Cigarettes whisked out of sight at Canadian stores

You can browse the latest porn magazines at Canadian shops, but tough new laws mean that cigarette packages are simply too suggestive.

Shop owners in Ontario, Quebec and a few other provinces must now hide tobacco products from their customers under rules that will cover most of Canada by year-end as the country tries to stamp out smoking by young people.

The provincial governments want to discourage the habit by "de-normalizing" the presence of cigarettes, which typically enjoyed prime placement behind the cash register.

Retailers must store cigarettes in drawers or behind grey wall coverings that cost as much as C$1,000 (496 pounds), leaving some fuming over the cost, inconvenience, and hypocrisy.

"It's a pain in the ass, and a double-standard that the government supports liquor sales," said a Toronto shop owner who did not want to be named, but who noted children too young to buy pornography are still free to eye the plastic-covered magazines, which are only partly hidden by their shelving.

"It's kind of like a nanny state."

The law has its critics, including those who point accusingly at Ontario's provincially owned liquor stores. But advocates say the seemingly draconian measure will eventually work, and is too important to get bogged down by morality.

"Pornography, with all its faults and deficits, won't kill you," said Michael Perley, director of the Ontario Campaign for Action on Tobacco, an anti-smoking lobby group. "Tobacco industry products kill one in two of their long-term users."

Perley's group, backed by national cancer and medical associations, complains that the cigarette industry paid retailers to display their colourful products in prominent positions in retail stores.

The latest move puts Canada, which already bans cigarette advertising and sports sponsorships by tobacco companies, among a small group of countries which hides tobacco products at the cash register.

Iceland was first in 2001 and Thailand followed in 2005, while Ireland is moving in the same direction.

Canadian retailers complain the law will confuse customers and sellers, and stifle sales of their top product.

But the provinces, which are responsible for managing Canada's publicly funded healthcare system, say they are trying to curb the country's No. 1 cause of early death, cancer.

Canada's explicit health warnings on tobacco products, including graphic images of blackened lungs and rotten teeth, are already considered among the world's most direct.

"It doesn't take long to de-normalize social psychology," said Toronto cigarette-smoker Karolina Jonsson. "People underestimate just how much advertising we are exposed to every day, and cigarettes are the same."

Hen who lived at a McDonald's finally captured

In the end, the elusive chicken that took up residence outside a McDonald's just got too comfortable in its new home.

For four months customers tried unsuccessfully to catch the brown hen using bait or bare hands. Last week, the fast fowl was finally captured after it settled in for the night right on top of the drive-through window box.

A group of employees distracted the bird with bites of hamburger bun and nabbed it.

Restaurant manager Chona Cauley said the chicken's downfall was that it got a little bit too comfortable around the drive-through.

"Normally, the chicken sleeps in the bushes," Cauley said.

The bird won't end up on the menu. It has been sent to live as a pet with other chickens at the home of a restaurant worker.

Since the chicken arrived, customers often found themselves waiting to order their McNuggets while the bird blocked the drive-through lane.

Homing pigeon checks into hospital for rest

A homing pigeon on its last leg of a 515-mile race checked into the hospital for a well-deserved rest. The friendly pigeon flew into the Meadows Hospital courtyard earlier this week and stuck around after receiving a warm welcome, said technician Jennifer Sommer, who first spotted the bird.


"Miss Pigeon" was not afraid of people, making her popular with the staff and the patients at the mental health facility. She has even sat in on some group health sessions.

"She just sat on the picnic table, and just sat next to us and wasn't afraid of us at all," Sommer said.

Sommer called the number on the band on the pigeon's leg and connected with the Central Indiana Racing Pigeon Club, which said the bird belonged to Al Coury, who lives in Wanamaker, not far southeast of Indianapolis.

Coury raises racing pigeons, hand-feeding the nestlings to socialize them. He has about 100 pigeons in his loft. He told Sommer to feed his bird unpopped popcorn, which she gobbled up.

He said the bird was one of 12 pigeons he shipped to Montgomery, Ala., for release on May 31. It took the bird about a day and a half to get to Bloomington.

"It was a very difficult race with lots of wind," Coury said.

Several of Coury's other pigeons were home to roost the night before, and his loft won the race.

"I was shocked that they got here so soon," he said.

Lawyer sues Delta for ruining family vacation

A New York lawyer is suing Delta Air Lines for $1 million, saying his family vacation turned into a nightmare after they were stranded in an airport for days and treated disdainfully by airline employees.

Richard Roth, who filed the lawsuit on behalf of himself and his mother, said he planned the Christmas 2007 trip to Buenos Aires to celebrate his mother's 80th birthday. She had grown up in the city, but had not returned in years, he said.

Instead, Roth, his two teenage children, his wife and mother spent three days in airports, went days without their luggage, were treated rudely by airline employees and were forced to spend $21,000 on unused hotel rooms in Argentina, replacement clothes, and other costs.

"Through its gross negligence, malfeasance and absolute incompetence, Mr. Roth holds Delta responsible for ruining his vacation," said the lawsuit, filed in New York state court.

Delta Air Lines Inc had no immediate comment.

Roth said that he has been in touch with Delta about getting reimbursed, but was repeatedly rebuffed. He told Reuters on Wednesday filing the suit was a last resort.

After the initial flight from New York was delayed by more than two hours, the family was not allowed to board their connecting flight in Atlanta, Roth said.

A Delta employee "literally walked away chuckling that he had left them stranded," he said.

After waiting in the airport for hours, Roth was told the next available flight would depart more than two weeks later.

He then booked a flight through a different airline and arrived in Argentina three days later than planned. The family was not reunited with their luggage for more than five days.

"Suffice it to say, Mr. Roth's elderly mother was a mess. And she has been suffering ever since. The kids are all upset. And it was Christmas Eve. Mr. Roth had spent one-half of his vacation in Buenos Aires chasing Delta and its incompetent representatives," the lawsuit said.

Twin, separated at birth, sues for mix-up

A Spanish twin, separated from her family for 28 years, is suing the Canary Islands for a mix-up at the maternity hospital which led to her being taken home by the wrong mother, media reported Wednesday.

The woman discovered she had an identical twin when she was mistaken for someone else in a shop in 2001.

The two sisters , who were not named, found they were born in the same hospital in 1973 around the same time and a DNA test subsequently showed they were identical twins.

"In 1973 there were two assistants and one supervisor for 60 babies," Densi Calero, who worked in the maternity unit of the clinic at the time, told local radio. "It's not impossible to imagine something like this could happen."

The woman is suing the Canary Island health services for 3 million euros ($4.7 million) for emotional trauma, El Pais newspaper reported. "I wish I'd never found out about it," her lawyer quoted her as saying.

Her sister was brought up alongside another girl, believing they were twins.

Police hunt for robbers wearing thongs as masks

Police in a Colorado town are searching for two robbers whose masks showed plenty of fashion sense but little modesty: women's thong underwear.

A surveillance video released this week by police in Arvada, Colo., shows two unarmed men inside the convenience store. They stole an undisclosed amount of cash and cigarettes in the robbery May 16.

One man wore a green thong and the other wore blue. Each thong barely covered the man's nose, mouth and chin and left the rest of his face exposed. One also wore a pink backpack in which he stuffed the stolen items.

The suspects also wore T-shirts and pants and were described as in their 20s. One had a left arm tattoo.

Ticketed driver pays Wis. fine, 21 years later

Someone in Texas apparently had a guilty conscience, paying up on a parking ticket handed out 21 years before.

The Kenosha Police Department says officers found a $6 payment for the ticket, issued Jan. 20, 1987, in a drop box.

A notice on the ticket indicated that failure to pay within 120 hours would result in doubling of the $3 forfeiture.

It was signed by a man who listed a Dallas address.