When Trouble comes around, he’s hard to miss.

That’s because the Sacramento, California cat is 19 inches (over 48cm) tall from paw to shoulder, making him the tallest cat in the world.

Owner Debby Maraspina bred him three years ago and is delighted that her cat has risen to fame.

Trouble is part house cat and part African serval cat, a recognised hybrid called a Savannah, but his height is still surprising, even for his breed.

Mrs Maraspina told the Sacramento Bee that she didn’t really think much of Trouble’s size until a friend, who owns the world’s longest cat, suggested that she get him measured at a cat show in Reno.

The process to get Trouble registered and confirmed as the Guinness-certified tallest cat was a long one.

Mrs Maraspina had to get Trouble measured by a veterinarian and document the cat’s height in both photos and videos.

After all of that – and sending in affidavits – she received a call from London in November.

They had good news to deliver – Trouble was the new tallest cat in the world, beating out the previous record holder by about an inch.

Despite his size, Trouble only weighs 20 pounds. And according to Mrs Maraspina’s husband John, ‘He’s just a relaxed, indoor animal.’

While Trouble may be relaxed, he’s a picky eater and turns up his nose at regular cat food. Instead, he feasts on rabbit meat and beef.

And he’s quite pampered. ‘He expects me to get his food out, warm it up and cut it into chunks – off the bone,’ Mrs Maraspina told the Bee.

Savannahs are a recent creation – they were recognised as a breed only ten years ago, after existing for 15 or so years prior to that.

Mrs Maraspina says that the cats are difficult to breed since females are picky over which males they accept, and Savannahs that have more than five or six per cent feral cat are sterile.

Trouble is a quarter serval, and is therefore sterile, but makes a good show cat. (Mail Online)

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A 99-year-old Italian man and his wife of 77 years are to become the world’s oldest couple to divorce after his 96-year-old wife had an affair 70 years ago.

The husband, identified by lawyers in the case as Antonio C, found out about the adultery when he was looking through an old chest of just before Christmas.

He immediately asked his wife, who is identified as Rosa C, for a divorce as he was so upset over the betrayal.

Court papers released in Rome this week revealed that she sent letters to her lover during a secret affair in the 1940s.

The couple have five children, a dozen grandchildren and one great-grand child, but the discovery proved to be the last straw for the marriage, which reportedly ran into trouble ten years ago.

Lawyer Anna Orecchioni said: ‘The husband decided to file for divorce after finding the love letters. He felt betrayed and unable to carry on with the marriage which has lasted 77 years.’

The pair met in the 1930s when Antonio was posted in Naples as a Carabinieri officer.

In Britain the oldest couple to file for divorce was Bertie and Jessie Wood, who ended their 36-year marriage in 2009 when they were both two years away from becoming centenarians. (Metro)

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While most of you were busily sucking down eggnog, Jordan Romero, the boy mountain climber who became the youngest to scale Mt. Everest, was down in Antarctica setting a seven-peak record. The 15-year-old reached the summit of Mt. Vinson Massif yesterday, making him the youngest to climb the tallest peak on each of the seven continents.

The Californian began his quest at the age of 10, when he climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro. He later scaled Australia’s Mt. Kosciuszko in April 2007, Russia’s Mt. Elbrus in July 2007, Argentina’s Mt. Aconcagua in December 2007, North America’s Mt. McKinley in June 2008, and Indonesia’s Carstensz Pyramid in September 2009. His record beats that of Brit George Atkinson, who completed the feat in May at age 16. (BBC)

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Before her feet even touch the floor each morning, Bernice Bates is practicing yoga.

While still in bed, she does her vinyasa, a series of seven or eight postures that gets her blood flowing. She puts her arms above her head for a stretch and a yawn, pulls her knees to her chest, “walks” the ceiling with her feet and stretches her shoulders and hands.

“By the time you’re through — it takes about eight minutes — you’re ready to walk, instead of slopping around,” Bates said. “You can walk to the kitchen, to the bathroom, whatever your procedure is and not sort of drag yourself and say, ‘I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to do that.’ You’re ready to go.”

Yoga has been a way of life for Bates, 91, for more than half her life: She began practicing and teaching hatha yoga in about 1960. In a fitting tribute to her decades of helping others learn her passion, she recently won the distinction of the Guinness World Record holder of oldest yoga instructor. Guinness says she is the oldest yoga instructor to complete the complex verification process.

It’s an honor, the humble yogi feels, that isn’t hers alone.

“I don’t have this reward by myself,” she said. “I share it with all the students I’ve taught through the years.”

Bates credits yoga with keeping her flexible, fit and healthy.

“I think yoga is the best exercise there is,” says Bates, who has always been active and still swims laps.

“I’ve never had anything I had to go to the doctor for, except checkups,” says Bates, who tips the scale at 105 pounds and is about 5 foot, 2 inches tall. “That should say something.”

Yoga involves the whole body — muscles, ligaments, organs, she says, and gives you energy without exhausting your body.

“You’re not just standing on a treadmill and going, going, going and you get off and can hardly walk,” she says. “Yoga itself means yoke, that’s to join. We join our mind, our body and our spirit in everything we do.

“Yoga gives you flexibility like you’ve never had before, and it makes you healthy because you’re working on the whole body, inside and out,” she said.

Bates, who has instructed children and adults, now leads a weekly one-hour class nine months a year at the Mainlands Retirement Community Center in Pinellas Park, Fla., where she lives. Most students are in their 60s and 70s, though she has two fellow nonagenarians and several students in their 80s. (Today Health)

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Couple David and Janean Richards have an incredible 331,038 fairy lights covering their property – smashing the previous world record.

The couple, from Forest Act, Australia, have 331,038 lights covering their property.

David Richards, a barrister and father of three, has been working for the past four years to bring together all the decorations.

The illuminations have helped to raise money for the charity SIDS and Kids – an organisation Mr Richards said helped his family during tough times in 2002.

Although their entry into the Guinness World Records and the money raised for charity have obviously gone down well with the Richards, the household don’t plan to do the same thing next year.

The couple will be passing the lights on, as a way of encouraging the new owners to raise money for charity. (Metro)

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Dwarf Vince Brasco is the world’s smallest firefighter at just 4ft 2in (127cm) tall.

The 19-year-old has been manning the hoses at a station in Pittsburgh, USA, for four years.

Tough Vince works out to keep fit for the demanding role and can bench press more than three times his 6st 3lb body weight.

He’s also in such good shape he can lift more than 19st.

Determined Vince volunteers for his local station while working part time in an electronics store and studying to become a nurse.

Sounds like a tall order to us. (The Sun)

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• Jyoti Amge crowned world shortest woman at just 62cm tall
• She weighs only 12lbs – just 9lbs more than she did at birth

Celebrating your 18th birthday is a momentous occasion for anyone, but for tiny Jyoti Amge the milestone is even bigger news.

The 2ft teenager is already a mini celebrity in her hometown of Nagpur, India, but is now set for a huge record when she is officially declared the world’s smallest woman.

And despite her miniature stature, 61.95cm-tall Jyoti hopes to celebrate being crowned the world’s shortest woman by launching a Bollywood movie career.

She took the Guinness World Record from 2ft 3in American Bridgette Jordan, and celebrated her birthday with a teddy bear which loomed over her tiny 24.4in frame.

She measured 7 centimeters (2.76 inches) shorter than the 22-year-old American Bridgette Jordan, who had held the title since September.

A teary-eyed Jyoti, dressed in one of her finest saris, called the honor an ‘extra birthday present’ and said she felt grateful for being small, as it had brought her recognition.

She also blew out candles on a birthday cake which was comfortably bigger than her.

Even the Guinness World Records book at the ceremony came up to Jyoti’s waist.

Jyoti weighs just 12lbs (5.5kg) – only 9lbs more than she did at birth – and has a form of dwarfism call achondroplasia, which stopped her growing after her first birthday.

She has brittle bones and is likely to need care for the rest of her life, but that has not stopped her tall ambitions of cracking the movie industry.

Budding actress Jyoti, who is set to appear in two Bollywood films next year, told The Sun: ‘I want to make people happy.’

As a teenager at school in Nagpur, Jyoti had her own small desk and chair, but said the other students didn’t treat her any differently.

She also has to sleep in a specially-made bed and uses utensils that are smaller than average.

This was not Amge’s first Guinness record. Until Friday she was considered the world’s shortest teenager, but in turning 18 qualified for the new title.

She has grown less than 1cm (0.4in) in the last two years, Guinness said in a statement, and will grow no more due to a form of dwarfism called achondroplasia. (wrapup)

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At 24 and a half, Pip is way too advanced in years to be learning any new tricks.

But as probably the oldest dog in the world – and most certainly in her home county of Essex – she already has plenty of tricks under her belt – or rather her collar.

The terrier-whippet cross is believed to have become the most senior canine after the death of a 26-year-old pet in Japan earlier this month.

And Pip has lived a life that most young pups could only dream of. Jumping through hoops of fire, sniffing out weapons and even meeting Royalty, she has packed a lot into her 170 dog years.

She is still a key member of a display team for whom she has performed 1,000 times, and was singled out for praise by the Queen after the Royal Tournament at Earls Court in 1997. Pip took the mantle of the world’s oldest dog after the death of a Shiba mix in Japan called Pusuke.

But she still has a while to go before she can lay claim to being the oldest recorded dog in history – a title held by Bluey, an Australian cattle dog who was 29 when he died in 1939.

Pip’s owner Tiffany Dyer, 36, of Brentwood, Essex, said: ‘It is wonderful to know that she is the oldest dog in the world but the main thing for me is her quality of life.

‘She has the right amount of exercise and a very good diet but she is a little old lady now so she needs her time to relax and does have problems with her eye-sight and hearing.’

Miss Dyer’s father Roy, 68, said: ‘After the team performed for the Queen, Her Majesty said “Mr Dyer, that was absolutely brilliant”.’ (Daily Mail)

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A flamboyant entrepreneur with apparently more money than taste has turned a classy Mercedes into a ‘blingmobile’ – and wants £7 MILLION for it.

Swiss businessman Ueli Anliker is selling the one-off supercar after transforming it using a team of 35 workers who spent a total of 30,000 man hours and more than £3.5 million.

He has renamed the 200mph plus Merc the ‘Anliker McLaren SLR 999 Red Gold Dream’.

But his design changes have fallen flat, with Top Gear saying the paintwork could ‘burn a hole through your eyes and into your nightmares’.

The garish body has 25 layers of red paint with 5kg of gold dust worked into it. Each of the car’s wheels are covered in 24 carat gold as are the headlights and door sills

And the car’s supercharged 5.4-litre engine has had power boosted from 640bhp to 999bhp – giving it a top speed of more than 210mph.

Inside, there are jewelled indicators, a gold-trimmed interior and steering wheel and ruby-covered switchgear.

In total there are more than 600 rubies within the car’s interior, which would have cost around £300,000 before the staggering overhaul.

Mr Anliker is now selling the Mercedes with a ‘minimum’ price-tag of £7 million – making it the world’s most expensive vehicle for sale on the open market.

A spokesperson for Mr Anliker said: ‘Selling the vehicle has never been part of Mr Anliker’s motivation but he will consider a suitable offer.

‘Having invested about 5 million Swiss francs and more than 30,000 man hours, the car is worth more than 10 million Swiss francs, which is his minimum selling price.’

The SLR was jointly developed by Mercedes in Germany and McLaren in the UK.

It went on sale in 2003 with production running until last year. (Daily Mail)

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Adventurer Mark Moffett has found the world’s biggest insect – which is so huge it can eat carrots.

Former park ranger Mark, 53, discovered the giant weta up a tree and his real life Bug’s Bunny has now been declared the largest ever found.

He came across the cricket-like creature, which has a wing span of seven inches, after two days of searching on a tiny island.

The creepy crawly is only found on Little Barrier Island, in New Zealand.

The species were wiped off the mainland by rats accidentally introduced by Europeans.

After Mark found the female weta he fed it the carrot before putting it back where he found her.

Mark, 53, said: "Three of us walked the trails of this small island for two nights scanning the vegetation for a giant weta.

"We spent many hours with no luck finding any at all, before we saw her up in a tree.

"The giant weta is the largest insect in the world, and this is the biggest one ever found, she weighs the equivalent to three mice.

"She enjoyed the carrot so much she seemed to ignore the fact she was resting on our hands and carried on munching away.

"She would have finished the carrot very quickly, but this is an extremely endangered species and we didn’t want to risk indigestion.

"After she had chewed a little I took this picture and we put her right back where we found her."

Mark, from Colorado, America, added: "We bug lovers hear a lot of people who think insects are inferior in some way because of their size, so it was great to see such a big insect.

"This became all the more amazing when we realized that this was the largest insect recorded." (Daily Telegraph)

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