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28 March 2024

Man irons face when phone rings

Tomas Paczkowski, 32, from Elbag

Published

POLAND: A man in Poland tried to impress his wife by doing his bit of housework. However, the man lived to regret his good deed as he managed to iron his face when the phone rang.

The 32-year-old man, who was ironing some clothes when his mobile phone went off, automatically put the device in his hand, ironically a hot iron, to his ears to respond to the call, reports UK website Orange.

The man's attention was on the boxing match that he was watching while doing the dreaded housejob.

After feeling incredible pain, he rushed to the washroom to apply water on his burnt cheek and ears, only to ram into the bathroom door.

So, now he looks like one of the boxers who has lost his match. He has a bruised eye and a burnt cheek to show for his wee bit of multi-tasking at home.

Coffin features in-built sound system

SWEDEN: If you do not wish to rest in peace, you can ask your heirs to order one of these coffins from Sweden. The special 'musical coffin' comes with an in-built stereo sound system.

Fredrik Hjelmquist says his CataCombo Sound System is the ideal because it allows people to choose their own playlist before they die so they can listen to their favourite pieces of music from beyond the grave, reports UK website Orange.

The system doesn't come cheap at £18,500 but it also allows relatives to make changes to the playlist by using a touchscreen built into the headstone.

The music is piped into the coffin via two-way front speakers, four-inch midbass drivers, "divine" tweeters and "a hell-of-an-eight-inch subwoofer", its maker says.

The system is completely soundproofed so it does not wake the 'dead'?

The creator of the system believes that just because a person is dead, he/she should not be 'deprived of life-enhancing power of music'.

Teacher becomes heir to gold fortune

US: A substitute teacher from California was found to be the only heir to a fortune of gold coins discovered by a cleaning crew in the home of a reclusive cousin who quietly stashed away a treasure of more than $7 million before he died this year.

A court hearing in Carson City is scheduled Tuesday, when a judge is expected to certify first cousin Arlene Magdanz as the lone heir to the treasure valued at $7.4 million found in the home of Walter Samaszko Jr., Carson City Clerk-Recorder Alan Glover told the Nevada Appeal.

Samaszko, 69, lived a quiet life in Nevada's capital city since the late 1960s and no one apparently knew of his wealth. Records show he withdrew just $500 a month from his stock accounts to pay modest bills, said Glover, who was handling Samaszko's affairs as public administrator.

Samaszko apparently had no living family in Carson City, so genealogical researchers went to work to find relatives elsewhere. They found Arlene Magdanz is the only living heir. Magdanz could not immediately be reached for comment.

A crew hired by Glover to clean up the man's house discovered the eye-popping stash: boxes of gold coins and bullion in the garage. More boxes were later found, and Glover said the gold coins, some neatly wrapped in foil and plastic cases, were enough to fill two wheelbarrows.

"You name it, (he) had it," Glover said.

Since Samaszko was found in his home, Glover said he and experts brought in to help with the case have made progress in appraising the fortune and disposing of some of the other property, including the house, which sold for $112,500.

He said he is taking Samaszko's 1968 Ford Mustang California Special in for servicing this week or next to get it ready for sale. The classic is appraised at about $17,000.

Samaszko also had money market, stock and bank accounts totaling $165,570 and $5,330 in other property in the home. But the vast majority of the fortune was in gold coins. Appraiser Howard Herz filed his report several weeks ago listing a total of 2,695 coins appraised at more than $7.4 million.

"What some individuals have called a hoard of gold is, in fact, a quite well-thought-out investment in gold," he wrote.

Once the gold and other property is sold off and the taxes and expenses paid, the proceeds will become the sole property of Magdanz. Those expenses include the appraisals, storage of the gold and other property, legal fees and 2 percent of the eventual proceeds that, by law, go to the public administrator who handled everything.

Glover said there have been a few callers trying to claim some or all of the gold is theirs - one of them annoying enough that Glover got a court order blocking him from further communications. None of the callers presented any evidence to support their claims, he said.

"If they have a true claim, they've got to file court papers," he said.(AP)

Man too obese to be executed

US: An obese death row inmate was spared from execution Monday by Ohio's governor, who said the prisoner had not received an adequate legal defense.

Ronald Post, 53, weighs more than 480 pounds (220 kilograms). His lawyers had filed a motion arguing that lethal injection would be "torturous and lingering" due to his weight -- the injection might not kill him, they argued, or could take up to 16 hours to take effect.

Post was convicted of murdering a hotel clerk during an armed robbery.

However, Ohio Governor John Kasich did not mention weight when he announced that Post would not be executed as scheduled on January 16.

"Regardless of the heinous nature of their crime, a criminal defendant is entitled to an effective defense, especially in a death penalty case," Kasich said in a statement.

"The Parole Board's conclusion is that Ronald Post did not come close to receiving such a defense. After my own careful review, I agree."  Kasich, however, did not pardon Post or call for a retrial.

"Therefore, I am ordering that he spend the rest of his life in prison with no possibility of ever getting out. This decision should not be viewed by anyone as diminishing this awful crime or the pain it has caused," Kasich said.  (AFP)