Coin flip decides mayor’s race
Nearly a month after the Nov. 3 election, a coin toss has settled an Ohio mayor’s race that remained tied after a recount. Jerry Fiala will be sworn in as the new mayor of Kent, though he and opponent Rick Hawksley still had 2,502 votes each at the end of a three-hour recount Monday. Fiala had won a coin flip on Nov. 20, the day the Portage County elections chief had to certify the results and declare a winner. So, Fiala’s choice of ``heads’’ now makes his win final, because the automatic recount didn’t break the tie in the city about 30 miles southeast of Cleveland. Hawksley says he won’t challenge the other man’s victory. Fiala says he doesn’t know if he considers himself lucky, but he jokes he’s had half a dozen offers to go to Las Vegas.Giant egg mystery turns out to be joke
A West Virginia mystery egg has turned out to be nothing more than a practical yolk. Days after Sherman Farley found a giant egg while hunting in central West Virginia near Clendenin, another man has admitted planting it in the woods as a joke. Herbert Herold says he got the ostrich egg from Benedict Haid Farm, about three miles from where Farley found it. Herold left it in the woods, hoping his brother Bill, who was hunting nearby, would find it. But Farley found it first, and the 4.5-pound egg with a diameter of 18 inches had wildlife experts puzzled. Farley’s wife, Rosie, has emptied and bleached the egg, which now sits on her kitchen counter.Board sued over fish pedicure
A conservative watchdog group has filed a lawsuit against an Arizona agency on behalf of a salon owner who uses nibbling fish to remove dead skin from the feet of customers. The lawsuit filed by Goldwater Institute on Monday says the Arizona Board of Cosmetology overstepped its bounds when it decided the fish perform pedicures and are subject to regulatory control. Cindy Vong opened Spa Fish Therapy in Gilbert last year and charged customers $30 to plunge their feet into a clean tank filled with fish, which nibble on customers’ feet, removing dead skin. The therapy is popular in Asia and some U.S. states. It uses small fish imported from China. The board ordered the spa to close because the fish cannot be sterilized. Vong says the move cost her a substantial financial investment and lost business.Strip club robbed, woman escapes
The woman who got police attention at Diva’s Gentlemens Club in Lexington, Va., wasn’t on stage, but at the front door. WLEX-TV in Lexington reported a white woman with shoulder-length blond hair pulled a gun and demanded money from the cashier at the entrance of the strip club, then got away on foot. The cashier wasn’t hurt. The robbery occurred about 10 p.m. Sunday and the suspect was wearing a white raincoat, black pants and boots.