the eastern China province of Jiangsu. Frightened by a dog, the little boy apparently cried loudly near the hen house window and the 443 chickens trampled each other to death in fear. The boys father was ordered by the courts to pay compensation to the chicken owner.
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For those romantics who want to play it safe: The Quadrant hotel in Auckland is offering a special "Room & Romp package" for Valentine's Day. The deal includes "a bottle of Verde, a three-pack of condoms and a DVD rental hire." (Source: wotif.com)
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IBM fired Vietnam veteran James Pacenza from his job at a research facility in East Fishkill, NY, because he had logged on to an internet chat room at work after being told not to. However, Pacenza responded with a $5 million lawsuit in November, claiming that he is "addicted" to chat rooms, as "self-medication" for his Vietnam-based post-traumatic stress disorder. (Source: News of the Weird)
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The Who Wants to be a Millionaire? picture in Wednesday's Sideswipe was a fake, therefore the public humiliation belongs to Sideswipe. In fact the woman pictured was Briton Fiona Wheeler answering correctly the £32,000 question. To somehow make amends, here's a real failed Who Wants to be a Millionaire? contestant ... Paul Glam, a lawyer from Oregon, gave the wrong answer to his very first question: "Which of these phrases is a common way of saying 'I can't take it any more': 'That's the last stick/straw/leaf and I'm moving to Canada'?" He answered "stick".
