Never too old to tie the knot, and more

Never too old to tie the knot

Ebenezer Rose of West Palm Beach, Fla., who as a young man traveled the world as a Christian missionary, lost his wife of 58 years in 2005. His friend Monica Hayden, whom he had known for 20 years, lost her second husband last fall. This week, before a crowd of friends and relatives, the 93-year-old Rose and the 89-year-old Hayden tied the knot. “She had eyes on me all these years,” said Rose. “I told her, ‘Each of us is living a lonely life. Why not get married?’ By God’s grace, we’re here.”

A seven-leaf clover

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Nine-year-old Alastair Barnes of Salisbury, U.K., was walking his dog with his father and keeping a lookout for lucky four-leaf clovers. Suddenly he spotted one with not just four leaves but seven. No one knows precisely how rare seven-leaf clovers are, but it’s estimated that there are 10,000 of the standard three-leaf variety for every four-leaf specimen. “It just goes to show it is always worth keeping your eyes peeled when you are outside,” said Sue Tatman of the Wildlife Trust, a consortium of British conservation groups, “as nature is full of surprises.”

A degree in astrophysics at age 11

Moshe Kai Cavalin has just graduated from East Los Angeles Community College with an A-plus average and a degree in astrophysics—and he is only 11 years old. Cavalin’s parents initially schooled him at home, but soon realized that their son was a prodigy. So when he was 8 they enrolled him in an intermediate algebra class in East L.A.; by the end of the term he had earned an A-plus and was tutoring classmates more than twice his age. “I don’t consider myself a genius,” he said, “because there are 6.5 billion people in this world and each one is smart in his or her own way.”