Odds and ends for August 10

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Crew paints yellow line over raccoon

Crew paints yellow line over raccoon

JOHNSTOWN, Pa. (AP) — The “squirrelly” configuration of a western Pennsylvania road helped cause a state road crew to paint a double-yellow line over a dead raccoon.

Motorcyclist Sean McAfee snapped a photo of the mistake before it could be cleaned up and submitted it to the Tribune-Democrat of Johnstown.

He says he almost crashed, he was laughing so hard.

PennDOT spokesman John Ambrosini says paint crews usually have a foreman on the job who clears away any dead animals before the paint-spraying truck equipment passes by. This crew didn’t have a foreman and the equipment was too big to turn around in traffic, remove the animal and repair the paint. He says “the squirrelly geometry” of the narrow road didn’t help. But the crew did try to stop the paint gun.

DC man orders TV, gets assault rifle

WASHINGTON (AP) — A Washington musician who ordered a flat-screen TV from Amazon.com was shocked to receive a semiautomatic assault rifle instead.

Thirty-eight-year-old Seth Horvitz says he purchased the 39-inch television from a third-party seller. A box arrived from UPS on Tuesday evening, and it seemed too small to contain the TV. He says he initially thought it contained accessories.

But when he opened it, he found a Sig Sauer military-style rifle. He says he had never held a gun before he felt the trigger of the rifle.

An invoice showed that the gun was intended for delivery to a firearms dealer in Duncansville, Pa. Horvitz called police, who took the gun and are investigating how the mistaken shipment occurred.