So, if I were to go outside, grab a flamethrower, and torch every damn thing in North Carolina that produced pollen, just how much of my gardening cred do you think I'd lose? Because my sinuses feel like they're taking up about 640% of my headspace right now. Ugh.

Perkins, my cats don't pee in their carrier, so sad for you that yours do.

That cat is kinda scary looking IMHO.

He looks worried, if you ask me.

But this [link]

WANT

He looks worried, if you ask me.

I think the kitty is thinking: "Please. Keep me away from sparks and open flames."

I find the kitty a little alarming, but the

Schrunchy faced Puppies [link]

are adorable.

In other cranky bastard news, a Minnesota family wrote letters of protest to Canadian senators (clearly the family need instruction on where the power lies in Canada) about the seal hunt, calling it horrible and inhumane. One senator wrote back:

what she finds horrible is "the daily massacre of innocent people in Iraq, the execution of prisoners – mainly blacks – in American prisons, the massive sale of handguns to Americans, the destabilization of the entire world by the American government's aggressive foreign policy, etc."

She said Americans are not in a position to criticize others. "They must start to look at their own behaviour, the permanent heightening of the planet's insecurity since the election of Bush," she told La Presse.

[link]

I guess when you are appointed to a job for life*, you don't worry much about who you tell off.

• Until age 75.

Hi all. I need advice from someone with better social skills than mine - i.e. anyone on this board. I approach a leading expert on alternatives to fossil fuel in hopes that he would take a look at my book and consider giving me a forward. He agreed, and asked me if I was related to so-and-so. I thanked him effusively, and explained that so-and-so is my second cousin, and shared an amusing story about so-and-so and my late father - making it clear that my father knew so-and-so well, but I only met him a few times. The expert e-mailed me back to let me know that so-and-so is his uncle by marriage. Obviously it is my turn, and I'm stumped as to what to write back.

Heh. I love the idea of contacting Canadian Senators for anything more important than restaurant reservations, but what a response.

Puppies!!!

(Extra exclamation points courtesy of the three-Guiness, company-dime lunch I just returned from.)

I would really like a life-time appointment that allowed me to mouth off in public.

Obviously it is my turn, and I'm stumped as to what to write back.

"Wow, small world. Thanks again for agreeing to write the forward to my book."

Perkins, my cats don't pee in their carrier, so sad for you that yours do.

Makes new note in the "not so nice after all" file