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Kitten unharmed after road trip under hood

NORTH ANDOVER, Mass., Feb. 11 (UPI) -- A Massachusetts family say their pet kitten was unharmed after traveling nearly 100 miles beneath the hood of their car.

Stephanie Cooke said she and her family arrived at Mount Sunapee in New Hampshire for a ski vacation and heard cat-like cries coming from beneath the hood of their Hummer, WHDH-TV in Boston reported Wednesday.

Cooke said her husband lifted the hood and discovered stowaway Maddie, the family's 7-month-old kitten, hiding in the sport utility vehicle's engine compartment.

"I couldn't believe it, the cat just popped right up and I went right over to it and it was totally fine," Cooke said. "She just found this little nooky spot and that's where her head popped up and managed to survive an hour and a half in the car."

Cooke said Maddie rode home in the comparative luxury of the vehicle's back seat.

"You know how they say cats have nine lives, well I think she maybe has one left after that," she said.

Liquor execs dump bourbon in protest

FRANKFORT, Ky., Feb. 11 (UPI) -- In the tradition of the Boston Tea Party, liquor industry executives dumped bourbon on the Kentucky state capitol steps to protest taxes.

The Tuesday rally, which drew about 400 liquor industry workers and executives, was to make a 160-proof point about their opposition to a state House committee's approval of a 6 percent tax on alcoholic beverages in stores, WLKY-TV in Louisville, Ky., reported Wednesday. The measure faces votes in the full House and Senate.

"If this tax is left to stand, if you can believe it, Kentucky bourbon will be taxed more in Kentucky than any other state in the country and that's pretty ridiculous," said Bill Samuels, president and chief executive of Maker's Mark.

Kentucky's current liquor taxes include an 11 percent wholesale tax on packaged liquor, a 6 percent tax on drinks purchased in bars and restaurants, an 8-cent-per-gallon tax on beer, a 50-cent-per-gallon tax on wine and a $1.92 per-gallon tax on distilled spirits.

Wrong turn a blessing for fire victims

NEWPORT, Ky., Feb. 11 (UPI) -- A new arrival in Kentucky who came upon a fire after taking a wrong turn is being hailed as a hero for saving a man with cerebral palsy.

Adolfo Valle, 25, ran into a burning building and pulled out Harold Moore, 58, of Newport, Ky., on Jan. 30. He went on his way without leaving his name, the Cincinnati Enquirer reports.

Valle's family identified him this week as the unknown rescuer. He was with his mother-in-law at the time.

Moore's family, including his mother, Ruby Brown, 82, and sister, Pauline Bullock, 55, plans to thank Valle in person.

"It is going to be a blessing to meet him," Bullock said. "He was just out the blue. He didn't even think before he came running in. That is a human being with a big heart. That will be a closure for me to tell him what it meant to me and my family."

Valle, who moved to Covington from Mexico last year to get married, said he was already thinking about trying to become a firefighter.

"I like to rescue people and being somebody who can help people," he said.

Director talks 'Romeo' violence with cops

LONDON, Feb. 11 (UPI) -- A director at Shakespeare's Globe Theater in London says he is meeting with police to discuss concerns that "Romeo and Juliet" promotes knife crimes.

Bill Buckhurst, who is directing a production of William Shakespeare's tragedy that will be shown for free to about 10,000 teenagers, said he plans to discuss its violent aspects, including three fatal stabbings and Juliet's famous suicide-by-dagger, with Cmdr. Steve Allen, a knife crime expert , The Sun reported Wednesday.

Katharine Grice, a public relations consultant with Shakespeare's Globe, said Buckhurst's discussions with Allen will not radically alter the play, but may inform his approach to the material.

"They are not altering it, but the whole way the play is edited is with the audience in mind. What the director learns from that discussion might feed into rehearsals," she said.

London Mayor Boris Johnson invoked "Romeo and Juliet" last year when he told a select committee that officials "need to deglamorize knife crime and make clear to people that this is moronic and wasteful."

"This is not the death of Mercutio taking place on the streets of London," he said, referencing a famous scene in the play.

Recent figures released by London police indicate teenage knife crimes have fallen since the start of a crackdown last May, with the number of young stabbing victims falling by more than 20 percent from 2007 levels by late last year.

"Romeo and Juliet" is to open March 9.