Slaved Over a Hot Stove: Delivering gourmet meals to customers' doors is a fast-growing business model, with chefs in nearly every large modern city trying to cash in. So far, perhaps only London's brand-new Housebites goes the extra step. According to its press release, cited by Huffington Post in June, Housebites not only home-delivers "restaurant quality" cuisine (at the equivalent of about $15 to $20 per entry), but offers an optional dirty-pans service (about $8 extra), lending out the containers in which the food was prepared, thus allowing clients entertaining guests to display "evidence" of their culinary skills and hard work. [Huffington Post, 6-14-2012]

-- Big Fish: The U.S. Department of Justice has been widely criticized for failing to bring to fruition investigations of Wall Street traders' alleged lies (such as accusations that the firm MFS Global made bets on European bonds by illegally using clients' money, of which CEO Jon Corzine suspiciously professed to be unaware). However, in several notable instances, its investigators have been relentless -- for instance, prosecuting baseball's Roger Clemens for lying to Congress and, in January, indicting marine biologist Nancy Black, who faces 20 years in prison for allegedly lying to investigators about whether her crew might have illegally fed whales to attract their attention for a boatload of whale-watchers. [Huffington Post, 1-7-2012]

-- The government office in Liverpool, England, that takes applications for benefits from disabled persons acknowledged in March that it needed to relocate. The office's parking garage is 13 stories high, but that still requires visitors to climb two more flights of stairs from that level to reach the offices. A Liverpool Council statement admitted that the office was "not (in) the ideal location." [Liverpool Echo, 3-3-2012]

-- Worth Every Penny: (1) In April, police chief John Crane of Gadsden, Ala., learned that his department has owned, for two years, two unmanned aerial drones. He said he has no idea why they were purchased (at about $150,000), but that local taxpayers need not worry since they came with a federal law enforcement grant. (2) NBC Bay Area reports periodically on uses of 2009 federal stimulus money distributed in the San Francisco area, and in May revealed that the University of California, San Francisco, had received $1.2 million to interview 200 men on what effect being overweight has on their sex lives. A government budget activist decried funding a "sex study over fixing bridges and roads that are crumbling every day." [Associated Press via Huffington Post, 5-1-2012] [KNTV (San Francisco), 5-16-2012]

-- The Indispensability of Arts and Crafts: (1) There are not enough video games, according to the National Endowment for the Arts, which in April awarded a $40,000 grant to the University of Southern California to help produce another, based on Henry David Thoreau's "Walden." (2) Australia's Council for the Arts announced in May that it would give A$20,000 (U.S. equivalent, $20,380) to the "death-metal" band Ouroboros, citing the band's distinct genre and its need for a symphony orchestra for its next album. Said the drummer, "We wouldn't consider hiring an orchestra to do this without (the grant)." [Time, 4-30-2012] [The Australian, 5-21-2012]

-- In May, performance artist Stuart Ringholt opened his show, at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, naked. His pieces (a hodge-podge of exhibits on current art-world commentaries) were secondary to his insistence that all visitors to the show also shuck their clothing. His subtext, he said, was to explore reactions to extreme embarrassment (and told a New York Times correspondent that in an earlier self-shaming display, he had stood by a marble fountain for 20 minutes, dressed formally but with toilet paper trailing from his trousers). According to a Times dispatch from Sydney, Ringholt was joined by 48 nude-yet-nonplussed patrons -- 32 men and 16 women. [New York Times, 5-2-2012]

-- London's Hayward Gallery staged an exhibition in June of "invisible art" -- pieces that depend almost completely on the imaginations of viewers. For example, "1000 Hours of Staring" by Tom Friedman is a blank piece of paper that Friedman eyeballed off and on over five years before deciding that the object was finished and display-ready. Friedman also "submitted" an empty section of floor space, which he said was once cursed by a witch. Also there: an Andy Warhol bare platform that looks like it should have something resting on it, but doesn't, and, by Yoko Ono, a typed set of instructions urging patrons to imagine some stuff. [Daily Telegraph (London), 5-18-2012]

-- Germany's Spiegel Online reported in April that police in Hamburg had charged a 33-year-old man with 96 burglaries based in part on the "ear prints" he left at each scene when he leaned against a front door to detect whether anyone was home. DNA and fingerprints were also collected, said a police source, but "earprints are of similar value as fingerprints in terms of evidence." [Spiegel Online, 4-30-2012]

-- Easy Collar: Kalvin Hulvey, 35, was charged with attempted auto theft in Tulsa, Okla., in June after jumping into Jeremy Penny's van and fleeing. Penny and his dad took up the chase and caught Hulvey. Said Penny later, "I rodeo. (Dad and I) both rodeo." When police arrived, Hulvey had been neatly hog-tied and secured to a fence. Explained Penny, "(L)ately, I've been having bad luck keeping calves tied (in rodeos), so (Dad) did the tying up." [KOTV (Tulsa), 6-19-2012]

(1) Charles Marshall, 28, was arrested in Cincinnati in June and charged, for the fourth time in two years, with crimes involving exposing himself and simulating sex with a teddy bear. (It was not reported whether it was the same teddy bear.) (2) A 36-year-old man was arrested in Harvard, Idaho, in May and charged with indecent exposure. A newspaper account reported that the target of his flashing was a dog, which he was allegedly trying to entice to approach the fence and nuzzle the man's genitals. [The Smoking Gun, 6-15-2012] [Moscow-Pullman Daily News, 5-26-2012]

You Would Think ...: (1) In June, Logan Schwab, 20, who used to work at the police department in Carlisle, Pa., was seen on surveillance video sneaking into an office at the station, prying open a desk, and taking away $200 to $300 in parking-ticket money. (2) In Panama City, Fla., in May, Michael Marquez, 34 (who had been arrested with another man after being caught fighting over suspected stolen goods), was seen snatching a clock off the wall of the room in which he was being interrogated. He had stuffed it into his backpack when an officer left the room briefly, but was recorded on surveillance video. [Associated Press via Pocono Record, 6-13- 2012] [WJHG-TV (Panama City, Fla.), 5-22-2012]

In the U.S., most preschoolers who parade down pageant runways with their mothers cheering them are 5- and 6-year-olds. Britain's upcoming Miss Mini Princess U.K. will probably feature Eleanor June Rees-Sutherland, who has yet to reach her second birthday. Though Eleanor June's father strongly disapproves, Mom Robyn told the London's Daily Mail that Eleanor June is a born pageant contestant ("such a girly girl") who loves to wear makeup and nail polish, especially bright colors, and already owns a wardrobe of 20 dresses and 15 pairs of shoes. Robyn seems assured that pedophiles pose no threat: "I don't think there's anything sexy about a child who's dressed like a little princess." [Daily Mail, 6-10-2012]

Tragedy struck Poplar Bluff, Mo., on June 5 when five teenage girls parked their Jeep on railroad tracks at night at a spot notorious in local lore for the "ghost train" that once killed two people. As a train approached at 12:30 a.m., the girl driving tried to start the Jeep, but, as in the movies, the engine failed. Three girls fled, but, as in the movies, two were not able to unfasten their seat belts in time (and began screaming). One of the girls returned and helped one trapped girl escape, but the rescuer and the other trapped girl died when the train hit the Jeep. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 6-5-2012]

Update: Last week's News of the Weird gave serial impregnator Desmond Hatchett, of Knoxville, Tenn., too much credit. It is true that he has fathered at least 24 kids by at least 11 different women (and has no hope of meeting child-support obligations), but he is hardly Tennessee's most prolific. A June summary by the Daily Mail of London (citing WMC-TV and WREG-TV in Memphis) revealed that Terry Turnage of Memphis has 23 children by 17 different women, and Richard M. Colbert (also from Memphis) has 25 with 18 women. Courts have ordered the men to pay the various mothers monthly support ranging from $259 to $309, but one woman said the most she had ever seen from Turnage was $9. [Daily Mail, 6-14-2012]

-- Debbie Stevens, 47, filed a claim before the New York Human Rights commission in April alleging that she was fired in November by Ms. Jackie Brucia, a controller of the Atlantic Automotive Group of West Islip, N.Y., after Stevens failed to recover quickly enough from major surgery in August. Stevens had donated a kidney to Brucia, who apparently could not understand why Stevens was still in pain by Sept. 6 so that she needed more time off. (Actually, since Brucia and Stevens were not perfect matches, Brucia had Stevens donate to a woman ahead of Brucia on the waiting list, which created an opening for Brucia. Brucia's husband told a New York Post reporter in April that Stevens' claims were "far from the truth," but would not elaborate.) [New York Post, 4-23-2012]

-- In April, a jury in Charlotte, N.C., convicted Charles Hinton, 47, for a break-in at the Levine Children's Hospital in 2010, where he had been charged with stealing 10 video gaming systems that sick children relied on for entertainment while they received cancer treatment. [Charlotte Observer, 4-26-2012]

-- A CNN investigation revealed in May that the Disabled Veterans National Foundation had collected almost $56 million in donations over four years but given nearly all of it to two direct-mail fundraising companies. CNN was able to locate a small veterans charity in Birmingham, Ala., that received help, but mainly in the form of 2,600 bags of cough drops, 2,200 bottles of sanitizers, 11,520 bags of coconut M&Ms and 700 pairs of Navy dress shoes. Another, in Prescott, Ariz., received hundreds of chef's coats and aprons, cans of acrylic paint and a needlepoint design pillowcase. Said the manager of the Birmingham charity, "I ask myself what the heck are these people doing." [CNN, 5-8-2012]

-- Andrea Amanatides suffered a boo-boo in May while being booked to begin a six-month jail sentence in Albany, N.Y., for a probation violation. As she was being placed in a holding cell, a cache of drugs fell onto the floor. Deputies soon figured out that a condom Amanatides had placed into a bodily orifice had burst. The final inventory: 26 Oxycontins, 10 Ambiens, 50 Valiums, 37 Adderalls, plus 133 more prescription pills and four baggies containing heroin. The sequence was captured on surveillance video. [Times Union (Albany), 5-31-2012]

-- Weekend WTMW-TV (Portland, Maine) news anchor Meghan Torjussen was called on to deliver breaking sports news on June 3, the score of a playoff game between the Boston Celtics and the Miami Heat. Time had run out in the fourth quarter with the score tied, 89-89. "I guess the game just ended," Torjussen announced. "This is what my producer is telling me right now." "There's the score (on the screen), 89-89. Uh, went down to the wire ... ended in a tie. (A)ll right, let's move on to professional baseball." (Boston eventually won, in overtime, 93-91.) [Huffington Post, 6-4-2012]

-- Things People Believe: Seattle attorney Andrew Basiago told Huffington Post in April that he "time-traveled" eight times as a child as part of the secret Project Pegasus staged by the Pentagon's notorious Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Another lawyer, Alfred Webre, recently explained, matter-of-factly, to a seminar audience in Vancouver, British Columbia, that teleportation is an "inexpensive, environmentally friendly means of transportation" and was used most recently by then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld "to transport troops to battle." Basiago said, in a flourish of detail, that he was at Ford's Theater the night Abraham Lincoln was assassinated but did not witness it, and said that twice, he ran into himself while back in the past. [Huffington Post, 4-28-2012]

-- In June, the North Carolina Senate passed a state House of Representatives bill (House Bill 819) that orders scientists to use the "correct" way to predict weather in North Carolina. The bill requires that only historical analogies back to 1900 be used to predict sea-level rise -- meaning that scientists must ignore "feedback loops" in which recent, consistent heat and violent atmospheric conditions suggest more radical weather. For example, nine of the hottest 10 years on record have occurred since 2000, but North Carolina scientists must not be swayed by that fact because only patterns of the more stable 20th century can forecast 21st-century sea levels. (Many North Carolina coastal property owners believe the 40-or-more-inch rise in sea level by 2100 that is predicted by most scientists would threaten property values and would rather believe the perhaps-8-inch rise that House Bill 819 would dictate.) [The Virginian-Pilot, 6-12-2012] [Scientific American, 5-30-2012] [EarthObservatory.NASA.gov, 1-19-2012]

-- In testimony at an extortion trial in New York City in June, Anthony Russo (alleged Colombo family associate) told prosecutors that a mob war was narrowly averted after another Colombo hand learned that a new Staten Island pizza parlor (run by an alleged Bonanno associate) featured pies that suspiciously resembled those of the top-rated L&B Spumoni Gardens in Brooklyn, which has Colombo ties. Representatives of the families had a "sit-down" (at a neutral site -- a Panera Bread restaurant!) and worked out a payment plan to satisfy L&B. [New York Daily News, 6-13-2012]

-- Seattle police reported that a woman had been walking her dog in Plymouth Pillars Park at about 2 a.m. on May 10 and allegedly making noise that disturbed another man. Both were carrying pooper scoopers, and it is unclear which of the two started it, but the woman claimed the man jousted his toward her off and on in a "30-minute" duel, as she used hers to block his assaults. Police said a search failed to turn up suspects. [KOMO News via KVAL-TV (Eugene, Ore.), 5-15-2012]

-- Good to Know: Five hikers on holiday from Miami got lost overnight on May 3 high in the Adirondack Mountains in Essex County, N.Y., and endured a night of rain with temperatures in the 40s before they were rescued. One or more of the hikers (number unclear in the news report) got to test one theory of body-warming, but learned that its benefit was illusory. That is, warming up a cold body by urinating on it provides only momentary, if any, relief. [Times Union (Albany), 5-8-2012]

-- Serial flasher-alcoholic Michael McShane, 55, of Workington, England, seems well aware of the serious problem he has. He has been arrested 283 times (190 convictions) for indecent exposure and public drinking, and was apparently trying to keep himself out of trouble one night in April by dressing in two pairs of pants, so that if he shed one, he would still be within the law. However, on that night, police picked up a passed-out McShane outside a bar where he had already managed to pull both pairs of trousers down past his buttocks, and in May, he garnered conviction number 191, in Carlisle Crown Court. [News & Star (Cumbria), 5-21-2012]

Earlier this year, Tokyo artist Mao Sugiyama, 22, had elective surgery to remove his genitals, underscoring his commitment to an "asexual" lifestyle in which his behavior and attitude are supposedly completely irrelevant to whether he is male or female. Then, on April 8, he solicited diners to a meal (for the equivalent of about $250 each) in which his genitals were cooked and served, garnished with button mushrooms and Italian parsley. One applicant was a no-show, but five dined with him on April 13. According to a May report on Huffington Post, the well-photographed story "went viral" in Japan, and authorities repeatedly assured journalists that no law had been violated. [Huffington Post, 5-24-2012]

Thanks This Week to John Kearney, Glenn Mitchell and David Henshaw, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.

Chinese media reported that on May 4th, at the Xiaogan Middle School in Hubei province, high school students studying for the all-important national college entrance exam worked through the evening while hooked up to intravenous drips of amino acids to fight fatigue. A director of the school's Office of Academic Affairs reasoned that before the IVs were hung, weary students complained of losing too much time running back and forth to the school's infirmary for energy injections. After the media reports, there was a public backlash, but less against the notion that China was placing too much importance on the exams than against reports that the government was subsidizing the cost of the injections. [South China Morning Post, 5-9-2012]

-- Desmond Hatchett, 33, was summoned to court in Knoxville, Tenn., in May so that a judge could chastise him for again failing to make child-support payments. Official records show that Hatchett has at least 30 children (ages 14 down to "toddler") by at least 11 women. He said at a 2009 court appearance that he was "through" siring children and apparently has taken proper precautions since then. (In Milwaukee, Wis., in April, Sean Patrick was sentenced to 30 years in prison for owing more than $146,000 for 12 children by 10 mothers, and the city's Journal Sentinel newspaper reported that, before being locked up, two convicted pimps, Derrick Avery and Todd Carter, had fathered, respectively, 15 kids by seven women and 16 children with "several" mothers.) [Los Angeles Times, 5-18-2012] [Journal Sentinel, 4-3-2012]

-- The Associated Press reported in May that Kentucky prison officials were working behind the scenes to resolve the thorny question of whether inmate Robert Foley deserves a hip replacement. Normally, a prisoner in such extreme pain would qualify. However, Foley, 55, is on death row for killing six people in 1989 and 1991, and since he has exhausted his appeals, he is still alive only because a court has halted all executions while the state reconsiders its lethal-injection procedure. Furthermore, all local hospitals queried by the prison to perform the procedure have declined to take Foley because the prison considers him dangerous. [Associated Press via AzCentral.com (Phoenix), 5-17-2012]

-- Chilean artist Sebastian Errazuriz recently created "Christian popsicles" made from wine that Errazuriz obtained by trickery after a priest consecrated it into "the blood of Christ." The popsicle's stick is actually a figure of Jesus on the cross, as sort of a reward for finishing the treat. (Also, The Icecreamists shop in London, England, recently began offering a popsicle made with absinthe -- and holy water from a spring in Lourdes, France, which many Catholics revere for its healing powers. The "Vice Lolly" sells for the equivalent of about $29.) [CNN, 5-17-2012] [DigitalSpy.com (Hearst Publications), 5-31-2012]

-- The official class photo of Eileen Diaz's second-grade kids at Sawgrass Elementary School in Sunrise, Fla., was distributed this spring with the face of the front-and-center child replaced by a dark-on-white smiley face. Apparently there was miscommunication between the school and the photographer about redoing the photo without the child, whose parents had not given permission for the shot. (Another child without parental authorization was easily edited out of the photo, but the front-and-center student could not be.) [WPLG-TV (Miami), 4-3-2012]

-- In May, the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled, 3-0, that it is not necessarily improper under federal law for Minute Maid to name a beverage "Pomegranate Blueberry" even though those two ingredients constitute only 0.5 percent of the contents. A competing seller of pomegranate juices had sued in 2008, pointing out that 99.4 percent of the Minute Maid beverage was merely apple and grape juices. Minute Maid's owner, Coca-Cola, called the competitor's complaint "baseless." [San Francisco Chronicle, 5-18-2012]

-- Almost all companies that collect customer data publish their policies on how they keep the data "private" (even though those "privacy" policies almost always explain just precisely the ways they intend not to keep the data "private" -- and are not required to by law). Researchers writing in the journal I/S: A Journal of Law and Policy for the Information Society (summarized in an April post on the blog TechDirt.com) found that if typical consumers bothered to read all of the detailed privacy policies they encountered, it would take from 181 to 304 hours per year (22-38 workdays), depending on shopping habits. (If every consumer in America did it, it would take from 40 billion to 67 billion hours a year, or 5 billion to 8.3 billion workdays a year.) [TechDirt.com, 4-23-2012]

-- In April, the Federal Communications Commission announced that it was fining Google for deliberately impeding the agency's investigation into the company's collection of wireless data by its roaming Street View vehicles and that the agency had decided, based on Google's "ability to pay," that it needed to double its staff-proposed fine in order to "deter future misconduct." Hence, it raised Google's fine from $12,000 to $25,000. (As pointed out by ProPublica.org, during the previous quarter year, Google made profits of $2.89 billion, or $25,000 every 68 seconds.) [ProPublica, 4-16-2012]

-- In April, police in Newtown Township, Pa., searched (unsuccessfully, it turns out) for a "skinny" black male, between ages 35 and 45, wearing a black tracksuit. He had indecently exposed himself at a place of business -- the offices of the Bucks County Association for the Blind (although, obviously, at least one sighted person reported his description). [PhillyBurbs.com, 5-1-2012]

-- District of Columbia Councilman Marion Barry initially was scorned in May for criticizing the influx of "Asian" shopkeepers into the ward that he represents. "They got to go. I'll say that right now." Later, after re-thinking the issue, Barry announced that his ward should be "the model of diversity," and issued an apology to Asian-Americans. But, he lamented, America has always been tough on immigrants. "The Irish caught hell, the Jews caught hell, the Polacks caught hell." (The preferred terms are "Polish" or "Poles.") [WTOP Radio (Washington, D.C.), 5-24-2012]

(1) A team of scientists from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, following up on a Harvard study that found dramatic weight-loss qualities from eating yogurt, did its own yogurt study. The results, summarized in Scientific American in May, noted that yogurt-eating male mice have 10 times the follicle density of other mice, producing "luxuriantly silky fur" and larger, outward-projecting testicles that made them far more effective inseminators. (2) British researchers from the University of Liverpool and the University of Bristol concluded in an April journal article that caterpillars of the large white butterfly, which defends itself against predators by vomiting on them, are less likely to do so when the caterpillars live in groups. The researchers hypothesize that gratuitous vomiters are seen as poor mating risks. [Scientific American, 5-4-2012] [Science Daily, 4-12-2012]

The most recently reported morbidly obese person who required that her home be partially torn apart by firefighters so that she could be lifted out to be taken to a hospital was teenager Georgia Davis in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales. Davis, 19, weighs nearly 800 pounds, and 40 people were involved in extricating her in May from her upstairs bedroom, via scaffolding. (Several years ago, Davis enrolled in a weight-loss camp in the U.S. and got down to about 250 pounds, but she quickly gained it back.) [WalesOnline.com, 5-24-2012]

A time-honored defense used by many older men when charged with having sex with underage girls is now so common that it must be retired from circulation. In February in Bridgeport, Conn., Norberto Millet, 60, denied raping the 9-year-old girl, accusing her of actually attacking him -- and said he had to fight her off. In fact, Millet told police, a lot of girls 8- to 10 years old try to have sex with him. And in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in May, Lyle Moodie, 47 at the time, said much the same about his 16-year-old accuser. "She just suddenly grabbed me by the pajama bottoms. I pulled back and said, 'No, stop.' I didn't know what to do." [Connecticut Post, 2-10-2012] [Canoe.ca, 5-16-2012]

Thanks This Week to Gary Goldberg and David Henshaw, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisers.