LMNOP

"Nearly 20,000 camels from the UAE and other Gulf Arab countries have converged on Abu Dhabi’s western region for one of the world’s biggest camel beauty contests involving prizes worth nearly $9.5 million."

(source)

Wait--one of???? Oh, yes. Later in the article: "Camel beauty contests and races are among the most popular events in the Arabian Peninsula, along with falconing and other desert activities."

BRB, researching camel beauty pageants (and "other desert activities").

Here are pictures from Pancake's first three Christmases.

2007

2008

2009

2010 shall be taken today! 

It's time for another installment of Let's Read an Article Together. Today's article comes from Newslite, a British site whose tagline is "it barely qualifies as news." I beg to disagree, because this is one of the most important stories I have read in 2010.

The article begins below. As with the first installment of this feature, my comments are in blue italics.

Abandoned orang-utan goes on first-class cruise

An abandoned baby orang-utan has made his way to new home -- by travelling as a first class passenger on cruise ferry. 

WTF. Is this how British people spell 'orangutan?' And what is a 'cruise ferry?' Does that just mean cruise sh---OMG, A PICTURE OF A BABY ORANGUTAN HOLDING A BOTTLE SITTING ON A BOAT, OMG OMG OMG

No, British website photo captioner, I have not. Also, "Credit: Monkey World" is the only photo credit I hope to ever see ever again in any story about anything.

11-month-old Silvestre was rejected by his mother at Santillana Zoo in Spain and as a result was being taken to Monkey World sanctuary in Dorset.

Silvestre's mother is awful and I hope she has terrible karma and never gets to go anywhere cool like Monkey World, or have any Disney movies made about her life, unless she is the villain and Silvestre is the star and I could go see it in a theatRE, which is how I am spelling it in case Sylvestre is reading.

But because he had to be kept close to his keeper, special permission was given from the British authorities for him to travel on board a ferry.

Glad the British authorities are keeping busy these days.

As a result, Silvestre had his own four-bed cabin for the journeyand spent most of the time swinging from the ladders and bunks.

Sorry, Emily, but this is what we should have done on our cruise.

With that sort of behaviour he should fit in perfectly on a EasyCruise holiday.

There will never be another picture as good as this picture.

A spokesperson for Monkey World (please let that be my job title some day, please let that be my job title someday) said: "Now at Monkey World, Silvestre is meeting his new adopted family. His new family are all Bornean orang-utans (Pongo pygmaeus), a different species to him, but their behaviour is very similar. 

I'm sure Sylvestre noticed.

"Silvestre will grow up with his adopted family at Monkey World learning all the skills and behaviour that he will need to mature into a well adjusted adult male Sumatran orang-utan."

This paragraph is what TV pilots are made of.

Andrea González of Santillana Zoo added, “Santillana Zoo Foundation is involved in the conservation of Sumatran orang-utans and our first goal is the welfare of all our animals, especially Silvestre. He spent his firsts 11 months of life being cared for by our staff and seeing his two sisters, Victoria and Juliana, from time to time. From now on he will live with his new family at Monkey World, which will help him to develop a natural behaviour and a social life as an orang-utan.”

What? We are just ending this there? Does he ever get to see Victoria and Juliana again? On holidays, maybe? Can we rescue them from that awful mother and send them on cruises and make sure everyone has a happy end and--OMG, PICTURE OF A BABY ORANGUTAN IN A DIAPER, WHAT WAS I SAYING? NEVER MIND, IT DOESN'T MATTER.

A spot of imagined importance has been discovered!

Know this: Pancake loves snow. The Official Pancake Snow Fun Protocol is as follows:

1. RUN AROUND IN CIRCLES FOR A LONG TIME
2. STOP ABRUPTLY TO STICK NOSE IN GROUND AND INVESTIGATE A SPOT OF IMAGINED IMPORTANCE
3. SHAKE SNOW OFF FACE
4. REPEAT 1-3 UNTIL CALLED IN

(Didn't you know? Dogs think exclusively in CAPS LOCK.)

The great thing about all of this is that it results in a particularly exhausted Pancake, which is exactly the kind of Pancake that will sit in my lap for hours while I watch TV and listen to me as I say things like, "I do believe this is the most epic dinner party o'drama in all of Real Housewives history!" And that means I'm technically not talking to myself, so . . . win-win.

The Big Picture's Year in Pictures feature is pretty awesome. Here are parts one, two, and three. (thx, Em)

This cool Christmas tree is made out of books, which also means it's made out of . . . other trees.

xkcd is always funny, but this one made me laugh extra hard.

40 Photos of Dogs Freaking Out in the Snow. Be sure to check Pancake Breakfast tomorrow for one more dog in the snow!

Chinese archaeologists uncover 2,400-year-old soup. Sounds delish!

Is "chalant" the opposite of "nonchalant?"

Oh--here's a bison riding in a car. NBD.

Britain's ugliest dog is the ugliest ugly dog I have seen in a while.

Lastly, I do not think I can overstate the cuteness of this video of a ladybug playing with sprinkles:

Guys, Home Alone is 20 years old. Let's celebrate the only way we know how: with a list of completely random shit. (This is clearly my preferred format for celebrating fine movies; recall this post about King Ralph.)

1. Here is Roger Ebert's review of the movie from November 16, 1990. It's kind of funny, because he mostly calls it implausible and chides John Hughes' screenplay for being unrealistic. For example, he says: "If Home Alone had limited itself to the things that might possibly happen to a forgotten 8-year-old, I think I would have liked it more." What? How could that have possibly made for a good movie? A real kid would have cried for like 25 minutes and then called the police or a trusted friend. Kid Cries and Gets Help Alone would have been the actual worst movie ever.

2. This list of 12 Things You Probably Didn't Know About Home Alone is great. Key facts about everything from Buzz's girlfriend to the evil furnace can be found.

3. I keep forgetting about my lifetime goal of ordering a bunch of yellow satin jackets and going to a Halloween/costume party with a group of people dressed as John Candy's polka band.* Can I trust all of you to help me remember this?

Wanted: this jacket

4. I didn't find out until too late about this Twitter reenactment of Home Alone, which happened yesterday. However, it is still worth your while to go back through it and see awesome tweets like this:

*In case you're trying to remember the name of the band right now, it's the Kenosha Kickers.

This is a video of a woman dancing to "You're the One That I Want" (from Grease) with her dog:

(http://youtu.be/HgTgO1Zojyg)

There are many possible reactions to this video, but there is only one that means you officially waste way too much time online. If you, like me, watched this video and said, "Wow, this video is way worse than that other video of a woman dancing to 'You're the One That I Want' with her dog," then congratulations: you win. (Slash lose.)

Here, for reference, is the other video, which is from a few years ago:

(http://youtu.be/akYEagV4UfE)

I think this means I have made it all the way around the internet and am back at the beginning.

Sorry, but I really wanted that title to be alliterative. On to the links:

This is hilarious and delightful and comes in as my #1 recommendation for YouTube viewing this week. ALAN! AL! (thx, Michelle!)

Have I mentioned that I love Community? I do. This season has been FANTASTIC. Here are a bunch of Community GIFs.

Some guy has decided to watch Julie & Julia every day for a year and write a blog about it. Good luck with that.

"wow pretty sad arrested development is over . . ."

This article has my favorite news photo of the week.

Reeeeally hard to pick a favorite daytime talk show screengrab here.

Puppies using laptops incorrectly. Man, they have no idea how computers work.

Dude, so glad someone has called this Folger's commercial out for being creepy.

Want: bowl made from melted toy soldiers.

The Lego Advent calendar contains a naked Santa taking a shower, because why not?

Flamingos in the shape of a flamingo. We have to go flamingo-er!

This is definitely the best Bill Murray GIF you will see today.

Little dude is super excited for Christmas, and it's contagious. My sibs, the neph, and I all have dinner at my parents' house every Sunday night, and the past two visits have been full of decorating, reading Christmas books, talking about Santa, and even singing a few songs. (My rendition of "Jingle Bells" features rougher vocals than a pre-autotune Kim Zolciak, but nepherino doesn't seem to mind.)

Caedan's also going to be a sheep in his Christmas play, which is bad news for anyone who hates cuteness. Really, really, really bad news.