UPI NewsTrack Quirks in the News

Engagement ring found after 67 years

THURMASTON, England, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- An 88-year-old woman in Thurmaston, England, has recovered an engagement ring that she chucked away at least 67 years ago.

Violet Booth wept with joy as she put on the ring found for her by her grandson, Leighton Boyes, 33, The Sun reported Monday.

Booth and her then fiance Samuel hunted in vain for the diamond and gold ring after she chucked it into a field during a lovers quarrel in 1941.

It took Boyes only two hours to find his grandmothers ring using just a metal detector and his wits.

"This is amazing and very emotional," said Booth as she put on the ring. "We got another ring in time for the ceremony but it is not the same, is it? This ring means the world to me and brings back so many happy memories. I can't stop looking at it."

Her late husband Samuel was not there for the happy moment since he passed away 15 years ago.

Prosecutors drop sanitizer-sniffing case

LEWISVILLE, Texas, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Prosecutors dropped charges against a Lewisville, Texas, teenager after they decided that sniffing hand sanitizer isn't a crime.

Charges against the 14-year-old student were dropped after prosecutors decided that hand sanitizer isn't an abusive inhalant under the Texas Health and Safety Code, The Dallas Morning News reported Monday.

"It's not a crime. Hand sanitizer does not fall within that statute," said Jamie Beck, first assistant district attorney in Denton County, Texas. "The police agency brought it up mistakenly thinking it was."

The boy was charged after rubbing his teacher's hand sanitizer on his hands at Killian Middle School and then smelling them. The boy's father quoted school officials as saying his son "inhaled heavily." However, the father said his son sniffed the substance "because it smelled good."

The man said the charges embarrassed and humiliated his son.

"They were going to prosecute my son," he told the Morning News. "He still has that stigma. People know him as a drug user and he's not."

Students to hold sex talk in Williamsburg

WILLIAMSBURG, Va., Jan. 28 (UPI) -- The College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va., has given the green light to a student-run Sex Workers' Art Show on campus.

University President Gene Nichol approved the controversial sex show in a statement that also said Nichols had tried to work with students to hold the event at an off-campus venue, the Newport News Daily Press reported Monday.

Students were unable to find an off-campus venue, however, and Nichol said the First Amendment and "defining traditions of openness that sustain universities" required he allow the show to be held at the college.

"My views and the views of others in the community about the worth or offensiveness of the program can provide no basis for censoring it," he added.

The show is scheduled for Feb. 4 at William and Mary and Feb. 5 at Virginia Commonwealth University and features monologues by strippers, prostitutes and other sex workers.

Bugatti Veyron ticketed in Manchester

MANCHESTER, England, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Crowds of shoppers in Manchester, England, actually applauded as a nearly $2 million Bugatti Veyron was ticketed for parking illegally.

The crowd made noises and clapped as a female officer placed a $118 fine on the flashy vehicle, which had been parked illegally in a Manchester city center, The Daily Mail reported Monday.

The same vehicle, which does 0-60 mph in 2.5 seconds, was also ticketed in Alderley Edge, Cheshire last year.

The car's owner returned to his Veyron to find an audience of shoppers watching as he took the ticket off his window and drove off.

The Bugatti Veyron is recognized as the world's most expensive street-legal car.