Here is a thief monkey!

Police in China said they failed to apprehend a thieving monkey caught on camera going into apartments to steal food.

Video filmed in Chongqing’s Qijiang district shows the monkey climbing on the exterior of an apartment building and entering residences through the balconies. The monkey was also filmed climbing its way through the building’s inside hallways.

Police said they were unable to catch the monkey, which took food and left some apartments messed up.

Officers said the monkey may have previously been fed by someone in the neighbourhood, leading it to return for more food.

Want to be a Lego professor of play?

The University of Cambridge has invited people to apply for a new, permanent role as the Lego professor of play.

The role offers a ‘competitive salary’ plus all the perks you’d expect as a professor at Cambridge, and will focus on leading the university’s newly established Centre for Research on Play in Education, Development and Learning.

The centre will ‘examine the importance of play and playfulness in education’, with an aim of getting kids equipped with skills in problem solving, team work, and self-control.

The successful applicant will also be required to do some teaching, research, examination, supervision and administration. So it won’t all be building rockets out of Lego — but that’ll likely be part of it.

The university states they’d particularly welcome applications ‘from those working in the field of play and playfulness’, but also any outstanding scholars in the fields of educational or developmental psychology.

The Guardian reports that The Lego Foundation is hoping for a candidate with a ‘childlike mindset’ — someone who’s ‘playful, extremely curious, open-minded, imaginative and creative.’

Rare albino deer spotted

Sacramento Regional County Sanitation District, the US has tracked an albino deer among a pack of 12-15 black-tailed mule deers, on its trail camera since September last year.

“We first saw the deer in September, so we think it was born in the spring or fall,” natural resource supervisor for Regional Sanitation Brian Young said.

Most white deer get their colouring from a recessive genetic trait known as leucism, but Young believes the deer is a true albino.

“Just based on the lack of pigmentation and the pinkness you see in the ears and around the eyes leads us to believe this is a true albino,” he told the Sacramento Bee.

The deer is not endangered by human contact as the Bufferland is not open to the public, but its light colouring makes it a target for natural predators.

“One thing about albino deer is their lifespan isn’t that long,” Young said. “That’s because they are conspicuous to predators and hunters.”

The Bufferland’s staff continues to monitor the development of the small deer population and hope the albino can live a long life.

Police called to ‘stop the wind from blowing!’

A Niagara Falls police dispatcher informed officers that a resident had called to request police stop the wind from blowing, according to an audio recording.

“All cars be advised, someone called to see if the police could stop the wind from blowing so they could sleep,” the dispatcher said.

The dispatcher then requested any officers with command over the elements of nature contact dispatch to handle the situation.

“If any of you guys could do that, could you let me know?” she asked.

Published in Dawn, Young World, February 18th, 2017