oddly enough

oddly enough

Chinese toad in candlestick comes to South Africa

JOHANNESBURG

It’s a real life “Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.”

Animal-rescue officials in South Africa say they found a toad from China hidden inside a porcelain candlestick.

The Star newspaper of South Africa quoted animal expert Brett Glasby in Cape Town saying that workers had to break the candlestick to get the toad out. He said the toad, an Asian Common Toad, can slow its breathing and heart rate to survive times of drought, likely helping it to survive the voyage.

Workers fed the hungry toad worms and crickets after freeing it.

The animal is not endangered. But because the toad is a possible invasive species for South Africa, workers will have to put the animal down.

$500 million in checks left at Jerusalem holy site

JERUSALEM

Worshippers usually leave notes to the Almighty at one of Judaism’s holiest sites. But half a billion dollars?

Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitch, who oversees Jerusalem’s Western Wall, said a worshipper found an envelope at the site Wednesday with 507 checks in the amount of about $1 million each. They were not addressed to anyone, and it’s doubtful they can be cashed.

Rabinovitch said most are Nigerian. Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said some were from the United States, Europe and Asia.

Rabinovitch says he has found similar checks in Western Wall charity boxes before, but they all bounced. He says most of them were written by people from Africa.

The rabbi says he thinks the check writers “wanted to give all they had to the Creator of the universe.”

Associated Press