Pythons and pumpkins highlight a typically weird and wacky week on the planet in this week’s edition of “Strange But True.”

IN THAT A PYTHON IN YOUR PANTS?

A New York City man has been charged with smuggling three Burmese pythons in his pants at a US-Canadian border crossing. Calvin Bautista, 36, is accused of bringing the hidden snakes on a bus that crossed into northern New York. Importation of Burmese pythons is regulated by an international treaty and by federal regulations listing them as “injurious to human beings.” The charge carries the potential for a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a fine as high as $250,000, according to federal prosecutors.

MAY THE DOUGH BE WITH YOU

Han Solo may be a hunk. But “Pan Solo” is a hunk of bread. That’s what a bakery in the San Francisco Bay Area has dubbed its 1.8-metre bread sculpture of the “Star Wars” character as he appeared after being frozen in carbonite in “The Empire Strikes Back.” Hanalee Pervan and her mother, Catherine Pervan (photo), co-owners of One House Bakery in Benicia, Ca., spent weeks molding, baking, and assembling the life-sized sculpture, which is now on display outside of the bakery, located about a half-hour’s drive north of San Francisco. Pan Solo is the bakery’s entry in the annual Downtown Benicia Main Street Scarecrow Contest in which the public votes on their favourites from among more than two dozen creations entered by local businesses.

MAN BITES DOG

Police in Germany detained a man for resisting arrest and biting a service dog. Officers were called to a dispute between two men and a woman in the western town of Ginsheim-Gustavsburg shortly after midnight. The trio acted in an “extremely aggressive and uncooperative” fashion, and in the course of resisting arrest, one of the men also bit a police dog, police said, adding that the canine did not sustain any injuries. Meanwhile, the 35-year-old woman injured a police officer with a punch to the face. All three were detained and spent the rest of the night in jail to sober up.

ONE MAN’S TRASH

A bargain hunter who went to an estate sale in Maine to find a KitchenAid mixer, a bookshelf or vintage clothing walked away with a 700-year-old treasure. Instead of a kitchen appliance, Will Sideri stumbled upon a framed document hanging on a wall. It had elaborate script in Latin, along with musical notes and gold flourishes. A sticker said 1285 AD. Based on what he’d seen in a manuscripts class at Colby College, the document looked downright medieval. And it was a bargain at $75.

Academics confirmed the parchment was from The Beauvais Missal, used in the Beauvais Cathedral in France, and dated to the late 13th century. It was used about 700 years ago in Roman Catholic worship, they said. An expert on manuscripts said the document could be worth as much as $10,000, though

Sideri said he has no intention of selling it.

THE GREAT PUMPKINA 2,554-pound pumpkin grown in upstate New York has set a new US record for the heaviest. State and national records fell over the weekend at the Great Pumpkin Farm in the Buffalo suburb of Clarence, when Scott Andrusz’s entry broke the previous national record of 2,528 pounds. The previous New York state record was 2,517 pounds. The winning gourd was displayed at the Great Pumpkin Farm fall festival last week. A grower in Italy holds the world record for heaviest pumpkin. He grew a 2,702-pound squash in 2021, according to Guinness World Records.