Funny old world: the week's offbeat news

From outlaw ostriches to China's meaty rewards for slimming. Your weekly roundup of offbeat stories from around the world.

- Fat lot of beef -

A Chinese city has found a mouthwatering way of encouraging people to lose a few pounds... by giving them three times as much free prime beef as the weight they lose.

With obesity tripling as the appetite for the better things in life grows, China could soon rival the United States for overweight adults.

If the trend continues, seven out of 10 will have crossed the line by 2030.

"When you see delicious food, it's hard to resist," Haihua Zheng told AFP. He is one of more than 1,000 people who have signed up for the Trade Fat for Beef scheme in Wuxi, eastern China.

Slimmers in Yunnan in the southwest have a similar Flab for Potatoes programme. And if they really shrink their waistlines, they can even upgrade to chicken.

Supermarket chain Yonghui has got in on the act, with in-store weigh-ins to win free beef, crayfish or kiwi fruit.

- Big bird roadrunners -

Something strange is happening to ostriches in Asia. One escaped from a Thai cat cafe in the resort town of Pattaya and ran for miles down the middle lane of a motorway, passing out cars.

"Who lost an ostrich on the road? Come get him. He runs so fast," said bemused motorist Chairat Sompong as he filmed him.

The flightless birds are not easy to catch, with a top speed of around 70 kilometres (43 miles) per hour.

But the runaway, named B1, was finally cornered 15 kilometres from its pen.

The next day another ostrich went walkabout in the Chinese capital Beijing after escaping from a family, sprinting off down a highway chased by police.

After a plucky bid to give officers the bird, the ostrich was finally nabbed.

- Plumbing the depths... of space -

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Fans of the "Sesame Street" saga "Pigs in Space" will know that sexism is not confined to Planet Earth. So it was that when the $23-million toilet on NASA's Artemis II lunar spaceship broke down, it was the sole woman on board who got to fix it.

"I'm proud to call myself a space plumber," said astronaut Christina Koch, trying to make the best of a bad job.

A bunged up loo is a serious business with four people sharing a space no bigger than the inside of a camper van.

The cramped toilet is so noisy they have to protect their ears, and works on a suction system. Solids, however, go into disposable bags to be brought back to Earth.

Which is why there was a few titters when Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney called to ask Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen if his "preference is for maple syrup over Nutella on your pancakes in the morning" after a pot of chocolate-coloured material was seen floating through the capsule.

 - Moving house, twice -

An Australian couple have been forced to move their house after it was placed on the wrong plot.

Five months after Melanie and David Moor moved into their new pre-fabricated house in rural Victoria, they got the bad news that it should have been put next door.

"We got the call from the council to say it was on the wrong block -- and we actually owned the block next door," Melanie told AFP.

So they had to take a deep breath and spend a small fortune on moving the house about 100 metres (330 feet) by truck to the right plot.

- That seals it -

And finally traffic in the same state was diverted around a slumbering seal Friday when it decided to take a nap on a road.

The dozy pinniped known locally as Sammy was spotted snoozing near the seaside town of Dromana.

"You don't know where he will pop up next," local Laura Ellen told AFP.

"He usually sleeps all day," she said.

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