Tina Fey Accepts "Nathaniel Hawthorne Prize for Judgmental Personality" at the "Tea Party Rifle Range and Bowling Alley"

Watch the full episode. See more Mark Twain Prize.

If You're Bored with Vodka + Jell-o

Mind you, there is nothing wrong with vodka--jell-o shots. But these look awesome.

Dave Barry's Blurred Groin

We don't think Dave Barry is as funny as some people seem to think he is, but he turned his humiliating pat-down by the TSA into good material, which is worth something. Thing is, last time we flew, we weren't looking for new material for the ol' NPR segment--we were just trying to exercise our right to travel freely. And our right to privacy.

ADDENDUM: TSA agents do not have the authority to remove prostheses from travelers' bodies, but may demand the traveler remove the prosthesis.

ADDENDUM #2: After TSA agent #1 pulled down a woman's blouse and exposed her to the entire airport, TSA agent #2 exclaimed, "Damn, you mean I missed that?! Thank God for the video tape!"

QotD: The Bullshit Detector

In 1914, John Alexander Smith, Oxford University Professor, began his two-year lecture series with this benediction: 

“Gentlemen, you are now about to embark on a course of studies that (will) form a noble adventure…Let me make this clear to you. ..nothing that you will learn in the course of your studies will be of the slightest possible use to you in after life – save only this – that if you work hard and intelligently, you should be able to detect when a man is talking rot, and that, in my view, is the main, if not the sole purpose of education.”

via.

How Cats Lap Water

Beautiful research inspired by the family cat, published in Science this week. via.

The FDA Grows a Pair

The FDA released 36 graphic warning labels for cigarettes, mostly gruesome, for public comment.

We agree that smoking should be discouraged, and we agree that pictures of autopsy specimens and cancer victims are more powerful than staid Surgeon General's Warnings.

"blog" of "unnecessary" quotation marks

Of course, "necessary" is in the eyes of the author, not the rules of English usage and grammar.