But What If the Device Falls Into the Wrong Hands? A 55-year-old British man whose bowel was ruptured in a nearly catastrophic traffic accident has been fitted with a bionic sphincter that opens and closes with a remote controller. Ged Galvin had originally endured 13 surgeries in a 13-week hospital stay and had grown frustrated with using a colostomy bag until surgeon Norman Williams of the Royal London Hospital proposed the imaginative operation. Dr. Williams, who was interviewed along with Galvin for a November feature in London's Daily Mail, wrapped a muscle transplanted from Galvin's leg around the sphincter and attached electrodes to tighten or loosen the muscle's grip.

The Wisconsin Department of Corrections decided in October that it (i.e., taxpayers) should fund complex facial reconstruction surgery for inmate Daryl Strenke, who is serving 30 years after pleading guilty to murdering his girlfriend. Strenke had shot himself in the face in apparent remorse for the killing, severely disfiguring his mouth and jaw and making it nearly impossible for him to eat or speak normally.

-- (1) In November, the Solihull Council in Britain's West Midlands county ordered a flooring store to remove the festive balloons it had pinned out front to attract business, calling them hazards. One councilor explained that drivers may be distracted by the colors, and another was concerned that if a balloon came loose, it might possibly float into traffic and lure a child to follow it. (2) In October, Britain's Association of Chief Police Officers prepared a guidebook of instructions for bicycle-duty officers on how to ride a bike. The book was 93 pages long, containing such assistance as a diagram on how to turn left or right ("deployment into a junction"). (Following widespread ridicule, the association decided in November not to release it.)

-- Examiners from Britain's Health and Safety Executive, inspecting bowling alleys for hazards, considered recommendations (according to a November Daily Mail report) that included erecting barriers over the lanes to prevent bowlers from wandering the alleys and perhaps getting caught in pin-setting machines or, feared one inspector, bowlers injuring themselves trying to knock over pins by hand. The barriers would leave space for the ball to roll under.

-- Wake Forest University's Institute of Regenerative Medicine, which has successfully grown human bladders in the lab using only a few extracted cells sprayed onto a chemical frame that mimics the body's tissues, has so far been unsuccessful at regenerating penises because of the organ's complexity. However, it announced in a November journal article a success with rabbit penises. Four of the 12 rabbits with lab-grown phalluses successfully impregnated females, and in an unexpected finding, the new penises appear not to lessen sexual desire, in that all 12 of the rabbits began mating within one minute of meeting females.

-- Occasionally, people lose their short-term memory following vigorous sex, according to doctors interviewed for a November CNN report on "transient global amnesia." The condition occurs because blood flow to the brain is restricted by the strenuous activity, temporarily disabling the hippocampus from recording new memory. One sufferer, "Alice," recalled her experience, recounting how she initially cracked a joke about being unable to remember how good the sex was that she just had, and then supposedly repeated the joke over and over, each time as if she had just thought of it.

(1) Three men were convicted in August in Kansas City, Mo., of having convinced "numerous" customers to buy 3-inch-by-4-inch laminated "diplomat" cards that, promoters said, would legally free them from ever having to pay taxes or being arrested for any crime. According to the FBI, customers ponied up fees ranging from $450 to $2,000 to get the cards. (2) Dr. Yehu Azaz, a wealthy, respected physician, gave up his career in 1991 and gave away all of his possessions, coming under the spell of guru Rena Denton's spiritual healing center in Somerset, England. In a 2009 lawsuit to recover his wealth, Azaz said that despite being an educated professional, he did not realize what he had done until 2003 because he had been brainwashed ("unduly influenced") by the aged guru. (A judge tossed out his lawsuit in July.)

-- After six years of total obstinacy, Janet and Lowell Carlson finally agreed in October to upgrade their farm's septic system in Camden Township, Minn. Until then, the couple had ignored numerous inspections, sheriff's visits and court orders even though a new system had already been paid for (by escrow funds left by the owner who sold them the farm). The Carlsons' inspiring principle throughout the six years of living with failed plumbing was to challenge the county for its "inconsistent" enforcement of septic upgrades.

-- Scottish pig farmer Peter Roy, 72, is embroiled in a long-standing dispute with the Perth and Kinross Council over who has the responsibility for repairing the sewage system on his farm in Craigmuir, but has taken a more hardcore approach than the Carlsons. He has saved his sewage in oil barrels stored on his property (now numbering about 80) to the outrage of neighbors. Roy has also periodically stepped up his protests to include leaving full barrels around town.

After Nicolas Cage filed a lawsuit against him for mismanaging the actor's money, Cage's former business manager Samuel Levin filed his defense in November, charging Cage with creating his own problems by disregarding Levin's budgetary advice. According to Levin, Cage's 2007 purchases included three houses (costing $33 million), 22 cars (including nine Rolls-Royces) and 47 works of art. By 2008, said Levin, Cage owned 15 houses, four yachts, a Gulfstream jet and an island in the Bahamas.

Better Planning Needed: (1) Brier Cutlip, 22, and Paul Bragg, 25, who were on parole and prohibited from possessing firearms, were re-arrested in December in Elkins, W.Va., when they showed up for a parole appointment. However, they had just come in from a day of hunting and were still wearing orange vests, alerting the parole officer to the fact that they had been firing guns all day. (2) Grandville Lindsey, 30, on probation in Beaumont, Texas, after a child-sex conviction and prohibited from visiting any "social" Web sites, was re-arrested in November when he sent a Twitter alert to a woman he had met while in the probation office, asking to include her as an online "friend."

British Museum officials announced in September that the hoard of 7th-century Anglo-Saxon gold and silver treasure discovered on land in Staffordshire (at least 1,500 pieces, including crosses and parts of helmets and daggers) would take a year to evaluate fully but could be worth "many times" the 1 million pounds ($1.6 million) archaeologists initially estimated. The treasure was discovered by an unemployed 55-year-old man using one of the widely ridiculed, hand-held metal detectors that beachcombers favor to recover loose coins in the sand.

Hillsborough, England, was the site of a soccer stadium disaster in 1989, in which 96 fans were crushed to death. In March 2001, the government revealed that a police officer who worked at that site beginning in 1998 nonetheless acquired post-traumatic stress disorder from continually imagining the 1989 carnage and for that received a disability settlement from the government of the equivalent of about $560,000. That amount, according to a report in London's Guardian, is more than 100 times what was paid to any of the families of the 96 people who were killed at the site.

-- Spare the Rod: In September, engaging in a 300-year tradition of the Dussera holiday in India's Tamil Nadu state, Hindu priests ritually whipped 2,000 young women and girls over a five-hour period as penance for a range of sins, from insufficient studying to moral impurity. Said one sobbing yet inspired lash recipient, to an NDTV reporter, "(W)hen we are whipped, we will get rid of our mental and physical ailments and evil spirits." (And in November, Pope John Paul II was revealed to have periodically atoned for sins by privately whipping himself, according to a nun who worked with him and who was cited in the Vatican's ongoing consideration of John Paul II for sainthood. The nun said she heard him distinctly several times from an adjacent room.)

-- From a police report in the North Bay (Ontario) Nugget (Nov. 7): An officer in line at a traffic light, realizing that cars had not moved through two light changes, walked up to the lead car to investigate. The driver said she was not able to move on the green lights because she was still on the phone and thus driving off would be illegal. The officer said a brief lecture improved the woman's understanding of the law.

-- The inspector general of the National Science Foundation revealed that on-the-job viewing of pornography Web sites was so widespread at the agency that the resultant ethics investigations hindered his primary mission of investigating fraud on grant contracts. The agency report, obtained by the Washington Times in September, said the heaviest user was a senior executive who logged on to pornography at least 331 days in 2008. He subsequently retired, but before leaving defended his habit, claiming that his Web site visits actually helped impoverished women in Third World countries to earn a decent living (by posing for pornography).

-- Fine Lawyering: Jacob Christine, 21, acting as his own lawyer at an October hearing, denying charges that he severely slashed a fellow inmate at an Easton, Pa., prison, offered his own view of whoever the perpetrator was: "Whoever attacked (the victim) had a high regard for life," said Christine, because the cut "isn't deep at all. It's on his neck. It's not on his face."

-- When Minnesota's Riverview Community Bank opened for business in 2004, founder Chuck Ripka claimed divine inspiration -- that God had told him to "pastor the bank" and, in exchange, that He would "take care of the bottom line," leading Ripka to use "prayer" as a theme in the bank's promotions. In October 2009, Riverview became only the sixth bank in the state to be shut down by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Riverview acknowledged that it had invested aggressively in real estate.

-- Dr. Hulda Clark, 80, passed away in September of multiple myeloma, an advanced cancer of the plasma cells. Before she was stricken, she had authored three books touting her eccentric remedies as cures, first, for "all diseases," and then, especially, cancer. In her books "The Cure for All Cancers" and "The Cure for All Advanced Cancers," she urged those diagnosed to immediately stop chemotherapy and embrace her quixotic regimens, to subdue the "parasites" that cause cancer.

-- Albert Freed's lawsuit for defective underwear against Hanes was dismissed in October by a Pensacola, Fla., judge, even though Freed had complained that the briefs had caused severe pain and ruined his vacation. Freed said the garment's flap had inexplicably failed to close, allowing his penis to protrude and rub against swim trunks that contained sand from the beach, irritating the sensitive skin. However, Freed delayed diagnosing the problem -- by declining to inspect his organ. He explained that he cannot easily peer over his "belly" (and wouldn't even consider, he said, examining his naked self in a mirror or asking his wife to inspect). Consequently, he had endured increased irritation before recognizing the source of the chafing.

-- According to a November Chicago Sun-Times report, county officials in Chicago have agreed to pay a $14,000 injury claim to janitor Mary Tait, of the sheriff's department. The amount covers two incidents, in 1997 and 1998, in which she hurt her back in the same way -- while "reaching around to pick up a piece of toilet paper."

-- In November, a judge in Somerville, N.J., overruled a local police chief who had rejected a firearms license for hunting enthusiast James Cap, 46. The judge ordered the chief to grant the license, even though Cap is a quadriplegic and will need to mount the gun on his wheelchair and fire it by blowing into a tube. (Cap was an avid hunter before a football injury incapacitated him.)

-- (1) In July, Charles Diez was charged with attempted murder for his angry reaction to a bicyclist who was carrying his 3-year-old son on the bike unsafely, on a busy Asheville, N.C., street. According to police, Diez was so anguished that he pulled his gun and fired at the bicyclist, grazing the man's helmet. (2) In October, just as Pennsylvania federal judge Lawrence Stengel was launching into his explanation for the sentence he was about to impose, bank robber Trammel Bledsoe grew impatient. "Can you hurry this up? I don't have time for this. Just sentence me. ..." ("You'll have all the time in the world," responded Stengel, who gave Bledsoe 41 years.)

-- Great Expectorations: (1) Charles Hersel, 39, was arrested in Thousand Oaks, Calif., in November after police investigators overheard him offer $31 to a Westlake High School boy to spit in Hersel's face. Several boys had complained to police that a man (allegedly Hersel) had approached them, offering money for expelling saliva and other bodily fluids on him. (2) Also in November, Patrick Girard, 29, a member of the City Council in Plattsburgh, N.Y., apologized to the constituent in whose face Girard had spit at the height of a barroom argument about the Boston Red Sox. Said the constituent, "It got in my eye, on my face, on my jacket."

-- Could've Planned Better: (1) Vincent Salters, 46, was arrested in East Knoxville, Tenn., in November after having shoplifted shoes the day before from the Shoe Show store. He had dashed out hurriedly with several display shoes, but an employee said they were all for the left foot. Salters was arrested outside the store the next day, perhaps having come to pick up right-foot shoes. (2) Travis Himmler, 22, was charged with burglary in November after allegedly stealing the cash register from the Golden Wok restaurant in Bloomington, Minn., and carrying it away on his bicycle. He was found down the street, injured, after taking a bad tumble when the dangling cash register cord got caught in the bike's spokes.

-- Las Vegas body modifier Nathan McKay, 24, complained in November 2000 about the difficulty of getting proper medical care, namely, further surgery to prevent his already surgically forked tongue from fusing back together and removal of all teeth (and replacement with platinum implants). Said McKay, who also has 1-inch-stretched holes in his earlobes (for holding ebony disks): "I want my tongue split ... as far back as possible, to the uvula, so I have two separate strands in my mouth." The original surgeon was a family friend, but he has balked at any follow-up. Said McKay, "I'm not trying to turn myself into anything except someone to remember."

Commercial test-preparation courses are already popular for applicants to top colleges and graduate schools, and recently also for admission to prestigious private high schools and grade schools. Now, according to a November New York Times report, such courses and private coaching are increasingly important for admission to New York City's high-achiever public kindergartens, even though the applicants are just 3 and 4 years old. Basic coaching, which may cost more than $1,000, includes training a child to listen to an adult's questions and to sit still for testing. Minimum qualification for top-shelf kindergartens are scores at the 90th percentile on the Olsat reasoning test and the Bracken School Readiness knowledge test.

-- In the past three years, at least 39 drivers in Dallas have been ticketed by police officers for the "offense" of being "a non-English speaking driver," according to a Dallas Morning News investigation in October. The software for officers' in-car computers features a check-off box with the phrase, perhaps leading officers (and their sergeants) to believe it constituted a separate traffic offense rather than merely an indication that the motorist might not have understood an officer's instructions. The police chief expressed shock at the report and promised to end the practice.

-- The Public Record: (1) From the Findlay, Ohio, police: "A woman called the police early Saturday morning (Oct. 31) during an argument with her husband after he claimed that the woman's daughter performed oral sex on him, and the daughter was better at it." (2) From the Steamboat Pilot (Steamboat Springs, Colo.), Nov. 4: "Police were called to a report of a suspicious incident in the 2900 block of West Acres Drive where a woman reported that she found feces in her toilet that she did not think she put there."

-- Justifiable Felonies? (1) Five people were arrested in Los Angeles in October and charged with kidnapping and "torturing" two "loan modification" agents who had taken fees while promising to save their home from foreclosure but had allegedly failed to help. (2) Daniel Adler, 61, was arrested in October in Stony Point, N.Y., and charged with assault. Police said Adler had been solicited by a Sears Home Improvement telemarketer and had agreed to an appointment but that when the employee arrived, Adler allegedly punched him in the face. Adler said he had scheduled the appointment only to "advise" Sears, in person, to stop calling him.

-- Oops! In an October incident, an off-duty Jacksonville, Fla., sheriff's deputy forgot to leave her service weapon outside when accompanying her mother to Shands Jacksonville hospital for an MRI. The powerful magnet sucked her Glock away in a flash, trapping the deputy's hand between the machine and the gun. Repairs, plus the lengthy powering-down and re-powering of the machine, was said to have cost the hospital $150,000.

-- Google 1, FBI 0: In September, Nebraska prison guard Michal Preclik, 32 (who had been on the job for a year and had just been promoted), was discovered to be on the lam from Interpol for drug and fraud crimes in the Czech Republic. The Corrections Department's background check, on the FBI's National Criminal Information Center database, had turned up nothing, but when officials subsequently Googled Preclik, the Interpol wanted poster was one of the top results.

-- Promoting the General Welfare in Malaysia: (1) The government of the state of Terengganu initiated a campaign in November to halt the growing divorce rate by offering pre-marital classes in sensuality. Also, because newlyweds have identified spousal body odor and ugly pajamas as turn-offs, the government invited cosmetics firms and lingerie sellers to improve their offerings. (2) The chairwoman of the family and health committee of Malaysia's Kelantan state suggested in October that male legislators should take, as additional wives (permitted under Islam), some of the 16,000 unmarried mothers now dependent on state support.

-- U.S. Homeland Security officials confirmed in October that an estimated 200,000 temporarily admitted foreign visitors to the U.S. since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks are still in the country illegally, with overstayed visas, and that there is still no system in place to catch them. The problem had surfaced in September when a 19-year-old Jordanian man (legally admitted on a since-expired tourist visa) was arrested and accused of plotting to blow up a Dallas skyscraper. He had been arrested two weeks before that on a traffic violation, and even though he was on an FBI watch list because of visits to a jihadist Web site, he had no immigration "record" and thus was released after paying the traffic fine.

-- When the DRP party candidate for president of Mexico City's most populous borough lost in the primary this year, party officials hatched a plot to elevate a street peddler, "Juanito" Angeles, to run in the general election, with the "understanding" that he would step aside if victorious, in favor of the original candidate, Clara Brugada. Helped by his "everyman" image (according to a New York Times dispatch), Angeles won the election. However, his sudden power and celebrity apparently went to his head, and he refused to relinquish the presidency. (He finally agreed, in September, but only after receiving concessions from the party.)

-- Florida Democracy in Action: (1) When a Broward County Republican club held its scheduled meeting in October at a local gun range (according to a South Florida Sun-Sentinel report), among the shooters was the congressional candidate trying to unseat the Democratic incumbent, and on his target as he fired away, someone had written the Democrat's initials. (2) Also in Broward County in October, the father (a Democrat) of County Mayor Stacy Ritter was arrested and charged with threatening his daughter at gunpoint. The father is running for mayor of Tamarac and was upset that his daughter had endorsed his opponent.

Franciscan monk Cesare Bonizzi, 63, who 15 years ago turned from spiritual new age music to heavy metal (inspired, he said, by the groups Metallica and Megadeth) and who has spent the last several years as the robe-clad lead singer of his own band, Fratello Metallo, announced his retirement in November after realizing, he said, that the devil had tempted him too much with celebrity and turned him away from his brothers.

(1) William Evans, 57, on trial in St. Augustine, Fla., in August for a sex crime that occurred nearly 30 years ago (but not erased by the statute of limitations), committed suicide while away from the courthouse, awaiting the jury's decision. Without knowing that, the jury came back and declared him not guilty. (2) Engineering student Ken Kitamura, 19, drowned in the Yodogawa River in Osaka, Japan, in August. He and several colleagues had constructed a prototype canoe made of concrete, and Kitamura was the first to try it out.

News of the Weird reported in October 1998 the on-the-job death by snake bite of serpent-handling preacher John W. (Punkin) Brown Jr. (In a landmark book on Southern snake-handling preachers, "Salvation on Sand Mountain," Brown was called the "mad monk," the one most "mired" in the "blood lust of the patriarchs.") Because Brown's wife had died three years earlier (of a snake bite during services in Kentucky), the Browns' three orphans were objects of a custody fight between the two sets of grandparents. In February 1999, the wife's parents won primary custody, in a Newport, Tenn., hearing, largely because Mr. Brown's parents were not able to refrain (despite a judge's orders) from taking the grandkids to snake-handling services.