Cat handbags: A woman in Japan, known as Pico, designs handbags that look like real cats. Using faux fur, a handbag might appear to be a pure white kitten,  a black and white cat about to pounce, or a green-eyed grey feline that wants to cuddle. One of Pico’s creations is a knapsack which, on the wearer’s back,  looks like a house cat on its haunches clawing at a screen door. Pico’s work became known on social media, but she makes them in limited numbers because she is busy raising her young children.

Car Museum: Many famous automobiles have appeared in movies over the  years. Anyone with a hankering to see their favourite movie vehicle can visit  the Celebrity Car Museum in Branson, Missouri (U.S.). More than 100 such cars are collected there, from the Ford Explorer in Jurassic Park to the Flintstone’s  granite car to the Batmobile from the 1966 TV series. The museum is the brainchild of the Velvet family, who have been car collectors for years. Displays  change because the family regularly buys and sells cars. Visitors are  welcome to pretend to be a movie star behind the wheel. 

Body art: Born in Italy, Johannes Stötter is an artist who is an impressive body painter. He uses human models as his canvas and creates realistic looking animals, insects, reptiles, fish, and more. As the models can’t stay in place indefinitely,  he takes photos of the finished work. Often, it’s difficult to tell there is a human being (or two) in the photo. For example, he painted two models to look like a crocodile. He painted one curled-up model to look like a  beautiful butterfly. Two models, one on top of the other, appear to be a scaly lizard. Aside from his painting, Stötter is also a trained musician.

Crazy furniture: A furniture maker from Auckland, New Zealand, has found a  way to make his creations unique. Henk Verhoeff uses his carpentry skills to design and make furniture that looks like it’s warped or cracked – but it is not.  In reality, every drawer opens perfectly on a dresser that appears to be crooked and broken, and a hole in the door of a side table is camouflage for miniature shelves on the inside. It is quite a feat for Verhoeff to accurately cut the angles so the moving parts work properly. Verhoeff’s work became known when his daughter posted some images on social media.

Unusual art: Artist Reijo Kela of Finland must have been a bit bored when he decided to make some friends – literally. He came up with an art installation consisting of over 1,000 “people” made of wooden frames and dressed in colourful clothing. All the figures, which have heads of peat and hair of straw,  face the same direction. Called “The Silent People,” the installation is situated in a field near a highway, in the Finnish municipality of Suomussalmi. Drivers who are accustomed to the sight may not look twice, but those who don’t know about it experience quite a shock when they first view the army of scarecrows.

Unshorn sheep: A sheep named Prickles has become a celebrity in Tasmania  (Australia). The ovine got separated from Alice Gray’s family farm in 2013  during intense bush fires. A lamb at the time, the family worried that she  wouldn’t  survive in the wilderness. However, they were buoyed by a few sightings of her over the years, and finally, they managed to catch her, put her  in a truck, and get her back to the farm. Prickles had not had her wool shorn for  so long that she  looked like a big ball of fluff. The family sponsored a  contest for people to guess how much the wool weighed, and they donated  the proceeds to a COVID-19 relief fund. 

Pancake perfection: The small city of Ames, Iowa (U.S.), is home to The Grove  Café. This little restaurant, which was founded back in 1948, serves such good food that it has been voted one of the 20 best breakfast restaurants in the country. Pancakes are the menu item that gets diners’ attention. They are enormous and barely fit on a plate. At an inch thick and with perfect fluffiness,  these pancakes can be ordered as a short stack of two, for diners who are really hungry. Toppings include butter, blueberry and raspberry jam, and whipped cream.

Picturesque burglary: If you are going to rob someone, try not to take a  picture of yourself on the victim’s phone. That’s what Ashley Keast did after breaking into a home with the intent of stealing. Keast, of Rotherham, South  Yorks (England), stole a SIM card and put it into a different phone before posting a selfie. He didn’t realize that the photo was seen by the victim’s co-workers, who called the cops. It didn’t take long to find the thief, who was caught with the victim’s £4,000 Rolex watch. Keast ended up in jail for his bad deed.

Plant lover: Joe Bagley lives in his own personalized jungle. His home is a one-bedroom coach house in Loughborough, Leicestershire, England, and it is filled to the rafters with all kinds of potted plants, from cacti to ivy and from tropicals to succulents. All told, he estimates that 1,400 plants live in his abode. His love of plants started when, as a boy of 13, his grandmother gave him a spider plant cutting. Since then, collecting and caring for plants has become his passion. Even his work involves plants: he works in a garden centre.

Close proximity: Those who live near busy highways may not be thrilled with traffic noise, but that’s nothing compared to a situation in Cairo, Egypt.  Designed to carry fast-moving vehicles, Teraet Al-Zomor Bridge is under construction just 50 centimetres (20 in.) from four high-rise apartment buildings. Apparently, the bridge is an important addition to the infrastructure,  and the construction has a permit. The apartment dwellers will have to relocate, as the buildings will be torn down. For now, though, the view from some of the suites is definitely blocked, but hopefully, the compensation to the renters will be worth it! 

Big loaves: The country of Vietnam holds many tourist attractions, but one unlikely item has people talking – giant loaves of bread. Baker Pham Thi Bac of An Giang province in the Mekong Delta started making the big loaves in 2018, just for fun. At about one metre (3 ft.) long and weighing approximately three kilograms (6.5 lbs.), the loaves taste great and are glazed with butter and seeds. Local people heard about the bread first and started asking for it.  Then tourists joined in, wanting to take home a loaf or two as souvenirs – if they could figure out a way to carry them!

House for Raffle: Katherine Jablonowska and Ryan Mclean wanted to do something different, so they took on a unique project. They bought a 19th- century cottage on the Llyn Peninsula in North Wales and renovated it. But their goal was not to live there. Instead, they plan to raffle it off for £5 per ticket, with the lucky winner becoming the new owner. Originally a working barn, the home is now a beautiful, peaceful abode, with all the “bells and whistles” of modern life. When selling tickets, the pair is requesting a £1  donation, which they will match and donate to The Children’s Society.

Underwater art: A young Bahamian girl sits beneath the sea off the coast of  New Providence, an island in the Bahamas. Actually, the girl is a statue, made of sustainable materials designed to encourage the growth of coral. Named  “Ocean Atlas,” this statue was made by Jason deCaires Taylor, an artist and photographer. “Ocean Atlas” was installed in 2014 under the water near the city of Nassau. It is 5.5 metres (18 ft.) tall and weighs over 60 tonnes. It is possible to go snorkelling in the area to see this interesting art instalment up close.

Tiny tree: Fairy Lake near the town of Port Renfrew on Victoria Island, Canada,  draws people to its shores so they can view a little fir tree. This small conifer is special because it is growing out of a log that is submerged in the lake. The tree is thought to be between 30 and 40 years old, and no one is quite sure how it survives on the log, which is the source of its nutrients. The tree is the subject of many photographs, and no two are alike. In times of high water, it may be almost submerged, while on still summer mornings, it sits peacefully in the mist.

Twice lucky: His last name has not been released, but “Joe B.” is one lucky fellow. From Pueblo, Colorado (U.S.), Joe bought two lottery tickets on the same day at different stores located a few blocks apart. He purchased one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Both tickets turned out to be $1 million winners! Joe used the same numbers (his lucky ones) each time. It took him a month to claim his prizes, and when he did, it was via a drive-thru window set up during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Animal hospital: The Nairobi National Park in Kenya has a special centre for injured animals. Called the Nairobi Animal Orphanage, this centre takes in and treats animals and birds of many different species. On any one day, there may lions, hyenas, cheetahs, parrots, ostriches, and more. While the animals are ill or injured, they are nursed back to health by the orphanage’s staff. The centre’s goal is for the animals to be rehabilitated and returned to their natural habitats. Often, park rangers are the ones who find and bring in animals and birds that need medical treatment. The public can visit the orphanage for educational tours.

Lost in the maze: Those who don’t mind getting lost might want to visit the rare Elizabethan hedge maze in the VanDusen Garden in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, on Canada’s west coast. Planted in the fall of 1981, the maze is made of over 3,000 pyramidal cedars, which have been growing ever since. Some people come to test their sense of direction as they walk through its cool passageways, while others enjoy finding a quiet spot to contemplate life. Those who are afraid of getting lost can view the maze from an observation terrace and watch others try to find their way out!

Sandy art: Visitors to a beach in Basque Country in Spain could be forgiven if they ran away in fear because they saw a big bull sitting in the sand. However, what they saw wasn’t a real bull. It was a sculpture created by sand artist Andoni Bastarrika. For a decade, the artist has been making sand sculptures mainly to entertain people, but images of this life-size bull went viral on social media and made him famous. Bastarrika uses his hands to get the shape of his subject and then moves to brushes, sticks, and toothpicks to sculpt the fine details. In addition to creating his own art, he also teaches sand sculpting workshops.

Stay home!: The originator of Batman probably never envisioned the caped crusader as a virus fighter. However, that was the case in the Mexican city of Monterrey, Nuevo León, during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. A man dressed up in a real Batman suit drove around the city in a Batmobile, taking it upon himself to tell people to stay at home. He blasted a recorded message from the vehicle asking people to keep their distance from each other. The vigilante apparently was Candelario Maldonado, a Batman impersonator known in the city.

Cat sense: Dogs tend to get all the recognition for being heroes in times of trouble, but a cat in Portugal Cove-St. Philip’s, Newfoundland (Canada), deserves some credit for being a “watch cat.” The black and white feline, called Joey, is owned by Scott White. Just after midnight, White had put some food in the slow cooker, expecting it to be ready in the morning. However, he woke up a few hours later to find Joey pacing around the bed and whacking him with a paw. Turns out the slow cooker had caught fire. Without Joey, the house might have burned down.