NBC and Nielsen were expected to release more detailed ratings information on Tuesday, but preliminary estimates show the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics averaging a strong 21.4 million viewers in primetime.

While down 12% from the 24.4 million who watched on average during the more time zone-friendly Vancouver Games of 2010, it’s up 6% from the 20.2 million average for the last European Winter Games in Torino in 2006.

The Closing Ceremony from Sochi on Sunday averaged about 15.1 million viewers, well below the 21.4 million who watched the final night from Vancouver (following that afternoon’s Team USA-Canada men’s gold medal game). It was up slightly from the 2006 Torino closer (14.8 million).

From a competitive standpoint, the Olympics have never been more dominant. For the first complete week of the Games (Feb. 10-16), NBC logged its most lopsided primetime victory in network history.

http://variety.com/2014/tv/news/nbc-averages-21-4-million-for-sochi-olympics-down-from-vancouver-but-up-from-torino-1201118839/

SUMTER, SC (WIS) -

Sumter police were called to an Applebee's last week after they received a report of a man who tried to pay his lunch tab with a $1 trillion bill.

Michael Williams, 53, tried to pay the bill with his debit card, but after it was declined, he offered to pay his tab with a $1 trillion bill, police said.

Williams was arrested on an unrelated charge of contempt of magistrate's court. He was sentenced to probation and ordered to pay $262 in court fees.

http://www.wistv.com/story/24794238/man-tried-to-pay-applebees-tab-with-trillion-dollar-bill?hpt=ju_bn1

Orland Park police say a local man and his date turned a cab ride from Rosemont into an erotic adventure and then told the driver they couldn't pay the $83 fare.

Police responding to the 15500 block of Sunset Ridge Drive in Orland Park on Feb. 9 said they encountered an exasperated driver, two intoxicated, incoherent passengers and clothing "strewn throughout the taxi."

Prompted by the presence of police, the 27-year-old man used his mother's credit card to pay the debt, leaving the 31-year-old Elgin woman to find her way home, police said. Authorities said they took her to the police station, where she was eventually picked up by her brother.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/ct-orland-park-sex-cab-tl-ssw-0227-20140221,0,3172037.story

COMMACK, N.Y. (WABC) -- A man celebrating his 96th birthday got quite a surprise.

It wasn't the birthday cake, but what was inside the cake.

When they cut into it there was a disgusting find, a rat.

The store-bought cake came from a grocery store in the Hamlet of Commack in Suffolk County.

Neil Gold's Uncle Joe wanted one thing for his 96th birthday party, his favorite German apple ring cake and it had to come from his favorite store.

"He's had all their cake. He loves their cake. It has to be King Kullen," Gold said.

Uncle Joe took one bite of the cake Thursday night and complained.

"He said, 'It doesn't taste right,'" Gold said.

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/local/long_island&id=9441283

He's been to a doctor and a vet just to make sure, but Prime Minister John Key is adamant he's not a shapeshifting reptilian alien.

Mr Key was unusually forced to deny any previously non-declared extraterrestrial connections to reporters after an Auckland man put in an Official Information Act (OIA) request asking for proof he might be one.

"To the best of my knowledge, no. Having been asked that question directly, I've taken the unusual step of not only seeing a doctor but a vet, and both have confirmed I'm not a reptile," a smiling Mr Key said today.

"So I'm certainly not a reptile. I've never been in a spaceship, never been in outer space, and my tongue's not overly long either."

Last month, Auckland man Shane Warbrooke put in an OIA request to the prime minister's office, asking for "any evidence to disprove the theory that Mr John Key is in fact a David Icke style shapeshifting reptilian alien ushering humanity towards enslavement".

http://www.3news.co.nz/John-Key-Im-not-a-reptile/tabid/1607/articleID/331979/Default.aspx

A cleaner has mistakenly thrown away contemporary artworks meant to be part of an exhibition in southern Italy.

Works made out of newspaper and cardboard, and cookie pieces scattered across the floor as part of Sala Murat's display were thrown out.

Lorenzo Roca, from cleaning firm Chiarissima, said the unnamed cleaner was "just doing her job".

He added his firm's insurance would cover the value of the art, estimated to be around 10,000 euros (£8,200).

According to local press, security noticed a number of items were missing when the venue, in the province of Bari, opened on Wednesday morning.

It later emerged the cleaner had handed them over to refuse collectors, thinking it was rubbish left behind by workers who set up the Mediating Landscape exhibition.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-26270260

HADDON TWP. — Police arrested a Camden County man after he stole a sound system and other valuables from a Haddon Township home, then returned a half hour later to swipe the remote control he forgot to take.

Carlos Ruiz, 42, of Pennsauken, was charged with burglary, theft and criminal mischief after he entered a home twice in about 30 minutes on Feb. 4, Haddon Township police announced in a statement.

Authorities said surveillance video near the home captured Ruiz pulling up to the home in a SUV around 9 a.m. He broke into the home and spent less than 10 minutes inside before walking out with valuables, including a sound system, police said.

http://www.nj.com/camden/index.ssf/2014/02/nj_man_steals_sound_system_from_home_returns_half_hour_later_for_forgotten_remote_police_say.html#incart_river_default

Sword swallowing is 4,000 years old -- and it's still cutting edge.

"It's one form of entertainment that can't be dated," sword swallower Dan Meyer told The Huffington Post. "It's been 4,000 years of doing the impossible."

Meyer is now trying to do something almost as difficult. He's raising awareness about this incredibly difficult skill with World Sword Swallowers Day. Held annually on the last Saturday of February, World Sword Swallowers Day is a day when sword swallowers take center stage at 13 Ripley's Odditoriums around the globe.

"We have 42 confirmed, and there are two people who may attempt to swallow their first sword in public," he said. "The high point is at 2:22:14 local time, when all the sword swallowers swallow their blades simultaneously."

Sword swallowing is so difficult that there are only a few dozen professional sword swallowers in the world. It's a small amount, but a big increase since Meyer went pro in 1997.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/22/world-sword-swallowers-day_n_4831411.html?utm_hp_ref=weird-news

BAGHDAD — If there were such a thing, it would probably be rule No. 1 in the teaching manual for instructors of aspiring suicide bombers: Don’t give lessons with live explosives.

In what represented a cautionary tale for terrorist teachers, and a cause of dark humor for ordinary Iraqis, a commander at a secluded terrorist training camp north of Baghdad unwittingly used a belt packed with explosives while conducting a demonstration early Monday for a group of militants, killing himself and 21 other members of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, army and police officials said.

Iraqi citizens have long been accustomed to daily attacks on public markets, mosques, funerals and even children’s soccer games, so they saw the story of the fumbling militants as a dark — and delicious — kind of poetic justice, especially coming amid a protracted surge of violence led by the terrorist group, including a rise in suicide bombings.

Just last week a suicide bomber struck a popular falafel shop near the Ministry of Foreign Affairs here, killing several people. On Monday evening Raad Hashim, working the counter at a liquor store near the site of the attack, burst out laughing when he heard the news.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/11/world/middleeast/suicide-bomb-instructor-accidentally-kills-iraqi-pupils.html?_r=0

Looking to drum up some new business, 13-year-old Girl Scout Danielle Lei and her mom set out for a San Francisco medical marijuana clinic on Monday, armed with boxes of Tagalongs, Dulce de Leches and other cookie varieties she and other scouts sell annually.

Any patients at The Green Cross with the munchies didn't stand a chance. In two hours on President's Day, Danielle sold 117 boxes outside the clinic — people gobbled up all her Dulce de Leches and blazed through the Tagalongs. According to her mother, Carol, that's 37 more boxes than what she sold during the same two-hour period outside a small Safeway the next day.

Carol said her two middle-school-aged daughters have sold Girl Scout cookies outside a medical marijuana clinic before, though this was the first time they stopped by The Green Cross. She usually has them set up shop at various points around San Francisco so they can learn about different environments while earning some cash. Plus, Carol figured this might be a good way to start a conversation about drugs and how some use marijuana as medicine while others just get high.

http://mashable.com/2014/02/20/girl-scout-cookies-marijuana/?utm_cid=mash-com-Tw-bus-link