QUIRKY WORLD ... A daily look at some of the world’s stranger stories

USA: Everyone knows it’s rude to interrupt, and so too, it seems, do marmosets.

Like humans, the monkeys follow the rules of polite conversation, chatting to one another in turn for up to 30 minutes at a time.

Lead researcher Asif Ghazanfar, from Princeton University in the US, said: “We were surprised by how reliably the marmoset monkeys exchanged their vocalisations in a co-operative manner, particularly since, in most cases, they were doing so with individuals that they were not pair-bonded with.

They found that the monkeys typically waited for around five seconds after one individual had made a call before responding.

In other words, they followed their own rules of conversational etiquette.

The research was reported in the journal Current Biology.

THE ARCTIC: The new shipping route opened up through the Arctic by climate change will not be crowded any time soon.

Cargoes of coal, diesel, and gas have made the trip but high insurance costs, slow going, and strict environmental rules mean there will not be a rush to follow them.

Looser ice means icebergs. One vessel has already been holed, and large ice breaking vessels, not always on hand, are a must.

Last month, a dry bulk vessel carrying coal from Canada passed through the Northwest Passage to deliver a cargo to Finland, in a trip its operators said would save $80,000 (€58,500) worth of fuel and cut shipping time by a week.

USA: A caring and watchful mail carrier in Graham, North Carolina, has been credited with saving the life of one of his customers who suffered a stroke.

Michael ‘Mickey’ Wheeley has been a US Postal Service mail carrier for over two decades, and knows nearly everyone on his route. He told WGHP Fox 8: “We come in contact with them probably as much as our own family members.” So when Mick noticed one of the mailboxes on his route was full for several days with packages that included medication, he felt he had to do something. “I said: ‘Anybody home?’ and the man muttered to come in and when he came in, he was in a recliner.”

The man told Mick that he had been confined to the chair for two days because he recently had a stroke and his caretaker quit suddenly earlier that week. The mail carrier called his supervisor, Carole Eckstrom, who then called 911. Mick offered to get the man food and he asked for “water and chicken nuggets. And I told him I’d get them and he sort of come teary eyed when that happened.”

Emergency services were quickly on the scene to take the stroke victim to the Durham VA hospital. Mick said he is looking forward to seeing the man come home from the hospital and wants to keep his chicken nugget promise, saying: “I still owe him some. But he never did tell me what kind of sauce he wanted though.”

USA: A western Ohio woman charged with petty theft for allegedly stealing $2.87 from a courthouse fountain says she is jobless and took the change to buy food.

WBNS-TV in Columbus reports the woman pleaded not guilty last Wednesday. A police report alleges she stole the change on Oct 7 from the Logan County Courthouse fountain in Bellefontaine, and an officer asked her what she was doing and found change in her pocket.

The woman says she worries she will end up in jail for taking money that she says did not belong to anyone. She says she has no job, is on the verge of losing her apartment and was trying to feed herself and her four cats.

The city’s safety director said that officials hope to resolve the matter before the November trial.