Jockstrip: The world as we know it

Coyotes thriving in Michigan suburbs

DETROIT, Oct. 4 (UPI) -- Hundreds of coyotes have settled in the Detroit suburbs.

Experts say they are attracted by available food, including trash and the occasional pet dog or cat. Nancy Maitre of Farmington learned that the hard way. She saw a coyote walking across her yard with the body of her cat in its mouth.

"This is the city -- we didn't think we'd have to deal with this kind of thing here," she said. "We moved here from Pinckney, where you expect to see coyotes. But not in Farmington."

Dave Bostick of the Wildlife Division said that coyotes rarely attack humans. But he said they are also so intelligent that they are quick to lose their fear of humans.

He recommends that area residents get used to coyotes and take some simple measures to deprive them of food, like locking up trash and not putting pet food outside overnight.

Traditional costumes big this Halloween

CHICAGO, Oct. 4 (UPI) -- This year, traditional is in for Halloween across the United States.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports that the top-selling children's costume is the princess, followed by Star Wars characters, witches and Spider Man. Adults are going for witches, vampires and celebrities.

"Simplicity is easiest for people," said Tim Dennis, manager of Fantasy Costumes in Chicago, told the newspaper.

Courtland Hickey of Chicago Costume Company agreed that top sellers tend to be old standbys. But he said the company is also doing well with more trendy fare, including plug and socket outfits for couples and a Roy Horn costume featuring the performer who was attacked by a tiger last year with a tiger attached to the neck.

Kristin LaVoie and Eugenya Brener, both sophomores at DePaul University, are going for the woman in a uniform look, with one planning to be a chambermaid and the other a police officer.

"Girls just want to look pretty, hot and sexy, and the guys just want to be bloody and scary," Brener said.

Drought cuts size of Illinois pumpkins

CHICAGO, Oct. 4 (UPI) -- This year's pumpkin crop in Illinois is smaller than usual both in number and the size of the pumpkins because of the drought in the central United States.

The Chicago Sun-Times reports that because of dry hot weather the pumpkins matured about three weeks early.

"It's like the drought stunted the beginning of the growth," Dorothy Putnam, owner of the Pumpkin Patch in Barrington, told the newspaper.

Illinois is the country's largest producer of pumpkins. Most of them end up in pies, but a few of them are destined for glory as Halloween jack o' lanterns.

David Bengtson, owner of Bengtson's Pumpkin Festival in Homer Glen, said he did his buying this year in Ohio. Bengtson likes to have a stock with an average weight of 20 pounds or more so that buyers looking for those really big pumpkins can find them. The Illinois loads he looked at averaged 14 pounds.

Scotland Yard probed racy 1935 book

LONDON, Oct. 4 (UPI) -- A passage in a 1935 book suggesting a British man could be seduced by a Russian woman almost led to criminal prosecution of the author.

The book by Naomi Mitchison, "We Have Been Warned," offended the wife of a magistrate in Norfolk, who contacted Scotland Yard.

A Sgt. W. Tapsell filed a report to the director of Public Prosecutions, questioning the morality of the book, The Telegraph reported.

"(Page) 274 describes carefully the seduction of a man, hitherto moral, by a Russian woman," the sergeant wrote. "(Pages) 487-88 contain a discussion between a man and wife as to whether she can get rid of a pregnancy by an abortion."

The case for prosecution was snuffed by Home Secretary John Simon, who cited artistic freedom.

"The book as a whole is, I dare say, a work of art and I would not prosecute," he ruled.

Mitchison died in 1999 at the age of 101.