offbeat

Chesterfield Borough Council last weekend launched a "well dressing" with a blessing service that marks the 20th anniversary of Princess Diana's death in a Paris car crash.

A well dressing involves using only natural materials, including seeds, berries, leaves and flowers to make a mural.

Now Adelaide is about to join that illustrious list, with its own Christmas tree trail.

In a bid to bring festive fun to the Adelaide Riverbank and attract visitors near and far, Renewal SA has sought tenders for the $40,000 project.

The pitch?

To design and manufacture up to 30 Christmas tree sculptures.

Each should be at least 1.2 metres tall, but no more than 2.5 metres (which includes the tree and a stand).

They must be identical and have a surface colour and finish so they are effectively a 'blank canvas'.

The team spent more than three weeks in the western German city of Duisburg working on the artwork, which includes a sandy replica of the Great Sphinx of Giza, Venice's Rialto Bridge and the grave of Elvis Presley.

It also features models of tourist attractions such as Athens' Acropolis, Barcelona's Sagrada Familia and the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Guinness World Record official Jack Brockbank was on hand to approve the new record for the German sculpture, which eclipsed the previous tallest sandcastle, a 14.84-metre world peace monument built in India in February.

The officer was spotted getting into the spirit of the Notting Hill Carnival, an annual event celebrating Britain's West Indian community, by an MC on stage.

"We got a policeman over there with some moves," the MC says.

"Make some noise for the undercover raver."

Twitter user @phemmynice shared a video of the officer's antics, and he was quickly identified as Police Constable Dan Graham.

The officer, from Kingston in London's south-west was dubbed 'Dancing Dan' after appearing on Britain's Got Talent earlier this year.

So-called noms de womb can be funny, cute and just a little on the weird side.

Phoebe Payn said as soon as people discovered she was expecting twins they started to name them.

"My dad has just started calling them Jesus and Mary because they're due at Christmas," she told Helen Shield on ABC Radio Hobart.

"B1 and B2 is popular. Which is actually quite fitting because in the scan you could see them and they were actually headbutting each other like the Bananas do.

On show until October 15, Bug Lab: Little Bugs, Super Powers is a co-production between New Zealand museum Te Papa and special effects company Weta Workshop.

Te Papa entomologist Dr Phil Sirvid said the show was "a celebration of the genius of bugs".

Here's four freaky insect facts from the exhibition.

Dragonflies out-hunt lions

Lions may be kings of the jungle, but they are amateur hunters compared to dragonflies, Dr Sirvid said.

"A lion hunting on its own gets its dinner about one time in five; dragonflies, typically, it's 95 out of 100."

The jungle python was seized during a police raid of an ice lab where it had absorbed the drug through its skin, said Ian Mitchell, a senior overseer at the John Morony Correctional Complex in Berkshire Park.

He said the snake's methamphetamine addiction made it more confused, erratic and aggressive than it would normally be and it needed six weeks of detoxification at the prison's wildlife care centre.

But why should February 14 be off-limits to those who aren't in the thralls of romantic bliss?

We all have people in our lives we are fond of and value greatly. While those connections are not romantic — a thoughtful colleague, a beloved pet — nobody can deny that these relationships are equally as important and worth acknowledging.

So this Valentine's Day, let's expand our definition of love to include all of those special people in our lives.

Your local barista

"Coming in to this class I feel great, I feel sexy and I don't think a lot of women feel that anymore," said disability worker Jasmine, who signed up to try and improve her body confidence.

"I was very unsure of myself when I first messaged Vivienne. I said 'I'm a bigger girl, I am afraid of all my curves and my bits and pieces'.

"[Performing on stage] has helped me the most with my confidence and it has come through to my everyday life... I am sexy; it doesn't matter what the rest of you think."

We all have our favourite Christmas songs, from Mariah Carey to the one where the lady is on a drip.

But Christmas also inflicts on the listening public an annual barrage of aural abominations that could make Frosty the Snowman take a sauna. They're appalling, but Christmas wouldn't be the same without them.

Here are the definitive Ten Worst Christmas Songs of All Time.

Aussie Jingle Bells