Lulu goes a little bunny

Lulu's new pet therapy outfit... she's clearly thrilled.

Gourmet cupcakes in NYC, anyone?

I found another source of info. on New York City insider information and I'd like to add a gourmet cupcake to the things I intend to consume.

Here's why.

Yum.

Odd news

I cruised through the AP wire for a few minutes today and found some interesting stories...

DVD protects South Carolina firefighter from being shot; no, it wasn't 'Bulletproof'

WALTERBORO, S.C. (AP) _ A South Carolina man is thankful for a DVD that ended up taking a bullet for him.

Colleton County Fire and Rescue Director Barry McRoy says he was leaving a Waffle House restaurant in Walterboro on Saturday morning when two men ran in fighting over a gun. Police say a bullet hit one of the struggling men, shattered a window and then hit McRoy.

The bullet hit a DVD McRoy was carrying in his pocket. He suffered a bruise but didn't realize he had been shot. As he told a police officer what happened he noticed a bullet hole in his jacket, the shattered DVD case and a piece of the bullet.

"I was saved by a DVD," McRoy says. "How lucky can you get?"

One man was arrested on assault and battery and gun charges.

The DVD was nicked. It was a gift from an employee who had recorded a TV show about fire extinguishers.

Couple in Colorado uses a fake $100 bill to rip off Girl Scouts, wiping away a day's earnings

WESTMINSTER, Colo. (AP) _ A pair of con artists ripped off a Girl Scout group when they exchanged a fake $100 bill for cookies, police said.

The unknown couple handed over the bill Friday night at a supermarket, telling the girls it had been washed when asked about why it looked so strange.

"It felt and looked wrong and it was a quarter of an inch shorted than a $1 bill," said Jil Hennessey-Seabolt, the cookie director for Junior Girl Scouts Troop 2121. Hennessey-Seabolt said the Girl Scouts gave the couple $93.50 in change after the purchase.

The exchange eradicated the Scouts' earnings that day. The money they raise in the sales goes to camping trips and to area charities.

"Something like this isn't fair when it happens to adults, but when it happens to kids who work so hard, it's so frustrating," Hennessey-Seabolt said.

The story does have a happy ending, though. A resident donated $100 to the Girl Scouts.

Florida pastor challenges married couples to have sex everyday for a month

YBOR CITY, Fla. (AP) _ A southwest Florida church issued a challenge for its married members: Hanky panky every day.

Relevant Church head pastor Paul Wirth issued the 30-day sex challenge to take on high divorce rates.

"And that's no different for people who attend church," Wirth said Sunday. "Sometimes life gets in the way. Our jobs get in the way."

The challenge doesn't extend to unwed congregants, however.

A 200-pound English mastiff in Michigan to be honored for donating blood 20 times

HOWELL, Mich. (AP) _ He's donated blood 20 times and is being honored by the Livingston County chapter of the American Red Cross.

Not bad for a 200-pound, 2-year-old English mastiff who answers to the name Lurch. He'll receive the chapter's "Pet's Best Friend" award at an event here Thursday.

"We're doing something different this year," executive director Diane Serra said. "We're honoring Lurch because he's actually donated blood."

Lurch's owner, Joni Melvin-Thiede, said Lurch donates blood for other canines about once every four weeks. His blood has helped dozens, including saving one dog who got into some rat poison.

"You really don't end up knowing which dogs he helps, but his little picture goes on each bag so the person that gets it will actually know it."

Besides being cooperative with nurses, Lurch is also friendly with his housemates: four pugs, seven cats and the occasional litter of kittens. There's also an American mastiff named Lucas, who teams with Lurch to eat about 200 pounds of food per month.

"Mastiffs are just like 200-pound pugs," Melvin-Thiede said. "They're just as friendly and just as goofy except they have a couple more zeros at the end of the weight."

Spot on steer's side looks like state of Michigan, could save it from slaughterhouse

SPAULDING TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) _ One steer's unique hide may save it from someone's dinner table.

The animal is named Michigan, and for a good reason — the brown spot on its side resembles the state's mitten shape.

The pattern on its other side is shaped like a "U."

It's one of 30 cattle on Jacob and Georgia Kessler's family-run farm in Spaulding Township, about 80 miles northwest of Detroit.

Cattle from the farm are eventually sold for beef. But the owners are willing to sell the steer for promotional or mascot use instead of shipping it to the slaughterhouse.

Boys seeking buried treasure with metal detector in Florida find live grenade

PACE, Fla. (AP) _ An 8-year-old boy and his friend found a live, World War II-era hand grenade while searching for buried treasure with a metal detector.

Sidney Mathis and his friend had found nails, bolts and a toy car by sweeping the detector over a field near their home Thursday. But it was their other find that alarmed Sidney's father, Chris Mathis.

He arrived home Thursday to find the boys about to put the grenade into a bucket of water. Chris Mathis grabbed the grenade and dangled it outside the window of his sport utility vehicle as he drove away from the apartment complex.

Mathis had second thoughts.

"I hit a bump and that's about the time I realized moving the grenade wasn't the brightest thing to do," he said.

Two members of an Air Force explosives unit from nearby Hurlburt Field in the Florida Panhandle took the grenade and destroyed it Friday morning.

This auction makes a lot of cents: 301 rare pennies sold off for $10.7 million

LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) _ A penny saved is not necessarily just a penny earned: One man's collection of rare American cents has turned into a $10.7 million auction windfall.

The collection of 301 cents featured some of the rarest and earliest examples of the American penny, including a cent that was minted for two weeks in 1793 but was abandoned because Congress thought Lady Liberty looked frightened.

That coin and a 1794 cent with tiny stars added to prevent counterfeiters each raised hundreds of thousands of dollars, according to the Dallas-based auction house Heritage Auction Galleries, which held the sale in Long Beach on Friday night.

Heritage Auction president Greg Rohan said the auction was the biggest ever for a penny collection, with hundreds of bidders vying for the coins. Presale estimates valued the collection at about $7 million.

"It was a fabulous night," Rohan said. "Every major coin collector of American cents was either there in person, bidding online or on the telephone."

The coins came from the collection of Burbank resident Walter J. Husak, the owner of an aerospace-part manufacturing company. Husak became interested in collecting at age 13, while visiting his grandparents who paid him in old coins for helping with chores.

There were 168 successful bidders, and the auction gallery got 15 percent of the total.

Barking up the wrong love tree... or not

OK... so we all know the eHarmony experiment was a bust. If I were a more adventurous (and more desperate) girl, I'd try this doggie-friendly online dating site. I'm not going to, but it could have potentially offered a fun foray into the world of people crazier than I about their pets.

In other doggie news, I went to PetSmart and the new Petco in Hickory over the weekend. I prefer PetSmart, both in pricing and product selection, paws down.

While in PetSmart, I bought a bunny hat for Lulu and Gracie to wear at Easter at Cleveland Pines during our pet therapy visits. (As if the bunny dress and ears weren't embarrassing enough for my girls.) I'll post pics soon of them wearing part of their regalia.

Maybe I am crazy enough to try that site... or not.