JOKE: the Cow from Minsk

The only cow in a small town in Poland stopped giving milk. The people did some research and found that they could buy a cow from Moscow for 2,000 rubles, or one from Minsk for 1,000 rubles. Being frugal, they bought the cow from Minsk.

The cow was wonderful. It produced lots of milk all the time, and the people were amazed and very happy. They decided to acquire a bull to mate with the cow and produce more cows like it. Then they would never have to worry about the milk supply again.

They bought a bull and put it in the pasture with their beloved cow. However, whenever the bull came close to the cow, the cow would move away. No matter what approach the bull tried, the cow would move away from the bull and he could not succeed in his quest.

The people were very upset and decided to ask their wise rabbi, what to do. They told the rabbi what was happening. "Whenever the bull approaches our cow, she moves away. If he approaches from the back, she moves forward.

When he approaches her from the front, she backs off. An approach from the side and she just walks away to the other side."

The rabbi thought about this for a minute and asked, "Did you buy this cow from Minsk?"

The people were dumbfounded, since they had never mentioned where they had gotten the cow. "You are truly a wise rabbi," they said.

"How did you know we got the cow from Minsk?"

"My wife is from Minsk," the Rabbi said.

Golden-Voiced Homeless Man Captivates Internet

Who is this homeless man along Ohio's I-71 with a cardboard sign claiming to have "the God-given gift of voice." His name is Ted Williams, and he's an ex-radio announcer according to the note he scrawled on a piece of cardboard that he uses to solicit change from drivers. And wow, does Williams ever deliver for a dollar. Williams tells the Dispatch about his struggles, but thankfully "alcohol and drugs and a few other things" haven't diminished Williams' velvety vocal cords, and he says he's two years clean now.

"I have a god given gift of voice. I'm an ex-radio announcer who has fallen on hard times. Please! Any help will be greatfully appreciated. Thank you and God bless. Happy holidays," says Williams' roadside sign for help.

Monster Cat-Killer Fox Caught in England

Weighing almost two stone(28 lbs.) and measuring four feet from his nose to the tip of his tail, this is thought to be the biggest fox ever found in Britain.

Twice the normal size of the species, it was trapped and killed in a garden in the South East after apparently devouring a pet cat.

The discovery has fuelled fears that urban foxes are hunting new prey after getting bigger and bolder as they gorge themselves on leftovers, including treats put out for them by animal lovers.

Monster: To give a sense of scale, seven-year-old Archie Wright stands next to a 26lb fox shot in Maidstone, Kent

The animals’ rise was highlighted last year after twin babies were mauled in their east London home. 

Nine-month-old Lola and Isabella Koupparis were left scratched and scarred after a fox jumped into their cot in the night, leading to calls for the animals to be culled as pests.

The new giant was caught by vet Keith Talbot at his parents’ home in Maidstone, Kent, on Boxing Day after they told him they believed a fox had killed their black and white pet cat, Amber. 

He said today: ‘Obviously, they were very upset. Amber was 19 and liked sleeping on the front door mat.

‘Dad had seen a fox come down the drive and stalk up to her a few nights before. He phoned me and said would a fox attack the cat? I said - perhaps a bit naively - I don’t think so, she would wake up and see it off.

‘A couple of days later, dad heard a commotion outside and looked up to see a fox disappearing up the drive and the next morning found parts of the cat on the lawn. Unfortunately, the family pet was no more.’

Stark contrast: Foxshooter Roy Lupton displays a normal fox beside the 26lb monster shot by Keith Talbot to show the difference in size

Mr Talbot, 28, who works in Scotland, went to stay with his parents for Christmas and put down a trap to try to catch the offender. On the first night, he caught a 14lb fox and the next night the giant specimen, which weighed 26.5lb. Both were humanely destroyed.

The Handbook of British Mammals says the average fox weighs up to 15lb, with reports of up to 22lb.

Mr Talbot said: ‘I’ve seen cats and foxes in the garden before and they normally give each other a wide berth.

‘Cats can usually defend themselves and are not on the menu for a fox. But when a fox gets that size, and particularly in bad weather, it appears it may become desperate and go for a cat.’

He was surprised at the size of the fox, but it was only when he showed it to his friend Roy Lupton, a veteran fox shooter who weighed it, that he realised he could have just caught the country’s largest fox.

Mr Talbot said: ‘I’m not against foxes, I think everything in nature has a place.

'But there is a limit and when something like that happens and they start eating cats, it probably tells you that the balance of nature has been upset by humans feeding them and that it’s time for controls to come in.’

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Pa. Widow Builds Vault, Could Get Corpses Back

WYALUSING, Pa. -- It looks like Jean Stevens will be reunited with the two people she loved so much that she wanted them to keep her company after they died.

The 91-year-old widow who lived with the embalmed corpses of her husband and twin sister -- until authorities found out and took them away -- is hopeful they'll be returned soon.

Jean Stevens, 91, seen here in June, holds a photograph from the 1940s of herself and her late husband, James. Stevens is building a vault on her property to keep the embalmed corpose of her husband close by.

Workmen at Stevens' rural property outside the northern Pennsylvania town of Wyalusing have been busy the past few months, erecting a gabled building with gray siding and a white door. It resembles an oversized shed, or a smaller version of Stevens' detached garage.

In reality, it's a mausoleum that Stevens intends as the final resting place of her husband of nearly 60 years, James Stevens, and her twin, June Stevens. And authorities have told her it's the only way she can get them back.

Jean Stevens' house as it is seen on Dec. 20, from a mausoleum on her property.

She can't wait.

"I think about them all the time," Stevens told The Associated Press a few days before Christmas, "and I always will."

The coroner, she said, "has them up there in the cold box, which makes me shiver. He says, 'They're all right, Jean, you don't have to worry about them.'"

Stevens had their bodies dug up shortly after they died -- James in 1999, June in 2009 -- because she couldn't bear not being able to see them again. She kept her husband on a couch in the garage, and her sister in a spare room off the bedroom, where "I could touch her and look at her and talk to her," Stevens told AP last summer.

"Death is very hard for me to take," she added then.

Stevens' tale touched a chord. She estimates she received about 70 letters from around the world, most of them expressing well-wishes and sympathy. She's written back to some. One of her new pen pals mailed a Christmas package with fruitcake, mints and a holiday tin stuffed with Chex mix. "Dearest Jean," wrote her correspondent, "you've sent us a Christmas treasure, your letter!"

Stevens also knows that some people think she's strange. She laughs heartily as she leafs through a pair of supermarket tabloids that had blared her story. She says Jay Leno once cracked a joke about her.

But it's Stevens who may get the last laugh.

Bradford County authorities, who have been storing the bodies in the morgue since they took them away in June, have told Stevens she can have them back if she builds an aboveground vault.

Coroner Tom Carman said he plans to release them once it's completed.

"I want to get Jimmy and June back here just as soon as I possibly can," he said.

Carman has struck up an unusual friendship with Stevens. He's spent hours listening to her talk, mainly about the past. "She's a wonderful lady," he said.

Stevens plans to place her husband and sister in body bags with clear panels, so she can see their faces.

The mausoleum is large enough to hold as many as eight bodies. Stevens said she'd like to transfer the remains of several loved ones to the crypt, including those of her long-deceased mother and father.

One of the spots will be reserved.

"She means to be placed there, as well," Carman said. "She's made that very clear."

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Minn. Man Clocked @ 86 MPH on Closed, Snow Covered Interstate

Patrolling a section of Interstate 94 that had been closed because of treacherous road conditions, a Minnesota State trooper was stunned Sunday to see a car hurtling down the snow-covered highway east of Fargo.

Clocked at 86 miles per hour on a day when cars were still sliding into ditches across northwestern Minnesota, Dimitri Kilin said he was just trying to catch an airline flight out of the Twin Cities.

"How he didn't roll or put his car off into the ditch I don't understand it," said Minnesota State Patrol Sgt. Jesse Grabow. Kilin didn't pose a danger to any other driver on the deserted highway, but Grabow pointed out that snowplows were out. "Those guys are under the assumption that they have the entire freeway closed to do their work and get these routes open up and then some guy comes smoking along like that."

The 100-mile stretch between the Fargo-Moorhead area and Alexandria is shut down a couple of times each winter because of poor road conditions, Grabow said. Electronic crossing guards, barricades and sometimes just a big pile of snow are used to block the entrance ramps during the closure. During the past four days, the troopers stopped at least 13 people who drove on I-94 despite the barricades.

It was a big mound of snow that first prevented Kilin from entering the interstate in Moorhead, he said. But he said he drove through Fargo, got onto Interstate 29 and then found his way onto Interstate 94. "I did not know the road was closed," he said in a telephone interview on Monday.

He's pretty sure he saw other cars on the road. But he and his wife were in a hurry to catch their flight to Albuquerque for a wedding. He already had lost time by waking up late.

Once he got on I-94, he said the road conditions seemed fine to him. "It wasn't perfect like it is in the summer," said Kilin, 36, of Fargo. "I was in full control of the car."

But Grabow has some stats that show just how bad the road conditions have been in northwestern Minnesota. Between the start of the storm on Thursday until Monday morning, the State Patrol reports 621 vehicles slid off the road, 67 vehicles crashed, including 32 rollovers, and two semi-trailers jackknifed. Eleven people suffered minor injuries.

"Driving conditions were the worse I've seen in a long time," Grabow said.

Kilin was cited for speeding and faces a minimum fine of $125.

Even a hefty fine might be a bargain, Kilin said. New plane tickets would have set him back more if he and his wife missed their flight, he said.

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