Kitty acrobatics of all kinds. Funny.

But this is the best: Talking cats. I swear to God, they talk. You don’t want to be eating or drinking while watching this.

Y’know, I had to take an editing test tonight, and discovered that I have test anxiety. I never used to have test anxiety. Not in high school, not in college, not, as I recall, in grammar school. But I had it when I went to the Chubb Institute a few years back, and I had it when I took the GREs, and now, I have it when I have to take editing and copy editing tests for prospective employers. And may I say: Test anxiety sucks.

So now I look like an ass, because I simply couldn’t do it. I called up and was going to just give up, but the editor said close the file and take a look at it on Sunday and try again. What a nice person.

The tire portion of this post: Heidi noticed my right front tire was kind of low on the Fourth. Her husband has a compressor, so we filled the tire (and the other three, while we were at it). I noticed it looking poorly again yesterday and this morning, but forgot to check before I left work. It was low enough that a kind man in a white pickup truck beeped and pointed at it on the highway. I knew what he meant, pulled into Kroger’s, called the place I’d bought my tires, and found that yes, I still am covered by the service plan I bought, and yes, if I hurried, they’d take care of it tonight. Hurried to put air in the tire at the next gas station, then fought rush hour traffic to get to the tire place. It was a screw in the side of the tire. That’s the second time that’s happened to me since I’ve been here. The first time was the day before the 2003 Blogathon, and the story was duly blogged. Funny, a screw and Kroger’s were involved last time. I’d be very suspicious, except for the fact that I had the flat before I got to Kroger’s this time around.

The good news: I paid an extra $8 a tire for the service contract, which includes replacement up to a certain mileage. Well, I fell within the mileage. I paid a total of $14.94 for the tire, counting the fifty cents for air at the gas station and having to buy a new service contract for the replacement tire. I’d have to say my $32 was well-spent.

Time to go think of a subject for the podcast.

The Iranian president, known fondly in these pages as “Gorilla Boy” (go look at a picture to figure out why), has once again threatened Israel’s existence while also trying to deny that Israel exists.

TEHRAN - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned on Friday that continued Israeli strikes against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip could lead to an “explosion” in the Islamic world that would target Israel and its supporters in the West.

Again, Ahmadinejad questioned Israel’s right to exist. “This is a fake regime … it won’t be able to survive. I think the only way [forward] is that those who created it [the West] take it away themselves,” the president told a rally in Tehran in support of Palestinians.

Cognitive dissonance is obviously not a concept that Gorilla Boy can wrap his tiny brain around. Here’s the money quote:

“If an explosion occurs, then it won’t be limited to geographical boundaries. It will also burn all those who created [Israel] over the past 60 years,” he said, implicitly referring to the United States and other Western nations who support Israel.

I do believe that he has just threatened Israel, the United States, Europe, and, well, the entire West.

I’m shaking. How ’bout you?

To the visitors who arrived here due to “The Internet is a Series of Tubes” PowerPoint presentation:

I would like to sincerely apologize for shaking your worldview. I understand that it’s incredibly difficult to accept that someone with an opposing political viewpoint on certain issues might not only have a sense of humor, but might actually create something that you laugh at as well. I know that many of you like to believe that anyone who disagrees with you is an evil, vile, warmongering Rethuglican (sorry, I’m an independent, though I did vote for Bush in ‘04) neocon (sorry, nope, I’m center-left) Zionist (okay, there you have me) cro-magnon (I think you want these guys), um, I think I ran out of adjectives. Give me a minute. No, really.

Oh! Anti-feminist (can’t help you there, I’m a feminist who loves pissing off conservative and liberal anti-feminists) religious nut (I’ll give you the religious part, but nut the rest—ahhahaha, get it? “nut the rest”? Get it?”), um, I lost my way again. Oh. Humorless.

Well, that one’s not a fit. You got here by laughing at my PowerPoint presentation of Senator Ted Stevens explaining the internet. (Series of tubes, remember?)

Anyway, well, folks, um—I voted for Gore in 2000, and dutifully chanted the “stolen election!” mantra, right up until the NY Times released its count of the votes that said that Gore still lost. But I guess that was all blown to hell by my voting for Bush last time. And I’d vote for Lieberman if I lived in Connecticut. So once again, I deeply apologize for messing with your worldviews. Next time I write something funny, I’ll make sure it doesn’t get linked on any liberal-left sites.

The FBI stopped a terrorist plot to blow up the Holland Tunnel and, ah, flood Wall Street with the millions of gallons of water that would somehow make their way through the tunnel (without paying the toll, mind you) and bash their way out of the tunnel and up and down that Street of Walls.

Actually, this isn’t really funny. The death toll from the explosion would have been huge. An explosion in a confined space causes far more damage than an explosion in an open area. A car bomb or two in the middle of the tunnel would have been horrible, indeed.

However, no, the water would not have made its way uphill to flood Wall Street.

Sources said that New York City officials believed the plan could conceivably work with enough explosives placed in the middle of the tunnel, which runs underneath the river bed, a source said.

But others doubted the plot was feasible.

“You are talking major, major explosives and knowledge of blast effect to make this happen,” said another senior counterterrorism source.

Besides bedrock, the tunnel is protected by concrete and cast-iron steel.

Experts also said that even if the tunnel cracked, the Financial District would not be flooded because it is above the level of the river.

Yeah, that gravity thing sucks—I don’t think the terrorists have figured out how to get around it yet. But I sure hope they keep trying. That oughta keep ‘em busy—and not blowing stuff up—for years.

Note: the title of this post is from an old gag my father taught me. You walk up to someone and breathlessly announce, “Did you hear? The Holland [or Lincoln] Tunnel is underwater!” Nearly every single time, the victim will respond, “No! What happened?”

Yeah, it’s a dumb joke. But I kid you not about the success rate. At least, if you lived in the NY-Metro area and tried it. It worked even into my college years.

So did the old snake-in-a-can. Yes, I am full of an appreciation for low humor. Why do you ask?

Brigadier General Aviv Kochavi says the palestinians are “in shock” over the Gaza operation. Which begs the question: How is it that Israel couldn’t figure this out beforehand?

The ground operation is accompanied by massive aerial activity, which has so far claimed a heavy price on the Palestinian side. The Palestinian Authority reported that one Palestinian was killed every hour since IDF soldiers entered the Gaza Strip territory.

According to the IDF’s data, more than 30 terrorists were killed since the northern Strip operation was launched.

IDF Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Dan Halutz arrived at the Gaza Division on Friday morning and was briefed by soldiers and commanders. The Israeli side spoke about stubborn fighting and a lot of explosive devices and weapons in the Strip, the result of 10 months of Israeli absence.

[...] “We are determined to create a professional chaos, to jump from one place, to emerge, to use this method or another, to leave the territory and enter it again after a while,” Brigadier General Kochavi told Ynet.

“We will take advantage of all the advantages of this method, which is a ‘raid’ rather than an ‘occupation.’ Meaning, don’t to base ourselves or wallow in the Strip. All this is aimed at creating the understanding among terror organizations that firing Qassams is not worthwhile,” he explained.

[...] “There is a chance that the pressure caused by the operation will lead the terror organizations to an understanding that Israel does not plan to give up easily on this matter. Already now we have identified a great surprise among the Palestinians in terms of our response – they are in shock. They did not expect a series of such long operations over time.”

Beit Lahiya, one of the towns in northern Gaza, has emptied of civilians.

According to the Palestinians, the town of Beit Lahiya is almost desolated, apart from gunmen in its allies who are exchanging fire with IDF soldiers. The town is suffering from severe electricity blackouts, and there has been no electricity supply to most of its parts since the IDF began its northern Gaza Strip operation.

Good. The IDF doesn’t have to worry about harming civilians while taking out the trash.

Ehud Olmert says there will be no ceasefire without the release of Cpl. Shalit.

Forty terrorists have been killed so far in Operation Summer Rains. One Israeli soldier has been killed, possibly in a “friendly fire” incident. These are the kind of numbers that drive the Israel-haters crazy, but they are also the kind of numbers that get a point across to the terrorists.

And of course, the kassam rockets continue to fall on Sderot. Three people were hit by shrapnel from a rocket that fell in the city’s central market, which was filled, of course, because it’s the even of Shabbat.

Word of a deal that will supposedly stop kassam attacks is being tossed around. I’m not buying it. Terrorists are not trustworthy negotiating partners. Has Israel learned nothing in the last forty years?

Over the last couple of days, there’s been an outbreak of truly disgusting comment and trackback spam being caught and destroyed by SpamKarma. I thought I’d warn you that this particular spam is so filthy and disgusting, I’ve set the “purge” time for 1 minute so I don’t have to see what got trapped.

Which means that if your comment accidentally gets flagged as spam, it is going to be deleted before I can rescue it.

Apologies in advance to any of my regulars whose comment may get caught in the spam filters.

After posting the story about Zhirinovsky’s visit to Israel, I have forgotten about it quite quickly, assuming that we’ll see the next chapter of the saga in a year or two. However, the chief Russian anti-Semite with a Jewish father cum chief clown of the Duma exceeded all expectations. And here it comes:

Russian politician to sue Germany for family’s death, says the new headline.

Russian right-winger Vladimir Zhirinovsky has said he plans to sue Germany for killing his family during WWII.

The leader of Russia’s ultra nationalist Liberal Democratic party and a deputy speaker of Duma, the lower chamber of parliament, also said he would sue Israeli doctors for failing to save his father, Volf Eidelstein, after being critically wounded in a car accident on 1983 in Tel Aviv, where he was later buried.

So, as you see, the thrill of waiting for the next turn of events subsided somewhat. Still, after reading the above quoted news item, I got a feeling that I have missed something in the longish article linked in the previous post. After a search I stumbled on it:

Reverently, Zhirinovsky opens a transparent plastic folder. In it is an official Interior Ministry death certificate, bearing the symbol of the State of Israel. He then removes from the folder photographs of his mother, his father and of himself, a two-month-old infant, in his mother’s arms. Again he breaks into tears.

Eureka! Now the reason for the tears described above is clear: these are simply tears of happiness of a man translating the lump amount of German Euros and Israeli shekels into vodka bottles.

It is certainly reassuring to know that with this character there is no need in changing the initial diagnosis: dreck.

And thanks to Jonathan Safran Foer for the borrowed title. Great book, by the way.

Cross-posted on SimplyJews