Wis. couple says pet chicken alerted them to blaze
ALMA CENTER, Wis. -- A Wisconsin couple says fire clucks, not fire trucks, helped them escape a blaze at their home.

HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- Visitors to parts of Everglades National Park are getting tarps and bungee cords to make their vehicles less delectable to vultures.
ALMA CENTER, Wis. -- A Wisconsin couple says fire clucks, not fire trucks, helped them escape a blaze at their home.
BRASSTOWN, N.C. -- A New Year's Eve possum drop that attracts thousands of people to a tiny western North Carolina town will go on this year, with one big change: It won't involve a live possum.
CLEMSON, S.C. -- A college student in South Carolina set out to determine how to help turtles safely cross the road. He ended up getting a glimpse of the dark side of human nature.
ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Owners of an old-school soda shop in St. Paul, Minn., are being warned to kick the habit and stop stocking novelty candy cigarettes.
LOS ANGELES -- James Comisar is the first to acknowledge that more than a few have questioned his sanity for spending the better part of 25 years collecting everything from the costume George Reeves wore in the 1950s TV show "Superman" to the entire set of "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson."
JOHANNESBURG -- They say cats have nine lives. Now a Chinese toad has joined that reputed club of wily survivors.
DENVER -- Officials in Denver want people to know this is only a test.
CHICAGO -- First, there was "Raiders of the Lost Ark." Now, there's "Mailers of the Lost Package."
CHICAGO -- University of Chicago officials are puzzled by a mystery piece of mail seemingly linked to the Indiana Jones movie series.
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. -- A man in Virginia Beach picked up an unusual jogging partner when an emu began following him.
HOLLY HILL, Fla. -- Police in central Florida say a man fatally shot his roommate during an argument over how to prepare pork chops.
VIENNA -- An Austrian museum says a man took the concept of life imitating art to an extreme when he suddenly stripped at an exhibition of pictures and sculptures portraying nude men through the ages.
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. -- A holiday tradition in this upstate New York resort town has a peppermint twist: pig-shaped hard candies are sold with little metal hammers to smash them at Christmas.
TORONTO -- The owner of a monkey caught wandering outside an Ikea store in Toronto says the tiny primate rarely left her side until he was confiscated by authorities -- and she wants him back.
MOSCOW -- "Men in Black" agents K and J may be about to recruit a new Russian assistant: Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev.
TORONTO -- Shoppers at an Ikea store in Toronto weren't monkeying around when they reported a primate on the loose.
VIENNA -- Vienna's transport authority says a city bus driver checking a bag left behind by a passenger had the surprise of his life -- (euro) 390,000 (more than $500,000) in neatly stacked 500-euro bills.
SOUTH PORTLAND, Maine -- A mall in Maine has sacked Santa Claus after children and parents complained he was rude, grumpy and wouldn't even let one child sit on his lap.
PENN HILLS, Pa. -- Some residents of a Pittsburgh suburb have gift-wrapped something they hope will be gone by Christmas: a charred and abandoned house that burned nine months ago.