'Once again, he turned to Rubio'

In the ancient English region of Cumbria, a woman discovered to her great surprise that Leonardo, her pet tortoise, had fled her house in Ulverston. Rachel Etches will occasionally allow Leonardo to wander around the garden lawn to his great enjoyment. Despite being far from a sprinter, it only took one lapse of concentration for […] The post After 9 Months on the Run, Escaped English Tortoise Found 1 Mile from Home Having Hibernated Through Winter appeared first on Good News Network.

The post The Cat Grass Conundrum: Clutch’s Fetish For Foliage by Dr. Karyn Kanowski BVSc MRCVS (Veterinarian) appeared first on Catster. Copying over entire articles infringes on copyright laws. You may not be aware of it, but all of these articles were assigned, contracted and paid for, so they aren't considered public domain. However, we appreciate that you like the article and would love it if you continued sharing just the first paragraph of an article, then linking out to the rest of the piece on Catster.com. Hi, I’m Dr. Karyn! Read my introduction to learn more about me and meet my five hilarious cats: Clutch, Cyril, Alex, Zelda, and Zazzles. Of all my indoor cats, only Clutch tries to shimmy his way through a gap in the door. Fortunately, he is the antithesis of stealth, meowing loudly to announce his escape, and immediately coming to a stop upon finding a suitably lush and delicious patch of grass to munch on. This is very much a fair-weather enterprise, so I never have to worry about chasing him through rain or hail, only shine. With his mild inflammatory bowel problem, Clutch tends to enjoy the positive digestive effects of grazing, but I have to limit his exposure to the green stuff. If left to his own devices, he will destroy an enormous mound of grass in a single sitting, and then suffer the intense emetic (vomit-inducing) effects that come from overindulgence. I provide one or two planters with cat grass inside their outdoor catio, but I have to make sure they don’t become overgrown. If not grass, why grass shape? Paved Paradise I will never forget the look of confusion, shortly followed by disgust, the first time Clutch darted into our back garden after we had replaced the patchy, dog-destroyed grass with the artificial variety. As he explored the four corners of the ‘plastic monstrosity,’ I swear I could hear him thinking: What fresh hell is this? An unfortunate consequence of this particular garden makeover is that Clutch has redoubled his efforts to dart through the narrowest gap in the front door, taking advantage of our numerous parcel deliveries. Luckily, we live on a quiet cul-de-sac, and the only real danger is from the obligatory cat-hating grumpy old man at the end of the street – every neighborhood seems to have at least one! Clutch was even more devastated when many of the occupants of our little street paved over their front gardens, trading a small grassy patch for much-needed parking space, further shrinking his munching opportunities. On a positive note, it has made it much easier for me to give chase, as his options are now somewhat limited. You could say that Clutch’s plight has become a metaphor for the world’s ever-shrinking natural habitats. He is Joni Mitchell, lamenting the fact that ‘we paved paradise to put up a parking lot,’ so to speak. Few plants are safe from Clutch No Indoor Jungle for Me While the amount of accessible grass around the house has reduced, much to Clutch’s chagrin, his fetish for foliage is the reason our indoor greenery has been seriously reined in. His propensity for gorging on greenery means that I can’t even enjoy cat-friendly plants inside the house without coming downstairs to a sprinkling of half-digested leaves, stems, and petals each morning. Husband’s beloved bonsai has been banished to the downstairs loo, floral arrangements are re-gifted or relegated to the patio, and the only plants that are safe from Clutch’s herbivorous pursuits are either cacti or fake. One of our few Clutch-safe indoor planters~4 Clutch has never tried to chew a cactus, for obvious reasons, but he also avoids the non-spikey succulent types, giving me a few more options to choose from. More recently, however, he has taken to using some of my smaller cacti for another purpose: a pillow, proving yet again that cat logic is very different from ours. Most of the time, I would argue that theirs is usually superior, but clearly, there are exceptions to the rule. This article is a part of Dr. Karyn's series with her five hilarious cats. Read her previous article: The Meme-ing of Life: Dr Karyn’s Cats Recreate Their Favorite Memes The post The Cat Grass Conundrum: Clutch’s Fetish For Foliage by Dr. Karyn Kanowski BVSc MRCVS (Veterinarian) appeared first on Catster. Copying over entire articles infringes on copyright laws. You may not be aware of it, but all of these articles were assigned, contracted and paid for, so they aren't considered public domain. However, we appreciate that you like the article and would love it if you continued sharing just the first paragraph of an article, then linking out to the rest of the piece on Catster.com.

Books Horror Five Frightening Books About Fiction Bleeding Into Reality Stories in which the imaginary becomes all too real… By Lorna Wallace | Published on May 2, 2025 Don’t Let the Forest In cover art by Jana Heidersdorf Comment 0 Share New Share Don’t Let the Forest In cover art by Jana Heidersdorf “Do you read Sutter Cane?” You may remember this iconic line, and the violence that follows, from John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness (1994), a film in which the horror books of author Sutter Cane start to bleed, disturbingly, into reality. Sadly, you can’t actually read Sutter Cane (at least not yet—there will soon be a novelization of the movie with Cane’s name on it), but the idea of fiction becoming reality remains a potent one in any genre. There are plenty of stories that go down the route of a-classic-monster-you-thought-was-fictional-was-actually-real-all-along, but then there are the tales in which the truly fictional unexpectedly comes to life (often to terrifying effect!). This list offers up five literary examples of the latter—from dreams with the power to change reality to creepy drawings leaping off the page. The Lathe of Heaven (1971) by Ursula K. Le Guin Unlike the rest of the books on this list, The Lathe of Heaven isn’t a horror story, but don’t let that fool you into thinking that Le Guin’s version of fiction becoming reality is at all pleasant. The story starts with George Orr doing everything in his power to stay awake because some of his dreams end up changing reality (although he’s the only one aware that anything changed in the first place). While that might sound like, well, a dream come true, George isn’t coping well with the burden of this power. He’s forced to see dream specialist Dr. William Haber, who is initially—and understandably—skeptical about his new patient’s predicament, but quickly realizes that he’s telling the truth. Haber thinks he can use George’s bizarre power for the good of humanity, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions and dreams can be rather unwieldy, uncooperative things. All of that to say, read The Lathe of Heaven if you want a brilliant, powerful exploration of why playing God is a dangerous game. The Story (2022) by Ronald Malfi Ronald Malfi’s Ghostwritten is a collection of four novellas, each of which is a different take on the idea of strange and sinister books. The final tale in the collection—appropriately titled The Story—sees a choose-your-own-adventure tale come to life. While that may sound like pure childhood fun, in Malfi’s hands, the idea is given a dark twist. The novella kicks off with Grady finding out that his recently estranged friend Taryn has died by suicide. He takes it upon himself to investigate the odd circumstances surrounding her death and discovers that she had become obsessed with an interactive online book in her final days alive. As Grady continues to dig, he not only finds himself irrevocably drawn into the choose-your-own-adventure story, but also realizes that it has the power to actually change reality. Bury Your Gays (2024) by Chuck Tingle For a brief moment, Misha Byrne is living his dream: he’s a successful Hollywood screenwriter who’s just been nominated for an Oscar. But he comes crashing back down to reality when he’s told that the studio executives have demanded he rewrite the season finale of his hit sci-fi TV show. Specifically, he’s ordered to kill off one of the lead queer characters—playing into the notorious trope referred to in pop culture as ‘bury your gays’—because the algorithm says that it’ll perform better. Misha is fed up with queer characters being treated as disposable, but then he’s hit with an even bigger problem: the fictional monsters and villains from his various scripts start hunting him down… in real life. Are his fans taking things too far? Is the studio trying to scare him into complying? Or have his past creations really come to life? Bury Your Gays is a fun and thrilling roller-coaster ride of a horror story, with Misha serving as a lovable and hilarious protagonist to follow through the madness made real. But the book also has a serious side, delivering a searing critique of AI, corporate greed, and lackluster queer representation in media. Don’t Let the Forest In (2024) by C.G. Drews Best friends Andrew and Thomas provide each other with support and solace at Wickwood Academy, where they both channel their feelings into art. Andrew writes creepy fairy tales and Thomas often draws and paints the twisted monsters from those stories (some of which are featured throughout the book in gorgeously macabre illustrations by artist Jana Heidersdorf). Thomas is being unusually distant at the start of the new school year—which weighs particularly heavily on Andrew because of his unspoken romantic feelings for his friend—and each night he mysteriously disappears into the forest at the edge of the school. When Andrew follows him into the trees one night, he discovers that Thomas is fighting and killing the now-somehow-real monsters from his drawings. Figuring out how to stop the dangerous creatures from coming to life becomes Thomas and Andrew’s top priority, but there’s still time for them to (rather messily) try to figure out their feelings for one another. From the monsters to the emotions, everything in Don’t Let the Forest In is channeled through Drews’ lyrical, memorable prose. When the Wolf Comes Home (2025) by Nat Cassidy When the Wolf Comes Home launches into a sprint almost immediately. Jess arrives home from a particularly brutal shift at her diner job to find a lost little boy hiding in the bushes outside. She takes him in, but before she can figure out how to help him, a distinctly werewolf-like creature goes on a rampage through the apartment building. Jess and the boy make a speedy getaway, and from there the story is a fast-paced, pedal-to-the-metal chase that belongs in a nightmare. Although Jess tries to rationalize the beast she saw—that now seems to be in hot pursuit of them—it soon becomes apparent that the boy is far from ordinary, and his fear may just have something to do with the thing that attacked them. The horror elements of the story are delightfully fresh and creative and bring forth blood-soaked chaos, but it’s all grounded by an emotional core. Not only is the budding connection between Jess and the boy heartwarming to follow, but they’re both working through some pretty intense daddy issues. I’m always eager to read more horror and SFF stories where fiction somehow becomes real, so if you’ve got any of your own recommendations, please leave them in the comments below![end-mark] The post Five Frightening Books About Fiction Bleeding Into Reality appeared first on Reactor.

When I heard about the I Know What You Did Last Summer reboot I was less than excited. The original movie took the Halloween season … The post I Know What You Did Last Summer is back! appeared first on The Retro Network.

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A mountain lion, perhaps? Or maybe a black bear? Turns out, it’s neither.