WEIRD STUFF

Tiny village votes to leave UK

LONDON (AP) —

A tiny English village has voted to leave the United Kingdom as a symbolic protest against government plans to house up to 1,200 asylum seekers on a nearby military base.

Residents of Piddington, which has a population of about 350, voted overwhelmingly for secession in the non-binding referendum. The results announced last Wednesday showed 285 votes in favour of breaking away, with 26 villagers voting against.

“We have given an absolute message, not just to the region, not just to the country, but to the world,” said the parish chairman, Tim McNally. He said the district will henceforth be known as “the Principality of Piddington.”

The attention-grabbing vote was called to oppose plans to turn the former Ministry of Defence Bicester base — which is about half a mile (0.8 kilometres) from the village — into housing for male migrants. The government says the site is “designed to be largely self-sufficient to minimise any impact on the local community.”

Residents in the Oxfordshire village have raised fears about safety, crime and the effect on house prices in the affluent area, 50 miles northwest of London.

Supporters called the declaration of independence a victory for people power and local democracy.

Others said the campaign had a darker side and stirred up fear of newcomers. Some backers of the Piddington referendum compared their fight against the asylum accommodation to the 1940 Battle of Britain against Nazi Germany.

Villager Herbert Owen, 76, said after voting last Tuesday that the independence referendum “isn’t just about Piddington,” adding: “It means everything our grandparents, our parents fought for. Today is the Battle of Britain.”

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Swerving van leads cops to mountain of silver coins

On a yearslong hunt for thousands of US silver coins squirrelled away in Norway, police investigating a money laundering case finally got a lucky break: A tip about a van swerving on a highway outside Oslo last year.

When officers pulled the vehicle over for inspection, in Baerum, west of the capital, in April 2025, they discovered tens of thousands of American Eagle silver coins. A second van that arrived shortly afterward was found to be carrying tens of thousands more.

The total take: Nearly 67,000 coins worth at least 25 million Norwegian krone (about US$2.65 million), officials said.

Last Thursday, the economic crime unit Okokrim announced that three Norwegians have been sentenced to prison over the illegal possession of the coins.

The convictions on charges of aggravated money laundering followed allegations that proceeds from a “major investment scheme” in the United States had been converted into millions of dollars worth of coins.

The three Norwegians — two men and a woman — were convicted in connection with organizing the scheme and storing the coins, and sentenced up to 2-1/2 years in prison.

Two Britons facing charges were acquitted. Both sides can appeal, and the verdict is not final.

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NEW YORK (AP) —

Man spent 20 years building NYC in his basement

For more than two decades, truck driver Joe Macken spent his free time building a massive scale model of his native New York City out of balsa wood and foam board.

When he finished, his daughter convinced him to show off the sprawling basement creation — encompassing over 800,000 structures — on TikTok. The video clips almost immediately went viral.

Now Macken’s model is on display at the Museum of the City of New York, which reached out to him after seeing his TikTok videos gain more than 10 million views in one week. “He Built This City,” as the exhibit is called, opened in February along Manhattan’s museum row near Central Park. It runs through October 12.

“I never really thought about finishing it because I had so much fun building it,” he said on a recent visit to the exhibit.

The museum’s chief curator, Elisabeth Sherman, said the model is a rare piece that appeals to both social media followers and traditional museum goers.

“I think people always want to get their arms around this whole city, this city that is impossible to know, impossible to grasp, and this is a way to see it from a bird’s-eye view,” she said. “We rarely have anything these days that reaches everyone in that way. We love that kind of energy it brings.”