Even though concealed-carry gun permit-holders in Texas can now "open carry," pistol-packing women concerned with fashion are not limited to traditional firearms in ordinary cowboy holsters. An online company, The Well Armed Woman, offers such carry options as stylish leggings, lace waistbands and an array of underarm and bra holsters (even an in-cup model, the "Marilyn") in leopard-print and pastel colors. However, a woman's body shape and size may be more important shopping considerations, according to the company's founder. "A 32A bust could not conceal a Glock 19 very well -- nor would a 42DD-or-larger (front) allow for effective cross-draw carry." [Star-Telegram (Fort Worth), 12-22-2016] [NPR, 1-28-2016]

In January, Robert Battle took the oath of office for his second term as a city councilman in East Chicago, Indiana -- administered at the county lockup, where he is being held without bail, charged with a cold-blooded murder during a drug deal. The crime made news in October (i.e., before election day), yet Battle still won his race. According to law, he cannot be forced out of office unless he is convicted or admits the crimes, and he had the right to vote for himself in the election (except that he failed to request an absentee ballot). [Chicago Tribune, 1-25-2016]

(1) The Albany, New York, company Vireo Health told reporters it would soon offer the world's first certified Kosher marijuana, announcing that the Orthodox Union of New York had authenticated it as having met Jewish dietary laws (e.g., grown with insect-free plants). (Other Kosher-validating officials complained that the approval should apply only to marijuana that is eaten, not smoked.) (2) Two habit-wearing nuns were scheduled to ask the Merced (California) City Council in January to decline its prerogative under state law to ban dispensing or cultivating medical marijuana. The nuns' order makes and sells salves and tonics for pain management, using a strain of cannabis containing only a trace of psychoactive material. [Haaretz (Tel Aviv), 1-7-2016] [San Francisco Chronicle, 1-4-2016]

-- Since the (naturally insulated) uterus can be a lonely space, Institut Marques of Barcelona, Spain, recently demonstrated a tampon-like "speaker" to carry soothing, specially selected, 54-decibel ("hushed tone") rhythms that supposedly improve fetal growth. In the Babypod's first "concert," the singer Soraya performs Christmas carols. (However, documented evidence for such a device was limited to success of in-vitro fertilization when music was wafted through during the first 48 hours of sperm-egg union.) [New York Times Live, 1-1-2016]

-- The Job of the Researcher: Taiwanese scientists recently announced the availability of their Infant Cries Translator (iPhone and Android app), which they say can, with 77 percent accuracy (92 percent for those under 2 weeks old), tell what a baby wants by its screeches and wailings. The National Taiwan University Hospital Yunlin doctors first had to create a database of 200,000 crying sounds. [Reuters, 12-30-2016]

The Latest in Corruption News: (1) Italy's highest court freed a man in January because the bribe he offered a cop to avoid a DUI ticket was "too small" to be serious -- 100 euros (about $108). (2) Lawyers for John Bills (former Chicago city commissioner on trial for taking bribes on a traffic-camera contract) said Bills was obviously innocent because everyone knows that, in Chicago, only bribing the mayor (or at least an alderman) will get anything done. (3) A security guard in Nairobi, Kenya, despairingly told a New York Times reporter in November (detailing corruption so rampant that, for example, ballpoint pens were being sold to the government for $85 each) that "If (people)'re going to steal, please, just steal a little." [The Local (Rome), 1-21-2016] [Chicago Sun-Times, 1-13-2016] [New York Times, 11-5-2016]

-- A former lecturer for Spanish classes at the liberal arts Amherst College near Northampton, Massachusetts, sued the school in December after it failed to renew her contract -- leading the lecturer to charge that the Spanish department had tried to solicit student course enrollment by prostitution. Lecturer Dimaris Barrios-Beltran accused her supervisor, Victoria Maillo, of hiring only attractive "teaching assistants" and encouraging them to "date" Amherst students with the ulterior motive of signing them up for Spanish classes -- to boost the department's profile. (College officials said they could not corroborate the accusation, but a lawyer for Barrios-Beltran said Maillo is no longer employed at Amherst.) [Washington Post, 12-29-2016]

-- William Bendorf, 38, filed a lawsuit in December against the Funny Bone comedy club in Omaha, Nebraska, and comedian-hypnotist Doug Thompson after plunging off the stage and breaking his leg following Thompson's having hypnotized him during his act. Thompson claimed that he had "snapped" Bendorf out of the trance, but the lawsuit claims that Bendorf, instead of exiting via the stairs as Thompson instructed, wandered directly toward his stage-side table because he was still "under" Thompson's spell. [Omaha World-Herald, 12-28-2016]

-- A patient who had been blind for a decade (a condition thought to have been brought on by brain damage from an auto accident) suddenly "regained" her sight, according to a research report in the latest PsyCh Journal -- but only in one of the 10 identities (a teenage boy) populating her dissociative identity disorder. Doctors have since ruled out organic damage and (through EEG testing) "malingering" and are now coaxing her eyesight back by treating the disorder. [Washington Post, 11-24-2015]

Chutzpah! (1) Michael Leonard, 53, was charged in December with stealing a package that moments earlier had been dropped off by a courier. The delivery was to a Prince George's County, Maryland, police station, and Leonard, hanging around in the station (to register as a sex offender), walked out with the package when no one was looking. (However, a station surveillance camera caught his face.) (2) Sean Lyons, 23, wanted on an Upper Darby, Pennsylvania, arrest warrant since October as a drug dealer, was arrested in January -- at the police station, where officers recognized him when he came to give information as a victim of an unrelated hit-and-run accident. [Capital Gazette (Annapolis), 12-23-2015] [Philly.com, 1-21-2016]

(1) David Newman, a prominent emergency room doctor at New York City's Mount Sinai Hospital, was recently charged with two counts of sexual abuse, one involving drugging, groping and masturbating onto the unconscious body of a female patient. (2) Well-known restaurateur Dan Hoyt, 53, was arrested in January and charged with exposing (and "pleasuring") himself to two women, repeatedly, at a New York City subway station -- and to one he had blatantly asked, "Can I masturbate to you?" Hoyt is the owner-chef at Quintessence in the East Village and gained notoriety in 2005 when a subway passenger photographed him "in action" during a previous weak moment. [New York Times, 1-20-2016] [New York Post, 1-13-2016]

(1) Kopi Luwak (the gourmet coffee beans roasted only after having been flavored by a trip through the digestive tracts of Asian civet cats) has been a staple of weird news stories for a quarter century, but a New York startup (Afineur) will soon bring to market a synthetic process mimicking the flavoring effects of the civets' gut bacteria. (2) From time to time, when people worry excessively about their stations in life, entrepreneurs create "destruction rooms," where, for a fee, customers get some time with a sledgehammer or baseball bat and pound on junked furniture. The most recent, Tantrums LLC, of Houston, opened in January, charging $35 for 10 minutes. [Business Week, 7-21-2016] [KHOU-TV, 7-22-2016]

Toshihiko Mizuno, 55, was arrested in Tokyo in June (2011) after three girls, ages 9 and 10, reported that he had talked them into spitting for him so that he could record it on video, to assist with "research" he was doing on "saliva." Police later discovered 26 videotapes, featuring about 400 young girls spitting. According to local media sources, Mizuno has had the obsession for 17 years, successfully getting at least 500 girls to spit, among the estimated 4,000 he propositioned. [NDTV (New Delhi, India)-Agence France-Presse, 6-14-2011]

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]