LEAD STORY -- Fashion Challenges

Beautician Sarah Bryan, 28, of Wakefield, England, who garnered worldwide notoriety last year when she introduced a wearable dress made of 3,000 Skittles, returned this summer with a wearable skirt and bra made of donated human hair (a substantial amount, she said, pubic hair). She admits having had to work in an eye mask, breathing mask and thick gloves, out of fear of donors' hygiene habits. (More conventionally, designer Van Tran of Brooklyn, New York, won the 12th annual (wearable) Toilet Paper Wedding Dress design contest in New York City in June, with a $10,000 prize from sponsors Charmin and Ripley's Believe It or Not.) [Metro News (London), 7-5-2016] [Washington Post, 6-20-2016]

World's Greatest Lawyers

-- Attorney Chris Dyer convinced a jury in La Crosse, Wisconsin, in June that there was "reasonable doubt" about what his client was doing in a family's basement when he was discovered, pants down, perched ("doggy style") over the family's golden retriever, Cooper. Client Daniel Reinsvold (a stranger in the house) told the jury that he has an "intestinal disorder" that makes him subject to "emergencies." What Reinsvold was doing was apparently perfectly clear to the resident's 17-year-old daughter, who discovered the scene and reported Reinsvold "screwing Cooper" (and a vet said later that Cooper showed signs of trauma). Nonetheless, Reinsvold was convicted only of trespass and disorderly conduct. [La Crosse Tribune, 6-16- 2016]

-- Attorney Lee Pearlman finally earned an acquittal in June (after two hung-jury trials) for his client Danielle Goeller -- one of a seemingly increasing number of drivers who hit pedestrians but claim they were unaware of anybody being hit. Goeller, 28, a trauma-room nurse with no intoxicants in her system, had struck a 60-year-old man on a busy, heavily lighted Tampa street at 11:45 p.m., cracking her windshield -- but drove on without stopping. "What does she think she hit?" asked the prosecutor. "A deer? A bear?" Responded Pearlman, "She's a scared girl in the middle of the night who doesn't have the life experience other people do." [Tampa Bay Times, 7-1-2016]

Bright Ideas

-- Picturesque Torrelodones, Spain (pop. 22,000), has 6,000 pet dogs and apparently few conscientious dog owners, which town leaders say accounts for the nearly half-ton of "litter" that accumulates daily. The town's latest bright idea: installing a 7-foot-high, 10-by-10-foot brown, inflated plastic "swirly" in the center of town as a reminder to residents to pick up after their dogs. (Spain's The Local reported in June that other towns have begun to tackle the problem as well, such as with DNA testing of dogs and street-scrubbing punishment for guilty owners.) [The Local (Barcelona), 6-3-2016]

-- British student Joshua Browder, 19, created an easy-to-use computer app to help drivers fight parking tickets they believe unjust -- and now reports that users have won 160,000 cases (out of 250,000), all in London and New York City, by following his question-and-answer "chat" interface at DoNotPay.co.uk. Browder said he was motivated to develop the app (which, as of now, is still free of charge) after himself getting about 30 tickets he says he did not deserve. [Metro News (London), 6-28-2016]

The Passing Parade

(1) A bicycle thief was stopped on June 10 when the bike's owner and several other people chased him from the Wal-Mart parking lot in Eagle Point, Oregon, drawing the attention of a passing rider on horseback (Robert Borba), who joined the chase and moments later (according to a report in Portland's The Oregonian) lassoed the man and restrained him until police arrived. (2) A kite surfer on a Sussex beach south of London got into trouble on June 26 and was unable to float back to land -- until he was rescued by two Good Samaritans in kayaks. The saviors happened to be dressed as Batman and Robin for participating in the Shoreham Beach Superhero Paddle. [The Oregonian, 6-10-2016] [Bognor Regis Observer, 6-27-2016]

Wait, What?

-- Not only are almost all federal employees above average, they are nearly all superior workers, according to a June Government Accountability Office review of agencies' personnel-rating results. (Yes, the review included the departments of Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security.) Most agencies use a 1 ("unacceptable") through 5 ("outstanding") rating system, and GAO found that 99 percent were rated either 5 or 4 ("exceeds 'fully acceptable'"). [Washington Post, 6-13-2016]

-- Not many DUI stops result in attempts to locate the suspect's chastity belt key, but the May 14 sobriety checkpoint stop of Curtis Eidam, 35, in Clinton, Tennessee, did. Eidam was outfitted in "red mesh see-through hose," according to the police report, with a ribbon tied in his goatee, and also a "little skirt" (perhaps a tutu), when he told officers he needed his key, which happened to be on a necklace worn by his passenger (a "highly intoxicated" 44-year-old woman). Thus, Eidam was able to unlock and remove the chastity belt, which had been "attached to his penis." (There was also a handgun -- illegal in Tennessee for an intoxicated person to carry.) [Knoxville News Sentinel, 6-7-2016]

Cognitive Failure

In a May journal article, biologists from the University of Florida and Oklahoma State University found that more than 80 percent of survey respondents want package labels on all foods that have "DNA" content (even though, yes, all meat and vegetables have DNA). The Oklahoma researcher found earlier that about the same number want such labels to be "mandatory." (Law professor Ilya Somin suggests playfully raising the fright level of those respondents by adding this "alarm" to the label they demand: "Warning: Pregnant women are at very high risk of passing on DNA to their children.") [Reason.com, 5-24-2016] [Washington Post, 5-27-2016] [Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, 5-18-2016]

Weird Japan

Client Partners is only one of several Japanese agencies that supply rental "friends" to the lonely, for hours or days of companionship tailored to the needs of the socially challenged client (with two rules, however: "no romance," "no lending money"). A writer for AFAR travel magazine interviewed several "friends" in June, one of whom explained: "Japan is all about face. We don't know how to talk from the gut. We can't ask for help." Said the female "friend" (who offered a good-bye handshake to the interviewer): "There are many people who haven't been touched for years ... who start to cry when we shake hands with them." [AFAR.com via The Week, 6-26-2016]

But It's Our "Policy"!

Good Samaritan Derrick Deanda is facing a $143 bill from paramedics in Elk Grove, California, after he, passing a car crash, jumped out to pull out a man and his three children (including a 2-year-old), who were trapped in the wreckage. A short time later the paramedics arrived and, noticing that Deanda had a cut on his arm (from breaking the car's window to free the family), bandaged him. Elk Grove has a policy charging "all patients" at a first-responder site $143 for the "rescue," and Deanda received his bill in June. [KOVR-TV (Sacramento), 6-20-2016]

Least Competent Criminals

Not Ready for Prime Time: In May, a 16-year-old boy in Lakewood, Washington, not only used Facebook to set up a marijuana-dealer robbery (one of many people, lately, to incriminate themselves on social media), but during the robbery itself accidentally shot himself in the groin and femoral artery, requiring life-saving seven-hour surgery. [News Tribune (Tacoma), 5-2-2016]

A News of the Weird Classic (July 2012)

Slaved Over a Hot Stove: Delivering gourmet meals to customers' doors is a fast-growing business model, but so far, only London's brand-new (as of 2012) Housebites goes the extra step. According to its press release, cited by Huffington Post, Housebites not only home-delivers "restaurant quality" cuisine (at the equivalent of about $20 per entree), but offers an optional dirty-pans service (about $8 extra), lending out the containers in which the food was prepared -- thus allowing clients to trick their dinner guests into believing the client actually prepared the meal. [Huffington Post, 6-14-2012]

More and more churches ("hundreds," according to a June Christianity Today report) offer hesitant parishioners a "money-back guarantee" if they tithe 10 percent (or more) of their income for 90 days -- but then feel that God blesses them insufficiently in return. The South Carolina megachurch NewSpring instituted such a program in the 1990s and claims that, of 7,000 recent pledgers, "fewer than 20" expressed dissatisfaction with the Lord. Advocates cite the Bible's Book of Malachi, quoting God himself (according to Christianity Today): "Test me in this." "Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse" and "see if I will not pour out so much blessing" that "there will not be room enough to store it." [Christianity Today, 6-28-2016]

A leading Chinese orthopedic surgeon continues to believe that "full-body" transplants are the next big thing in medicine, despite worldwide skepticism about both the science and the ethics. The plan for Dr. Ren Xiaoping of Harbin Medical University calls for removing both heads (the deceased donor's and the live recipient's), connecting the blood vessels, stabilizing the new neck, and "bath(ing)" spinal-cord nerve endings chemically so they will connect. (Critics say it is impossible to "connect" spinal-cord nerves.) According to a June New York Times dispatch, doctors regularly denounce China's ethical laxities (though Chinese officials term such denunciations "envy" at China's achievements). [New York Times, 6-11-2016]

-- (1) In June, District Attorney Jerry Jones in Monroe, Louisiana, dropped drug and gun charges against college football players Cam Robinson and Hootie Jones (who play for University of Alabama but are from Monroe) --declaring that the "main reason" for his decision is that "I refuse to ruin the lives of two young men who have spent their adolescence and teenage years working and sweating, while we were all in the air conditioning." (2) A Philadelphia "casting" agency solicited "extras" to show up at polling stations on the April 26 Pennsylvania primary day for candidate Kevin Boyle, who was running against state Sen. John Sabatina -- offering $120 each (plus lunch and an open bar). Since most polling-site "electioneering" is illegal, the probable job was merely to give voters the impression that Boyle was very popular. (Sabatina narrowly won.) [Times-Picayune (New Orleans), 6-22- 2016] [Gawker.com, 4-27-2016]

-- In January, a Chicago Tribune investigation revealed only 124 of the roughly 12,000 Chicago cops were responsible for the misconduct complaints that resulted in settlements (since 2009)-- with one officer, for example, identified in seven. (A June Chicago Reporter study claimed the city paid out $263 million total on misconduct litigation during 2012-2015.) [Chicago Tribune, 1-29- 2016][Chicago Reporter, 6-22-2016]

(1) Insurance agent John Wright filed a lawsuit in Will County, Illinois, in June over teenagers playing "ding dong ditch," in which kids ring a doorbell but run away before the resident answers. The lawsuit claims that bell-ringer Brennan Papp, 14, caused Wright "severe emotional distress, anxiety, and weight loss," resulting in at least $30,000 of lost income. (2) The ex-boyfriend of Nina Zgurskaya filed a lawsuit in Siberia after she broke up with him for his reluctance to "pop the question" after a two-year courtship. The man, not named in a dispatch from Moscow, demanded compensation for his dating expenses. The trial court ruled against him, but he is appealing. [Patch.com (Joliet, Illinois), 6-24-2016] [Daily Telegraph (London), 6-3-2016]

A team of researchers is following about 30 tabbies, calicos, and others, recording their moves and sounds, to somehow learn whether housecats have dialects in their meows and alter other patterns of stress and intonation when they "speak" to other cats or to humans. In explaining the project, linguist Robert Eklund (of Sweden's Linkoping University) personally sounded out "a pretty wide range of meows to illustrate his points," wrote a New York magazine interviewer in April. Eklund is already an expert on feline purring (at Purring.org) -- although from a distance, as he admits to being allergic to cats. [New York, 4-27-2016]

-- Quixotic Malaysian designer Moto Guo made a splash at Milan's fashion week in June when he sent model after model to the runway with facial blotches that suggested they had zits or skin conditions. One reporter was apparently convinced, concluding, "Each man and woman on the runway looked miserable." [Daily Mail (London), 6-20-2016]

-- Out of Control: (1) Nelson Hidalgo, 47, was arrested in New York City in June and charged with criminal negligence and other crimes for parking his van near Citi Field during a Mets game and drawing players' complaints when he ramped up the van's 80-speaker sound system. "I know it's illegal, but it's the weekend," said Hidalgo. "I usually (just) get a ticket." (2) Trina Hibberd of Mission Beach, Australia, finally showed concern about the python living inside her walls that she has known about for 15 years but (perhaps "Australian-ly") had chosen to ignore. In June, it wandered out -- a 15-foot-long, 90-pound Scrub Python she calls "Monty." "All hell broke loose," a neighbor said later, as snake-handlers took Monty to a more appropriate habitat. [AM New York, 6-20-2016] [Australian Broadcasting Corp. News, 6-21-2016]

Brigham Young University professor Jason Hansen apologized in May after coaxing a student (for extra credit) to drink a small vial of his urine in class. The physiology session was on kidney function, and Hansen thought the stunt would call attention to urine's unique properties. He confessed later that the "urine" was just food coloring with vinegar added; that he had used the stunt in previous classes; and that he usually admits the ruse at the next class session. Nonetheless, Hansen's department chair suggested he retire the concept. [KSTU-TV (Provo), 5-31-2016]

A Woman at the Top of Her Game: In Nashville, Tennessee, in June, sex worker Jonisia Morris, 25, was charged with robbing her client by (according to the police report) removing the man's wallet from his trousers while he received oral sex seated in his car, extracting his debit card, and returning the wallet to his pocket -- without his noticing. [WZTV (Nashville), 6-16-2016]

Recidivist Jesse Johnson, 20, was charged again in June (for suspicion of disturbing the peace) after he had crawled underneath a woman's car at an Aldi store's parking lot in Lincoln, Nebraska, waited for her to return, and then, as she was stepping into the car, reaching out to fondle her ankle. It was Johnson's third such charge this year, and he initially tried to deny the actual touch, instead claiming that he was underneath the car "simply for the visual." Johnson acknowledged to the judge that he needs help and that he had been in counseling but had run out of money. (At press time, the status of the latest incident was still pending.) [Journal Star (Lincoln), 6-23- 2016]

(1) Australian lawyer William Ray was killed on May 22 when he was thrown from his all-terrain "quad bike" in rural Victoria state and pinned underneath. Ray had come to prominence by representing Honda as the company balked at mandatory installation of anti-roll bars on quad bikes. (2) A 48-year-old employee at North Central Bronx Hospital in New York City died of a heart attack at work on June 7, under circumstances (according to police) indicating that he was viewing a pornographic video at the moment of his death. [The Age (Melbourne), 5-23-2016] [New York Daily News, 6-8-2016]

When the assistant manager arrived early on June 26 (2012) to open up the Rent-A-Center in Brockton, Massachusetts, he encountered a man on the ground with his head stuck underneath the heavy metal loading-bay door (obviously as the result of a failed burglary attempt during the night). "Hang tight!" the manager consoled the trapped man. "The police are on their way." Manuel Fernandes, 53, was arrested. [The Enterprise (Brockton), 6-26-2012]

In May, an apparently devout woman named Katy Vasquez of Winter Park, Florida, posted a sincerely written entry on Facebook (and told Huffington Post in an interview) that she had just seen a "sign from God" -- a cross -- as a smudge in her infant's soiled diaper. "I prayed to God for a sign that everything would be OK," she gushed to the reporter. "It might not be the prettiest sign, but he put it where he knew I'd see it." (Hence, News of the Weird retires the recurring theme begun in the 1980s with Jesus in a rust stain on an abandoned refrigerator.) [Huffington Post, 5-20-2016]

-- To their great surprise, Sophie Scafidi and friends, on an outing in Hampton Beach, New Hampshire, in June, learned that a man spying on and photographing them through a camera lens hidden in a Gatorade bottle painted black was not violating any law. Although the lens was rigged to the man's phone, which contained beach photos, including some of children, police informed Scafidi that even surreptitious photography in sleazy circumstances, as long as done on public property, was legal -- and that the only law broken in the incident was by the person who snatched the "camera" to show police. [WBZ-TV (Boston), 6-7-2016]

-- A court in Canberra, Australia, found Wesley King not guilty of a 2014 burglary despite his DNA's having been found at the crime scene -- on underpants containing his fresh feces. Wrote Chief Justice Helen Murrell in June: There is a "reasonable possibility" that the burglar was someone else who was wearing unwashed underwear that had previously been worn by the accused. (Thus, she found King not guilty of all charges.) [Australian Broadcasting Corp. News, 6-15-2016]

-- In June, a federal appeals court revived Adrian King's lawsuit against the Huttonsville Correctional Center in West Virginia for emotional distress and invasion of privacy in forcing him into surgery to remove the marbles he had implanted in his penis before going behind bars in 2008. King did not allege that he misses the marbles but only that he had chosen body-modification and that the surgery was against his will, causing pain upon touch (or whenever it gets cold, or rains or snows). Prison officials initially ordered the surgery because it was unclear that the objects were not contraband. [Reuters, 6-7-2016]

-- Medical Daily, in a May review of recent cases, noted progress in dealing with Cotard's syndrome -- a disorder that leads patients to believe they have no blood or vital body parts -- or feeling as if they are dead (or may as well be). Studies show one in about 200 psychiatric patients exhibit the symptoms, and one doctor, describing a brain scan of his patient, said brain activity resembled that of a person in a coma or under anesthesia. Cotard's, also known as walking corpse syndrome, leads patients to thus avoid eating or bathing (asking themselves, why bother?). [Medical Daily, 5-25-2016]

-- Awwwww: The Sacramento (California) Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals put out a call for help in April after stray kittens were found dumped in a yard, with only two still alive but nearly blind with eye infections and needing animal blood for a serum that might save the eyes. The call was "answered" by the rescue dog Jemmie. After Jemmie's blood "donation" (not a transfusion, since the blood went only to make the serum), vets reported saving one eye of one of the kittens, earning Jemmie a "special" reward. (Said vet Sarah Varanini, "There's nothing in life (Jemmie) likes more than kittens.") [KOVR-TX (Sacramento), 4-6-2016]

-- Recurring Themes: Even though extraordinarily rare, two people recently reported foreign accent syndrome after their brain traumas apparently caused crossing of cranial "wires." (1) "J.C.," 50, was described in the journal Cortex as an energetic Italian who, after a brain injury, inexplicably speaks constantly in "emphatic, error-prone French." (2) Six months ago, Lisa Alamia of Rosenberg, Texas, awoke from surgery inexplicably speaking in a British accent (particularly confusing her family and friends since she previously spoke not so much "English" as "Texan"). Medical experts cited by CBS News reported that fewer than 100 people worldwide have ever been diagnosed with foreign accent syndrome. [Washington Post, 6-3-2016] [CBS News, 6-22-2016]

At the monthly pro wrestling show in Ringgold, Georgia, in June, Patricia Crowe, 59, apparently having had enough of "bad guy" Paul Lee, reportedly jumped into the ring to rescue "good guy" Iron Mann, whom Lee had "tied up" and been beating with a chair. First, she cut Mann loose with her knife and then pulled a loaded handgun on Lee (and was eventually arrested by sheriff's deputies). Crowe admitted that Lee's earlier "mean" banter with ringside patrons had unnerved her, especially when he told Crowe to sit her "toothless self back down." [NorthwestGeorgiaNews.com (Rome, Ga.), 6-8-2016]

(1) A former Malaysian legislator (Mr. S. Manikavasagam), who was charged in June with taking a bribe worth about US$7,300 from a contractor, claimed innocence -- that somehow a package of money was thrown into his car as he drove down a city street. (2) A woman in Goldsboro, North Carolina, acquired a freezer from her neighbor several months ago but said she hadn't looked inside until May, when she discovered parts of a dead body (and called authorities). She said the neighbor had discouraged her from opening the freezer because "a church" was using it as a "time capsule." [Straits Times (Singapore), 6-18-2016] [WNCN-TV (Raleigh, N.C.), 6-2-2016]

The Illinois secretary of state stopped mailing reminders about license-plate renewal deadlines in October because his office said the state could no longer afford the $450,000-a-month mailing cost (thus saving taxpayers $3.6 million so far). The Belleville (Illinois) News-Democrat and The Associated Press reported in June that the state has collected (not surprisingly!) $5.24 million more in the resultant "late fees" people had to pay on their license-plate renewals than it had collected the year before the reminders stopped. (A proposal for a 30-day grace period for expired plates failed in the just-concluded legislative session.) [Belleville News-Democrat, 6-23-2016]

University of Georgia student Benjamin Abele, 22, was finally subdued by four police officers on May 29 after he had run naked down an Athens street and leaped into the gooey, malodorous back end of a garbage truck, wallowing in the slimy liquid that pools under the gunk (hindering arrest), and then attempting to burrow further into the filthiness to somehow "escape." Two Taser shots had no effect, and he was identified as high on PCP. [Athens Banner-Herald, 6-3-2016]

(1) Voters in June in the village of Draguseni, Romania, elected Vasile Cepoi mayor -- no, not the Vasile Cepoi who lost, or the other Vasile Cepoi who lost. The winner was the incumbent mayor, Vasile Cepoi. (There was also a fourth candidate, who was not named Vasile Cepoi.) (2) In June, an "artificial intelligence" robot ("IR77") being taught to "avoid obstacles" while moving around the Promobot lab in Perm, Russia, apparently "learned" how to walk out the door undetected, causing a downtown traffic jam when its batteries died. Handlers modified the computer script, but IR77 "escaped" again several days later, and engineers said they may have to dismantle the program and start over. [New York Times, 6-14-2016] [RT.com (Moscow), 6-23-2016]

In testimony at an extortion trial in New York City in June (2012), Anthony Russo (alleged Colombo family associate) told prosecutors that a bloody mob war was narrowly averted recently. The Colombo family had learned that a new Staten Island pizza parlor (run by an alleged Bonanno family associate) was featuring pies that suspiciously resembled those of the top-rated, Colombo-promoted L and B Spumoni Gardens in Brooklyn, and thus, representatives of both families had to have one of those classic "sit-downs" at a neutral site to smooth things over. The sit-down took place, Russo said, at a Panera Bread cafe. [New York Daily News, 6-13-2012]