In July, Abbie Hawkins, 19, a hotel receptionist in Norwich, England, said she found a baby bat nestled inside the padded bra she had been wearing for several hours.

"When I was driving to work, I felt a slight vibration but I thought it was just my mobile phone in my jacket pocket," she told the Daily Telegraph. Hawkins had fetched the bra off of a clothesline that morning, where it had been hanging overnight.

First reaction: "I thought how mean I was for disturbing it."

Return to sender

The Nebraska legislature's new "safe haven" law for unwanted babies, like other states' laws, allows them to be dropped off anonymously at hospitals to discourage abortions (and neglect by unfit parents).

However, unlike other states' laws, Nebraska's applies not just to infants, but "minors," because, said Sen. Tom White, "All children deserve our protection."

In September, the first two non-infants were abandoned, as exasperated parents gave up on rebellious sons aged 11 and 15, and critics say the law could apply to those up to age 19.

Cultural Diversity

- "In many ways," reported the Los Angeles Times in August, the Torajans of Indonesia's Sulawesi Island "spend a lifetime preparing for their demise," in that the most glorious highlight of their existence appears to be planning the elaborate celebration of the end of it.

In fact, taking one's last breath is only the beginning of a lengthy tribute, such as the one for Toraja's last king, who died in 2003 but has not been put away yet, pending completion of the necessary ritual animal sacrifices. (In the interim, the deceased is considered more "sick" than "dead.")

Said one local ("cheerfully," according to the Times), "Torajans! (We) live to die!"

- About 250,000 women in the southern India states of Karnataka and Maharashtra are self-described "elite" sex workers whose impoverished, or devoutly pious, parents "dedicated" them as children to the Hindu goddess Yellamma, according to an August dispatch in The New Yorker.

Despite the state's outlawing the practice in 1982, the women's fate as "devadasis" remains an attractive alternative to ordinary marriage (which would usually be to poor and abusive men) and provides a degree of status, in that they dress nicely and can inherit family property, while street prostitutes cannot. However, devadasis still fall victim to the region's rampant HIV rate.

In August, the U.S. Department of Transportation unveiled new rules for train and bus drivers returning to work from drug-use suspensions. They must now be tested first by a strip search to detect devices for cheating (such as artificial penises), and if none is found, they may re-dress themselves, but a monitor must still "directly watch the urine as it goes from the employee's body into the collection container." Not surprisingly, several unions have challenged the rule in court.

Barbie's not just a girls' Obsession

(1) Robert Martin, 47, was arrested in Cape May, N.J., in July after a State Police officer spotted an array of pornographic magazines in his car in a public parking lot, along with a serving platter resting on his dashboard, piled with women's underwear, and a collection of naked Barbie dolls lined up on the seat. (2) Christopher Sullivan, 43, was arrested in Oshkosh, Wis., in August as the person who allegedly sent his upstairs neighbors threatening packages, including a Polaroid photo of three naked Barbie dolls with their heads cut off. He told police he was angry that the couple were too loud when they had sex.

More ways to consume that heavenly food

The fourth annual Big Tex Choice award for best taste this year (at a precursor event to September's Texas State Fair) went to Glen Kusak's chicken fried bacon.

Earlier this summer, fourth-generation candymaker Joseph Marini III introduced chocolate-covered bacon bon-bons at his stand on California's Santa Cruz Boardwalk.

For the more sophisticated, restaurateur Don Yovicsin of Waltham, Mass., serves bacon-infused Absolut vodka (allowed to sit for four weeks' time and then filtered of the bits). For a Bacon Bloody Mary, add mix, a lime wedge, "barbecue rub" and a Slim Jim).

Latest religious messages

(1) In August, Birmingham Cathedral announced plans to open a series of wine bars in London, as (according to an official) one of the "alternative ways" of engaging non-church-goers. (2) The new church curate in Dursley, Gloustershire, is Rev. Skye Denno, 29, a married mother of two, whose down time is spent in biker boots, hot pants, a dog collar and her six piercings, listening to the Sex Pistols. Said she, "I don't do it to be difficult. (I) think it makes me more approachable."