Eccentric British rock musician Genesis P-Orridge (born Neil Megson) and his wife and partner, Lady Jaye Breyer, are gradually transforming themselves surgically into gender-neutral human beings ("pandrogynous") resembling each other, so that eventually they will be indistinguishable, to demonstrate how overrated gender is as a point of reference. (For example, he wore a lace dress at their wedding, and she dressed as a biker guy, with moustache, and for Valentine's Day 2003, each got breast implants.) P-Orridge told SF Weekly in October that their goal is to jointly become a third person, distinct from either of them.

(1) Katherine Williams was kicked out of the public library's community flea market in Spring Hill, Tenn., in October because she offered for sale a yellow duck-shaped bath sponge, larger than a football, that happened to vibrate (to the delight of her child, she said); city officials (who were apparently focused on the word "vibrate") concluded that it must be a sex toy and said her booth violated the town's adult-business law. (2) Archaeologists excitedly announced in October that in examining ruins on the Wittenberg, Germany, property of 16th-century philosopher Martin Luther, they discovered the actual stone toilet on which he composed the manifesto that launched the Protestant Revolution. (Luther suffered chronic constipation and thus spent much of his days on the toilet.)

In November, former mayor Diana Cortez of La Grulla, Texas, and the town's former bookkeeper pleaded guilty to taking $53,700 in federal community grant money and spending it all on psychic consultations. And in August, the St. Louis (Mo.) Regional Chamber and Growth Association fired psychic David Levin after seven years' service, during which time it paid him $1.4 million in fees and expenses. Levin's business card read "executive coach," and the association president admitted Levin had "uncanny" abilities, but Levin prominently attributed his astuteness to his spiritual powers, which he said he has in common with his wife and 15-year-old son.

-- Showstopping designs for women during October's Fashion Week in Paris this year included (according to a report in London's Daily Mirror) a formal, plastic, nearly transparent bag, about 3 feet by 4 feet, designed to be worn over the head (from Dutch designers Viktor and Rolf); a set of deluxe armor plates resembling football shoulder pads (and helmet) (from Alexander McQueen); and an outfit seemingly consisting of more than a dozen foot-long black tied bows extending from the shoulders to below the waist (Viktor and Rolf).

-- Mr. Ilker Yilmaz, 28, of Istanbul, inspired to bring pride to Turkey by achieving a Guinness Book world record, decided to challenge Canadian Mark Moraal's 8.7-foot mark for squirting milk out of his eye. In October, exploiting what he called an anomaly in his tear gland, he sucked milk up his nose and pinched it 9.223 feet out of an eye socket in front of several witnesses and is now awaiting official recognition.

-- In one of the stark reminders of regional language variations in the United States, a game resembling horseshoes is fast becoming a pastime in the Midwest that likely would not be so popular under the same name in the South. In this game, contestants throw beanbag-like bags of corn toward a platform that has a hole in the center, trying to score points (in the hole, or on the platform, or knocking your opponents' bag off the platform). Some refer to the game as Corn Toss, but the more popular name, according to a September report in the Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch, is Cornhole.

-- Included among "weapons" allegedly found on inmates at the Grafton prison in Australia, reported in September in Brisbane's Courier-Mail, were four venomous redback spiders that an inmate said were "pets" that were regularly "milked" of venom by inmates in order to produce a toxin that they could inject, to help them get high.

(1) Friends tried to persuade a 37-year-old man at a party near Greenville, Mich., in September that he was too drunk to drive home safely, but the man became enraged; in the ensuing brawl, the man was clubbed in the head with a flashlight and died. (2) Parent Deborah Meister, 46, was charged with assault in Anchorage, Alaska, in September following a public meeting on school policies at Central Middle School; according to police, Meister roughed up an assistant principal because she thought he had been too cavalier about the problem of student bullying.

Among the unsuccessful 2004 write-in presidential candidates (according to a November report on NJ.com): Jack Grimes of Maryland, who admires the leadership methodology of Saddam Hussein but would rely on telepathy and astrology to make tough presidential decisions; Sterling Allan of Utah, who alphabetized and then numbered every word in the Bible and said that the codes he produced told him to return the United States to the gold standard, among other insights; and Randy Crow of North Carolina, who says that despite a government-implanted chip in his brain, his administration would crush the "Omega Agency," which steals from people, which staged the Sept. 11 attacks, and which may have the ability to vaporize everyone.

It was one of the classics, but it happened anew, in Bloomington, Ill., in October. Donald R. Hilger was arrested and charged with robbing 11 local businesses over the previous two weeks. He was picked up shortly after a robbery of a Jewel/Osco store, and police brought two of that robbery's witnesses by the arrest scene to see if they could identify him. According to police, however, as soon as the employees spotted Hilger, Hilger pointed at one of them and blurted out, "That's the one I robbed."

A 47-year-old tribesman from Vietnam, who had relocated to a U.S. government-sponsored Montagnard community in North Carolina to escape persecution, got homesick and headed back to Vietnam in September. However, he lost his papers and is now stranded at Los Angeles International Airport because no country will issue him a visa, in a dilemma reminiscent of that of Merhan "Alfred" Nasseri, who has been chronicled several times in News of the Weird since 1988 (and in the recent movie "The Terminal") and who remains at Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris. The tribesman is convinced that his only chance of repatriation will be lost if he leaves the airport, but at press time, he was continuing to examine options while making his home in an airport chair.

Robbers stole $70,000 from the Lucky Dollar Casino in Greensburg, La., in November, and, acting on a deal-seeking tip from one of the robbers, police checked a creek near Baton Rouge, where two of the three moneybags were recovered. A search downstream turned up the third, which had been carried away by beavers and used in the construction of their dam, with apparently all of the money still inside. Jacqueline Wall, 25, was charged, and at least one other arrest was expected.

Joel Crytzer, 63, was charged with marijuana possession in November in Butler, Pa., when officers spotted some on the floor of his car, which they had stopped because Crytzer had been cruising down the road, seemingly oblivious of the fact that his car had only three tires. And Kevin Martzett, 39, was charged with robbery in Cass County, Neb.; according to police, besides taking money from the victim, he also forced the victim to cash a $75 government check made out to "Kevin Martzett."

(Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net or go to www.NewsoftheWeird.com.)

"Anal-wart researcher" (visual inspection being the only way to detect anal cancer from the human papillomavirus) heads Popular Science magazine's second annual November list of the worst jobs in science. However, "worm parasitologist" can be just as challenging, especially for anyone studying the Dracunculus medinensis (which can settle in humans to a length of 3 feet and then must be removed carefully after its thousands of offspring burst through the skin). Other contenders: "tampon squeezer" for the study of vaginal infections; a Lyme-disease "tick attractor" (who must sing, to keep bears away, while trolling in the woods); and "monitors" at warm-climate landfills (where garbage has been reduced to steamy, liquid condensates).

Perhaps the strangest election result this year was in Orange County, Calif., where a school board seat went not to the favored establishment candidate but to an unknown, Steve Rocco, who never campaigned or even appeared in public. (He did tell a friend after the election that he would appear at the board meeting on Dec. 9.) Among the little information known about him: His candidate registration included one page of (according to the Los Angeles Times) "densely typed text cut and pasted together, and filled with rambling prose," and several years ago, he hosted a 17-episode interview series on public-access TV while wearing dark glasses.

In November, four University of Memphis basketball players, who share an apartment on campus, reported a break-in, with items missing (according to the police report obtained by WPTY-TV) including $6,000 worth of shoes, $4,000 of custom-made shirts, $6,000 of trousers and $40,000 of mink coats.

(1) The September nomination of Michael Kostiw as executive director of the CIA was withdrawn almost immediately when The Washington Post revealed that he, while in a previous stint with the agency, had been caught shoplifting a $2.13 package of bacon from a Langley, Va., grocery store. (2) While demonstrations about Iraq usually either support the troops or criticize U.S. involvement, a group of porn-video actresses staged an idiosyncratic protest in August in Los Angeles, denouncing the U.S. military for offering breast implants to female soldiers (as a way to help keep combat surgeons sharp for battle-related plastic surgery). (One sign read, "Honk if you love natural breasts.")

-- Asking for Trouble From the Spirits: Kenneth Rabalais, 19, was charged with desecrating a grave in a suburb of New Orleans after he opened the crypt of a young relative, believing that other relatives had buried "tribute" money and drugs to help ease the deceased's transition to the afterworld. (Apparently, the deceased left un-tributed.) And in Hawaii, Wal-Mart opened a store in October despite warnings that it had been built on an ancient grave site (and, indeed, the remains of 44 bodies turned up during construction). (Wal-Mart said it is protecting the remains while it seeks state approval to re-bury them.)

-- Colin Hancock, a convicted drug dealer serving time in Perth Prison in Scotland, filed a lawsuit in October, asking the equivalent of about US$55,000 because of an improper rectal exam (responding to his symptom of urine blockage) given by a prison physician. Dr. Alexander MacFarlane said he was forced to use, as lubricant, milk from a bowl of porridge because that was all the prison had on hand.

-- In August, a pilot, cruising over Forest Grove, Ore., on assignment, reached out the window to scatter the cremated ashes of a man over the Mountain View Memorial Gardens, but the 4-pound bag slipped out of his hand, eventually crashing through the roof of Barbara Vreeland, who lives near the cemetery. The deceased's family paid for the damage, but Vreeland later told a reporter, "I think some of (him) is still in our attic."

-- The child pornography collections allegedly belonging to two men were inadvertently exposed in separate incidents in October. Robert Medvee was arrested in Frederick, Md., on 96 counts after workers spotted a stash as they were making repairs on his home following recent tornado damage. And part of the collection of the late Todd Darow was spotted by police, who had gone to his home in Livonia, Mich., to inform his widow that Darow's body had been found (at a church where he was a part-time custodian). (A search of the house turned up a more extensive holding, including videotapes of children being molested in the church restroom.)

In October, Los Alamos National Laboratory nuclear research officials evicted Roy M. Moore, 56, who had been living for years, apparently undetected, in a hard-to-access cave on the grounds (though not in a high-security area of the property). Moore had equipped his cave with a wood-burning stove, solar panels, a bed, a glass door and satellite radio. And in Houston in October, police calling at the home of Ronnie Luhn, 37, regarding the theft of a newspaper vending box, arrested him after finding 181 of them crammed floor-to-ceiling in the one-bedroom house he shared with his wife and three children.

(1) Frances Lea Shaw, 41, was charged with arson of her home in Greensburg, Pa., in August after police and firefighters discovered that her most valuable household items (clothes, TV set, microwave oven) had already been placed in the yard under a heavy tarp by the time they arrived at her burning home. (2) John DeWitt, 18, fled from a security guard at the Orlando Ale House (Orlando, Fla.) in September after the guard suspected he was about to burglarize the building, but DeWitt's flight ended when he climbed into what he thought was a garbage can in order to hide but which turned out to be discarded restaurant grease.

News of the Weird reported in 2002 on a rooftop brawl in Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre (under joint control of six Christian faiths, whose adherents sometimes get snippy with each other), when a cleric placed a chair in an area reserved for another faith. In September 2004, Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox clerics had a fistfight (resulting in at least five injuries) after a Catholic left a door open during an Orthodox service. (Coincidentally, on almost the same day in Bedford, Ohio, police said that more than 100 Sikhs were involved in a brawl over proper clerical dress at the Guru Gobind Singh Sikh Temple.)

Three of these four things really happened, just recently. Are you cynical enough to figure out the made-up story? (a) A California Highway Patrol officer ticketed the operator of a Jeep off-road vehicle driving on Interstate 5 while tending to two hamburgers cooking on a portable grill. (b) A Texas state representative had his house and yard toilet-papered by a group of adult women who were supporting his opponent. (c) A Louisiana man arrested for indecent exposure confessed to police his longstanding hobby of photographing himself nude in unusual locations. (d) Police called to a Utah man's house to stop him from slitting his wrists also found the man's mother trying to commit suicide by automobile exhaust in the garage.

In October, with the homeowner away on vacation, Beverly Valentine, 54, broke into a house in Douglasville, Ga., and made herself totally at home, commandeering owner Beverly Mitchell's clothes, having the utilities changed to her name, ripping out carpeting, having a new washer and dryer installed, and painting a room, among other changes. When Mitchell returned after 17 days in Greece, she was of course dumbfounded that her key wouldn't work. Valentine has not yet explained, but a former neighbor said she has had some "problems."

(Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net or go to www.NewsoftheWeird.com.)

New Scientist magazine reported in October that psychologists seem to be reclassifying people who are permanently uninterested in sex, from the old notion that such behavior was a disorder to the emerging position that it is merely a sexual preference of "none of the above." (Asexuals profess no sexual attraction at all, encompassing loners reluctant to associate with people and gregarious, caring people whose natural inclination is to relate to others nonsexually.) Recent research estimated that 1 percent of the population is asexual, and in previous research, 40 percent of asexuals described themselves as "extremely" or "very" happy. An asexuality support group (AVEN) touts its best-selling T-shirt, "Asexuality: It's not just for amoebas anymore."

Jackie Lee Shrader, 49, and his son, Harley Lee, 24, had a brief shootout with .22-caliber handguns, provoked when the pair confronted each other over how to cook skinless chicken for dinner (Bluewell, W.Va., September). And Niccolo Rossodivita, 62, shot Billy Cordova, 40, twice in the chest after Cordova followed him around their house prolonging their argument over Jesus Christ's correct name (Wasilla, Alaska, September). And Angela Morris, 19, was charged with assaulting her boyfriend by pouring boiling oil on him during an argument over a Bible verse the two had been reading together (Eugene, Ore., May).

(1) According to a September Washington Post dispatch from a Culpeper, Va., conference of people obsessed with spotting the alleged, 7-foot-tall Sasquatch, which is said to be roaming the woods of America, many attendees ("East Coast Bigfoot community") seem consumed by the West Coast Bigfoot community's supposed arrogance. That is, Western witnesses seem to regard Eastern witnesses as delusional, in that Sasquatch obviously lives west of the Rockies. (2) Thomas Patrick Remo, 50, was arrested in September in Dallas and charged with practicing medicine (gynecology) without a license; Remo had a stream of female customers who apparently did not think it odd that the exams were free and that he ran his office out of a self-storage locker.

-- Patricia Frankhouser filed a lawsuit in Jeannette, Pa., in November against the Norfolk Southern railway as a result of being hit by a train in January as she walked on railroad tracks. Frankhouser, who suffered various cuts and a broken finger, claimed in the lawsuit that Norfolk Southern should have posted signs alongside the tracks warning people not to walk on them, that trains might be coming.

-- In August, cardiologist Dr. Lawrence Poliner won $366 million in damages from a federal court jury in Dallas because his practice was virtually shut down through word of mouth for seven months in 1998, a verdict that (after subtracting 25 percent in attorney fees) would reward him with earnings during the shutdown of $39 million per month. The shutdown came after a hospital peer review panel had found errors in 29 of 44 patient-cases of Poliner (but he was reinstated after prominent cardiologists supported him, though the panel did not retract its initial finding).

-- Frederick Puglisi, 23, was awarded $850,000 by a jury in Ramsey, N.J., in September, for injuries, including a disfigured hand caused by frostbite, suffered when he got drunk at a party, set out on foot, and passed out in a snow bank. The jury determined that his injuries were worth $1 million in damages and that Puglisi was only 15 percent responsible. (Ramsey police and the Bergen county police bore greater fault because they had failed to respond quickly enough to a 911 call about a man passed out in a snow bank.)

-- From the July 23, 2004, Police Reports column of the New London, Wis., Press-Star: "1:15 p.m., a juvenile approached an officer at (Hortonville Police Department) complaining about having a lock stuck around his right testicle for three days and he didn't know how to get it off." (The officer found a master key.) "Having the master key in hand, the juvenile left the room for a moment and returned with the lock. The officer spoke to the juvenile about experimenting with sexuality and how he needs to be more careful in the future."

-- When the police chief in Springdale, Pa., allegedly used the N-word while detaining two black teenagers, the boys' parents charged racism, but the chief's brother, police officer Mike Naviglia, came to his rescue. Officer Naviglia suddenly grabbed one of the boys, in front of their mother, and kissed him flush on the mouth. Said Naviglia, "Does that taste like racism?" (According to the mother, Naviglia said, "I kissed him to show him that I wasn't prejudiced." The mother was undaunted and said she would proceed with her complaint.)

Australian sleep-disorder expert Dr. Peter Buchanan caused a stir in October when he told reporters that the odd behavior of "sleep sex" (leaving home at night in a deep sleep and seeking random sex with strangers) would soon be regarded as an official sleep disorder and be included in the next version of the sleep disorder manual. Said Buchanan, anticipating skepticism: "Incredulity is the first staging post for anyone involved in this (study)."

Paul Michael Callahan, 32, was arrested in Boston in August after, according to police, a short career as a bank robber, which started badly when Callahan tried to hold up the copy shop at Boston University, believing it was a bank. (The clerk asked, "Do you know you're in a copy store and all we can give you is copies?") Callahan fled but allegedly robbed a Fleet Bank branch a few minutes later (getting less than $200) and then a Citizen's Bank branch, clearing about $2,500. However, the red-dye pack from Citizen's exploded, distracting him, and then his getaway car got a flat tire, and police found him hiding in a gas station.

Among the recent idiosyncratic decrees by Turkmenistan's megalomaniacal president-for-life, Saparmurat Niyazov: No publicly chewing "nas" (the country's popular drug, partly tobacco, slacked lime and chicken droppings); television show hosts cannot wear makeup (because the president said he has difficulty distinguishing heavily made-up males from females); and an ice palace will be built in the heart of the country's extremely hot desert so that children can learn to ski.

Three of these four things really happened, just recently. Are you cynical enough to figure out the made-up story? (a) Municipal officials in Amsterdam tentatively approved a euthanasia-drug home delivery service, provided that all orders are screened by a physician before the driver is dispatched. (b) Boston police arrested a wheelchair-confined bank robber, who had become paralyzed when shot during a previous bank robbery. (c) Police in Lagos, Nigeria, organized groups of officers into street choirs to help disperse unruly mobs by singing. (d) A British Medical Association official warned that hospitals have recently become "inundated" with serious knife and broken-bottle injuries among barroom-brawling women.

Initially, Florida artist Maria Alquilar refused to correct a series of misspelled names in a $40,000 historical mural she did for the city of Livermore, Calif., claiming that "words" were not important to her art, comparing her errors to Michelangelo's "David" (imperfect in the sense that one of the testicles is lower than the other). After receiving much hate mail from Livermore taxpayers, suggesting that she must have a learning disability for not detecting "(Albert) Eistein," "(William) Shakespere," "(Paul) Gaugan," "(Vincent) Van Gough," and seven other misspellings, Alquilar agreed to fix her mural in early 2005 (but wants an additional $6,000 for her trouble).

(Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net or go to www.NewsoftheWeird.com.)