In January, the upscale Italian fashion house Dolce & Gabbana introduced stylish hijabs and abayas aimed at Muslim women unafraid to call attention to themselves as they exercise their obliged modesty. D&G's marketing effort even accessorized models' headscarves and cloaks with stilettos and oversized, gaudily framed sunglasses. It was clear from the suggested retail prices that D&G would be pitching the line mainly in the wealthy Persian Gulf countries like United Arab Emirates. [The Atlantic, 1-7-2016]

Awkward Signals in New Jersey: (1) The government watchdog MuckRock requested records on the cause of death of a dolphin in New Jersey's South River last year (to investigate larger dangers to the animal), but in January 2016 the state's Department of Agriculture initially declined to release them -- citing "medical privacy" (usually requested, for autopsies, by "the deceased's family"). (2) At the same time, Maria Vaccarella is facing a $500 fine in Howell, New Jersey, for violating a state law because she illegally rendered "care" to two apparently orphaned baby squirrels when their mother abandoned them. She was due in court as News of the Weird went to press. [MuckRock.com, 1-11-2016] [WPVI-TV (Philadelphia), 1-16-2016]

The director of senior services for Cranston, Rhode Island, resigned in January after a mayor's press-conference went badly. To publicize a snow-removal program that would benefit seniors unable to shovel for themselves, the director (needing a proper example of a beneficiary of the program) instructed a middle-aged male subordinate to (unconvincingly) don a wig and dress and stand beside the mayor during the announcement. [WJAR-TV (Providence), 1-13-2016]

-- Weird Japan, Again: (1) Among the sites Japan has submitted for 2017 United Nations World Heritage status is the island of Okinoshima, home of a sacred shrine with which Shinto gods have been "protecting" fishermen as long ago as the fourth century. (The island is so sacred that females have never been allowed on it -- judged either too delicate to make the trip or menstrually unclean). (2) A current Tokyo craze, reported an Australian Broadcasting correspondent, involves "stressed out" professionals and office workers publicly outfitted in colorful, full-body lycra suits ("zentai") in a rebellion against the nation's stultifying conformity. Said one, "I'm a different person wearing this. I can be friendly to anyone." [Daily Telegraph (London), 1-13-2016] [Australian Broadcasting Corp. News, 1-10-2016]

-- Crescent City, California, drug dealer James Banuelos pleaded guilty in January in exchange for a lighter sentence (three years in prison), thus avoiding for police the airing of an embarrassing hidden-camera video of the raid showing arresting officers stealing the dealer's money and valuables. "Multiple" officers were shown laughing and helping themselves, and a gold chain belonging to Banuelos wound up for sale a few days later on Craigslist. As part of the plea agreement, the prosecutor agreed to give all Banuelos' stuff back to him. [Del Norte Triplicate (Crescent City), 1-11-2016, 1-14-2016]

-- The United Nations announced at year-end that the book most often checked out last year at its in-house Dag Hammarskjold Library in New York was the nearly 500-page "Immunity of Heads of State and State Officials for International Crimes." The list of borrowers was not revealed. (In general, the book concludes, current heads of state have immunity but not past ones.) [Newsweek, 1-7-2016]

-- New Age Medical Care: Surgeons treating 4-month-old Teegan Lexcen (born with only one lung and a critically deformed heart) had given up on her, but doctors at Nicklaus Children's Hospital in Miami jury-rigged a surgical tool that saved the infant's life. In a delicate seven-hour procedure, using an iPhone app and $20 Google Cardboard box virtual-reality viewers, doctors guided themselves through Teegan's chest based on two-dimensional body scans that the app had converted to 3-D. (Old-style 3-D images, they said, were too grainy for precision surgery.) [WFOR-TV (Miami), 12-22-2015]

-- Too Much Information: In January, the British sex toy company Hot Octopuss, trying for a spurt of publicity in New York City, unveiled a reconfigured pay phone booth at 5th Avenue and 28th Street in Manhattan that offered a seat, a laptop, a Wi-Fi connection, and a "privacy curtain" to help people (mostly men, one imagines) relieve stress "on both your mind and body." A company rep claimed that about 100 men "used" the booth its first day, but what the men actually did there is "private." [ArsTechnica.com, 1- 18-2016]

-- Think Your Commute Was Bad? (1) The main road linking the port city of Mombasa, Kenya, to Nairobi and beyond (to landlocked Uganda) was blocked in mid-November by damage from heavy rains, leading to a 30-mile-long stream of stopped vehicles, stranding more than 1,500 trucks. (2) In October at the end of China's traditional, annual week-long getaway, new traffic checkpoints for the notorious G4 Beijing-Hong Kong-Macau Expressway reduced the previous 50 lanes of traffic (yes, that's "fifty") to 20. Videos from a TV network's drone showed a breathtaking traffic jam-cum-parking lot that quickly inspired delight, or compassion, all around the Internet (bit.ly/1je9mG6). [BBC News, 11-19-2015] [CityLab.com, 10-8-2015]

-- Police chiefs of six small Ohio towns recently demanded an investigation of Sandusky County Sheriff Kyle Overmyer after, comparing notes, they learned that Overmyer had approached each one claiming to be helpfully "collecting" for "disposal" their departments' confiscated drugs -- on behalf of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency. (DEA, reportedly, knew nothing of this.) The Ohio attorney general is investigating. [Courthouse News Service, 1-12-2016]

(1) Jason Hayes, 17, was arrested in a Philadelphia suburb in January when he arrived for a scheduled appointment with a robbery victim from the night before. According to police, Hayes had attempted to shake down a woman in her home, but was still dissatisfied with the money she had on hand. Fearful, she agreed to bring more the next day if they met at a local shopping mall, and he agreed (promising to wear the same clothes so she would recognize him). She, of course, called police. (2) Dusty Ingram, 38, being searched by jailhouse guards in Crestview, Florida, in January, said she had prescriptions for everything -- but then said she thought they were in her purse and professed not to know how they got into that plastic bag in her genitals. [Philly.com, 1-21-2016] [Northwest Florida Daily News, 1-19-2016]

(1) In December, a judge in Hamburg, New York, dismissed the DUI charge against a motorist who had registered a 0.33 blood-alcohol reading because her lawyer had convinced the court that she suffered from "gut fermentation syndrome" -- that her digestive system makes so much yeast from ordinary food and beverages that it functions like a "brewery." (2) In January, Donald "Chip" Pugh, 45, wanted by police in Lima, Ohio, and Columbus, Georgia, on several charges, texted Lima cops a photo of himself to use as a mugshot because he was dissatisfied with the one on the department's website. "(T)hat one is terrible," he wrote. (However, it was clear enough for authorities in Escambia County, Florida -- who arrested Pugh a few days later.) [Buffalo News, 12-26-2015] [WJW-TV (Cleveland), 1-12-2016]

The Sept. 11, 2001, attacks led (among many other effects) to massive "homeland security" spending in which Congress was spooked by "what if" scenarios and motivated to disburse budget-busting funding among all 50 states. Among the questionable projects described in an August (2011) Los Angeles Times review were the purchase of an inflatable Zodiac boat with wide-scan sonar -- to be prepared for terrorists eyeing Lake McConaughy in Keith County, Nebraska; cattle nose leads, halters and electric prods (in case of biological attacks on cows in Cherry County, Nebraska); and $557,400 in communications and rescue gear for when North Pole, Alaska (pop. 2,100), gets hit. [Los Angeles Times, 8-28-2011]

(1) The "public art" statues unveiled in January by Fort Myers, Florida, Mayor Randy Henderson included a metal structure by sculptor Edugardo Carmona of a man walking a dog, with the dog "lifting his leg" beside a pole. Only after inspecting the piece more closely did many observers realize that the man, too, was relieving himself against the pole. Carmona described the work as commentary on man and dog "marking their territory." (2) A recent anonymously authored "confidential" book by a National Football League player reported that "linemen, especially," have taken to relieving themselves inside their uniforms during games, "a sign that you're so into the game" that you "won't pause (even) to use the toilet." [WBBH-TV (Fort Myers, 1-8-2016] [New York Times, 12-29-2015 (review of "NFL Confidential: True Confessions From the Gutter of Football")]

-- The popular Nell's Country Kitchen in Winter Haven, Florida, was shut down again (for "remodeling," the owner said) in December after a health inspector found that it had been operating for two weeks without its own running water -- with only a garden hose connection, across its parking lot, to a neighbor's spigot. It had also closed for a day earlier in 2015 because of mold, roach activity and rodent droppings (although management insisted that business had immediately picked up the day they reopened). [WTSP-TV (St. Petersburg), 12-23-2015]

-- Weird News One Can Actually Use: In November, a perhaps-exasperated Centers for Disease Control attempted once again to tout a startlingly effective anti-HIV drug -- after a recent survey revealed that a third of primary-care doctors said they had never heard of it. So, FYI: Truvada, taken once a day, said the CDC, gives "better than 90 percent" protection from risky gay sex and better than 70 percent protection from HIV acquired from the sharing of needles. Truvada is the only FDA-approved retroviral drug for retarding HIV (but its maker, Gilead Sciences, has declined to advertise it for that purpose). [USA Today, 11-30-2015]

-- Oklahoma Justice: In 2004, abusive boyfriend Robert Braxton Jr. was charged with badly beating up the three children of girlfriend Tondalo Hall, 20, with injuries ranging from bruises to fractured legs, ribs and a toe. Braxton got a deal from Oklahoma City prosecutors, pleaded guilty, served two years in prison, and was released in 2006. Hall's plea "bargain" resulted in a 30-year sentence for having failed to protect her kids from Braxton, and she's still in prison -- and in September 2015 (following a rejected appeal and a rejected sentence modification), the Pardon and Parole Board refused, 5-0, even to commute her sentence to a time-served 10 years. [Washington Post, 9-24-2015; Buzzfeed, 9-23-2015]

Mike Wolfe, 35, of Nampa, Idaho, finally brought his dream to life for 2016 -- a calendar of photographs of "artistic" designs made by shaving images into his back hair. He said it took him about four months each for enough hair to grow back to give his designer-friend Tyler Harding enough to work with. (January, for instance, features "New Year" in lettering, with two champagne glasses; July's is a flag-like waving stripes with a single star in the upper left.) "Calend-hairs" cost $20 each (with proceeds, Wolfe said, going to an orphanage connected to his church). [KTVB-TV (Boise), 12-30-2015]

-- Jamie, 29, and Abbie Hort, 21, an unemployed couple drawing housing and other government benefits, won a United Kingdom lottery prize in December 2014 worth about $72,000, promptly spent it all (including "some" on "silly" stuff, Abbie admitted), and according to a January press report, are angry now that the government will not immediately re-institute their benefits. Abbie said, as lottery winners, she and Jamie "deserved to buy some nice stuff" and go on holiday, but that now, except for the large-screen TV and Jamie's Ralph Lauren clothes, the winnings are gone. Said Jamie, this past Christmas was just "the worst ever." [Daily Telegraph, 1-7-2016]

-- Public relations spokesman Phil Frame, 61, was arrested in Shelby Township, Michigan, after a Jan. 1 Sheriff's Office search of his computer and paper files turned up child pornography. The Detroit News reported that Frame had already been questioned about child pornography, in September, by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and for some reason apparently was not intimidated enough (or was too lazy) to clear out his files. (The Homeland Security investigation is still ongoing.) [Detroit News, 1-4-2016]

(1) Neighbors in Inola, Oklahoma, complained in December and January about a Union Pacific train that had been parked "for weeks" while tracks up ahead were under repair. Not only does the train block a traffic intersection, it triggers the ringing of the crossing signal. "It's annoying, yeah," said one resident, apparently a master of understatement. (2) At a ski resort in western Vorarlberg, Austria, recently, as the ski lift was temporarily stopped (to address a problem elsewhere on the lift), one occupied lift basket came to rest directly in front of the industrial-strength artificial-snowmaking machine, drenching the two passengers in a several-minutes-long blizzard (of which, yes, Internet video exists). [KTUL-TV (Tulsa), 1-8-2016] [The Local (Vienna), 1-8-2016]

-- Fort Worth, Texas, firefighters, responding to a suspected blaze in January at a grain elevator, encountered smoke on the structure's eighth floor -- along with a man "juggling flaming batons." No explanation was reported (except that the man "did not belong there"). A department spokesman said his firefighters "put (the man's) torches out." [Star-Telegram, 1-6-2015]

-- In December, animal protection officers in Halland County, Sweden, confiscated two cats that the officers found being "mistreated" in a home -- coddled (by two women) as babies in "pushchairs" and spoon-fed while strapped in high chairs. Both cats had been encouraged to suck on pacifiers, and one woman reportedly allowed the cats to suckle her breast. The public broadcaster SVT reported that the cats were removed from the home because they were not being allowed to develop "natural animal behavior." [The Local (Stockholm), 12-3-2015]

(1) A 40-year-old man driving a stolen truck was killed after a brief high-speed police chase on Jan. 14 in Alameda County, California. Police noted that the man had pulled to the side of Highway 238 to flee on foot, but fell to his death off a cliff -- landing on the grounds of the San Lorenzo Pioneer Cemetery. (2) A coroner's hearing in Folkestone, England, in January determined that a 16-year-old boy had died of accidental asphyxiation from spray deodorant. According to the boy's mother, he preferred massive application of the spray instead of bathing, and police recovered several dozen empty spray cans in his room. [KNTV (San Francisco), 1-14-2016] [Kent Online, 1-6-2016]

Marie Holmes, that 2014 Powerball winner in North Carolina whom News of the Weird had reported in September rapidly running through her winnings by bailing her boyfriend out of jail (alleged drug dealer Lamarr "Hot Sauce" McDow), had already tied up $9 million on two arrests. In January, Hot Sauce was arrested again (only for "street racing," but that violated his bail conditions), and Holmes was forced to fork over another $12 million (as bond basically doubles with each violation, but Holmes would get about 90 percent back -- if Hot Sauce shows up for court). (Holmes earlier addressed her critics on Facebook: "What y'all need to be worried about is y'all money ....") [Fox News, 1-7-2016]

Refreshing the Witness: A convenience store clerk, Ms. Falguni Patel, was giving testimony in the witness box in the September (2011) trial of a man charged with robbing her in Hudson, Florida, two years earlier when she began shaking and then passed out. A relative of Patel's approached, removed her sneaker and held it to Patel's face, without success. The relative explained that Patel was subject to such blackouts and that sniffing the sneaker often revived her. (After paramedics attended to her, Patel took the rest of the day off and went back to court the next morning.) [St. Petersburg Times, 9-7-2011]

They are simply "'spas' designed to attract teenagers," according to one university official -- plush, state-of-the-art "training" complexes built by universities in the richest athletic conferences to entice elite 17-year-old athletes to come play for (and, perhaps, study at?) their schools. The athletes-only mini-campuses include private housing and entertainment (theaters, laser tag, miniature golf) -- but, actually, the schools are in a $772-million-plus "arms' race" (according to a December Washington Post investigation) because soon after one school's sumptuous, groundbreaking facility opens, some other school's more-innovative facility renders it basically second-rate. And of course, as one university official put it, the "shiny objects" have "nothing whatsoever to do with the mission of a university." (Donors and alumni provide much of the funding, but most schools by now also tap students' "athletic fees.") [Washington Post, 12-21-2015]

-- Police in Monticello, Kentucky, charged Rodney Brown, 25, with stealing farm animals and equipment from a home in December -- but offering to return everything if the victim (a man) had sex with him. Brown allegedly took 25 roosters, a goat and some rooster pens and other rooster-care equipment. (Because Brown also supposedly said he'd beat the man up if he called police, a "terroristic threatening" count was added to "promoting prostitution.") [WKYT-TV (Lexington, Ky.), 1-5-2015]

-- Made in Heaven: William Cornelius, 25, and his fiancee, Sheri Moore, 20, were arrested at the Bay City (Michigan) Mall in January, charged with theft. Police found a pair of earrings and a necklace swiped from Spencer Gifts on her, but she refused to "snitch" on Cornelius, who had minutes earlier proposed to her via a Wal-mart loudspeaker and given her a ring, to applause from onlooking shoppers as she accepted. Cornelius, holding $80.93 worth of goods (a watch, an edible thong, a vibrator and "BJ Blast" oral-sex candy), was apprehended at the mall food court, having apparently (according to the police report) "fallen asleep at a table while tying his shoe." [Bay City Times, 1-7-2015]

-- Islam Rising: (1) A geography class at Riverheads High School in Augusta County, Virginia, alarmed some parents in December when students were assigned to copy an Arabic script to experience its "artistic complexity." However, the phrase the teacher presented for copying was the "shahada" ("There is no god but Allah"). District officials called that just a coincidence -- that the phrase was presented only for calligraphy and never translated. (2) A Washington state uncle complained in December that a WolVol toy airplane he bought for his nephew on Amazon.com, instead of making engine noises, recited spoken words -- which a Whatcom County Islamic Society spokesman said was actually a prayer that hajj pilgrims speak when they journey to Mecca. (Wolvol said it would investigate.) [Schilling Show via Fox News, 12-15-2015] [KING-TV (Seattle), 12-28-2015]

-- Wait, What? NPR's "Morning Edition," reporting on the violent tornadoes that hit North Texas on the night after Christmas, interviewed one woman who said she was luckier than her neighbors because of her faith. She was entertaining 10 relatives when she heard the "train-like" sound of the winds approaching and took everyone outside to confront the storm: "We ... started commanding the winds because God had given us authority over ... airways. And we just began to command this storm not to hit our area. We spoke to the storm and said, go to unpopulated places. It did exactly what we said to do because God gave us the authority to do that." [NPR.org, 12-28-2015]

-- The most promising current concussion-prevention research comes from a study of ... woodpeckers (according to a December Business Week report). Scientists hypothesize that the birds' apparent immunity from the dangers of constant head-slamming is because their neck veins naturally compress, forcing more blood into their craniums, thus limiting the dangerous "jiggle room" in which brains bang against the skull. A team led by a real-life doctor portrayed in the movie "Concussion" is working on a neck collar to slightly pinch the human jugular vein to create a similar effect. [Business Week, 12-28-2015]

-- Researchers from the University of York and the University of St. Andrews wrote in the journal Biology Letters in December that they observed wild male parrots using pebbles in their mouths to help grind seashells into powder and hypothesized that the purpose was to free up the shells' calcium in "vomitable" form so that they could pass it to females before mating, to help improve their offspring's health outcomes. [Discovery News via Washington Post, 12-15-2015]

National Pride: (1) Factory worker Thanakorn Siripaiboon was arrested in December in a Bangkok suburb after he wrote a "sarcastic" comment on social media about the dog that belongs to Thailand's king. For the crime of "insulting the monarch," Thanakorn faces 37 years in prison. (2) Michael McFeat, a Scottish man working on contract for a mining company in Kyrgyzstan, was arrested in January after he (on Facebook) jokingly called the country's national dish "horse penis." ("Chuchuk" is indeed a sausage made from horsemeat.) The crime he was charged with carries a five-year prison term. [New York Times, 12-14-2015] [BBC News, 1-4-2016]

The government of the Netherlands, seeking to boost the economy while simultaneously improving highway skills, enacted legislation in December to allow driving instructors to be paid in sexual services provided the student is at least 18 years old. Though prostitution is legal, the transport minister cautioned that the "initiative" for the new arrangement must be with the instructor so that the country gains better-trained drivers as a result. [CNN, 12-21-2015]

(1) In November, the president of Mauritania, Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, in the stands but "bored" with his country's "Super Cup" soccer final that had been tied, 1-1, for a long stretch, ordered officials on the field to stop play abruptly and proceed to a game-ending 10-kick "shootout." (The Tevragh-Zeina team won.) (2) Jorge Servin, Paraguay's head of indigenous affairs, was fired in November after he apparently kneed an indigenous woman in the stomach as she protested her people's treatment by the government. (3) The head of Croatia's human rights committee, Ivan Zvonimir Cica, posing alongside President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic to commemorate International Human Rights Day in December, had his pants inexplicably come loose and fall to his ankles. [NBC News, 12-1-2015] [BBC News, 11-28-2015] [Huffington Post, 12-9-2015]

Most Recent Net-Cash-Loss Theft: The manager of the Nandos Riccarton restaurant in Christchurch, New Zealand, is pretty sure that he knows who swiped the contents of the store's tip jar that December evening (based on surveillance video), but the man denied the theft and walked out. The manager told police there was less than $10 in the jar at the time -- but also that the man had paid his $14.90 tab for food, yet hurried off without eating it. [Stuff.co.nz (Wellington), 12-21-2015]

Approaching Maximum Capacity: The Smoking Gun website suggested in December that the Fairbanks, Alaska, counterfeiting arrest of Chelsea Sperry, 31, might have set a woman's "record" for orifice-concealed contraband. Her vaginal inventory included 16 counterfeit bills (face value $890), one genuine $10 bill (in a different orifice), two baggies of meth, another containing seven morphine pills, two baggies of heroin and 40 empty baggies (apparently anticipating further sales, although it was not reported why the empty baggies -- and the $10 bill -- were not stored openly, for example, in her pocket). [The Smoking Gun, 12-11-2015]

London Fashion Week usually brings forth a shock or two from cutting-edge designers, but a September (2011) creation by Rachel Freire might have raised the bar: a floor-length dress made from 3,000 cow nipples (designed to resemble roses). Initial disgust for the garment centered on implied animal abuse, but Freire deflected that issue by pointing out that the nipples had been discarded by a tannery and that her use amounted to "recycling." Freire, 32, distracted by the animal-abuse angle, was spared having to explain the other issue -- why anyone would want to wear a dress made with cow nipples. [Ecouterre.com. 26-2011]