Best of Web: Docs fix boy born with no ear...

Docs fix boy born with no ear

(AGENCIES)

UK: Born without a right ear, Ethan Giles-Bowman became increasingly shy and self-conscious with each passing year.

He grew his hair long to try and cover up the flap of skin where his ear should have been, but was always aware of the way strangers looked at him, reports Daily Mail
Now the nine-year-old is enjoying a new lease of life after surgeons created an ear for him using cartilage taken from his ribcage.

It was a painful process, but the schoolboy is delighted with the result and proud of his realistic-looking new ear.

His insecurities have disappeared overnight and he immediately had his hair cut short to show it off. He can't wait for summer to come along so he can wear sunglasses on holiday, said the paper.

Ethan was one of the first children in the UK to undergo the complicated six-hour operation. He has never been able to hear from his right side, but a permanent hearing aid may be fitted in future to give him some hearing.

His rare congenital condition Hemi-facial Goldenhar Syndrome meant his right ear was originally little more than a lobe.
 
Badger babies rescued from floods

(AGENCIES)

SOMERSET: These super sweet baby badgers weigh less than four spoons of sugar each - and are lucky to be alive after being saved from British floods last week by their quick-thinking mother.

The 2oz cubs are just over a week old and are the smallest ever seen by Secret World Widlife Rescue in Highbridge, Somerset, and signal the approaching Spring.

And because the animals aren't normally seen until they first venture out of their sett at three months, they give a rare glimpse of what early life is like for the animals.

They were found abandoned in a barrel when floods battered Wales a week ago.

Staff say their mother detected the oncoming danger - as animals often sense disasters before they strike - and moved them to higher ground to stop them from drowning.

A local found them desperately calling out while stashed inside and, with their mother nowhere to be seen, they alerted Secret World who took them in.

Because of their light weight and the need to measure them carefully the two females and one male were named Lavender, Saffron and Nutmeg after spices used for cooking. 
 
'The most stupid criminal ever' pleads guilty

WASHINGTON: He didn't exactly stand much chance of getting away with it.

And the man described as 'the most stupid criminal ever', who stole a laptop then posted a leering photo of himself on its owner's Facebook page, pleaded guilty to burglary in Washington DC.

Last December, Rodney Knight Jr, 19, broke into the home of  Washington Post journalist Marc Fisher and stole his 15-year-old son's laptop computer, $400, a winter coat and another laptop.

Except to rub salt in the wound, as well as stealing the family's property, Knight also decided to taunt them with his very own calling card.

At the time, Fisher described how the burglar broke into his family's Washington D.C. home and kicked through the basement door while they was out.

Fisher wrote: 'He opened my son's computer, took a photo of himself sneering as he pointed to the cash lifted from my son's desk, and then went on my son's Facebook account and posted the picture for 400 teenagers to see.

'In the picture, the man is wearing my new winter coat, the one that was stolen right out of the Macy's box it had just arrived in.'

Despite Knight virtually designing his own wanted poster, it still took police almost a month to track him down.
 
Winner who blew it all...

Lotto winner who squandered $15 million.

ENGLAND: A man who won £9.7million ($15.5m) on Lotto has squandered it and is now an alcoholic, earning £75 ($120)-per-day as a painter and decorator.

Nine years after he famously turned up to collect his winnings wearing an electronic tag, 27-year-old Michael Carroll has turned up in a court again for breaching a community order for drink driving, MailOnline reported.

Carroll, who has a string of criminal convictions, frittered away almost his entire fortune on wild parties, cocaine, prostitutes, luxury cars, chunky gold jewellery and cash hand-outs to hangers-on.

He made the lives of neighbours a misery by buying a 1.2 hectare field to stage demolition derbies in old banger cars behind his former home in Swaffham, Norfolk.

The field was left littered with the remains of dozens of his crashed and burned out cars. At one stage his antics became so bad that council officials set up a hotline for neighbours to report disturbances he was involved in.

Carroll  was finally forced to sell his dream home for a £600,000 ($970,000) loss last August after wrecking it.

He started working as a painter after going on the dole.

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