Mid-Daily Items: Twins the size of a lima bean

January 12, 2009 10:13 am

— Nebraska zookeepers are seeing double and they’re thrilled about it, with the birth of twins to a rare species of tree kangaroo.
Twin joeys were born last month at the Lincoln Children’s Zoo to Matschie’s tree kangaroos Milla and her mate Noru. They were found in Milla’s pouch last month, and count as two of the four documented Matschie’s tree kangaroo births last year.
Kansas City Zoo zookeeper Jacque Blessington says only about 50 of the animals exist in North America. In the wild, they live in the rain forest in northeastern Papua, New Guinea.
She says the babies were likely the size of a lima bean at birth.
They are expected to begin poking out their heads or feet as early as May.

— A ninja, or at least someone dressed like one, is lurking in the shadows of Palm Beach County, Florida.
The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office says a heavyset man with a visible potbelly and a ninja costume unsuccessfully tried to steal two different ATMs over the past two weeks.
Security video from the automated teller machines showed the unidentified man dressed in a black ninja outfit with a hood that showed only his eyes.
Authorities say the first attempt was made at a bank on Dec. 29 and the second at a Walgreens on Tuesday. Authorities did not say how the man tried to steal the machines.

— The Taco Bell tolled for the wedding of Paul and Caragh Brooks in Normal, Ill.
Customers inside the fast-food restaurant continued to order tacos and burritos as the couple sat Friday in an orange booth at Taco Bell and exchanged vows.
“It’s appropriate,” groom Paul Brooks said. “It’s an offbeat relationship.”
Employees displayed hot sauce packets labeled with the words “Will you marry me?” They decorated the restaurant with streamers and balloons.
The bride wore a $15 hot pink dress and the entire wedding cost about $200. Several dozen guests looked on as the couple’s friend, Ryan Green of Normal, administered the vows while wearing a T-shirt. He was ordained online.
“This is the way to go — there’s no stress,” said the groom’s mother, Kathy Brooks.
Caragh Brooks, 21, of Australia, met Paul Brooks, 30, on an Internet dating Web site. They already had the same last name.
The couple wrote back and forth and talked on the phone for nine months before Caragh Brooks moved to the United States.
“We have the same brain, just in two bodies,” Paul Brooks said. “We think alike in virtually every manner. We have the same interests, viewpoints.”
He proposed on New Year’s Eve and, because they like to spend time at the local Taco Bell, they decided to wed there.
“I would never have expected in my life in working here there would be a wedding,” restaurant manager Carl Hamlow said.

— And finally today, Japanese are taking their noses global with a Web site that describes different odors around the world and pinpoints where they can be found on a map.
Launched in December, the “Nioi-bu,” or Smell Club, has registered more than 160 scents around the world, ranging from “steam coming out of a rice cooker” to “used socks in the summer,” and pinpointed their locations on a Google map.
Nearly 200 members, called “smellists,” have joined the Japanese-language only site, said Kayo Matsubara, spokeswoman of its operator, KAYAC Inc.
Users can either click on a balloon on the world map on the Web site, or use an index to find each scent if they’re not yet on the map.
Some of what they report: “A toasty odor of cow dung” in Fujisawa City, just southwest of Tokyo. In Kamakura, eastern Japan, “cats with halitosis” were suspected to be roaming about.
“All that is missing on the web is a smelling function,” Matsubara said. “That’s our next challenge.”
Not all reports are of stenches, with others including mouth-watering dishes, fresh laundry, greenery and scented soap. From Paris, there is a “scent of verbena soap near a monastery,” and from Thailand’s ancient capital Ayuthaya, a mix of “incense, grass, dirt and wild dogs.”

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