Odd & Interesting

The nation’s oldest active park ranger is hanging up her Smokey hat at the age of 100.

Scientists have figured out why vampire bats are the only mammals that can survive on a diet of just blood.

A Massachusetts man says he has the answer for those singing the blues about stratospheric gas prices.

A particularly prized copy of the first-ever Marvel comic book fetched more than $2.4 million in an online auction, the auctioneer said Friday.

The aroma of sizzling meat in melted butter wafts from a cast iron pan while Jaden Bales shows his favorite way to cook up the best steak cuts from a big game animal.

An annual rattlesnake roundup in south Georgia recently changed the format of this month's event to celebrate living snakes without skinning and butchering them, earning plaudits from animal rights activists.

A man who tried to slither past U.S. border agents in California had 52 lizards and snakes hidden in his clothing, authorities said Tuesday.

An Aroostook County courthouse is poised to be the first in Maine to have a dedicated therapy dog to provide emotional support for people dealing with traumatic experiences.

A gemstone, billed as one of the largest gem-quality opals in existence, was sold for $143,750 at auction in Alaska.

A treehouse is causing trouble on New Hampshire’s Seacoast.

A Michigan woman soon will celebrate a milestone birthday. How old? Look at her decorative upper arm.

Would you willingly live like a prisoner for a day or two — or four? Hundreds of people have jumped at just such a chance in the Swiss city of Zurich, volunteering to take part in an open house of sorts for a new jail before the facility accepts its first inmates.

A man has been arrested for allegedly stealing a fossilized dinosaur claw valued at $25,000 from a vendor in Tucson last month and then trying to resell it.

Nearly 60,000 bees have been stolen from a grocery store company’s field in Pennsylvania, the company said.

Imagine a town clock that displays not the minutes and seconds that govern our lives, but time that moves faster or slower based on how fast rivers are running.

A wandering chicken was caught sneaking around a security area at the Pentagon, a local animal welfare organization said.

Peacocks could be on the outs in some South Florida neighborhoods after the Miami-Dade commission agreed to loosen a law protecting the birds.

Some residents think a northern Alabama city’s new logo might be sending the wrong message.

A Detroit-area judge has apologized for wishing that she could send a 72-year-old immigrant with cancer to jail for a weedy property.

A decaying, 122-year-old Victorian marketed as “the worst house on the best block” of San Francisco has sold for nearly $2 million — an eye-catching price that the realtor said was the outcome of overbidding in an auction.

Auction house Sotheby’s Dubai has unveiled a diamond that’s literally from out of this world.

A 4 billion-year-old meteorite from Mars that caused a splash here on Earth decades ago contains no evidence of ancient, primitive Martian life after all, scientists reported.

Gruyere cheese does not have to come from the Gruyere region of Europe to be sold under the gruyere name, a federal judge has ruled.

Always remember to tip your server, if you know what’s good for you.

Twin panda cubs made their first public appearance this week before devoted fans in Tokyo, but they will be on display only briefly for now — over three days — due to a spike in COVID-19 cases driven by the omicron variant.