GERMANY. Pope?s parents met through personal ad. Pope Benedict?s father met his mother by advertising for a wife in a local Roman Catholic newspaper, a German paper reported yesterday. ?Bild am Sonntag (BamS)? said 43-year-old Joseph Ratzinger senior placed an advertisement as a ?low-level civil servant? seeking ?a good Catholic girl, who can cook and sew a bit ... to marry as soon as possible, preferably with a picture,? in a Bavarian paper in March 1920. He got married by November.

SPACE. Atlantis astronauts inspect shuttle for damage. Shuttle Atlantis astronauts guided yesterday a sensor-laden robot arm along the outside of their spacecraft to check for damage after launching on a flight to restart construction of the International Space Station. NASA executives said pieces of ice and foam from Atlantis? fuel tank glanced off the spacecraft several minutes after take-off from Florida on Saturday, but they believe no harm was done. The six astronauts on Atlantis are on their way to the space station on the first flight to resume assembly of the half-finished $100 billion outpost. They are scheduled to arrive today.

AUSTRALIA. Crocodile Hunter gets private funeral. A private funeral service was held for Australian TV naturalist Steve Irwin on Saturday and he will be buried at his family?s zoo in the northern state of Queensland, local media reported. Irwin, known as the ?Crocodile Hunter? after his popular TV documentaries which aired around the world, was killed six days ago by a stingray barb to the chest while diving on Australia?s Great Barrier Reef.