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Ship of Fools to run 3D church service

The world's first "three-dimensional" internet church service is being launched next month.

The service, on the Ship of Fools satirical Christian website, will have cartoon characters for a congregation. It will also feature wooden pews.

The service will be celebrated by a priest who will appear in cartoon form and who will be able to move around the church.

The congregation will be able to log on and see themselves as cartoon characters on the screen.

Simon Jenkins, the website's editor said: "We're running this as an experiment for three months and we are looking forward to seeing how people use the church and what they get out of it."

The service begins on May 11.

 'Mummy's boy'

Police in Germany had a hard time returning a little boy to his family after he told them his name was "Mummy's boy".

The boy, aged two, was seen trying to cross a street on his own at a red light in Bremen.

A passer-by alerted police officers who decided to look for the little boy's family.

But when asked what his name was, he told officers he was: "Mummy's boy".

Police drove around with him for a while, trying to find out whether he could lead them to his home.

During the trip, he told police he was also called: "Pascal's brother".

When police failed to find the boy's home, they took him along to the station. Meanwhile, his mother had reported him missing.

The boy, whose real name was Karim, had run away from his grandmother on a shopping trip.

Police returned him to his mother and told her to try and teach him to remember his real name.

This Just In:
Slave Lake,AB—Burglary Suspect Nabbed

In a daring daylight raid, local authorities think they have finally caught the "Easter Bandit", so called because of his brief overnight crime spree that ended in the very early hours of last Sunday.

Although it is not yet known what if any property is missing, shaken residents reported that a shadowy figure was seen by several children in living rooms throughout town between the hours of midnight and 5AM.

The capture brings with it a great sigh of relief from anxious parents who have been reportedly having a difficult time consoling excited children.

Too much time on his her hands Department:

Wolly writing creates new poetry

The poetry is also an exercise in quantum mechanics

A North East writer has been given a grant of £2,000 to use sheep to create random poems, which also utilise the deepest workings of the universe.
The money has been provided by Northern Arts for Valerie Laws to create a new form of "random" literature.

Each of the animals has a word from a poem written on their backs and as they wander about the words take a new poetic form each time they come to rest.

But the exercise is not just an attempt to create living poems, it is also, according to the poet, an exercise in quantum mechanics.

Sheep have individual words sprayed on them

The animals being sprayed belong to farmer Donald Slater of Whitehouse Farm Centre, Morpeth, in Northumberland.
Mrs Laws, 48, said: "I like the idea of using living sheep to create a living poem, and creating new work as they move around.
" Quantum mechanics is a branch of physics which a lot of people find hard to understand, as it seems to go against common sense.
" Randomness and uncertainty is at the centre of how the universe is put together, and is quite difficult for us as humans who rely on order.
" So I decided to explore randomness and some of the principles of quantum mechanics, through poetry, using the medium of sheep."

Sheep have individual words sprayed on them
Mrs Laws created a poem for the project, based on the traditional Japanese haiku form of poetry.
Each sheep had a word from the poem sprayed on their back, and when they came to rest a new text was created.
Farmer Donald Slater said: "After last year's devastation (of foot-and-mouth) we all needed cheering up and this might just do it."
A spokesman for Northern Arts called the scheme "an exciting fusion of poetry and quantum physics".
One of the poems created by the sheep reads:
Warm drift, graze gentle, White below the sky, Soft sheep, mirrors, Snow clouds.
From story found at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/2541761.stm

Discoveries from the Weird Wide Web

Ever consider what pets must think of us? I mean, here we come back from a grocery store with the most amazing haul - chicken, pork, half a cow. They must think we're the greatest hunters on earth! ~Anne Tyler, The Accidental Tourist