Weird story of the day

From The Guardian (here):

A parrot has been taken into custody in northern Brazil following a police raid targeting crack dealers.

According to reports in the Brazilian press, the bird had been taught to alert criminals to police operations in Vila Irmã Dulce, a low-income community in the sun-scorched capital of Piauí state, by shouting: “Mum, the police!”

The parrot, who has not been named, was seized on Monday afternoon when officers swooped on a drug den run by a local couple.

“He must have been trained for this,” one officer involved in the operation said of the two-winged wrongdoer. “As soon as the police got close he started shouting.”

A Brazilian journalist who came face to face with the imprisoned parrot on Tuesday described it as a “super obedient” creature – albeit one that had kept its beak firmly shut after being “arrested”.

   

Making omelettes

The Guardian gets righteous over wasted eggs:

Britons are throwing away 720m eggs every year – three times more than in 2008 and at a cost of £139m – according to research.

The scale of waste has been blamed on overcautious consumers relying on best-before dates to decide if eggs are fresh enough to eat, and the growing popularity of vegetarian and “flexitarian” diets has boosted overall sales.

Last year sales of eggs in the UK were 7.2bn – a 4% rise on the previous year – according to recent figures from the British Egg Industry Council.

720 million eggs sounds a lot.  But actually it is less than 12 eggs per head of population.  For every person in the UK to chuck away 12 eggs in a year does not seem so bad.

Furthermore, if the total eggs sold in Britain number 7.2 billion, then the level of wastage is a mere 1%.

 

The flicks

How often, do you suppose, does she actually attend a regular cinema?  The Guardian reports:

Helen Mirren has launched a broadside against Netflix at CinemaCon in Las Vegas. Speaking at a Warner Bros presentation of her new film, The Good Liar, she said: “I love Netflix, but fuck Netflix.”

Mirren continued: “There is nothing like sitting in the cinema.” The convention, at which studios air sneak peeks of forthcoming films, has previously been sceptical about streaming services.

"Nothing like sitting in the cinema"?  Plagued by the sounds and smells of those guzzling popcorn, while irritated by the noise of mobile phones. While those of us who are slightly deaf rue the absence of subtitles.  Having to attend at a pre-set hour.  And all at a cost which vastly exceeds a monthly subscription to Netflix.  Yeah, there's nothing like sitting in a cinema ...