Watercooler Stories

Firm offers Christmas 'divorce voucher'

LONDON, Dec. 18 (UPI) -- A London law firm said it has already sold 54 of this year's "must-have" Christmas gift -- vouchers for couples seeking to discuss divorce with a lawyer.

Lloyd Platt & Company said the vouchers, which start at $201 for a couple's half-hour session with a lawyer, have led hundreds of people to contact the firm in recent days and 54 of the vouchers have been sold in only three weeks, The Daily Telegraph reported.

"Christmas can be a very stressful time for families as we have always seen by the huge increase of people seeking advice in January," senior partner Vanessa Lloyd Platt said. "The vouchers seem to appeal to an enormously wide spread spectrum of people looking for that 'must-have' gift for Christmas."

Boy, 4, found with beer, stolen gifts

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn., Dec. 18 (UPI) -- Authorities in Tennessee said a 4-year-old boy apparently broke out of his home, obtained beer and broke into a neighbor's house to steal Christmas presents.

The Hamilton County Sheriff's Office said Hayden Wright, 4, was found wandering the streets of his Chattanooga neighborhood while wearing a little girl's dress and drinking a beer at 1:45 a.m. Tuesday, WTVC-TV, Chattanooga, reported.

Investigators said the boy, who was taken by police to a hospital to have his stomach pumped, apparently escaped his home by breaking a child-safety device on the doorknob.

"He runs away trying to find his father," said the boy's mother, April Wright, 21. "He wants to get in trouble so he can go to jail because that's where his daddy is."

Wright said the boy took the beer from a cooler behind her house.

"He got it out of my father's cooler in the back and how he got it open I don't understand because it was one of those tab beers," she said.

The sheriff's office said Hayden entered a neighbor's unlocked house and took five wrapped Christmas presents, including the dress he was wearing when authorities found him.

Wright said she met with child protective services and was told she will not face a challenge for custody of the boy.

Dynamite stick found in church

KELSO, Wash., Dec. 18 (UPI) -- A Washington state pastor said a bomb squad was called when she discovered a stick of dynamite while cleaning her church for a party.

Pastor Hanna Peterson of the First Presbyterian Church in Kelso said she was cleaning the church Wednesday for an evening Christmas party when she noticed the explosive on a bookcase, The Daily News, Longview, Wash., reported.

"I was moving chairs and looked up and saw the nitroglycerin on it and said 'That's not good,'" she said.

Peterson said she had to make a couple calls to emergency services to explain she was dealing with a stick of dynamite, not nitroglycerine pills, but a Portland bomb squad was eventually dispatched and the church was evacuated.

The pastor said the dynamite was removed and the building was declared clear at 6:02 p.m., in time for the party to begin only two minutes behind schedule.

Peterson theorized the dynamite may have been among items donated for a garage sale in May. She said the item may have been set on the shelf during sorting and forgotten until its discovery Wednesday.

Eatery offers discounts for tattooed

LAKEWOOD, Ohio, Dec. 18 (UPI) -- An Ohio restaurant said it is offering a 25 percent lifetime discount to anyone who gets a tattoo of the eatery's signature dish -- a grilled cheese sandwich.

Matt Fish, owner of The Melt Bar & Grilled in Lakewood, Ohio, said the open-ended offer will allow anyone with a tattoo of the sandwich to get 25 percent off all purchases for as long as they wear the grilled cheese tattoo, WJW-TV, Cleveland, reported.

"We ask people to take our core logo and kinda change it around, make it something personal to them," Fish said.

He said Voodoo Monkey Tattoo in Cleveland is offering a parallel promotion for $25 off the price of any grilled cheese tattoo.