It must be true... I read it in the tabloids

■ Three members of Ohio’s Amish community were caught carrying forbidden cellphones during the Oct. 4 national test of the government’s emergency alert system. A former community member, Eli Yoder, described on TikTok how three male friends for whom he’d secretly procured the phones were startled when their hidden devices began blaring the emergency alert. “We had our phones on vibrate, and it still went off,” Yoder said they told him. He said the men reported that church elders had sentenced them to “shunning,” which means they can’t take part in community activities. ■ A Missouri man traveled 39 miles down the Missouri River in a hollowed-out pumpkin, setting a new record for travel by gourd. Steve Kueny of Lebanon pronounced himself “cold, tired, but pleased with the result” after 11 hours kneeling in the slimy interior of Huckleberry, a 1,208-pound pumpkin he grew himself. “It takes a lot of planning and also a lot of flying by the seat of your pants,” said Kueny, who called himself “just a guy with a pumpkin and a whimsical sense of adventure out to have fun.” ■ A giant albino rat and a footlong otter triggered panic on a flight from Bangkok to Taipei when they escaped from a passenger’s carry-on bag and roamed the cabin. The rat bit one of the flight attendants on the VietJet flight as they tried to catch the animals. A search of the plane uncovered a box holding 28 live turtles, a snake, a marmot, two otters, and two other unidentified rodents. Officials are questioning a passenger and are investigating how the animals were smuggled through security.