--Sarah Smith Barnum

Not many people come home at night and ask themselves, “Is that a baby seal snoozing on my couch?” Actually, nobody does that, until now.

Annette Swoffer of New Zealand found this adorable baby seal curled up, asleep. Luckily for Annette, there were no bears and none of her porridge was missing...

From this story on the Huffington Post:

New Zealander Annette Swoffer got the surprise of her life when she found a baby seal in her kitchen, who later began to snooze on her couch, the New Zealand Herald reports.

According to the report, the seal wandered from the bay waterfront, through a residential area, across busy roads, under a gate, through a cat door, and up some stairs before he was found at around 9:30 p.m.

--Chad Love

Live bait anglers, prepare to get Crocodile Dundee'd, because this cricket is bigger than your sorry cricket. "You call that live bait? Now here's some live bait!"

From the (UK) Sun:

An explorer has found the biggest insect ever on record - so large it can scoff a carrot. She's called a Weta Bug and has a huge wing span of SEVEN inches and weighs as much as three mice. Renowned entomologist Mark Moffett, 55, discovered the cricket-like creature up a tree on New Zealand's Little Barrier Island.

By Chad Love

A coalition of environmental groups are suing the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, claiming the agency broke federal law by allowing genetically-modifed crops to be planted on national wildlife refuges.

From this story on the Mother Nature Network website:

Environmental and food safety groups filed suit on Wednesday against the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, demanding it end the cultivation of genetically modified crops on Midwestern wildlife refuges. The groups claim the federal agency broke the law by entering agreements with farmers that allowed planting of biotech crops on refuge land in eight U.S. states without environmental reviews required by U.S. law.

--Chad Love

Here's one from the "Watch Your Backcast" files: The artist known as Christo has won approval from the Colorado State Parks Board to erect almost six miles of fabric panels over parts of the Arkansas River.
 
From this story on Forbes.com: 

The Colorado State Parks Board approved an agreement Friday for the artist Christo to pay $550,000 to state parks to carry out his Over the River project, which would suspend 5.9 miles worth of fabric panels over parts of the Arkansas River. However, the agreement is moot if the Bureau of Land Management doesn't approve a federal permit for the project. The BLM hasn't made its decision yet. Christo's project would use heavy equipment to help erect a system of cables and anchors to hang the fabric along U.S. 50.