One of the world's best-known strategists on the game of checkers passed away in November. Richard Fortman was Illinois state champion six times, and in the 1970s and 1980s published a seven-volume handbook on rules and tactics. Many people now considering the game would be astonished to know that, as in chess, there are masters and grandmasters, and international rankings, that experts actually study historical opening moves and endgames, and that some play, move-by-move, via the U.S. Mail. A New York Times obituary noted that Fortman played as many as 100 games simultaneously, and won games blindfolded. Until the end, according to his daughter, Fortman spent "hours each day" playing checkers online.

-- Serbians, who have previously, bafflingly, constructed large, reverential public statues of martial-arts actor Bruce Lee and movie characters Tarzan and Rocky Balboa, built one of reggae musician Bob Marley in August in the village of Banatski Sokolac. Also planned was a statue of British singer Samantha Fox, but that project fell through. One Serbian artist who helped raise money for the Rocky statue told The New York Times, "My generation can't find role models (at home) so we have to look elsewhere."

-- The Gorani, a small group of Muslims scattered through the former Yugoslavia, lead mostly unremarkable lives, except for their singular distinction: Every five years, they gather in southern Kosovo for Sunet, a festival of mass-circumcision of toddlers, with a history tracing back centuries. Last year, 130 boys born since the previous Sunet were circumcised, without anesthetic, by Zylfikar Shishko, 70, for a small fee. Many Gorani are apprehensive about 2012, according to an October dispatch in Germany's Der Spiegel, because Shishko is 70 years old and the only skilled Gorani circumciser.

-- An administrative court in Sweden overruled a government agency in November, thus requiring that the Madonna of Orgasm Church founded by artist Carlos Bebeacua be registered as a legitimate religious community. "The orgasm is God," he said, and "should be worshipped" as a "metaphor of life." It should not be limited to ejaculation but can be taught "through art or by looking at a landscape and thinking, 'Wow!'" Bebeacua already claims "a few hundred" followers.

-- The streak for the longest continuous chanting (already noted twice in the Guinness Book of World Records) is still active, according to an August Indo-Asian News Service dispatch from Ahmedabad, India. Clerics at the Shri Bala Hanuman temple started intoning "Shri Ram Jay Ram Jay Jay Ram" on Aug. 1, 1964 (more than 23 million minutes ago).

-- "Intercessionary" prayer (having other people pray for you) is proliferating on the Internet, with the oldest such broker, Unity Church, now a Web presence (200,000 requests a year) after a century's operation by mail (500,000 last year) and telephone (another 1.3 million). Other Web sites also handle requests for life-saving miracles, inner peace and financial recovery (and one, on OurPrayer.org, quoted in a November New York Times report, asked for success on her financial accounting exam: "This is my third attempt on this paper, and I pray that the Lord will grant me wisdom and a clear mind").

-- It seemed like an obviously good decision by the Toronto Transit Commission in 2006 to curb counterfeiting of its aluminum coins and paper tickets by phasing in larger metal-alloy tokens as substitutes. By earlier this year, when the tokens had completely replaced the lighter coins and paper, the commission realized that its fare-sorting room was beginning to crack at the foundations because the tokens to be counted weigh about 60 tons more than pre-2006 aluminum and paper. A commission spokesman told the Toronto Sun in November that engineers were working on a solution.

-- In September, Atlanta-area educator Phillippia Faust, working on a $455,000 annual federal sex education grant, offered a $10,000 contest prize for an engaged local couple who had so far abstained from sex and would continue to do so until the wedding. (Any sex would be "risky behavior," said Faust, but worst of all would be living together before marriage, which is a "set up for the kill.") However, despite the large population of the area, she had no takers, and as the deadline approached, she told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that she even considered opening the contest to engaged couples who had had sex but regretted it. Faust eventually had to scrap the contest altogether because of conflicting federal grant rules.

-- In November, a judge in Dublin, Ga., sentenced Rico Todriquez Wright, 25, to at least 20 years in prison for the 2006 shooting of Chad Blue, who had told police initially that he didn't know who had shot him. Blue later heard a thug-life song on CD, "Hitting Licks for a Living," in which rap singer Wright brags, "Chad Blue knows how I shoot" and realized Wright was the one who shot him that night.

For 15 years, Eduardo Arrocha, 46, was different from us, as "Eak the Geek," the "Pain-Proof Man" at New York's Coney Island Sideshow, where he lay on nails, walked on glass, ate lightbulbs, and put his tongue in a mousetrap. However, in 2007, he traded everything in for a spot in the class at Thomas M. Cooley Law School in Lansing, Mich., where he is in his second year ("from one freak show to another," he said, "it's the most bizarre thing I've ever done in my life"). Job interviews may be tough because a three-piece suit will hide only his chest-to-toe tattoos; recruiters can't miss the stars and planets that cover his face.

-- Embarrassing: (1) A 49-year-old Leavenworth, Kan., man was hospitalized in November after (according to police) using a front-end loader to pluck an ATM from the Frontier Credit Union. He was hurt when he drove to the edge of a 50-foot embankment and tried to drop the ATM, imagining that the fall would break it open, but instead, he, the loader, and the ATM all crashed to the bottom. (2) British Muslim convert Nicky Reilly, 22, pleaded guilty in October in Exeter, England, to attempted terrorism for detonating a homemade nail bomb in the Giraffe restaurant. The plan failed when Reilly triggered the bomb in the men's room, intending to take it into the dining area, but then could not unlock the men's room door to get out. (His lawyer called him perhaps the "least cunning" person ever to be charged with terrorism in Britain.)

As animal hoarding goes, the 30 seized from Darlene Gardner's double-wide trailer home in Kootenai County, Idaho, last year weren't particularly noteworthy, even though two of them, deer, were living inside, each in its own bedroom. Authorities released the deer and other healthy animals into the wild and euthanized the rest, and Gardner's husband pleaded guilty to one animal cruelty charge. However, in November, Darlene filed a $2 million federal lawsuit against the county's "jack-booted thugs" who, acting without a search warrant, she said, had "killed my babies," referring to the animals that "were my life and my family."

In Toronto in March 1994, Sajid Rhatti, then 23, and his 20-year-old wife brawled over whether Katey Sagal, who plays Peg Bundy on the "Married with Children" TV show, is prettier than Christina Applegate, who plays her daughter. First, the wife slashed Rhatti in the groin with a wine bottle as they scuffled, but, remorseful, she dressed his wounds, and the couple sat down again to watch a second episode of the show. Moments later, the brawl erupted again, and Rhatti, who suffered a broken arm and shoulder, stabbed his wife in the chest, back, and legs before the couple begged neighbors to call an ambulance.

The Christmas Nativity scenes in northeast Spain's Catalonia region have, for three centuries, featured not only Mary and the Three Wise Men but the ubiquitous "caganer" icon, always portrayed with pants down answering a call of nature (and often so obscured in the scene as to popularize Where's-Waldo-type guessing by children). The origin of the caganer (literally, "pooper") is unclear, but some regard it merely as symbolic of equality (in that everyone has bowel movements). Catalonia is now home to artists who craft statuettes of religious figures poised to relieve themselves, and the franchise extends to renditions of sports figures and celebrities (and even a squatting President Bush). One family in Girona province sells about 25,000 a year, according to a November dispatch in Germany's Der Spiegel.

Larry and Diana Moyer set out in November from Beaver Dam, Wis., in their oversized RV to spend some warm days in St. Petersburg, Fla. Since they travel with their pets, Jack (Diana's "service" kangaroo) and Edward (an elderly goat that uses a cart for mobility because of front-leg paralysis), their route south was circuitous because of some states' restrictions on "exotic" pets. The RV broke down three times. In Florida, Larry had a stroke and was hospitalized for two days. Then, a fuse box short-circuited, and the RV burned up, torching their money and ID. Diana was hospitalized for smoke inhalation. With Red Cross help, they found a motel that accepted goats (but not kangaroos, so Jack went overnight to a wildlife facility). At press time, according to a Tampa Tribune report, the couple had bought a junk car and were headed home, with Jack curled up in Diana's lap.

-- Budget Relief for the California Government: A homeless transient, Steven Butcher, 50, was convicted of starting fires in the Los Padres National Forest near Santa Barbara in 2002 and 2006 (the latter which burned 163,000 acres) and in November was sentenced to nearly four years in prison. When Butcher gets out, he can work on the other part of his sentence, as he was also ordered to pay back the state for the fires' costs, in the amount of $101 million.

-- When the Poway Unified School District near San Diego cut teachers' printing budgets this year, some handout-intensive instructors had to dip into their own pockets to keep their students supplied. Calculus teacher Tom Farber decided in September to sell ad space on page one of his exams, at $10 for a quiz and up to $30 on the semester final. As of November, he told the San Diego Union-Tribune, only parent-sponsored inspirational messages have been bought, but he said he would welcome certain retailers' ads.

-- Economic Stimulus: A British surgeon will spend an estimated 250,000 pounds ($370,000) to equip her luxury home in Gloustershire with a state-of-the-art, three-room suite for her two Great Danes, including cameras so that she can monitor them via the Internet while she is away. Instead of an ordinary dog door, a retina scanner will control entry, and rather than rely on human stewards, the big darlings will be dispensed filtered water and dry food automatically in self-cleaning bowls. A temperature-regulated saline spa is available for relaxing dips before turning in for the night on sheepskin-lined dog beds.

A group of recently published cookbooks touting imaginative dishes served by world-renowned chefs includes Ferran Adria's volume on just his everyday fare at the world's top-rated elBulli in Spain. Probably too complex for home cooking are the parmesan ice cream sandwiches, quail eggs with crispy caramel coating, calamari tube ravioli with coconut gel, and especially the preserved tuna-oil air (to create foam). However, for about $250, wannabes can purchase Adria's "Sferificacion MiniKit" with utensils and guidance on more manageable possibilities, such as watermelon soup with tomato spheres.

-- Latest Off-Label Uses of Viagra: Britain's The Sun reported in November that Calvin Muteesa, 2, of South London has been forced to take Viagra four times a day since he was 3 months old to stave off a potentially fatal case of pulmonary arterial hypertension. And Bentley, a 7-year-old springer spaniel, has apparently recovered from a potentially fatal lungworm attack on his chronically weak heart via a Viagra regimen at a clinic in Highgate, England. (And last year, Argentinean researchers discovered that hamsters fed Viagra endured the rigors of jet lag about 50 percent better than hamsters fed a placebo.)

-- In October, ABC News profiled a 6-year-old boy with a rare coordination disorder called Angelman syndrome, which makes the afflicted seem stiff and jerky, but which also fosters a cheerful, gregarious (though non-verbal) personality, leading the disorder to be known as the "happy puppet syndrome." Seizures are a consequence, but so is excessive laughter, which is a major hindrance to early diagnosis, according to a pediatrics professor.

-- "This is a rare occurrence," said a Loyola University (Chicago) neurology professor in September, describing to WebMD.com only the seventh reported case of someone's suffering a stroke during orgasm. Several things must be present in series to create the condition, including having an unnatural opening between the two upper chambers of the heart (a "PFO"). Also, a blood clot must develop and break loose and then get sucked through the PFO at the moment of ecstasy, sending it directly to the brain.

-- Robert Garrett, 33, and Jesse Dyer, 32, were arrested in Lincoln, Neb., in November and charged with burglary and the theft of a 55-inch TV, which they had taken to their car, only to realize that it wouldn't fit. When a next-door neighbor spotted them, they tried to bribe her for $100, to hold the set until they could return with a bigger car, but she called the police.

-- Joseph Barton, 62, and an associate were arrested in November by local drug officials in Hurley, N.Y., and charged with a marijuana growing and distribution scheme of "epic scope and sophistication," according to a Middletown Times Herald-Record report. Besides the 45 pounds of marijuana seized, the chief evidence is copies of Barton's self-made biographical DVD chronicling a life of drug deals, describing candidly his adventures and business acumen.

More people who put their brains on "standby" while using satellite navigation systems: (1) In July, a group of 10 children and 16 adults from California were stranded in their cars in wilderness near cliffs close to the Grand Canyon, to which they had been misdirected by their navigation system. Rescuers were able to talk them back the next day on their cell phones. (2) Also in July, a truck driver hauling a 32-ton load from Turkey through several European countries headed for Gibraltar in the southern tip of Spain missed his destination by about 1,600 miles, winding up at a dead end in Skegness, England. (Gibraltar is a British territory, though nowhere near the British Isles, but both places have a "Coral Road," which was the destination.)

Saskatchewan physician John Schneeberger, then 31, implanted a thin, 6-inch tube of someone else's blood in his own arm in order to beat a DNA test after two female patients had accused him of rape. He cut open his bicep, inserted the tube, and pushed it down to the crook of the arm from which blood is usually drawn. Thus, "his" DNA didn't match the rapist's, and the cases were closed. However, one victim later hired a private detective, who exposed the scam, and Schneeberger was convicted in 1999 (though he maintained that he was forced into the deception because someone had framed him by breaking into his house and stealing a used condom). (Update: Schneeberger served four years in prison and was deported to his native South Africa.)

Change Oregonians Believe In: The voters of Sodaville (pop. 290) elected Thomas Brady Harrington, 33, mayor in November, notwithstanding his criminal rap sheet showing robbery, eluding a police officer, felon in possession of a gun and other crimes (with his electoral success perhaps due to voters' confusing him with his father, a respected town elder). And the voters of Silverton (pop. 7,400) elected as mayor Stu Rasmussen, 60, an openly transgendered, longtime resident who previously served as mayor while a man but who now sports breasts and dresses exclusively as a woman (especially miniskirts and cleavage-enhancing tops). Actually, Rasmussen still describes himself as a man and lives with his longtime girlfriend, but explained his switch as just his particular "mid-life crisis."

-- "I'm really sorry. ... I thought he was just tired," said Lynne Stewart, who was arrested in West Melbourne, Fla., in October and charged with stealing items from a 56-year-old, unconscious man who in fact had just suffered a fatal heart attack during sex with Stewart. She blamed her larceny on a cocaine binge that impaired her judgment such that (according to a police commander) she had sex with 20 men that weekend. (However, she was not charged with prostitution. Said the commander, "No, she just likes sex.")

-- Lame: (1) A woman being interviewed for jury duty on a murder case in Bronx (N.Y.) Supreme Court in October asked to be excused for the reason that she was once murdered, herself, by her husband (but had somehow been revived by a doctor). (She was dismissed from the jury, but on other grounds.) (2) In a recent report of DUI excuses in the Swedish newspaper Nerikes Allehanda, a 56-year-old woman had asserted that, though she had been drinking, her driving was not affected because she had remembered to keep one eye closed so as not to be seeing double.

-- Hummer H2 driver Yvonne Sinclair, 29, was convicted of gross vehicular manslaughter in November in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., from a 2006 crash that killed two people and in which her intoxication was a major factor. Sinclair had bought the Hummer from proceeds of a lawsuit settlement over the 2003 death of her boyfriend, who was killed by a drunk driver.

-- Strange Justice: (1) The Saudi Arabia delegation to the United Nations sponsored a conference on religious tolerance in November. (Not only does the kingdom employ a police force "on the prevention of vice and the promotion of virtue," but it is accused of widespread internal discrimination against disfavored Islamic sects.) (2) Janice Warder, a former Texas judge and now the incoming district attorney for Texas' Cooke County, was accused in March by a Dallas judge of having improperly withheld evidence in a 1986 case to secure a murder conviction. (The Dallas judge ordered a new trial.)

-- Patricia Howard filed a lawsuit against her USA Environmental employer in 2006 (just recently unsealed by a judge) for subjecting her to dangerous work during 2003-2005. The workplace was in Iraq and involved detonating surplus munitions to prevent their falling into insurgents' hands, but that was not the "danger" she feared. Rather, the munitions were located in abandoned football-field-sized warehouses that had long been home to pigeons. Foot-high piles of feces had dried and turned to powder, and Howard charged that the company's respiration protection was nearly useless, subjecting workers to Hantavirus and other diseases.

-- Veteran Massachusetts thief Robert Aldrich applied for compensation because his latest arrest happened to have been illegal, and a state law permits recovery for lost income during wrongful incarceration. However, in November, a Suffolk County judge turned him down as she was unable to find any "income" that Aldrich might have earned during his six wrongful months in jail except from more burglaries or for home-improvement money that Aldrich admitted he earned "off the books" so as to evade taxes.

-- "I would like an apology," explained Michael Wax, who was ejected in July from the Borgata Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City because of customers' complaints about his body odor. "There's no question I stink. ... I do have an odor. I've been playing for 17 hours," said the 440-pound man. Nonetheless, Wax filed a complaint with the Casino Control Commission, claiming that he should not have been so rudely treated in front of other patrons.

Ms. Hang Mioku, 48, is winding down her 20-year obsession with cosmetic surgery, having been at one time bulked up with enough silicone in her face to earn the nickname "the standing fan" because her head was so large compared to her legs. Hang moved from South Korea to Japan for better access to surgery and said she had convinced herself that each procedure in her odyssey only made her more beautiful than the last. When finally no surgeon would treat her, she began injecting cooking oil. Finally, she was talked into face-reduction surgery (removal of 260 grams of foreign substance from her head and neck) but, according to a November report in London's Daily Telegraph, she remains grotesquely misshapen.

One of the items in a November seized-contraband auction by the Denver Police Department was a 1977 Oldsmobile Cutlass that was ultimately bought for $350 by a 19-year-old woman, but which is still evidence in an active murder investigation. Police eventually took back the car, which has bullet holes and a bloody interior and contained blood-stained clothing. Furthermore, a second shooting victim who was in the car survived and was among the bidders at the auction. He dropped out, but did later sell the winning bidder his spare key to the car for $40.

The quasi-religious "philosophical" group Summum has been on News of the Weird's radar since 1988, when leader "Corky" Ra and his small band in Utah began offering to mummify household pets for $7,000, or create statues of them for $18,000 (though the price is considerably higher today), with an eye toward future mummification of humans, as illustrative of its core precept that "the soul moves forward" even though the body is memorialized. In November, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments that a city park in Pleasant Grove, Utah, must allow Summum to place a monument with "The Seven Aphorisms" next to the existing monument of the Ten Commandments. (Summum's Aphorisms shore up the soul-movement belief by recognizing, for example, such properties as psychokinesis and the constant vibration of bodies.) The court is expected to rule later this term.

Recent Public Appearances: Arkansas City, Kan., September (Jesus on the ceiling of the One Stop Body Shoppe weight-loss clinic). Pittsburg, Texas, August (Jesus on the body of a moth). Goshen, Ind., July (Jesus in the facial fur of the family cat). High Ridge, Mo., July (Jesus on a Cheeto). Arlington, Texas, September (Mary on a grape). Pompano Beach, Fla., November (Jesus on a slice of French toast). Gulf Shores, Ala., September (Jesus in the drywall of a home under construction).

A New York Times dispatch from India highlighted the growing problem of intra-family frauds in which one member claims a living relative's land or wealth by swearing to the government that the relative is dead. According to the Times, the "deceased" had finally begun to fight back. An advocacy group, the Association of Dead People, helps aggrieved citizens figure out how to prove that they are alive, which can be difficult, given India's slow-moving bureaucracies. The association's founder said that he personally had tried to authenticate his existence by public actions such as running for office, filing lawsuits and getting arrested, but that he nonetheless remained officially dead.