An 80-year-old Indian woman has admitted eating a kilo of sand everyday to keep herself fit and healthy.

Ram Rati, told the Asian News International she considers sand a vital part of her daily and eats a kilo of it before breakfast, lunch and after tea.

An Iowa woman, 60, was in for a surprise when she discovered a dead bat in her tea mug only after sipping all day from the cup.

The brown bat was about the size of two tea bags. The woman, who refused to identify herself, forwarded the bat to the Siouxland health office.

Next year, the first Malaysian astronaut in space aboard a Russian rocket will try to make the nation's favorite hot drink, teh tarik.

"The physics experiment is to see what happens to teh tarik in space," Haniff Omar, head of Malaysia's astronaut selection program, told Reuters.

Worms have a room of their at one plush hotel in South Africa. The five-star Mount Nelson uses red wrigglers or tiger worms to eat scrap food and in turn, the worms produce rich compost and fertilizer.

Their fluid excrement is called "worm tea" and is harvested to be used as a fertilizer in the hotel's gardens. The worm's other by-product is vermicast, a rich compost.

Hotel bars are shifting gear from being "night-time watering holes" into all-purpose hangouts targeting younger customers and boosting profits.

Michel Morauw, general manager of the newly restored Park Hyatt in Washington told USA Today, "People's lifestyles have changed...Not everybody wants to have a scotch and cigar at 11 p.m. in the bar."