Odds and Ends

OSLO, Norway - A Norwegian family's swimming pool wasn't just bolted down, it was in the ground. But that wasn't impediment to a band of determined thieves.

When the Nicolaysen family visited their mountain cabin over the weekend, they discovered a big hole in the yard in place of the swimming pool that had been installed 20 years ago.

"This can't be, we thought," Arild Nicolaysen told state radio network NRK on Monday. "We didn't think it was possible. No one can steal a swimming pool."

Evidently, someone did.

At some point since early November, when the family closed up the cabin for the winter, their 16-foot-diameter pool and all its equipment was uprooted and stolen.

"It must have been a terrible job to disassemble such a big pool. There is a steel lining all the way around, plus there is a plastic liner and then there was a skimming system, a filter system and a lot of big hoses, and pipes," said Brit Nicolaysen, who owns the cabin with her husband.

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BREMERTON, Wash. (AP) - A 96-year-old man aiming to become the oldest person to make a solo skydive had a rough landing near here and suffered a dislocated shoulder, but otherwise emerged unscathed.

Milburn Hart of Seattle jumped out of a plane Friday afternoon near the Bremerton airport.

"He said his arm hurt on the way out the door, so he had a little problem turning," said Dina Fodd of Blue Skies Adventures Skydiving.

Hart, who lives at the North Haven Retirement Center, prepared for the jump with five hours of training and a written test. He'd made two jumps in tandem with an experienced jumper last year.

The latest jump had some heart-stopping moments.

Hart held onto a plane strut for a second or two instead of free falling, hurting his shoulder and allowing him to only reach one of the two lanyards.

The folks on the ground watched anxiously as he swung toward the landing site, then away. Slowly, he dropped out of sight into distant trees, landing in an old gravel pit.

He remained lucid and clear-headed, and was briefly treated at Harrison Memorial Hospital in Bremerton.

Mike Faught of Blue Skies said Hart told him he'd like to jump again.

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RIGA, Latvia (AP) - Finding life on the run as restrictive as life behind bars, a Latvian man who escaped from a minimum-security prison five years ago showed up at the prison doorstep asking to be let back in.

Sergei M. - - prison officials would not give his full name - turned himself in Monday at the Vecumnieki penitentiary, 31 miles southeast of the capital, Riga, where he had escaped from in 1999 with 10 months left on his seven-year burglary sentence.

Karlis Serzants, a spokesman for the Latvian prison administration, said Tuesday that Sergei had been living in Riga with his girlfriend and had worked illegally at various jobs, but was finding it hard to find work and evade the authorities.

Sergei will serve the remaining 10 months of his burglary sentence and could face as long as three more years for his escape, Serzants said.

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BEDFORD, Pa. (AP) - The owners of a coffeepot-shaped luncheonette are hoping someone perks up and figures out a new use for the historic structure.

About a 18 months ago, a former owner donated the 1927-era Koontz Coffee Pot to the Bedford County Fair Board. The board moved the notable building to the front entrance of its fairgrounds and spent thousands of dollars to renovate it.

But now, the board isn't sure what to do with it.

"We're just letting it be known that if people have suggestions, we're open to them," said board president John Holbert.

Until 2003, the Coffee Pot sat on U.S. Route 30 - one of America's first highways, also known as the Lincoln Highway. Bert Koontz, a local businessman, built the structure as a novelty luncheonette designed to draw customers to the service station next door.

Some have suggested using it for a hot dog stand, a retail shop or an art gallery.

Olga Herbert, the director of the Lincoln Highway Heritage Corridor, thinks the Coffee Pot would be a great place to sell coffee cups and coffee beans.

"I thought it would be neat to work with local artisans to create coffee mugs," Herbert said.