CORVALLIS, Ore. -- Mohamed Osman Mohamuda, a 19-year-old naturalized American from Somalia, was arrested Friday by federal agents. He was charged with plotting to detonate a bomb during a Christmas-tree-lighting ceremony in downtown Portland.

The imam at the Islamic center Mohamuda had attended in college told reporters that the boy appeared to be in a state of constant confusion. “He would say things that weren’t true. He told people that he was getting married, but he wasn’t. He told people that his real name was Wally. He told people that he was a gifted basketball player and lover. But all who knew Mohamuda saw through these lies.”

TEHRAN, Iran -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad admitted today that the country’s centrifuges, used in the highly controversial enrichment of uranium, had been infected with a malicious computer virus, supporting reports issued the week before by Western diplomats.

Ahmadinejad continues to insist that the nuclear program is aimed strictly at power generation, but major Western powers that include Russia, Iran’s longtime ally, have become increasingly concerned that the enrichment program will soon enable Iran to build and launch nuclear weapons. The likely target, as intimated in Ahmadinejad’s vitriolic speeches, would be Israel.

Ahmadinejad did not specify which virus had plagued the systems controlling the centrifuges, but other officials in the Iranian government described some of the adverse effects. Said one scientist on condition of anonymity, “The virus created problems for only a limited number of our centrifuges, but the software has not been restored yet. Whenever we attempt to access the compromised platforms, a strange man in a banana suit appears singing a song about peanut butter, jelly and baseball bats. Our top code breakers are working around the clock to decipher the message, which can only be attributed to a decadent Western regime.”

LOS ANGELES, Calif. --  Dr. Alan Rumack, one of the heroes responsible for the successful landing of distressed Trans American flight 209 to Chicago in 1980, has died of complications with pneumonia. He was 84.

SAN NARCISO, Calif. -- Thousands of angry fans flooded the phone lines and email servers of MTV/Electronic Arts and its retailers with complaints over today’s release of the eagerly anticipated “Rock Band – Def Leppard Edition” game. The issue stems from a perceived design flaw in the drum kit.

“It’s been chaos in our Customer Service lines,” said Zeke Gersch, a Walmart manager in Bennington Vale. “We expected a lot of orders with Christmas coming up, but not this. All the games are screwed up. There’s only one drum stick in the box. Even worse, the drum kit itself has all these extra foot pedals that no one knows how to use. I can’t for the life of me figure out what the game-making people was thinking.”

LJUBLJANA, Slovenia -- On a narrow cobbled street winding up to a medieval castle overlooking the Slovenian capital, the Darilnica gift shop opened this month. Darilnica is a place where people can exchange dubious Christmas gifts of any kind for something they really do want.

According to Reuters, "If your drawers are packed with the ghosts of Christmases past in the shape of unwanted gifts, a new Slovenian shop may be just the thing for you this year."

Four outcasts -- a failed silver prospector, a winged lion, an elf dentist and a reindeer with body image issues -- decided to open the shop to "make people think before giving presents," particularly at Christmas.