Offbeat news briefs

Discount doughnuts for pretend cop?

A Dunkin’ Donuts in Florida was paid numerous visits from a man pretending to be a cop. Forty-eight-year-old Charles Berry was arrested last week after attempts to get doughnuts on the cheap.

Berry was allegedly under the guise of a U.S. air marshal, and used a police badge from his father to receive a 10 per cent discount. Authorities used a surveillance video to catch Berry in action. Upon arrest, Berry had 0.38-caliber revolver on his person.

Bring your parents to work day

LinkedIn held their first Bring Your Parents to Work Day on Nov. 7, with the intention of educating parents about the day-to-day activities of their children in the workplace.

Fourteen countries participated in the free event. The idea for the event was sparked by Danielle Restivo, an executive of LinkedIn, after she received an email from her mother who had difficulty explaining Restivo’s job to friends.

Google held a similar event earlier this year.

Volunteers lure escaped dog with rotisserie chickens, night vision camera

A rescue dog from Mexico named Zander escaped at the Victoria International Airport earlier this month. The dog reportedly slipped out of a harness after a previous flight.

Volunteers from Find Lost and Escaped Dogs (FLED) tried to capture the dog using three rotisserie chickens and a thermal-imaging camera, during a process that took approximately 24 hours.

Zander was finally captured when he found some chicken that was placed on a plate in a car and the volunteers closed the car door behind him.

Rover the robot rounds up cows

Sydney University in Australia is testing out a new machine to herd cows. That robot’s name is Rover.

The herding process went smoothly and the cows reacted calmly to the robot. Rover currently needs to be controlled by a human, but has the potential to be fully automated in the future.