yesterday was a ...

Good Day for Claudio Boccotti, a restaurant owner in Udine, Italy, who had been accused of tax evasion after revenue authorities noticed a marked discrepancy between the number of meals he claimed to have served in a tax year and the 17,000 napkins he had sent to the laundry. The judge, however, accepted his lawyers' argument that lobster was the house speciality and it left diners with very dirty fingers and above average napkin consumption.

Bad Day for Hagar the Horrible, as five Muslims, one armed with a knife, stormed the office of the Arab Times newspaper to protest at what they saw as a sacrilegious cartoon strip. The offending strip had shown Hagar on a hill saying "I pray and pray but you don't answer me," and a voice from the clouds responding: "Sorry if you don't get through right away. Keep trying. These days everyone wants to talk to me." The newspaper has since apologised.