Weekly World News

....and here's a wrap-up of the Weekly World News :)

Greece's parliament approved an austerity bill, cutting 15,000 government jobs and reducing the minimum wage by 22 percent in exchange for $170 billion in bailout funds from the European Union and the I.M.F.

More than 80,000 protesters marched in Athens on Sunday, some of them looting and vandalizing local stores. At least 34 buildings burned, including a Starbucks and an underground movie theater once used as a torture chamber by the Gestapo. "This is worse than the Forties," said an elderly woman. "This time the government is following the Germans' orders." 

While striking in Brussels against an increase in their retirement age, hundreds of firefighters broke through barricades outside the prime minister's office and soaked riot police in water and fire retardant. 

A man was arrested in The Hague after trying to throw a marijuana snowball over a prison wall.

Dutch ice skaters expressed hope that the extreme cold in Europe, which has killed more than 500 people, would allow them to hold the traditional 124-mile Elfstedentocht speed-skating race for the first time in 15 years. 

Anonymous hacked into the servers of the Syrian Ministry of Presidential Affairs, gaining access to staffers' email accounts, many of which had the password "12345." 

Following complaints from Catholic officials, President Barack Obama amended a recently issued mandate requiring employers to provide free contraception to employees. "Thanks to President Obama," said Southern Baptist minister and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, "we are all Catholics now." 

Florence Green, the last known veteran of World War I, died at age 110 in England.

singer Whitney Houston died at age 48 in Los Angeles.

A Wisconsin company was reported to have granted a four-year-old's Christmas wish for a $380 "Persuade" dual-flush toilet. "'Mom, wouldn't that be great if I could have this?" the boy said during a visit to the company's showroom. "Could you imagine all of the things I could do?"

New York City hotels announced plans to issue panic buttons to their maids.

British mathematicians used the Rapunzel Number to solve the Ponytail Shape Equation. "We all have likely wondered about the fluffiness of hair," said Raymond Goldstein, Schlumberger Professor of Complex Physical Systems at the University of Cambridge. 

Following incidents in four other states, the notorious Piggyback Bandit was spotted in Minnesota, where officials feared he would again rub the necks of high school athletes and jump onto their backs. "It's the creepiness of the behavior that alarms most people," said a North Dakota activities director. "It's a little creepy." 

Filmmakers raised money to release a movie about Osama bin Laden and an "army of zombie terrorists." 

In the United Kingdom, Queen Elizabeth formally rededicated herself to England.

English gardeners dug up a bed of blue centaurea growing in the shape of a swastika in Weston-super-Mare.

The Newtown Creek sewage-treatment plant in Brooklyn planned a Valentine's Day tour package including gifts of Hershey's Kisses and views of its stainless steel "digester eggs," which process millions of gallons of gas and sludge each day.