For September's Digital Design Weekend at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, artists Michiko Nitta and Michael Burton commissioned soprano Louise Ashcroft to sing, altering pitch and volume while wearing a face mask made of algae. According to the artists, since algae's growth changes with the amount and quality of carbon dioxide it receives, Ashcroft's voice, blowing CO2 against the algae, should vary the growth's "taste" as to bitterness or sweetness. After the performance, the audience sampled the algae at various stages and apparently agreed. The artists said they were demonstrating how biotechnology could transform organisms. [V&A Museum press release via io9.com blog, 9-27-2012]

-- Jordan and Bryan Silverman's start-up venture, Star Toilet Paper, distributes rolls to public restrooms in restaurants, stadiums and other locations absolutely free -- because the brothers have sold ads on each sheet. (Company slogan: "Don't rush. Look before you flush.") Jordan, with 50 advertisers enlisted so far, told the Detroit Free Press in August that he came up with the idea, of course, while sitting on the can at the University of Michigan library. [Detroit Free Press via USA Today, 8-21-2012]

-- First-World Problems: After an international trade association reported that women bought 548 million pairs of shoes in 2011 (not even counting those used exclusively for sports), the manufacturer Nine West has decided to start its own cable TV channel with programing on "various aspects of footwear," according to an August New York Times report. Programs will feature celebrities rhapsodizing about their favorite pair, women who hoard shoes (purchasing many more than they know they'll ever wear even one time), tips on developing one's stiletto-walking skills and shoe closet designs. It's about a "conversation," said a Nine West executive, "not about a shoe." [New York Times, 8-21-2012]

-- Habersham Funding of Georgia and its competitors make their money by buying terminally ill clients' life insurance policies for lump sums, then continuing to pay the policies' premiums so that they collect as beneficiaries upon death. The companies' business model therefore depends on those clients dying quickly; a client who outlives expectations turns the investment sour. Thus, according to an August report by the New York Times, the companies run extensive background checks on the illnesses and lifestyles of potential clients and employ sophisticated computer algorithms that predict, better than doctors can, how long a client will live. Supposedly, according to the report, the companies are nonchalant about erroneous predictions. No company, they claim, has an official policy of hoping for early death. [New York Times, 8-11-2012]

-- Scorpion antivenom made in Mexico sells in Mexico for about $100 a dose, but for a while over the last year, the going rate in the emergency room of the Chandler (Ariz.) Regional Medical Center was $39,652 a dose, charged to Marcie Edmonds, who was stung while opening a box of air-conditioner filters in June. She received two doses by IV and was released after three hours, to later find a co-pay bill of $25,537 awaiting her (with her Humana plan picking up $57,509), according to the Arizona Republic newspaper. The Republic found that Arizona hospitals retailed it for between $7,900 and $12,467 per dose -- except for Chandler. Following the newspaper's report, Chandler decided to re-price the venom at $8,000 a dose, thus eating a $31,652 "loss." [Arizona Republic, 9-4-2012, 9-20-2012]

-- Among the least-important effects of last summer's drought in the Midwest: Officials overseeing the annual Wisconsin State Cow Chip Throw said there would be fewer high-quality cow patties. Said chairperson Ellen Paulson: "When it's hot, the cows don't eat as much. And what was produced, they just dried up too quick." A few patties had been saved from the 2011 competition, but, she said, "It's not like you can go out and buy them." [Wisconsin State Journal, 8-23-2012]

-- The ongoing feud between two Warwick, R.I., households has intensified, according to an August complaint. Kathy Melker and Craig Fontaine charged that not only has neighbor Lynne Taylor been harassing them with verbal insults and threats, but that Taylor has now taught her cockatoo to call Melker, on sight, a nasty epithet (which rhymes with "clucking bore"). "I'm 53 years old, and I've never been called (that phrase) in my life," Melker said. [RhodyBeat.com (Providence), 8-16-2012]

-- At least two teams of Swiss researchers are developing tools that can improve farmers' efficiency and reduce the need for shepherds. The research group Kora has begun outfitting sheep with heart rate monitors that, when predators approach, register blood-pressure spikes that are texted to the shepherd, summoning him to the scene. Another inefficiency is cow farmers' frequent needs to locate and examine cows that might be in heat, but professors at a Bern technical college are testing placing thermometers in cows' genitals, with text messages alerting the farmer that a specific cow is ready for mating. (Since most insemination is done artificially, farmers can reduce the supply of bull semen they need to keep in inventory.) [New York Times, 10-2-2012]

-- Researchers writing in the journal Animal Behaviour in July hypothesized why male pandas have sometimes been seen performing handstands near trees. They are urinating, the scientists observed, and doing handstands streams the urine higher on the tree, presumably signaling their mating superiority. A San Diego Zoo researcher involved in the study noted that an accompanying gland secretion gives off even more "personal" information to other pandas than the urine alone. [Live Science, 8-28-2012]

-- Spending on health care for pets is rising, of course, as companion animals are given almost equal status as family members. In Australia, veterinarians who provide dental services told Queensland's Sunday Mail in August that they have even begun to see clients demanding cosmetic dental work -- including orthodontic braces and other mouth work to give dogs "kissable breath" and smiles improved by removing the gap-tooth look. [Courier-Mail (Brisbane), 8-12-2012]

Endangering the "Presumption of Innocence": (1) Roy Mullen, posing for his most recent photo to be posted on the Tennessee sex offender registry in September, showed up wearing a t-shirt reading "Love Sucks / True Love Swallows." (2) Hubert Leverich, 40, was arrested in Danville, Va., in September and charged with sexual abuse of an underage girl. Leverich's permanently tattooed forehead reads "Felon Thoughts" and (in English gothic lettering) "Insane." [The Smoking Gun, 9-18-2012] [News & Advance (Danville), 9-6-2012]

-- Pathetic: (1) Kalpeshkumar Patel, 40, failed in June to carry out his longstanding threat to burn down the Chevron station in High Springs, Fla. After dousing his car with gasoline in front of the store, he realized he had no lighter or matches and had to ask several customers, without success, to help him out. He was arrested before he could do any damage. (2) Ignatius "Michael" Pollara, 46, and his mother, 70, were arrested following what police said was a 10-year shoplifting spree that might have spanned 50 states. They were nabbed in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., because, said sheriff's Sgt. Rich Rossman, Pollara could not resist using a "rewards" card traced to him, which he used to get credit for some of the purchases he had switched for more expensive items. [South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 8-10-2012]

Recent, apparently dramatic public appearances of Jesus: Beeville, Tex.; August (Jesus in a breakfast taco). Belfast, Northern Ireland; August (Jesus on a tree stump in the Belfast City Cemetery). Sunderland, England; June (Jesus among the peeling paint on the door of a Chinese-food takeout stand). Port St. Lucie, Fla.; May (Jesus on the television show "The Bachelor" -- at least as per a woman's photo of the TV screen during the show). Splendora, Tex.; May (mold on a bathroom wall). New Orleans; April (Jesus in a shadow cast through a chandelier in the Ursuline Academy Chapel). Charleston, S.C.; April (Jesus on the back of a dead stingray). Clermont, Fla.; March (Jesus on an electric company meter at the Torchlite RV Park). Beeville: [KENS-TV (San Antonio), 8-6-2012] Belfast: [UTV New Media (Belfast), 8-9-2012] Sunderland: [Sunderland Echo, 6-28-2012] Port St. Lucie: [WPBF-TV (West Palm Beach), 5-15-2012] Splendora: [KTRK-TV (Houston), 5-31-2012] New Orleans: [WWL-TV via KTHV-TV (Little Rock, Ark.), 4-3-2012] Charleston: [Beaufort Gazette, 4-2-2012] Clermont: [WKMG-TV (Orlando), 3-21-2012]

Thanks This Week to Bruce Leiserowitz and the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisers.

Modern Warfare: China, Japan and Taiwan each claim ownership of the uninhabited South China Sea islands of Senkaku or Diaoyu, and the controversy heightened in September when Japan announced that it had formally "purchased" the islands from a private company that reputedly owned them. China countered by "launching" its first-ever aircraft carrier (a vessel junked in 1998 by Ukraine), which it hopes will intimidate its neighbors even though it is useless to planes. Days later, patrol boats from Taiwan and Japan had a confrontation near the islands -- drenching each other in a military-grade squirt-gun fight. (Japan won.) [New York Times, 9-25-2012] [Daily Mail (London), 9-25-2012]

-- A 14-year-old boy was hospitalized in critical condition in Churchill, Pa., in August after allegedly swiping a Jeep Grand Cherokee and leading the owner's boyfriend on a brief high-speed chase before rolling the Cherokee over on Interstate 376. The boy's mother, according to WTAE-TV, blamed the Cherokee's owner: A vehicle with the keys in it, she said, "was an opportunity that, in a 14-year-old's eyes, was ... the perfect moment." Also, she said, the boyfriend "had no right to chase my son." The boy "could have just (wanted) a joyride down the street. Maybe he (merely) wanted to go farther than he felt like walking." [WTAE-TV (Pittsburgh), 8-13-2012]

-- Irresistible: (1) David Thompson, 27, was arrested in August and charged with stealing a bag of marijuana from the Charleroi (Pa.) Regional police station. While talking to an officer about an unrelated case, Thompson noticed an evidence bag on a counter and swiped it. Caught moments later, Thompson profusely apologized, telling the officer, "I just couldn't help myself. That bud smelled so good." (2) Aaron Morris was charged in August with battery in North Lauderdale, Fla., for groping the buttocks of a woman at a Walmart. According to the arresting officer, Morris explained, "Her booty looked so good, I just couldn't resist touching it." [Observer-Reporter (Washington, Pa.) via NBC News, 8-15-2012] [South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 8-10-2012]

First-World Problems: (1) Ohio death-row inmate Ronald Post, 53, asked a federal court in September to cancel his January date with destiny on the grounds that, despite almost 30 years of prison food, he's still too fat to execute. At 480 pounds, "vein access" and other issues would cause his lethal injection to be "torturous." (2) British murderer-sadist Graham Fisher, 39, is locked up in a high-security hospital in Berkshire, England, but he, too, has been eating well (at about 325 pounds). In August, he was approved for gastric-band surgery paid for by Britain's National Health Service at an estimated cost, including a private room for post-op recuperation, of about $25,000). [Associated Press via Google News, 9-17-2012] [Daily Mail (London), 8-19-2012]

-- Iranian cleric Hojatoleslam Ali Beheshti was hospitalized in the town of Shahmirzad in September, allegedly after being roughed up by a woman. According to Iran's Mehr news agency, the cleric was merely performing his "duty," warning an allegedly immodestly dressed woman to cover herself better. She suggested, instead, that he should "cover (his) eyes," and when he continued admonishing her, she, unladylike, pushed him away and kicked him. [Bloomberg News, 9-20-2012]

-- Arrested in September and charged with aggravated indecent exposure (making continued obscene gestures to female kayakers on Michigan's Pinnebog River while nude): 60-year-old TV producer William H. Masters III -- the son of pioneer 1960s sex researcher William Masters (who, with Virginia Johnson, wrote the landmark books "Human Sexual Response" and "Human Sexual Inadequacy"). [New York Post, 9-5-2012]

-- In August, the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the Gerber Legendary Blades company of Portland, Ore., announced a recall of Gerber machetes. According to CPSC, the machetes might have a defect that could cause the handle to break, making the machete, said CPSC, a "laceration hazard." [CPSC News Release, 8-16-2012]

-- Challenging Races: (1) Richard Wagner Jones, running for a school board seat in Granite, Utah, told reporters in June that since the job is mainly about taxes and budgets, he would not have to make site visits to schools. That is fortunate, for Jones is barred from schools as a registered sex offender based on a 1990 conviction. (2) Mike Rios, a former school board member in Moreno Valley, Calif., said in August that he was still considering running for the town's council despite his March arrest for attempted murder and April arrest for pimping (allegedly caught with several underage recruits). (3) Verna Jackson Hammons said in August that her candidacy for mayor of Cullman, Ala., should not suffer by her having appeared 10 years earlier as "the other woman" in a love triangle on an episode of "The Jerry Springer Show." [KSL- TV (Salt Lake City, 6-6-2012] [KCBS-TV (Los Angeles), 8-1- 2012] [Associated Press via al.com (Birmingham)]

-- Brazil has a robust democracy but with very few controls on what candidates may call themselves on ballots. Among those running for offices this election season, according to a September New York Times dispatch from Rio de Janeiro: "John Kennedy Abreu Sousa," "Jimmi Carter Santarem Barroso," "Ladi Gaga," "Christ of Jerusalem," a "Macgaiver," five "Batmans," two "James Bonds," and 16 people whose name contains "Obama." "It's a marketing strategy," said city council candidate Geraldo Custodio, who apparently likes his chances better as "Geraldo Wolverine." [New York Times, 9-16-2012]

The City Council of Jersey City, N.J., voted in September to settle a lawsuit filed by Joshua Lopez, who had driven his car directly at a police officer during a 2009 traffic stop, trapping the officer against his own squad car, and thus forcing the officer to fire at him. Lopez suffered only an injured hand, but the city has now agreed to give him $26,500 out of fear of "litigation risk." [The Jersey Journal, 9-13-2012]

(1) Yak herders in Tibet and farmers in the Indian Himalayas are becoming relatively prosperous, according to recent reports by National Geographic and London's The Guardian, by harvesting rare caterpillar fungi. In Tibet, "yartsa gunbu" supposedly cures ailments ranging from back pain to HIV, from hair loss to asthma and more, and often sells in local markets for twice its weight in gold. In India, "kira jari" is believed to be an aphrodisiac and energy booster, but the government is trying to control the market because insufficient new larvae means the land might soon be picked clean. (2) Swiss researcher Francis W.M.R. Schwarze announced in September that he will manufacture 30 violins out of wood treated with certain fungi that, in music-appreciation tests, made a lesser-grade violin sound like a Stradivarius. [National Geographic, August 2012] [The Guardian, 7-30-2012] [Wall Street Journal, 9-22-2012]

Arrests were made in July of two men who had openly chatted on the Internet about torturing, cooking and eating children, but investigators have searched in vain for evidence of any such crimes by the men. Jason Scarcello, 42, who wrote, "(A)ctually (seeing) a child cooking would be a dream come true," is under arrest in Anderson, Calif., and Ronald Brown, 57, who suggested carving and cooking body parts for an "Easter meal," in Largo, Fla., was detained for possessing child pornography, but, regarding the Internet chats, both claimed a First Amendment right to their un-acted-upon imaginations, however disgusting. [Redding Record Searchlight, 7-27-2012] [Tampa Bay Times, 7-25-2012]

Arrested recently and awaiting trial for murder: Jarrod Wayne Rudder, Elkville, Ill. (April); Dustin Wayne Kimrey, Albemarle, N.C. (October); Jeffrey Wayne Finney, Jr., Riverside, Ala. (October); Garrette Wayne Bunch, Clemmons, N.C. (September). Indicted for murder: Daniel Wayne Harmon-Wright (aka Daniel Wayne Sullivan), Gainesville, Va. (May). Conviction for murder upheld by Texas Court of Appeals: Phillip Wayne Harris, Houston (March). Arrest warrant for murder issued: Jeffrey Wayne Powell II, Lakewood, Wash. (October). On trial for murder at press time: Curtis Wayne Bonnell, Miramichi, New Brunswick (September). Trial for murder postponed: David Wayne Laws, Manassas, Va. (October). On the other hand, Michael Wayne Hash, Culpeper, Va., was exonerated of his murder conviction in March after serving 12 years in prison. Rudder: [The Southern (Carbondale, Ill.), 4-24-2012] Kimrey: [The Stanly News and Press (Albemarle), 10-1-2012] Finney: [Daily Home (Talladega, Ala.), 10-2-2012] Bunch: [The Stokes News (King, N.C.), 9-20-2012] Harmon-Wright: [InsideNoVa.com (Manassas, Va.), 5-29-2012] Harris: [Harris v. State (No. 14-10-00977-CR), 3-20-2012] Powell: [Tacoma News Tribune, 10-2-2012] Bonnell: [Canadian Press, 9-19-2012] Laws: [InsideNoVa.com (Manassas, Va.), 10-1-2012] Hash: [Star Exponent (Culpeper, Va.), 9-30-2012]

Thanks This Week to Kathryn Wood, Adam Orbell, Bruce Leiserowitz, Gary daSilva, Phil Kanegsberg, Sandy Pearlman, and Karen Seavers, and to the News of the Weird Board of Editorial Advisors.

For some reason, South Korea (with about one-sixth the men that America has) is the world's largest consumer of male cosmetics, with its leading company approaching $1 billion a year in sales. According to a September Bloomberg Business Week dispatch, South Korean males became fascinated with the country's 2002 World Cup soccer team's "flower men," who had smooth, flawless skin, and the craze took off from there. Said a male college student, "Having a clean, neat face makes you look sophisticated and creates an image that you can handle yourself well." Makeup routines include drawing "thicker, bolder" eyebrows and, of course, expert application of lipstick. Said one admiring woman, "I feel like I have more to talk about with guys who use makeup." [Bloomberg Business Week, 9-17-2012]

-- Cliche Come to Life: In an August report, the inspector general of the Department of Veterans Affairs warned that the regional office building in Winston-Salem, N.C., was in danger of collapsing because there were too many claims files stacked on the sixth floor. "We noticed floors bowing under the excess weight to the extent that the tops of file cabinets were noticeably unlevel throughout the storage area." The report also warned of the potential of files falling on, and injuring, employees. For the short term, the agency relocated all the folders (estimated: 37,000) on the sixth floor to offices on the fifth, seventh and eighth floors. [Winston-Salem Journal, 8-31-2012]

-- For years, U.S. senators Ron Wyden and Mark Udall (of the Select Committee on Intelligence) have been asking the director of National Intelligence to disclose how often the government might be "overcollecting" information on U.S. citizens by too enthusiastically applying the Patriot Act, but the director's office has maintained that such information, whether or not it reveals wrongdoing, is classified. In July, the office finally declassified one fact that it said the senators were free to use: that the government had "on at least one occasion" overcollected information in violation of constitutional protections -- but that's all. The number of times, and all other details, remain classified. [Lowering the Bar blog via Forbes, 7-25-2012]

-- In August, a Michigan government watchdog group learned, in a Freedom of Information Act request, that the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department still to this day retains one job classification for a horseshoer. (The department owns no horses.) Over the years, the position has become a patronage slot paying about $57,000 a year in salary and benefits, sometimes requiring the "horseshoer" to do "blacksmith" work such as metal repair. (Because of severe budget cuts, the city employees' union fights to retain every job, no matter its title.) [Michigan Capitol Confidential, 8-20-2012]

-- Are We Safe? In August, the former director of Homeland Security's office in charge of shoring up the nation's chemical plants against terrorist attacks told CBS News that, five years after Homeland Security started the chemical program, "90 percent" of the 5,000 most vulnerable plants have still not even been inspected. The official, Todd Keil, said that when he left the job in February, $480 million had been spent, but that no plant had a "site security plan" and that management of the program was "a catastrophic failure." (A July Government Accountability Office report confirmed that 4,400 chemical plants had not been properly inspected.) [CBS News, 8-2-2012]

(1) KETV (Omaha, Neb.) reported in September that local mother Andrea Kirby had decided to give away her stored-up breast milk to a family in greater need. She had amassed a freezer-full of 44 gallons for her now-8-month-old child. (2) How Hard Could Medical School Be? Tokyo police arrested Miyabi Kuroki, 43, in September, and charged him with forging a medical license in 2009 and subsequently treating patients at a Tokyo hospital, providing, among other things, examinations and electrocardiogram counseling. Hospital officials estimate he "treated" 2,300 patients before being caught. [Associated Press via Star Herald (Scottsbluff, Neb.), 9-12-2012] [Japan Today, 9-25-2012]

-- Photographer Clayton Cubitt's video-art exhibit "Hysterical Literature" (the first installment of which was reviewed in August) features an attractive woman sitting at a table reading mainstream literature aloud ("everything from Walt Whitman to a science book on fungus"), but in a sexy voice and accompanied by squirming in the chair prompted by unspecified activities of a "distractor" agent supplied by Cubitt. After a few minutes, it is clear that the woman is experiencing an orgasm. Cubitt told Salon.com that he was mocking the "quack Victorian medical theory of 'hysteria' in women." [Salon.com, 8-24-2012]

-- Without the work of scientists Gregory Gage and Tim Marzullo, we might never know the effect of playing a loud hip-hop song to create vibrations that make squids' pigmented cells change colors. The men's Backyard Brains setup involved a 1993 Cypress Hill hit ("Insane in the Brain"), an iPod nano, and a "suction electrode" to jar a Longfin Inshore's muscles to reveal the squid's "chromatophores" that are either red, brown or yellow. A Time magazine writer gave her take on the work's reason for being: "Because really, you know, why not?" [Time NewsFeed blog, 8-26-2012]

-- Canadian artist Taras Polataiko's two-week-long live re-creation of "Sleeping Beauty" was featured through early September at Ukraine's National Art Museum in Kiev, with an unexpected outcome. Five women had been chosen to fall asleep daily and, by signed contract, to agree to marry the first man who awakened them with a single kiss (thus to witness "the birth of love," according to Polataiko). Only one awoke during the exhibit, but since that payoff kiss was applied by a female gallery-goer, the contract could not be fulfilled in that Ukraine forbids same-sex marriage. [Associated Press via Los Angeles Times, 9-11-2012]

-- Francesco Piserchia, 36, filed a $17 million lawsuit in August against Bergen County, N.J., police, and individual officers, for being shot following a wild, high-speed car chase through residential neighborhoods in 2010. Although Piserchia and an associate had nearly hit a squad car and were fleeing on foot after their car crashed, they claim the police had no reason to shoot at them because, just moments before the shots, the men had decided to surrender. (In a separate matter, two officers involved were indicted by a grand jury in August for tampering with evidence in the case.) [WCBS-TV (New York City), 8-2-2012, 8-20-2012]

-- An unnamed passenger on the Russian rail company Krasprigorod won a lawsuit in September for his 2010 experience of being stuck in a crowded train station for two hours and having to endure "moral suffering" from exposure to other passengers cussing. The Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported that the lawsuit (which also noted physical injuries including having his feet stepped on) originally asked the equivalent of $1,550 but that the court in Krasnoyarsk awarded much less. [RIA Novosti (Moscow) via United Press International, 9-4-2012]

Ihor Stetkewycz appeared in court in Warren, Mich., in June to answer for an indecent exposure incident, brought on, he told the judge, because his pants, purchased by his mother, were "10 sizes" too large. According to police sources, Stetkewycz had also recently dumped large sections of a tree in the middle of a Detroit street; had protection orders against him from two Warren neighbors; was late to the hearing in June because he raced down Interstate 94 chasing his allegedly stolen car that he had spotted on the way to court; and told a female TV reporter inquiring about the tree stumps, "I don't take no orders from no woman, by the way." He did promise to go clean up the tree parts: "I'm Mr. Clean Up." [WXYZ-TV (Detroit), 6-7-2012]

Dakoda Garren, 19, was arrested in Vancouver, Wash., in September on suspicion of stealing an antique coin collection in May that was estimated to be worth $100,000. Garren and his girlfriend were identified after spending some of the coins at a movie theater and a pizza restaurant, using rare Liberty Head quarters (worth from $5 to $18,500) at their face value. [The Daily News (Longview, Wash.) via The Columbian, 9-20-2012]