Wide World of Weird

A weekly roundup of unusual news from around the globe:

Pop Goes the Marmot: A New Jersey company got something extra in a shipment of ball bearings from Japan: a furry little marmot. The creature popped out of a box to Nachi America Corp. on Monday, after being inside the sealed container since it was shipped from Osaka three weeks ago, police said. The workers named the creature Hector. The 15-pound “groundhog-type animal” ate a carrot and drank some water at the Bergen County Animal Shelter, then tried to attack shelter director Mary Ellen Stout. “I guess he’s feeling better,” Stout said. Hector will be quarantined a few days, then released into the wild.

Beanie Ballistics: For years, police have sponsored buyback programs like Guns for Cash, Toys for Guns and even Guns for Groceries. Now, there’s Guns for Beanie Babies.

Police in Kankakee, Ill., said they weren’t sure anyone would show up when they agreed to accept guns from citizens in return for Teenie Beanie Babies, miniatures of the beanbag toys that have sparked a collection frenzy. But 40 guns were handed over, ranging from an illegal sawed-off shotgun to antique handguns.

Weed or Food?: Residents of Carbondale, Colo., are being urged to eat dandelions instead of spraying them. “It’s the most nutritious plant on the planet,” one city official said. “It’s really a vegetable. It’s only a weed in the eyes of people who grew up in the ‘50s and ‘60s and moved to the suburbs.” Dandelion beer, wine and food contests will be part of the town’s July 4 activities.

BirdCam: An online site featuring photos of two Canada geese nesting on the sixth-floor balcony of a Virginia office building is grabbing 120,000 Internet visitors a month. GooseCam ‘98, a tiny camera attached to the side of the building, takes pictures of the flighty couple, which are flashed on the Web every 40 seconds.

The Longest Ride: Jonathan Thompson, Dion Hughes and Darthy Brown have had lots of ups and downs in the past seven weeks. They’ve spent about 14 hours a day riding a roller coaster at Six Flags Over Georgia in hopes of winning a new Jeep. The contest began March 13. They’ve already broken the world record of 23 consecutive days of coaster riding and have turned down a radio station’s offers of $1,000 each to stop. The trio--all in their 20s--ride from 8 a.m. to 1 a.m. daily, with stops for lunch, dinner and a five-minute break each hour. They must sleep in sleeping bags on the platform next to the coaster. They can’t carry books or radios to relieve their boredom on the ride and they’re not allowed to take aspirin to relieve the aches and pains of being knocked around on the coaster.

News McNuggets:

* A Buddhist monk in eastern Thailand stole the unhatched eggs of two snakes, claiming he could determine the winning lottery numbers from them, but police made him take them back.

* A South African “supercow,” which scientists wanted to clone for her ability to produce more than 30 gallons of milk a day, died after an experiment to take skin samples went awry. The average South African cow produces 5.2 gallons a day.

* Florida’s governor ordered a probe into allegations that lawyers for inmates on death row made $5 bets on whether the prisoners would be executed.

* A racehorse named Tulsy Tsan was pulled from a New Zealand race last week after track authorities discovered the filly’s name spelled backward could be offensive.

* Frustrated over teacher contract negotiations, a Duluth, Minn., school board chairman stabbed a pin into a voodoo doll and asked it to “exorcise the evil spirits” from the board, then resigned.

* A Hong Kong university student was arrested for robbing a woman at knifepoint to get money to take his girlfriend to see “Titanic,” according to the South China Morning Post.

* Wide World of Weird is published every Friday. Off-Kilter appears Monday through Thursday.