Etc.

Am I in trouble, officer?

If the point of wearing "goth" attire in public is to attract stares, somewhere in Tulsa, Okla., a young man still must be smiling. Because, oh, boy, did he succeed last Friday afternoon. For an hour or so, you might even say he was the very center of attention. In fact, before it was all over, he had people checking him out every which way. No, not because Tulsa residents hadn't seen counterculture types dressed all in black before. It had more to do with what the unidentified fellow chose as an accessory to his fashion statement. Well, that plus the location where he was spotted at the time. From one wrist, you see, dangled a set of handcuffs. That might have been unremarkable in the company of like-minded high school students at, say, a mall. But not in the 500 block of South Denver Ave., which happens to be home to the county jail and courthouse. At least one passer-by, concerned that the wearer might have escaped from custody, alerted police, and a mini-manhunt ensued. But it didn't take long for officers to find their quarry. He then was subjected to a background check for arrest warrants and, when none was found, sent on his way. No word on what, if any, advice the police offered him on the way out. But as Sgt. Jody Britt put it later, "Wearing handcuffs near a courthouse is not exactly the most intelligent thing you could do."