With the Saints' win in the Super Bowl yesterday, as well as the election of a new guy to replace the utterly incompetent Ray Nagin, I've been wondering: can we please stop feeling sorry for New Orleans now?

Instapundit:

Justice Department is looking for a few good retarded lawyers. No, really.

Sorry. I'm too busy laughing to take this any further.

To: Cats
From: Management

1) I understand that from time to time, you will be eager to eat everything within reach, and many things that are not. This is fine; eat what you want, as long as it's clearly designated as cat food.

2) I also understand that from time to time, you may overdo it and subsequently feel compelled to barf. Though I am not pleased with this behavior, I understand it, and accept it as part of the price of cat ownership.

3) Really? The middle of the living room floor? Seriously?

4) If in future you feel compelled to repeat this behavior, please confine such activity to areas of the house with solid surface floors.

Thank you for your attention in this matter.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
^{(Directed by Tim Burton. Starring Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman, Sasha Baron Cohen, etc.)}

Quick review: I knew it was going to be "dark," but... ho... ly... crap.

3½ stars

Depp, as always, impresses.

This is the sort of movie that, in a cultural literacy sense, everyone probably ought to be familiar with, to some degree, but I don't think I'm going to be watching it again. Ever. I'm not one for a lot of blood and gore on screen.

Ace notices the Associated Press' explanation for a Hope/Change™ failure, and calls it like it is:

Obama's like Reverse Jesus. You will, collectively, assume his sins so that he is cleansed and untainted.

Or, to loosely paraphrase the line from Animal House: "It's your fault. You believed him."

When I woke up today and came out to the office and sat at my desk, I noticed this page was loaded in my browser.

I'm reasonably sure I didn't leave it that way. I think maybe the furballs are trying to send a message.

During the hiatus I took from shipbuilding, the question often occurred to me: how do I protect my project from a cat with a test-to-destruction sense of inquisitiveness?

Yes, I refer to Kismet, who gleefully gets into everything.

The last thing I wanted to do was invest a lot of hours in fiddly small details on a ship model, only to have it pushed off the work table and eaten (or at least chewed upon) by the cat, who would then suffer my inevitable short term wrath.

Really, even in the event of total destruction, I wouldn't be able to stay angry for very long. He's a nice little cat.

So the work in progress has to be protected during the hours I'm not working on it. How best to accomplish this? I can't pick everything up and store it away every time I have to wait for glue to cure or paint to dry or whatnot. For starters, I haven't got a good place to stow the project (which takes up more space than the finished product will) and of course picking up and carrying anything is an iffy proposition for me.

Then, one day while I was cruising the aisles of the Super Target looking for lonely divorcées bargains, I saw what might be the answer to my dilemma.

Et voilà:

The giant Rubbermaid bin, on its own, would not be likely to stop Kismet. He does, after all, have a habit of pushing things off tables in order to examine them at ground level. Hence the clamp arrangement seen at the bottom of the photo.

So far, it has served admirably well. Nevertheless, I am continuing my efforts to train Kismet not to get on the table at all. He keeps trying.

The next ship model I have in mind to work on is somewhat larger. I'm not sure what I'll do about the problem then. I guess I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

Six years ago, Mycah (and her companion, Xaxu) moved in. At first it was meant to be temporary, a babysitting gig, but over time it became permanent.

Just like my attachment to her.

The first picture I took of Mycah, the night she arrived:

Yeah... I am a cat guy.

Jon Stewart accidentally commits acts of journalism; the Left howls; Stewart apologizes.

Michelle Malkin has the video and details.

What struck me in Stewart's "clown nose: off" interview of so-called "torture memo" author John Yoo was his apparent inability to understand that there is a broad range of possible legitimate interrogation methods that fall between Miranda on one end of the spectrum and Mengele on the other.

(And for the record, I have no problem with waterboarding as an interrogation method.)

Update: I don't know how I missed it*, but there were more videos comprising the entirety of the interview; all three can be seen at Newsbusters. Yoo really does well as an interviewee.

*Yes, I do. I had an errand to run, so I rushed.

Bob Owens:

Other people do not exist to give your miserable existence meaning or to give you edification. You and you alone are responsible for your actions, your thoughts, and how you deal with the circumstances of your life.

From a post aptly titled "Avatards," at Confederate Yankee.