Quick Takes

Royal mix-up

An errant gas bill from a British utility mistook a pub in London’s northern suburbs for His Royal Highness Prince Charles. The letter from British Gas mailed to a pub called The Prince of Wales ostensibly amounted to a collection letter alerting the customer of a debt of more than $2,600. The Jan. 5 letter even included the salutation, “Your Royal Highness.” In an interview with the BBC, pub owner Terry Gaskin said his Prince of Wales pub doesn’t have an account with British Gas. “I’ve no idea whether Prince Charles has been paying his gas bill or not,” Gaskin said. An official with British Gas said the entire letter was a mix-up—neither Gaskin nor Britain’s crown prince owes the utility money.

Customs-made pizzas

It’s bad news for Swiss pizza lovers, but good news for Swiss pizzerias. Swiss customs authorities ruled in January they would make no exceptions for German pizzerias to transport their wares across the border into Switzerland without a routine customs inspection. In the past, Swiss residents who lived near the nation’s border with Germany have preferred calling German pizza delivery companies because they charge prices 30 percent lower. But a 2014 rule change meant that German delivery drivers would have to go through a normal customs process when entering Switzerland to deliver pies. The process resulted in both cold pizzas and unhappy Swiss customers.

Uncommon cents

A California man spent $4,785,000 on Jan. 8 to purchase two coins with a nominal value of 26 cents. Kevin Lipton, a wealthy numismatist from Beverly Hills, Calif., purchased an ultra-rare Birch Cent at an auction operated by Heritage Auctions. Only 10 Birch Cents, an experimental line of pennies produced by the U.S. Mint in 1792, are known to exist. Lipton paid $2,585,000 for the rare penny and another $2.2 million for a rare 1792 quarter.

Wet blanket

As snow blanketed parts of northern Saudi Arabia, a Saudi cleric gave playing in the snow a cold shoulder. Cleric Mohammad Saleh Al Minjed issued a fatwa, or religious ruling, prohibiting Muslims from building snowmen. The undated fatwa was widely circulated in the Arab press and social networks in early January. According to the cleric, building a snowman represented the customs of the decadent West and therefore should be avoided. Ignoring the fatwa, some Saudis have built snowmen and even snow camels during the rare January snowfall. Al Minjed also prohibited Muslims from making snow replicas of animals, but indicated that snow replicas of ships, fruits, and buildings were perfectly compatible with Islam.

Canine confidence

A new rug at the Pinellas County (Fla.) Sheriff’s Office greeted visitors for months before a deputy actually read the wording on the rug. It turned out the $500 rug carried the slogan: “In dog we trust.” Sheriff’s spokeswoman Cecilia Barreda on Jan. 14 said the rug’s manufacturer made the mistake and is correcting it.

Phone charges

Chinese customs agents had questions for a man stumbling around a security checkpoint at the border between Hong Kong and Shenzhen, China, on Jan. 11. He seemed sober but was struggling to walk normally. The man then set off a metal detector. A quick inspection revealed the unnamed border crosser to be in possession of 94 iPhone handsets taped around his body like long underwear. Authorities estimate the value of the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 plus models secured to his torso and legs to be worth nearly $50,000. Because of the price differences between Hong Kong and mainland China, iPhone smuggling has become a rising problem.

Pound foolish

A Manchester, U.K., trade group has warned associated bars and nightclubs to be careful after one of its affiliates accepted what a local newspaper called the worst forged banknote in the entire city. According to police, a local nightclub accepted a fake 20-pound bank note that amounted to two color photocopies stapled together. Manchester Bar and Club Network spokesman Phil Burke told the Manchester Evening News that he had almost fallen for the same sort of forgery in the past. “Everyone was laughing at me,” he told the paper. “But perhaps if you’re working in a nightclub which is very dark with flashing lights, you might not spot that it’s fake.”

Name that goon

A local government official in Maryland has learned the hard way you never pick a fight with people who buy ink by the barrel. In an impulsive Facebook posting delivered Jan. 3, Frederick County Councilman Kirby Delauter demanded the Frederick News-Post cease printing his name in the newspaper without first obtaining the councilman’s authorization or face a lawsuit. Delauter indicated he was upset by a recent News-Post piece detailing his concerns about his personal city hall parking space. In its news report on Delauter’s Facebook post, the News-Post mentioned Delauter’s name 10 times. Delauter apologized in a later posting in which he reaffirmed press and speech freedoms.

Late for work

Shri A.K. Verma last reported for work at India’s Central Public Works Department in December 1990. And in January, more than 24 years absent from his job, the wheels of justice for India’s bureaucracy finally turned and Verma was fired. An official with the Public Works Department said the bureaucracy began investigating Verma’s absenteeism in 1992, but the official charges necessary to fire him were not brought until 2007. Then his case file sat in a drawer for another eight years. According to a 2012 report from the Hong Kong–based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy, the Indian bureaucracy was rated as the “worst in Asia.”