Pun Salad

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• For anyone who scoffs at claims that environmentalism is a religion:

  Visitors to the Gaia Napa Valley Hotel and Spa won't find the Gideon Bible in the nightstand drawer. Instead, on the bureau will be a copy of ``An Inconvenient Truth,'' former Vice President Al Gore's book about global warming.

  Via Drudge; there are more substantive comments at the CEI OpenMarket blog.

• You can put all sorts of vile smut on the web and nobody will say boo, but if you post a certain 128-bit integer, you can find yourself in a heap-o-trouble, boy; it's an encryption key that allows "the decryption of video content on most existing HD-DVD and Blu-ray discs."

  Now, just like the author of the link above, I don't need that kind of hassle. But (as a number of people have pointed out), asking the Google about "09 F9" will show you an impressive list of links to pages composed by braver souls. Never was a cat so completely out of a bag. There's also an interesting followup note about the maelstrom at Digg. (Via the Technology Liberation Front.)

• Last night's Final Jeopardy answer, "Fictional Characters" category:

  He's the character mentioned in the first line of "Atlas Shrugged"

  Only Hayley Clatterbuck from the University of Nebraska knew this. Her competitors from fancy-shmancy Stanford and Yale drew blanks. What are they teaching Ivy League kids these days? I mean, the first line was even already in the form of a question!

• Speaking of Jeopardy, Ken Jennings has a very good essay titled "Mormon guy to Internet: shut up and think a minute." Good advice; the essay was inspired by his inclusion on a "Famous Mormon"-themed NYT crossword puzzle.

• Never Forget: the truth behind 4-29. (Via Instapundit.)

• And, finally, in the Hitting Uncomfortably Close to Home Department: "If Someone Wanted To Publish My Blog Entries For Money, I Wouldn't Say No." Although that guy looks nothing like me.