diff --git a/resources/recipes/xkcd.recipe b/resources/recipes/xkcd.recipe
index 312027004e..ad0d420deb 100644
--- a/resources/recipes/xkcd.recipe
+++ b/resources/recipes/xkcd.recipe
@@ -24,18 +24,18 @@ class XkcdCom(BasicNewsRecipe):
         (re.compile(r'(<img.*title=")([^"]+)(".*>)'),
          lambda m: '%s%s<p>%s</p>' % (m.group(1), m.group(3), m.group(2)))
     ]
-    
+
     def parse_index(self):
         INDEX = 'http://xkcd.com/archive/'
 
-        soup = self.index_to_soup(INDEX) 
+        soup = self.index_to_soup(INDEX)
         articles = []
         for item in soup.findAll('a', title=True):
             articles.append({
                 'date': item['title'],
                 'timestamp': time.mktime(time.strptime(item['title'], '%Y-%m-%d'))+1,
                 'url': 'http://xkcd.com' + item['href'],
-                'title': self.tag_to_string(item).encode('UTF-8'),
+                'title': self.tag_to_string(item),
                 'description': '',
                 'content': '',
             })
diff --git a/src/calibre/web/feeds/__init__.py b/src/calibre/web/feeds/__init__.py
index a70cf8b664..8aef350498 100644
--- a/src/calibre/web/feeds/__init__.py
+++ b/src/calibre/web/feeds/__init__.py
@@ -165,7 +165,9 @@ class Feed(object):
             if delta.days*24*3600 + delta.seconds <= 24*3600*self.oldest_article:
                 self.articles.append(article)
             else:
-                self.logger.debug('Skipping article %s (%s) from feed %s as it is too old.'%(title, article.localtime.strftime('%a, %d %b, %Y %H:%M'), self.title))
+                t = strftime(u'%a, %d %b, %Y %H:%M', article.localtime.timetuple())
+                self.logger.debug('Skipping article %s (%s) from feed %s as it is too old.'%
+                        (title, t, self.title))
             d = item.get('date', '')
             article.formatted_date = d