Most of us can barely wait to open our Christmas presents every year, but one Canadian man has managed to keep one unopened for the past 47 years.

Adrian Pearce of Edmonton received the gift in 1970 when he was a 17-year-old student at George S. Henry Secondary School in suburban Toronto. It was from Vicki, his first serious girlfriend, who gave him the gift and then immediately ended their relationship. He was so angry and upset about the breakup that opening the present was the last thing on his mind. He simply threw it under the Christmas tree and when it remained the only unopened present on Christmas day, he told his family that he was never going to open it. Believe it or not, he managed to keep that promise.

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A Thai family received the shock of their lives this month when the man they had cremated 7 months before casually waked through the front door as if nothing had happened.

Sakorn Sacheewa, a 44-year-old man from Thailand’s Si Ka Ket province, returned home after two years working on a fishing boat, in a different part of the country. He had never once contacted his family during that time, so he didn’t really expect the warmest of receptions, but being treated as a ghost never crossed his mind either. Only that’s exactly how his family reacted when he walked through the door on December 17, touching him to make sure he was real. He later found out that to them he had been dead for 7 months.

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In an age when phablets and big screen smartphones are more popular than ever, one manufacturer is swimming against the tide by trying to make its mobile phones as tiny as possible. Their latest achievement, a phone that’s smaller than the average human thumb and lighter than a metal coin.

The Zanco tiny t1 is being advertised as the world’s smallest mobile phone. It can fit into the tiniest of pockets, can store up to 300 numbers in its phonebook and makes an adorable-yet-practical gift. And just in case you’re wondering, Zanco claims that it is indeed a fully-functional ‘talk and text mobile phone’, allowing users to make and receive calls, and exchange text messages.

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If run of the mill disaster survival kits just don’t cut it and you can afford to splurge a few extra bucks on something more befitting your social status, try Preppi, a luxury doomsday kit supplier for the super rich.

Film director Ryan Kuhlman founded Preppi in partnership with costume designer Lauren Tafuri, and they run the business out of their downtown Los Angeles loft. The couple experienced a small earthquake in 2014 and realized that they should have supplies on hand for such emergencies. Today, their Prepster disaster kits are the most popular luxury survival accessories on the market.

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If you’ve ever wondered why washing your pillow case every once in a while is so important, this case may give you an idea. A Chinese woman who, for some reason, hand’t washed her pillow case in five years recently turned up at a hospital in Wuhan, where doctors discovered over 100 mites living on her eyelashes.

The woman, known only as Ms. Xu, told doctors that her eyes had been red and itchy for around two years, but that she just simply got used to their condition and relied on over-the-counter eye drops to alleviate the symptoms, instead of seeing an ophthalmologist. It was only when the problem got so bad that her eyelashes and eyelids started getting stuck together that she finally decided it was time to get some professional help.

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Ever wonder what a cross between a bear and a large dog would look like? Well, if you can’t even imagine it, maybe these pictures of a bear-like dog rescued by a shelter in the Russian city of Chelyabinsk will give you an idea.

Named Medvebaka, from the Russian words for ‘bear’ (Medved) and ‘dog’ (Sobaka), the unusual-looking canine was recently rescued by the Nash Dom animal shelter, whose volunteer staff have been working hard to find him a forever home. Photos of the animal, with a head resembling that of a brown bear and the body of a large dog have attracted a lot of attention on Russian social media, and even abroad, but as it turns out, this in not some mythical creature, but the result of poor mixed breeding.

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Wealthy residents of an elite neighborhood in Bristol, England have installed ‘anti-bird spikes’ on trees  in an attempt to protect their expensive cars from bird droppings.

The spikes, which are commonly used to prevent birds from roosting and nesting on building ledges over public sidewalks, were nailed to two trees in the exclusive Clifton area of the city, near the wildlife-rich Downs and the Avon gorge. The use of these spikes in trees has outraged locals and environmentalists alike, with one Twitter user calling it a war on wildlife. The affected trees have been described by a local Green Party councilor as uninhabitable to birds. A spokesperson for Bristol city council, however, said that the trees were on private property, so there was nothing that the local authorities could do to stop them. The spikes had apparently already been in place for several years.

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Two male Irish friends, neither of which is gay, have decided to get married in order to avoid paying a hefty inheritance tax. It sounds like the plot of a Hollywood comedy, only in real life.

Michael O’Sullivan, from Stoneybatter, north Dublin, has been friends with Matt (surname not disclosed for privacy reasons) for almost 30 years. Both are in their 80s, and O’Sullivan is now Matt’s caretaker and stands to inherit his home and other possessions. Unfortunately, because of Ireland’s Capital Acquisitions Tax (Cat), which applies to gifts and inheritances over specified amounts, Matt would have to pay 33% to the government. However, the tax does not apply to gifts or inheritance given to a spouse or civil partner, so the two men decided that the best way would be to get married.

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Remember that time when micro pigs were all the rage and made everyone go ooh and aah? Well, now seems to be the time of micro cows and the adorable tiny cattle are proving wonderful pets. There are very few micro-cattle breeders around the world. and Dustin Pillard, who has been breeding them on his farm in Iowa, is probably the most well-known. He has been featured in newspapers and TV news specials numerous times since he began breeding micro cattle in 1995, but his miniature cows are now the smallest they’ve ever been.

Dustin Pillard, a 46-year-old father of three, grew up in the city but regularly spent time on his grandparents’ farm near Cedar Rapids. In 1992, while in college, he attended a cattle auction where he saw micro-cows for the first time. He was fascinated with them, so three years later, when he became the owner of a 10-acre ranch, he knew he had to populate it with the tiny creatures.He bought five animals and started what is known today as the Oxen Ridge Miniature Cattle farm.

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It may sound crazy, but a mere £10.50 ($14) could actually make you the owner of a swanky English mansion in Devon which also comes with a Rolls-Royce, £50,000 in cash and all sorts of extra goodies, including a fully stocked wine cellar, a 3-hole golf course, a tractor and the whole house staff for an entire year.

If you consider yourself a lucky person, and have a few bucks to spare why not enter the “Win a Millionaire Mansion Competition” launched by an actual English millionaire looking to make a profit and have some fun in the process. The owner, who prefers to remain anonymous, sees this offbeat lottery as a way to sell the property without too much hassle and make a lucky someone’s dreams come true.

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While most songbirds build small, discreet nests designed to shelter one clutch of eggs, the Social Weavers (Philetairus socius) of southern Africa build communal nests so large that they can pull down mature trees. Each structure can weigh over a ton, and range upwards of 20 feet wide and 10 feet tall, with over a hundred separate nesting chambers. Successive generations refurbish and reuse these compartments, often for more than a century.

Social Weavers utilize several different building materials, starting with a basic structure of woven twigs. They then line the interior with grasses and feathers and construct a 10-inch long, one-inch wide private entrance with downward pointing spiky straws to deter snakes. While a breeding pair will have a private apartment, most chambers house three or four of the birds at a time. The benefits of this lifestyle become clear in the context of the desert where temperatures vary dramatically.

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YouTube has become the new breeding ground for celebrities. We’ve got fitness gurus, product pushers, comedians, gossip peddlers, gamers, you name it. Some of these people make quite a lot of money, but one of them is worthy of special attention because he happens to be a six-year-old boy. His name is Ryan and he has earned an eye-popping $11 million this year by doing something all kids love: playing with toys. The difference is that Ryan works (sort of) for his money by reviewing the toys on his channel, “Ryan Toys Review.”

Forbes magazine has just released its 2017 list of the 10 YouTubers with the highest income and young Ryan rank at number 8, tying for the spot with comedy channel Smosh. The estimate covers the period from June 1, 2016 to June 1, 2017, during which time Ryan’s videos clocked up more than 8 billion views in total and earned his family a cool $11 million in ad revenue. The boy is so popular worldwide that other kids have started imitating him and launching their own channels.

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Science and technology progress so fast that something created only a decade ago will most likely feel like an antique to its present-day observers. This, however, is not the case with the ball-shaped houses in the Dutch city of Den Bosch: they resembled the set of a sci-fi movie when they were conceived in 1984 and remain as futuristic-looking to this very day.

Known locally as Bolwoningen, these bulbous homes were created as part of a Dutch experimental housing program launched in 1968. They were designed by artist and sculptor Dries Kreijkamp in the 1970s and the project was completed in 1984 along with another subsidy winner: the famed Kubuswoningen (cube homes) in Rotterdam, designed by Piet Blom. While the program was shut down the same year the Bolwoningen became a reality, this experimental housing complex continues to stand and remains as wow-worthy as the day it took shape.

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It seems that these days people will go to any lengths for some attention on social media. Take YouTube, for example: it abounds in clips that will certainly make you go “Wow!” but also question the sanity of the uploaders. One guy enjoying his 15 minutes of fame right now is 22-year-old Jay Swingler from the UK, who made headlines for cementing his head inside a microwave oven for some YouTube views.

In hindsight, it looks funny and Jay certainly got the attention he craves. However, it may have gone horribly wrong: his friends couldn’t free him for an hour and a half, and emergency services had to be called. As relieved as Jay was to be rescued, he is absolutely unrepentant, saying the whole thing is hilarious and he is thrilled with the attention his video has garnered.

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If you still have any doubts that mobile devices have taken over our lives, this should make you a firm believer: smartphones and QR codes have become tools of the trade for Chinese beggars. If you’re feeling generous, you can simply whip out your phone, scan a a printed QR code and transfer some money to the beggar’s account.

Local media have spread news of mobile-savvy beggars in the city of Jinan, in China’s Shandong province. They gather in areas popular with tourists, holding begging bowls that contain a QR code printout. Anyone with Alipay, WeChat Wallet, or some other mobile payment app can scan the code and make a donation. Wait, beggars in China have mobile phones? Well, according to state media outlets, that’s not actually a rare thing.

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