A competitor with a Dalek on his head takes part in the annual UK Cold Water Swimming Championships at Tooting Bec Lido on January 24 in London. Participants from around the world braved the cold water to compete in a selection of different swimming races. #

Frozen sea spray coats a road sign and a church are pictured during a winter storm in Marshfield, Massachusetts, on January 27. Police said the storm punched out a section of the seawall in the coastal town. #

Tim Mannix pauses while speaking to reporters in front of his house in Marshfield, Massachusetts, on January 28. Mannix was injured Tuesday when a wave shattered a window during a winter storm that buried the Boston area in more than two feet of snow. #

Crystal, a golden retriever, dashes through the snow as she gets away from Danielle Reid, a girl walking dogs with her mom, at Revere Beach in Massachusetts on January 26. #

Vinnie Miliano (L) and Erin McGrath spend a day in Miami Beach, Florida after their return flight to New York was delayed. Most Northeast coast airports were shut down as a winter storm hit the area on January 27. As airplane passengers found themselves scrambling to make their way home, some got to enjoy another day or two at the beach as they waited to be rescheduled. #

President Barack Obama, first lady Michelle Obama, and Indian President Pranab Mukherjee stand during the US National Anthem before a receiving line at the State Dinner at the Rashtrapati Bhavan, the presidential palace, in New Delhi on January 25. Obama's arrival Sunday morning in the bustling capital of New Delhi marked the first time an American leader has visited India twice during his presidency. #

The Geisel Library building is pictured at the University of California San Diego on January 27. Designed in the late 1960s by William Pereira, it was named in 1995 in honor of Audrey and Theodor Seuss Geisel, the latter better known as Dr. Seuss, for the contributions they have made to the library and their devotion to improving literacy. #

Holocaust survivor Ela Weissberger, 84, looks at one of only 70 special candles, and the first in Scotland, commissioned to mark 70 years since the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, on January 27 in Ayr, Scotland. #

Rhiannon Griffith-Bowman smokes an E-Cigarette at Digital Ciggz on January 28 in San Rafael, California. The California Department of Public Health released a report that calls e-cigarettes a health threat and suggests that they should be regulated like regular cigarettes and tobacco products. #

Firefighters rescue one of two cows that plunged through ice on a pond in Fountain, Colorado on January 27. Fountain Fire Chief Darin Anstine said it was unclear how long the cows had been in the water before a motorist spotted them, but they're now doing fine. #

Socialist Popular Alliance Party (SPAP) activist Shaimaa al-Sabbagh receives help after she was shot during a protest by the party in Cairo on January 24. Sabbagh was shot dead with birdshot in central Cairo on Saturday, security sources said, one day before the anniversary of the popular uprising that ousted autocrat Hosni Mubarak in 2011. #

An injured girl waits for treatment in a field hospital after what activists said was an airstrike by forces loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in the Duma neighborhood of Damascus, Syria on January 28. #

Scott James Gundersen checks the eyebrow of Spain's King Felipe VI in his wine cork portrait of the Spanish monarch and his wife Queen Letizia during opening day at Madrid's International Tourism Trade Fair on January 28. #

Mary Jose Cristerna, a Mexican known as The Vampire Woman, poses for the public to take portraits of her during the annual Venezuela Tattoo International Expo in Caracas, Venezuela, on January 29. Tattoo artists from around the world are gathering for the four-day event that also includes under the skin implants and body piercing. #

People wait in a shelter for nearby shelling to end in Enakieve, Southwestern Debaltseve, Ukraine on January 29. The EU prepared to expand sanctions against Russia as Ukraine's warring parties announced fresh truce talks after a surge in fighting between Kiev and Kremlin-backed rebels. #

The body of a civilian killed in shelling is covered by a blanket in Donetsk, eastern Ukraine, on January 30. Artillery fire in the rebel stronghold of Donetsk killed at least 12 civilians on Friday afternoon, the city hall in the rebel stronghold said, as fighting intensified between pro-Russia separatists and government troops. #

A miniature resin figurine of a goat is displayed on top of a pencil lead in Taipei on January 28. The goat is about 0.08 centimeters (0.03 inches) long and 0.07 centimeters (0.03 inches) high. Chen created the figurine to welcome the upcoming Lunar Year of the Goat in 2015. #

Fishermen use a stretcher with steels bars to carry a rare 15-foot (4.5-meter) megamouth shark (Megachasma Pelagios) on January 28. The shark was captured in a fishermen's net in Burias Pass in Albay and Masbate provinces, central Philippines. A megamouth shark can reach to a maximum length of 17 feet (5.2 meters) with a life span of 100 years. It resides in deep waters but rises towards the surface at night to feed or eat plankton. #

Burning vehicles are seen near the village of Ghajar on Israel's border with Lebanon on January 28. A Hezbollah missile strike wounded four Israeli soldiers on Wednesday, the biggest attack on Israeli forces by the Lebanese guerrilla group since a 34-day war in 2006. Israeli artillery fired at least 22 shells into open farmland in southern Lebanon after the strike, a Lebanese security source said. #

A participant taking part in an ice water challenge in Zhangjiajie, central China's Hunan province, on January 25. Participants were required to stay in an ice pond, holding an ice block while eating ice-cream with an electric fan blowing at them. #

A photo taken on January 30 shows the eastern part of the destroyed Syrian town of Kobane, also known as Ain al-Arab. Kurdish forces recaptured the town on the Turkish frontier on January 26, in a symbolic blow to the jihadists who have seized large swaths of territory in their onslaught across Syria and Iraq. #

A couple dances as fireworks go off in La Boca neighborhood of Buenos Aires late on Saturday, January 24. The performance, coined "La vida es una milonga," or Life is a Milonga, was organized by artist Cai Guo-Qiang. #

A European eagle owl prances in its new outdoor enclosure at the zoo in Duisburg, Germany, on January 30. This superb owl is one of two, in danger of extinction, newly hosted by the zoo. #