Pun Salad

Fred Thompson apparently is bypassing next Wednesday's debate here at UNH, choosing to announce his candidacy the day after.

That's kind of disappointing, since I will be there. In fact, I'll probably be one of the few people there who paid full freight for a ticket.

(Although Pun Salad can, in fact, be bought; no candidate has so far felt it was actually in their interest to do that.)

Some links to comments related to this revoltin' development:

• Kathryn Jean Lopez at the NR Corner;

• Doug at GraniteGrok;

• Jim Geraghty at NR's Campaign Spot;

• Duane Patterson, Radio Blogger;

• an ill-tempered Union Leader editorial;

• John Gizzi at Human Events (via Drew Cline);

• Jennifer Rubin at the AmSpecBlog reports on the irked response of Fergus Cullen, NH State GOP Chairman;

• Patrick Hynes at Ankle Biting Pundits bites Fred's ankles;

• and the always-provocative Prof Althouse detects sexual innuendo at the New York Times!

OK, so Fred has broken my heart. And, in addition, I can't imagine what an evening of political rhetoric will do to my brain. But I'll try to put myself back together quickly enough to blog about the event on Wednesday evening upon my return to Pun Salad Manor. (Assuming I'm not abducted by a cabal of Ron Paul fans.)

What can I say? Blades of Glory is Talledega Nights transplanted from the world of NASCAR to the world of figure skating. Given the premise, it's formulaic. I approached it with my best stone face, daring it to make me laugh.

And it did, all the way through. It helped a bit, I think, that I find figure skating to be bizarre, weird, and borderline creepy in the first place. The movie takes that concept and embraces it.

Jon Heder plays a very good straight man to Will Ferrell's usual inspired looniness. The supporting cast is also great: Jenna Fischer, Craig T. Nelson, Amy Poehler, Will Arnett, and William Fichter.

Might not work for you, worked for me.