Well, well ,well.

You know, I was going to tell a little story about my friend Sam, who's in a big fight with this guy Bob, and then Bob's alleged "friend" Rob announced that he really doesn't want Sam's friend Pedro to go jump off a cliff. So shouldn't Pedro jump off the cliff? If Pedro doesn't jump off that cliff, isn't that a victory for Bob and Rob? (Actually I think it all started when Sam, Pedro and Nigel broke into Bob's house. But Bob was a evil bastard anyway, and just to complicating things more, so is Rob...)

I don't blame you for not following. You see, I was going to tell that story, but I'm not, because I just saw this.

Apparently the Al Qaeda-linked group claiming to have carried out the Madrid attacks say they definitely don't want John Kerry to win in November. Indeed, they've endorsed Bush. They say Bush's "idiocy and religious fanaticism" would "wake up" the Islamic world, which is exactly what they want. The money quote: "We are not going to find a bigger idiot than you."

There you have it: A vote for Bush is a vote for Al Qaeda. Case closed. (Yes, welcome to the Andrew Sullivan school of logic.)

Of course, it's a bit too good to be true. In fact, this group probably had nothing to do with the bombing. Remember, they also claimed responsibility for the U.S. power blackout.

But still, it's a bit odd that all those people decrying the Spaniards for their alleged "truce" with Al Qaeda (announced by the same group, in the same email, I think) haven't picked up on this one. (Yes, I mean you, NicMoc!)

P.S. No wait. It must be a trick. They're saying we should vote for Bush deliberately to make us not re-elect Bush.... Nuh-huh. Anybody who saw The Princess Bride knows this is the oldest trick in the book. They're deliberately trying to make us think that they secretly want us to re-elect Bush, so that we'll re-elect Bush in an attempt foil their plan, when in fact they really want us not to re-elect Bush after all....

Say, where's the nearest cliff, anyway?

CNN reporting that Pakistani forces are involved in a fight-to-the-death stand-off with Al Qaeda forces in the frontier provinces -- forces protecting a "high value Al Qaeda target." Meaning? "You could guess and so could we," says the anchor, the Aussie guy.

"Now that it's upon us, the war sounds like a really really dumb idea. " That's what I wrote one year ago tomorrow, in my first blog post.

As if you care what I think or thought about the war... But this is my blog's birthday, so screw you. Yes, in hindsight, I wish I'd been proven completely wrong about that one. I even somehow suspected that I'd be proven wrong, or at least more wrong -- which is a strange thing to think, because if you think you're wrong about something, you generally change your opinion. Unless of course something just doesn't sit right and you can't explain why, sort of like this whole "let's-invade-Iraq-and-walk-on-rose-petals-tossed-by-the-teeming-masses" thingie. Yeah, even a year ago, in all-out skeptic mode, I had much higher expectations. Go ahead, call me a sucker.

New Year's Resolution: No more inside baseball, unless wrapped in elaborate metaphors involving fictitious guys named Sam, Bob and Rob.

I'm getting a little bit tired of hearing about Spain's "capitulation" in the War on Terror. Spain was against the Iraq invasion from the beginning. The only thing that's changed is that the government now reflects the popular position.

Visegrad four mull retaliation over EU members' imposition of work barriers

Quote of the day: "'We are the ones who should be worried, because we are facing a threat that our best of the best will leave,' Slovak President Rudolf Schuster said in reaction to the wave of announcements of employment restrictions by the EU member states."

Hello, I'm going to Berlin tonight to finally pick up my visa. I'll be back tomorrow. In the meantime, take some time to read the Testimony of Past Worshipful Master Duane Washum.

(Yes, I was inspired by the guy from Long Island killed in a Masonic initiation ritual.)

When I'm back, a bit about the patented "free-standing lasagna" discovered by Geoff Goodfellow and the strange layered pasta-and-chicken dish making its way around Prague restaurants...