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Knicker nicker held




Police appealed for women who have had underwear stolen to come forward after a man was arrested with a large quantity of knickers and other garments.

A 40-year-old man was stopped by police in Church Road, Portsea, Portsmouth, Hants, and was discovered to be in possession of the large amount of underwear.

Officers believe the items may have been stolen from washing lines across the city. The suspect, from Southampton, was bailed while police inquiries continue.

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An academic in Australia has sounded a warning about the drinking habits of British backpackers after research showed they were consuming alcohol more often there than they do at home.

They are also using illicit drugs more in Australia than they do in Britain, the study found.

Some 40% are drinking five or more times a week in Australia, compared to just over 20% when

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A culinary author has claimed to know the origin of England's favourite takeaway, fish and chips.

Yorkshire, Lancashire and London have all staked claims for being the first places where fried fish and fried potatoes were first put together but no definitive proof has ever been found of where it all started.

Now writer Mark Hix, chef director of Caprice Holdings, which runs the exclusive London restaurant The Ivy, says fish and chips were first served up by a Cornish family.

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The very image of a 'working' girl, Amsterdam style - self assured, arms akimbo and standing in a doorway.

Thus will a bronze statue commemorate prostitutes of the world, made by sculptress Els Rijerse at the behest of Mariska Majoor, who has opened a centre for prostitution.

It will be erected somewhere in the Dutch capital's notorious red light district.

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A Hong Kong chef dropped off and dropped out - of the window of his 11th floor flat.

He rolled out of the top bunk, which was next to the window, and fell 150 feet before landing on a next door restaurant canopy.

News reports say his condition is stable, unlike the canopy, which was damaged beyond repair.

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When a mobile phone exploded in a California man's pocket it started a fire which gutted his hotel room and severely burned half his body.

Luis Picaso, 59, was stable in hospital after firefighters put out the blaze, which caused £40,000 damage to the room and a business on the ground floor.

The make and model of the phone have not been revealed.

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Beijing's notoriously disgusting back-street public toilets are being given a facelift for the Olympics next year.

By the end of last year more than 5,580 had been brought up to scratch, but, just in case, authorities are asking 3,000 commercial buildings to open their toilets to the public.

"All the toilets should be clean, water-conserving and installed with efficient ventilation equipment," says Lu Haijun, director of the City Planning Committee.

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Barking at a burglar or just barking mad? For all those maddened dog lovers, help is at hand.

An Israeli firm has created a computer database of canine decibels which can tell the difference between barking a warning and barking at the moon.

So while your favourite dog may still keep you awake at night, at least your intruder alarm can be programmed to keep quiet.

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Winning a Nobel Prize is more than a feather in the academic cap - it can add nearly two years to a person's life, new research suggests.

Scientists at the University of Warwick studied 524 chemists and physicists who had either won a Nobel Prize or been nominated for the honour between 1901 and 1950.

Nominees were found to live an average of 75.8 years, but the 135 scientists who actually won a Nobel Prize survived 1.4 years longer.

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The England football team's on-field performances may not have set this summer's World Cup alight, but it seems the players' lifestyles and the antics of their wives and girlfriends have endeared them to a new army of fans - in China.

New research has revealed that the England team shirt is the most popular football shirt in China, and England is the favourite international team among Chinese fans, beating Brazil, Argentina and Germany.

Some 96% of those surveyed by Warwick Business School said they would support another team in a tournament if China failed to qualify.

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Microwaved cloth burns kitchen




Fire chiefs warned against sterilising dish cloths in the microwave after one man set fire to his kitchen.

The blaze broke out in Telford, Shropshire, after he followed instructions he saw on a news programme.

A spokeswoman for Shropshire Fire and Rescue Service said the blaze broke out when the occupant put the cloth in on full power in a bid to kill bugs.

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Lottery give-away thwarted




A German lorry driver's plan to throw £50,000 out the window of his local town hall was thwarted, as the windows were sealed shut because of the air condition system they use.

He had won the money in a competition on a radio station in Mainz, south-western Germany, after coming up with the best answer to the question 'What would you do for 100,000 euro?' by saying he would keep a quarter of it, and throw the rest from a town hall window.

The radio station and its winner are now looking for another town hall with old-fashioned ventilation.

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Gone in 60 minutes




A motorist who waited nearly a year to take delivery of his high-powered car wrote it off less than an hour after getting behind the wheel for the first time.

Roger Robinson was on his way to work in his £19,000 silver Ford Focus ST on the M3 in Hampshire this month when he was involved in a collision with a BMW and a lorry.

The car skidded off the carriageway and ended up down an embankment, a complete write-off. Mr Robinson, from Basingstoke, was uninjured.

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Postal prison break




A prisoner has escaped from jail in Germany by posting himself to freedom.

Convicted fraudster Max Friedener hid in a box in the mail room of a prison in Darmstadt, and waited until he was collected and driven out of the prison grounds.

Prison guards and police were alerted when the mail truck arrived at a sorting depot where a hole in the box was discovered.

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If it walks like a duck, it's a - chicken.

Crowds of villagers have flocked to Buga, Colombia, to catch a glimpse of the web-footed hen, which experts say is not some sort of weird cross but a genetic mutation.

The bird's owner, who has raised chickens all his life, said he has never seen such a thing before.

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When a man in Wyoming, US, suffered a gun shot wound in the bathroom of his own home, police had to trace the route of the bullet some way in order to solve the mystery.

Casper police sergeant Mark Trimble said the bullet struck the man full in the chest. Fortunately, the speed the bullet was travelling by the time it got to him had dropped so much it only caused bruising.

Tracing back the bullet's path, police found it had travelled across the street from a neighbour's house, penetrated the wall of the man's home, entered his bathroom and ricocheted off the wall of the shower. The neighbour, unfamiliar with a brand-new pistol, had accidentally fired the shot.

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Sweet-toothed sheep are scuppering attempts to defrost icy roads - by eating the sugar-based grit.

During cold weather flocks of sheep have been spotted licking the tasty treat off roads in Halkyn Mountain, North Wales.

The bizarre behaviour comes after council officials introduced a new type of grit made from sugar, starch and cereal. Local resident Elfed Evans said he had spotted dozens of sheep licking the grit off the road

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Power cuts in Alaska are not uncommon, but sometimes the reason can be quite weird.

About 10,000 residents of Juneau were told they were without electricity because an eagle had crashed into the power lines.

Gayle Wood, a spokesman for Alaska Electric Light & Power, said engineers discovered the eagle hit the lines because it had been weighed down while carrying a deer's head. The eagle did not survive.

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Streakers beware, the police in Ohio, US, do not take kindly to the prank.

During lunch at a high school in Westerville, a naked student dashed into the canteen covered head-to-toe in grapeseed oil, and began running around, screaming and flailing his arms.

That was nothing compared to what he was doing after the police turned up. The officer assigned to the school didn't find it funny and decided to zap him twice with a Taser stun gun. Apparently, it came as rather a shock.