A 28-year-old woman, unnamed in news reports, veered off the road and into a house in the Florida panhandle town of Mary Esther on July 7. She apparently was free of drug or alcohol influence, but readily explained to police that she must have gone through a stop sign and left the road when she closed her eyes to pray as she drove. (The house was damaged, but no one was injured.) [Daily News of Northwest Florida, 7-11-2016]

-- The Transportation Security Administration announced in May that it had collected $765,000 in loose change left behind in airport scanner trays during 2015 -- an average "haul" for the agency of $2,100 a day (numbers assuming, of course, that TSA personnel turn in all of the money they find). Los Angeles and Miami airports contributed $106,000 of the total. [WTOP Radio (Washington, D.C.), 5-17-2016]

-- Take Your Word for It: Scientists at the University of Cambridge, writing in May in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, claimed to have figured out how to construct a "motor" a "million times" smaller than an ant. (It apparently involves lasers, gold particles and "van der Waals forces," and the object is to bind the gold particles and then cause them to automatically "snap" apart with, according to author Jeremy Baumberg, "10 to a hundred times more force per unit than any known other machine.") [Washington Post, 5-3-2016]

-- CEO Michael Pearson told a Senate committee in April that he "regret(s)" the business model he instituted in 2015 for Valeant Pharmaceuticals -- the one that, for example, allowed a drug (Cuprimine) that treats liver failure and formerly cost a typical user out-of-pocket about $3 a pill (120 per month, $366) to, overnight, cost the user $15 a pill. (The insurance company's and Medicare's cost went overnight from about $5,000 per 100 tablets to $26,000.) (A Deutsche Bank analysis of the industry tallied Valeant's all-drug average price spike at more than five times the average of any competitor's.) Pearson told the senators he had no idea that such a pricing strategy would turn out to be so controversial. [New York Times, 4-28-2016, 10-4-2015]

-- Neck and Back Support: The Japanese branch of the intimate apparel maker Genie is currently advertising, in Japanese and English, a handy guide for bras that emphasizes the hardship women bear by having to lug around breasts of certain sizes in ill-fitting garments. The Genie chart reveals weight in ounces of typical A-cup chests (11.5 ounces) through F-cup (41.7 ounces, or 2.6 pounds). To assist any innumerate Japanese shoppers, the chart also shows practical comparisons, such as A-cup pairs weighing as much as "two chipmunks," C-cups as "one newborn polar bear cub," and F-cups as "one 3-month-old Persian kitten." [Genie's press release via RocketNews24.com, 7-6-2016]

-- The Passing Parade: (1) Mark Herron, 49, of Sunderland, England, was arrested again in May -- his 448th arrest on alcohol-related charges. The year started "well" for Herron, with only 14 collars through March, and he cleaned up briefly before a "family bereavement" sent him spiraling downward again. His current lawyer admitted that his client has been in court more often than he himself has. (2) Austrian Hans Heiland vowed in June to assist a needy family in Oberholz by donating to a charity fundraiser sponsored by the local fire department. He has been collecting bottle tops through the years and figures he could sell his "treasure" now, as scrap metal, to help the family. He has at least 10,000, no, make that 10 million caps, weighing "several tons." [Sunderland Echo, 5-30-2016] [The Local (Vienna), 6-10-2016]

-- Wait, How Many Fell for This? In May, the federal government finally shut down a long-running international scam that had sold psychic assurances (prosperity! winning lottery numbers!) to more than a million Americans. In personalized form letters, two French psychics had guaranteed success and riches to clients if they would only buy their $50 books (and massive upselling usually followed). The Justice Department estimated that during the spree, the sellers earned upward of $180 million on at least 56 million pieces of postal mail. [Reuters, 5-9-2016]

-- In a June verdict still reverberating through the telemarketing industry, a jury in Utah found that three companies run by Forrest Baker III had illegally made 99 million phone calls to consumers on the Do Not Call Registry and an additional 18 million calls telling people they were merely doing surveys when the purpose was hawking their family-friendly movies. Both charges are violations of the Federal Trade Commission's Telemarketing Sales Rule. Although the total fine and damages have not been decided, the law provides that the most serious offenders could be assessed $16,000 per phone call (for a maximum of almost $1.9 trillion). [FTC press release, 6-2-2016] [NetworkWorld.com, 6-2-2016]

-- A recent study by a Harvard University data scientist estimated that the government of China funds the creation of at least 488 million bogus social-media posts a year. The report refers to a rumored government-sponsored arrangement that pays people the equivalent of 8 U.S. cents per post of "news" for the purpose of distracting social-media users and channeling them to subjects preferred by the government (such as successes of the Communist Party). [CNN Money, 5-20-2016]

-- The family of a Virginia Tech student missing since 1998 was notified in March that the man's remains and ID had been found in a wooded ravine 700 feet below the New River Gorge bridge near Beckley, West Virginia -- in an area the man's vehicle tracker had long identified for potential searching. A West Virginia State Police sergeant told reporters that in the years since the student disappeared, the remains of 48 other bodies had been found underneath the bridge. [Roanoke Times, 3-11-2016]

-- Recurring Themes: (1) Fernando Estrella, 41, was arrested in Franklin County, Vermont, in March and charged with making the foolish error of running a stop sign while carrying a heroin haul. Estrella was rectally packing three condoms stuffed with enough heroin, said police, to fill 1,428 street-retail-size baggies. (2) Esteysi Sanchez Izazaga, 29, was arrested for DUI, hit-and-run and vehicular manslaughter in Oceanside, California, in June after driving three-fourths of a mile (3,960 feet) with a pedestrian's corpse firmly lodged in her windshield after she struck the man. (The drive ended up at her home, where her horrified husband noticed the body and called police.) [Fox News, 3-30-2016] [KGTV (San Diego), 6-28-2016]

-- As typical of many pervert suspects in News of the Weird, Roger Marsh, 65, of Cowling, England, was a prodigious collector/hoarder of his indecent images. He was caught with a camera attached to his shoe following skirted women around an Ikea store, and in May was ordered to jail for 18 months by Leeds Crown Court, covering six offenses. However, police had also discovered a trove of 709,376 images and videos at his home, and preliminary perusal of the collection showed 1,600 live files of voyeurism and about 9,000 indecent images of children. [Keighley News, 5-25-2016]

New Mexico is an "open carry" state, with otherwise-law-abiding adults authorized to display loaded handguns in public. However, in the town of Vaughn (pop. 500, about 90 miles east of Albuquerque), perhaps the only people not legally able to carry are the town's two police officers. A June (2012) KOB-TV report revealed that Chief Ernest Armijo had been convicted in 2011 of criminal non-support of a wife and two sons, and was barred from possessing a gun. Deputy Brian Bernal has his own domestic issue: a conviction for family violence that bans him, under federal law, from carrying. (A month after the News of the Weird story, both men resigned, leaving the town's police dog the only active "officer.") [KOB-TV (Albuquerque), 6-28-2012]

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]