Pun Salad

• We don't do Current Events much here at Pun Salad, because if (frankly) you need this blog to tell you that James Brown, Gerald Ford, and Saddam Hussein recently shuffled off the mortal coil, well, maybe you should widen your web browsing habits.

  However, we do try to provide pointers to where you can get something better than mere trivial knowledge of current events: the understanding of underlying trends, a sense of proportion, under-reported happenings, and—dare I say it?—yes, I guess I do—uncommon wisdom.

  In that spirit, I bring you: Dave Barry's Year in Review.

  … there are many things about 2006 that we will not want to remember. This was the year in which the members of the United States Congress, who do not bother to read the actual bills they pass, spent weeks poring over instant messages sent by a pervert. This was the year in which the vice president of the United States shot a lawyer, which turned out to be totally legal in Texas. This was the year in which there came to be essentially no difference between the treatment of maximum-security-prison inmates and the treatment of commercial-airline passengers.

  This was the year in which -- as clearly foretold in the Bible as a sign of the Apocalypse -- Howie Mandel got a hit TV show.

  See? You don't really need to keep on top of that current-events stuff, as long as you can wait until the end of the year to find out what Dave says.

• And in the "I'm From The Government, And I'm Here To Kill You" Department: Don't undergo kidney dialysis in New York. One of the nanniest of all nanny states nannies some of its residents to death. Gosh, how could that happen?

• And if you're in need of a New Year's Resolution, Joel Achenbach proposes a pretty good one: Be more like 007 in 2007.

See you next year, folks. Hope it's a happy one for you and yours.