WEIRD STUFF: Duck runs marathon in New York

Duck runs marathon in New York

Wrinkle the duck was awarded a medal for completing the Long Island race and has gone viral on social media after a clip was posted on Instagram.

The duck also stopped for a photo opportunity after completing the marathon, as she showed off her prize.

The caption on the post read: 'Wrinkle Finished a Marathon. Thanks so much to @limarathon for having Wrinkle as a special guest to run in the Long Island Marathon Weekend (sic).'

An announcer can be heard saying: "I watched a duck run a race and cross the finish line."

The duck has previous sporting experience after waddling through the New York City Marathon last year with her own custom duck shoes.

------------

Golf fan on world tour of courses

A crazy golf fanatic has spent PS50,000 (approximately $9.5 million) touring courses around the world.

Richard Gottfried says his obsession with the sport began in 2006, when he won a free game after a hole-in-one, and has vowed never to hang up his putter.

The marketing consultant and his wife Emily have since teed off, both around the UK and beyond, on almost 1,000 courses.

Gottfried says his finest moment was winning a tournament in Las Vegas in 2011.

He told The Sun newspaper: "To a layperson, the courses all look the same. When you've played them all, they all feel very different.

"The courses I enjoy most are when I don't know what to expect. Some courses have to be seen to be believed.

"You forget everything going on in the world. All you want to do is get the ball in the hole.

"I will be playing forever."

---------------

Aliens could feast eyes on nude humans

Researchers want to send illustrations of nude humans into space.

The experts are hoping to send a coded message to aliens with the 'A Beacon in the Galaxy' proposal, which has been presented to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

It calls for a binary-coded message "developed for transmission to extraterrestrial intelligences (ETI) in the Milky Way Galaxy".

NASA has previously sent aspects of humanity into orbit, notably lyrics and quotes from The Beatles in last year's Lucy Mission, but the new proposal wants to focus on mathematics and physics.

The scientists said: "This information is part of the basic expectation of any message to an ETI, as it allows recognition of our appearance -- a detail of a given ETI that would no doubt be of interest to us, and relevant, should further exchanges be established, or we someday physically meet."

---------------

Social media break reduces depression

A new study has revealed that taking a brief break from apps such as Instagram and TikTok is beneficial for a person's mental health.

The boffins split a sample of 154 people age between 18 and 72 into two groups -- one of which was banned from social media, while the other was not.

Those who took a one-week break from social media saw their well-being climb from an average of 46 to 55.93 on The Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale. Levels of depression and anxiety also fell.

Dr Jeff Lambert, who led a team of researchers from the University of Bath, said: "Social media is a part of life and for many people, it's an indispensable part of who they are and how they interact with others.

"But if you are spending hours each week scrolling and you feel it is negatively impacting you, it could be worth cutting down on your usage to see if it helps."