PALERMO, Sicily (Reuters) - In some places it rains cats and dogs. In Palermo, it rains mice.

Residents of the Sicilian capital say mice, which leap from rooftop to rooftop in the run-down city center, have grown too fat to jump and are plummeting into the streets, often hitting passers-by below.

Pictures of the area, where a United Nations conference on crime is due to start soon, showed horrified citizens looking in disbelief at streets littered with dead rodents.

Angry residents erected barricades on Wednesday night to protest against city officials' failure to tackle the problem, disrupting traffic for several hours, the news agency ANSA reported. The barricades were later taken down.

-- Brother Rat (Living@Palermo.net), September 04, 2000

Answers

Oh! Bleahhhhh!

-- (sis@home.zzz), September 06, 2000.

That is pretty horrific if you think about it. Around here the only thing we have to worry about falling on our heads is Seagull poop.

-- kritter (kritter@adelphia.net), September 06, 2000.

Alberta is officially rat-free, and has a publicly funded rat patrol to help keep us this way. I know it sounds bizarre, but estimates are that it saves Alberta farmers several *billion* dollars in what the rats would eat if they were here...

Other than the weather, Alberta is a *fine* place to live!

-- Tricia the Canuck (jayles@telusplanet.net), September 10, 2000.