SIDELINES...

BOOKWORM LAG

An inmate at Garth prison near Preston dug a giant hole in his cell, not in an escape attempt, but to make a study where he could read in peace. Alerted by “noisy hammering” at night, staff found a tunnel behind his bed stashed with books. Sunday Mirror, 21 Dec 2014.

REPEAT SNAP

Claire Ottaway and Michelle Noble became friends when they were in adjacent hospital beds after giving birth to boys Ben and Henry on 8 March 2012. They were back alongside each other in Scarborough Hospital after giving birth to girls Evie and Isabel on 30 July 2014. The odds of giving birth on the same day twice were said to be 270,000 to one. Metro, 8 Aug 2014.

DIDACTIC AFTERLIFE

A head teacher in Romania has been allowed to stay in the class where he taught for 50 years – as a skeleton. Alexandru Popescu donated his bones in the 1960s, but they were confiscated over hygiene worries. After a clean, he has been given back to “help pupils with biology” in Prahova. Metro, 23 Oct 2014.

AVICIDE

For the last five years, a vicious gull has been dragging pigeons by the neck to the Serpentine in London’s Hyde Park, before drowning and feasting on their innards with its mate. The behaviour is extremely unusual for lesser black-backed gulls, which usually eat small fish and insects. Times, Metro, 14 Oct 2014.

TORTOISE EATS TURTLE

Lola, a 15lb (6.8kg) African spurred tortoise, hadn’t passed stool for a month and was evidently unwell. An X-ray revealed a metal turtle pendant in its digestive tract. Vet Don Harris was keeping Lola at his Miami clinic, hoping to get the pendant to pass with laxatives; if that failed, surgery would follow. [AP] 29 Oct 2014.