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The skinny

By TIMES WIRES
Published June 19, 2007

Medical reports

By not dying, he is now the oldest man

For Tomoji Tanabe, it's now official: He's the world's oldest male. He got the paperwork from Guiness to prove it on Monday. The 111-year-old thanked his children and grandchildren in a ceremony in Miyakonojo, Japan. Japan has the market cornered on oldest people lately, as the oldest person, Yone Minagawa, also lives there. She's 114. The country expects to have more than 28, 000 residents who are more than 100 this year. As for Tanabe, he freely gave away his strategy for longevity: "I don't want to die."

Elephant equivalent of a sports star

Jackson, 28, just seems to keep fathering offspring in one city after another. But everyone seems cool with that, because Jackson is an elephant. He lives at the Pittsburgh Zoo, and when Scotty was born in Louisville this spring, he was Jackson's sixth baby. (Well, the sixth that he knows of. Wink, wink.) And with six, he holds the record. It's not even close: five others have two progeny each. For the most part, Jackson's, um, seed is generally collected and it's all done very scientifically. But next year, the zoo is bringing in a couple of females from the Philadelphia Zoo to meet Jackson. If one thing leads to another ...

Police reports

1 car, 2 robberies and 2 arrests

Reports came in about a stolen Honda Accord in Yakima, Wash. Police spotted the car and followed it until the driver abandoned it. They then followed him on foot and eventually caught him in a nearby house. But by that point, the car had been stolen again. So police started looking for it again. They found it pretty fast this time, because the second thief abandoned it when he realized it had a flat tire. Police caught him, too.

Stash won't go down, but he will

A man in Wichita, Kan., was pulled over last week. Knowing he was in trouble, he started eating his stash. He did this without taking the marijuana out of the plastic bag. So by the time the officer got to the window, he found the driver choking on the bag. They tried the Heimlich, but that didn't work. So one of the officers reached down the man's throat and pulled the bag out. On their way to jail, they stopped in at the hospital to make sure he'd be okay.

Cops catch inmate catching some Z's

Raju Gaji's plan was either brilliant or stupid. The 19-year-old was missing from a jail in eastern India and was on the lam for almost 24 hours. Well, he wasn't really on the lam; he was on the roof. Of the jail. And he might have gotten away with it, too, except that Gaji snores. Loudly. Loud enough that guards heard him on the roof from outside the building. So guards went up and surrounded him ... and then woke him up. Gaji said he was bored with the jail's routine and wanted to catch up on his sleep.

Compiled by staff writer Jim Webster from Times wire services and other sources.

[Last modified June 19, 2007, 10:23:14]