Michele T.: If I ran the networks, there'd be room for both the abyss and the dancing on the edge of it.

Fay:

Thing 2 - they're doing something to wool in the foyer of my building. It's only a wee foyer, with my door on one side and my mate C's door on the other. I can't see any sign of the sheep, but there are 3 blokes doing some sort of esoteric sorting-out-of-shearings activity. They were very sweet about helping me carry my shopping into my apartment, and kept on apologising, and I tried to explain that they didn't need to apologise, because it's a very hot day and I can quite see why they'd rather do this in a shady foyer rather than out on the street, but I also tried to ask where the sheep were. Lacking the Arabic for 'sheep' there was much sheep impersonation of a physical and verbal nature, which was the cause of much merriment, and some assurance that, no, the sheep weren't hanging out watching my DVDs, nor were they all visiting the upstairs neighbour. Still not at all clear on where they actually are. Possibly hiding in my bedroom, or balancing very quietly out on the balcony. Huh.

Nobody COMMed JZ's brilliant suggestion?

And now I really want someone to write this story: Nilly and the Pirate.

As well as the follow up comments:

Susan W:

Can I make him a privateer? That's practically a pirate.

JZ:

[T]his clearly explains why Nilly's last few blind dates have not worked out. She keeps getting set up with mere workaday mortal men, who are unfit to appreciate her Nillitude. If somebody would just set her up with a nice Orthodox pirate, it would clearly be so completely wrong it'd be perfectly Right. She's worthy of nothing less.

Wolfram:

I know one Orthodox guy who owns a parrot. Would that work?

JZ:

If he can do a decent Dread Pirate Roberts impression, I think we've got something solid to work with.

Jesse in Natter:

Good thing about having a dumb cat -- people set off firecrackers in the neighborhood, the cat's like "OHMYGOD OHSHIT WHATWASTHAT?!?!!? ...oh hey -- check out my tail. Huh."

Dana in Natter:

They're potentially going to name a hurricane "Ophelia"? Oh, great idea. Why don't they just call it "Hurricane Crazy-Ass Bitch"?

JZ, in Natter:

Oh, for heaven's sake. Re the who and why of our various freedom-bringing efforts around the world, just print out this flash card and keep it in your wallet.

Who We Invaded/Blew Up/Might Do Eventually::How Come?

Afghanistan::As God is our witness, to capture Osama dead or alive

Iraq::9/11 WMD Frog-Marching freedom

Iran::Next door and thus convenient

North Korea::Nuclear program

France::Mean to us

Canada::Married gay people with health care

Spain::More married gay people, plus they all sleep a lot and then stay up too late, WTF is up with that?

Darfur::Yeah, yeah, massive human rights violations blah blah genocidecakes, look, we've got a lot on our plate right now, can you whiny whinybutts please keep it down to a dull roar?

Saudi Arabia::OMG NEVER, they are a shining beacon of glossy democracy and oil and our bestest friends ever

The San Francisco Bay Area::very, very angry aliens.

(Note: Edited with JZ's input.)

I don't know if you just copied and pasted Calli (I'm behind in a bunch of threads), but I strongly suspect that second Iraq listing (next door, and thus convenient) is supposed to be Iran.

That was totally my own stupid typo, Sean, and you are right.

I strongly suspect that second Iraq listing (next door, and thus convenient) is supposed to be Iran.

I think you may be right. But it's "Iraq" in the original post, and I'm kinda leery about changing things when I'm quoting someone else. Still funny, though.

JZ?

ETA: Never mind. Edited and all good now.

And still damn funny.

Jesse, who is so right.

This is still the internet, right? Isn't this the place to talk about cats?