Free Republic

BUTCHER Pan Xueping must have the world's strangest hobby. He collects hairballs from the stomachs of slaughtered pigs - just for fun. Pan, of Xiyangpan, eastern China, said: "They are very rare - I probably only find about one every three months when I'm cleaning the animals intestines. "I then wash them carefully to remove all the dirt and then I dry them with a hairdryer to make them nice and fluffy." The 42-year-old, who works in an abattoir, has amassed hundreds of furry balls over the nine years since starting his job, as reported in the Austrian Times. He...

Feral Shih Tzus roam Ga. condo complex MARIETTA, Ga., Jan. 19 (UPI) -- A small pack of feral, and very small, Shih Tzus has been evading capture at a Georgia condominium complex. The group of four dogs first showed up at the Covered Bridge complex in Cobb County in the Atlanta suburbs around Thanksgiving. Since then, two of them have disappeared, including one believed to have been killed by a car. The two remaining dogs appear to have reverted to their wild roots as the alpha male and female of their own small wolf pack -- albeit wolves that weigh...