IT MUST BE TRUE…

I read it in the tabloids

A zoo in Moscow is suing a production company for “exploiting” one of its raccoons by using the animal in an “erotic” photo shoot, when the zoo had been told the animal would merely be advertising duvets. Keepers say that Tomas was made to pose on a bed with a topless woman, and that he has displayed an unhealthy attraction to women’s breasts ever since. In its lawsuit, the Animals Aren’t Toys petting zoo claims that Tomas was “humiliated” by the experience, and that the shoot has damaged the reputation of his species, which will now forever be “associated with erotica”. In a counter-suit, the company claims Tomas stole the model’s bra and ate it. When a photograph of Ed Miliband blowing his nose was used as a stock “man with a cold” image last year, to illustrate a TV news item in the US, at least a few viewers recognised him, even if the broadcasters had no idea who he was. By contrast, former Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg was told this week that his picture had been used on a poster advertising upgrades at Las Vegas airport – and that for nearly a year no one had noticed. “To us, it’s just clip art,” said a spokesman for the airport.

A public loo in Beijing has taken drastic steps to tackle an epidemic of toilet paper theft. Loo roll in the lavatory, in the Temple of Heaven Park, is now locked away in a dispenser equipped with facial recognition software. A modest ration of paper – a sheet about 2ft-long – is given to each visitor once every nine minutes, at most, following an initial face scan.