STEER'S HIDE MIGHT HAVE SAVED ITS HIDE

A steer in Michigan might be saved from the slaughterhouse because the brown spot on its side resembles the state's mitten shape. The pattern on its other side is shaped like a U.

The steer, named Michigan, is one of 30 cattle on Jacob and Georgia Kessler's family-run farm in Saginaw County's Spaulding Township, about 80 miles northwest of Detroit.

The owners are willing to sell the steer for promotional or mascot use instead of shipping it to the slaughterhouse.

Time didn't heal this wound

Doctors extracted a bullet from an 88-year-old man in Madrid, Spain, recovering a piece of ordnance that eluded medics 70 years ago when he was shot during the Spanish Civil War.

Faustino Olivera proudly held up the rusty, deformed bit of metal -- its tip curved and pointy -- in video footage that aired Feb. 12 on the Web site of radio station Cadena Ser.

Olivera spent most of his life oblivious to the bullet that lodged in his left shoulder blade when he was shot with a rifle in 1938 while fighting for the Nationalist forces of Gen. Francisco Franco.

Doctors operated on him at the time but found no bullet.

Two years ago Olivera felt sharp pains in his left side. X-rays detected the bullet, and physicians said it was causing an infection and inflammation. They left the bullet, however, because it was close to an artery. Since then, Olivera had gone to the hospital every few months to have fluid drained.

On Feb. 6, Olivera was rushed to a hospital in the town of Barbastro because he had a huge bulge on his side and doctors delicately extracted the bullet.

Olivera said he gave the bullet to a nephew as a souvenir.

Itty bitty kitty survives in the city

A kitten that scampered out of its carrier on a New York subway platform has been found after 25 days in the underground tunnels.

Transit workers tracked down Georgia under midtown Manhattan on Saturday. Police reunited her with owner Ashley Phillips, 24, a Bronx librarian.

Track workers Mark Dalessio and Efrain LaPorte, making "meow" sounds, went through an area where the 6-month-old cat had been spotted.

Georgia responded, and they found her cowering in a drain between two tracks. She had lost some weight and scratched her nose but was otherwise fine. She had disappeared while Phillips was bringing her home from the vet last month.

Independent living, defined

Accidentally locked out of her home and stuck in the bitter cold, Geraldine "Gerry" Palmer took matters -- and an ax -- into her own hands.

Palmer, who recently turned 90, said a sliding glass door locked behind her Feb. 9 after she went out to rearrange some things that had gotten wet on the patio. Snow had formed a pile about 7 feet high between her and the yard, so she had no escape.

So Palmer picked up an old ax she had once used to chop wood and broke into her own home. She smashed the glass in the sliding patio door, then she reached inside and unlock it.

"I had to bang the glass four times with the ax before it broke," she said.

A penny saved is ... whoa

One man's collection of 301 rare American pennies is worth more than $10 million.

The collection featured some of the rarest and earliest examples of the American penny, including a cent that was minted for two weeks in 1793 but was abandoned because Congress thought Lady Liberty looked frightened.

That coin and a 1794 cent with tiny stars that were added to prevent counterfeiters each sold for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Auction house Heritage Auction Galleries held the sale in Long Beach, Calif., on Feb. 15.

Heritage Auction president Greg Rohan said the auction was the biggest ever for a penny collection, with hundreds of bidders vying for the coins. Advance estimates valued the collection at $7 million.

The coins came from the collection of Walter J. Husak of Burbank, Calif., the owner of an aerospace-part manufacturer. Husak became interested in collecting at age 13 while visiting his grandparents, who paid him in old coins for helping with chores.

Now that's how to be a centenarian

Retired British dentist Eric King-Turner, 102, became New Zealand's oldest immigrant earlier this month, disembarking from a cruise ship in the capital, Wellington, after a five-week trip from his home near Southampton in southern England.

He arrived with his wife, Doris, 89, a New Zealand national. They will live in Doris' hometown, Nelson, on the country's South Island.

Before he left Britain, King-Turner told the Daily Mail newspaper, "What's important is that when I'm 105, I don't want to be thinking, 'I wish I had moved to the other side of the world when I was 102.'"