Profit time: Man snaps up $6 watch and sells for $35k
Zach Norris said he went to a Goodwill store in January to look for a golf cart.
He recognised the 1959 Jaeger-LeCoultre diving watch, he told KTVK-TV.
“I’ve found some stuff in the past that I have been really excited about and stoked, but this is one of those things you’re like, ‘One day, one day it will happen,’ and it happened for me,” Norris told the TV station.
Norris took his purchase to a dealer for the brand, Oliver Smith Jeweller in the Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale. The business’ watchmaker authenticated the timepiece.
The watch was “worn, but not badly worn, certainly wearable,” vice president Paul White said said.
Norris announced his find on a website for watch collectors, and a San Francisco enthusiast gave Norris $35,000 plus a less valuable watch.
Asked about the price tag, White said it was “market-driven”. The watch was part of a production run of about 1,000 and “a rare enough piece” that it would have garnered interest among collectors, White said.
Norris says the proceeds will help pay for his wedding.
The discovery shows there are deals to be had at the thrift stores, Goodwill spokeswoman Summer Dunham said.
A Wisconsin mayor who catapulted to internet fame after he was bitten on the ear during a Groundhog Day event earlier this month has lost his seat in a primary election.
Jon Freund, who was appointed mayor of Sun Prairie in 2014, finished third among three candidates in Tuesday’s primary in the Madison, Wisconsin suburb.
Jimmy the Groundhog bit Freund’s left ear as an assistant lifted the rodent up toward the mayor during a Groundhog Day celebration on February 2. By tradition the groundhog is supposed to whisper a prediction only the mayor can understand.
Freund told the crowd that Jimmy predicted spring is on the way. The mayor also pardoned Jimmy the next day in a city proclamation, drawing appreciation from Jimmy’s significant other Clara, a groundhog, according to her Facebook page.
“If I were a human in your town, you would definitely get my vote,” she wrote. Freund responded: “Thank you Clara for your endorsement.”
A Massachusetts man accused of breaking into a restaurant, munching on pizza and guzzling beer before making off with $150 (€132) has been sentenced to a year of probation.
Daulton Young, of Pittsfield, was connected to the break-in last summer at the East Side Cafe by police who traced two calls from the restaurant’s phone to Young’s girlfriend.
Cafe employees arrived to discover a half-eaten pizza, an empty beer bottle and two cash registers that had been pilfered.
His attorney says Young has an alcohol problem.
Carnegie Mellon University mistakenly informed about 800 applicants that they had won a place in one of the school’s prestigious computer science programmes before retracting the acceptance letters, the school said.
The acceptance letters were sent by email on Monday, according to the Pittsburgh-based school.
Many hours later — enough time for applicants to share what they thought was happy news with family and friends — the school sent out another round of emails telling the applicants they did not get in after all.
“We understand the disappointment created by this mistake,” university spokesman Byron Spice said in a statement.
