Libraries in southeastern Michigan are turning the page on peace and quiet.

Video game events at public libraries are drawing crowds of teens, including about 100 competing monthly at "Guitar Hero" at the Rochester Hills Public Library.

"Getting teens to come to the library is right up there with getting them to go to church: It's not exactly the first place they want to go," Christine Lind Hage, library director, told the Detroit Free Press for a story Sunday.

Hage stocked the shelves with 1,823 games. And the games are hot items, with an average of 1,300 checked out daily.

A competition in Rochester Hills was held Feb. 9, and similar events are being held at other Detroit-area libraries.

Nearly 30 teens play "Guitar Hero" or "Dance Dance Revolution" every few weeks at the Clinton-Macomb Public Library, which offers 300 video games in its collection.

"It's a big social event," said Stephanie Jaczkowski, 17. "I've met a lot of friends there, and they're really good friends."

The Canton Public Library six months ago began offering games and holding monthly tournaments for Nintendo Wii bowling and "Super Smash Bros."

"Many of the games are complex. They're worthy in their own right. They can help build cognitive skills," said Brad Bachelor, teen librarian.

A pair of con artists ripped off a Girl Scout group when they exchanged a fake $100 bill for cookies, police said.

The unknown couple handed over the bill Friday night at a supermarket, telling the girls it had been washed when asked about why it looked so strange.

"It felt and looked wrong and it was a quarter of an inch shorted than a $1 bill," said Jil Hennessey-Seabolt, the cookie director for Junior Girl Scouts Troop 2121. Hennessey-Seabolt said the Girl Scouts gave the couple $93.50 in change after the purchase.

The exchange eradicated the Scouts' earnings that day. The money they raise in the sales goes to camping trips and to area charities.

"Something like this isn't fair when it happens to adults, but when it happens to kids who work so hard, it's so frustrating," Hennessey-Seabolt said.

The story does have a happy ending, though. A resident donated $100 to the Girl Scouts.

(02-18) 14:53 PST Albuquerque, N.M. (AP) --

A cat that fled a house fire is back home in Albuquerque, N.M., after turning up some 240 miles away. The black and white cat named Miko disappeared in December, on the night of the fire.

About two weeks ago, Miko's owner got a call from an animal shelter in Pueblo, Colo., saying her cat was safe.

Officials at the shelter speculate that the cat, trying to keep warm, hopped a tractor-trailer and rode it to Colorado.

When they found her, her collar was missing. But shelter officials scanned the microchip in her neck and came up with her owner's name.