So, let’s play a little game in this post for the holidays, if you’re willing. I’ll type a sentence, and you follow it with a sentence of your own. The sentences can be about anything, but each one must contain one word from the previous sentence. Just one word. Anyone can join in as often as he likes. The only other rule (aside from those of public decency) is that a participant may not follow himself.

Sound fun? Diverting? Something the Thinklings would do? All right then, I’ll begin.

“Have a holly, jolly Christmas” may be my second least preferred seasonal rerun, close on the heels of “Santa Baby.”

The 1507 Waldseemuller map will go on display in the Library of Congress this month, but historians don’t understand it fully. The map was designed only thirteen years after Columbus landed on this side of the ocean, and modern scholars don’t know how the mapmakers knew enough to draw the land and oceans as accurately as they did.

TINFOIL HAT: So, why don’t we know how they could have designed this map? Could it be that someone doesn’t want us to know? Martians, or perhaps more likely, Brazilians?!?

The FDA reports “that regular consumption of Oreo’s Double Stuf cookies could lead to an increased tolerance to stuf,” according to this Onion report. I’ll bet this reduces stress too. I need to head to the store.

The Springfield, Oregon, police have been overrun by gnomes among other things. “Somebody stole 75 lawn ornaments from around town and placed them meticulously on and around the lawn of one house on Oct. 17,” reports the AP. Now they are at the police station.

“We need to get them out of here,” Capt. Richard Harrison said.

Oh, yes, you do, Captain Harrison, but that won’t be the last of them. They will come again, and they will come here too. The gnomes are on the move!

Hey, hey! That’s a monkey–a Japanese macaque monkey in the snow, to be exact. More monkeys can be seen here.

The fortune cookie maker Wonton Food has released less-than-upbeat messages in their cookies in response to consumers who wanted “more fortunes with actual predictions rather than cryptic sayings,” reports the NY Times. The reporter asks, “Was one writer having a bad day? (‘Perhaps you’ve been focusing too much on yourself.’) Were the cookies giving voice to worries about the economy or terrorism? (‘There may be a crisis looming, be ready for it.’)”

Here are some message suggestions: “What are you looking for, advice from a cookie?” “Don’t eat here again.” “She’s not the one for you.” “Make sure you still have your wallet.” “Reconsider.” “Refinance.” “Ask for a refund.”

Any suggestions you have?

Whereas I once was on vacation, I have returned to the office. As you can see from my new webcam, I am hard at work.

I guess I’m required to say that I didn’t watch the Emmys. Why, I have no idea. Nobody watched the Emmys. I might as well say, “Last weekend, I didn’t play polo.”

Anyway, I’m informed that Sally Field expressed the hackneyed opinion (which was stupid back when I first heard it, in college) that there’d be no wars if women ran the world. Which prompted the following Deathless Quotation from me:

Stand by for a Deathless Quotation from Lars Walker.

If women ran the world, we’d have wars once a month.

This has been a Deathless Quotation from Lars Walker.

Full disclosure: the insight isn’t mine. I stole it from Katie McCollow at Yucky Salad With Bones (not the top post, but the next one down. Katie never posts two days in a row. I’m sure she did it this time just to mess up my link). I merely expressed it in a pithier fashion. Which is what I do, because I’m a trained professional.