Poor Mojo's Newswire

Refusing to leave his abandoned apartment building in Jilin City, China, Wen Hsu feared that the uninsulated pipes running through his building would freeze during the winter. His solution? Just leave the tap running. Wen has lived in this building for 35 years and he's the last remaining resident. He decided to stay put even after real estate investors bought all the apartments in the block in preparation for a new mall. Worried that his water supply would be cut off by the frigid temperatures, he left the warm water running and diverted it down the side of the building — and this is the result. Wen says that the developers have offered him too small an amount to be able to buy another apartment, so he's refusing to sell his home.

But in late January 2009, a man whom Anaya knew only as Esteban called for help with a more exotic product: a hidden compartment that Anaya had installed in his Ford F-150 pickup truck. Over the years, these secret stash spots—or traps, as they’re known in automotive slang—have become a popular luxury item among the wealthy and shady alike. This particular compartment was located behind the truck’s backseat, which Anaya had rigged with a set of hydraulic cylinders linked to the vehicle’s electrical system. The only way to make the seat slide forward and reveal its secret was by pressing and holding four switches simultaneously: two for the power door locks and two for the windows. Esteban said the seat was no longer responding to the switch combination and that no amount of jiggling could make it budge. He pleaded with Anaya to take a look. Anaya was unsettled by this request, for he had suspicions about the nature of Esteban’s work. There is nothing intrinsically illegal about building traps, which are commonly used to hide everything from pricey jewelry to legal handguns. But the activity runs afoul of California law if an installer knows for certain that his compartment will be used to transport drugs. The maximum penalty is three years in prison. Anaya thus thought it wise to deviate from his standard no-questions-asked policy before agreeing to honor his warranty. “There’s nothing in there I shouldn’t know about, is there?” he asked. Esteban assured him that he needn’t worry. Esteban drove the F-150 to Anaya’s modest ranch-style house and parked by the back porch. A friend of his, who introduced himself as Cesar, followed right behind in a black Honda Ridgeline truck. The 37-year-old Anaya, a boyishly handsome man whose neck and arms are covered with tattoos of dice and Japanese art, tested the switches that controlled the truck’s trap. He heard the hydraulics whirr to life, but the seat stayed firmly in place. He would have to use brute force. Anaya punched a precise hole through the upholstery with his 24-volt Makita drill, probing for the screws that anchored the seat to the hydraulics. After a few moments he heard a loud pop as the drill seemed to puncture something soft. When he finally managed to remove the backseat, he saw what he had hit: a wad of cash about 4 inches thick. The whole compartment was overflowing with such bundles, several of which spilled onto the truck’s floor. Esteban had jammed the trap by stuffing it with too much cash—over $800,000 in total. . . .

Tehran, the capital of Iran, has a rat problem. No, let me rephrase that: Tehran has a monster problem, and they just happen to look like rats. According to Tehran's city council, radiation and chemicals that have been used against the rodents over many years have mutated the typically diminutive pests. The rats currently roaming the streets can weigh as much as 11lbs, and are now larger than the cats that used to prey on them. Chemicals and poisons that were once utilized to keep the pest problem in check appear to have no effect on the new, larger breed, so Iran called in the big guns - literally. After the sun sets, snipers with infra-red capabilities take up positions around the capital and begin scanning for the mutant rodents. After a night of "pest control," the bodies of the freakish animals are either burned or buried in lime to prevent the spread of disease. According to city officials, over 2,200 of the cat-sized rats have been taken out, but that's just the beginning. The city hopes to flesh out the sniper brigade even further, eventually bumping up their numbers to as many as 40 armed, rat-murdering men in uniform.