As the Hollywood writers’ strike drags on into the New Year, it seems to be getting harder to choose a side and stick with it. I’ve been behind the writers all along, asserting that the immediate impact of a settlement is less important than setting the precedent for compensation when, a few years down the road, all television is delivered to your set from the Internet. But as my favorite scripted shows run out of banked episodes, ready to be replaced by reruns, untested new series and a handful of episodes of LOST, my resolve to support the union wanes, and I wish they’d figure out a short-term deal that would leave open the possibility of future negotiations. But as late-night talk shows return tonight, some without writers, I can’t help but support those who are bold enough to stay on the picket line.

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It took six days before the local media owned up to their completely unnecessary sensationalizing of the ‘07 Bonnie and Clyde story, but when the Inquirer did so, courtesy of an editorial from columnist Monica Yant Kinney, they hit the nail on the head:

“This story would be nothing without the photos,” a local TV reporter mentions as we wait, pathetically, in the lobby of the Criminal Justice Center for a glimpse of the parents who created celebrity train-wreck Jocelyn Kirsch.

Indeed, for a week now, Kirsch’s surgically-enhanced mug has enjoyed an almost uninterrupted stay on philly.com’s home page, thanks in no small part to a library of alternately salacious and stupid pictures of her that the media has uncovered. And the deluge of self-congratulatory schadenfreude from the local papers is exhausting.

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Avast, mateys! Today be International Talk Like a Pirate Day. Celebrate by walking around with one eye closed and a parrot on ye shoulder. Also refuse to take in any vitamin C and you might soon get the adjective “scurvy” attached to your name.

Incidentally, is anyone sailing these seas? I know I’ve been inactive lately, but if I actually get into the theater and see a few movies, is there anyone left to read?

Every year, the political correction of the holiday season becomes more evident. Soon enough, the Salvation Army Santas will be reduced to men in business suits asking for “holiday donations” - after all, jolly ol’ Saint Nick is a Christian tradition. But it isn’t the purpose of the season to simply avoid insult - or perhaps to avoid lawsuits at the hand of extremists - it’s to bring good will to men (…and women). So, while I spend the day celebrating Christ’s birth, I also wish you the merriest fulfillments of your end-of-the-year festivities. Whatever it is you celebrate, be it Chanukah, Kwanzaa, Festivus, or even Decemberween, may you revel in it to the fullest. Thank you for all the time you’ve spent this year reading my inane babbling and adding some intelligence to my discourse. Here’s hoping for more in the new year.

A rather depressing bit of news this morning…Bill Amend, creator of the comic strip “FoxTrot,” recently announced that his strip would cease its daily publication schedule and run new strips only on Sundays. In an age where some of the world’s worst comic strips manage to stick around, it’s a shame that a strip like “FoxTrot” can’t keep up with the pressure of filling the void. Amend noted that “classic” “FoxTrot” selections would be run on his website each day.

Some recommended reading to help you get your daily dose of new comics includes “Pearls Before Swine” and “Get Fuzzy.” And while you’re reading your archived “FoxTrot” online, check out the syndicated “Peanuts” strips or dig through the final thirty days of “Calvin and Hobbes.”

Things to do today, on International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

• Watch Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. Alternately, for equally fun swashbuckling action, watch The Princess Bride.
• Listen to “The Mariner’s Revenge Song” by The Decemberists. Do not listen to “Come Sail Away” by Styx.
• Tell bad pirate jokes. Example: Why couldn’t the young pirate get into the movie theater? Because all the movies were rated ARRRR.
• Play “The Secret of Monkey Island,” or help me make the movie.
• Watch Hook. Do not confuse it with Dustin Hoffman’s other cross-dressing movie, Tootsie.
• Talk like a pirate, of course. Matey.

Other suggestions (like watching Peter Pan or Finding Neverland) are welcome via comments.

A moment of silence in remembrance of what happened five years ago right at the moment this is posted. I remember walking into my Physics class and the projector was on, and I had no idea what was being shown on the screen. Naturally, nobody could imagine how much it would change our world. The Internets will be full of rhetoric today about heroism, war, tragedy, and so on. I’m opting to take the blogging day off. I recommend you look around my blogroll and see what some of the finer sites around have to say, if they choose to write something.

After 44 years of fearless showmanship, Steve Irwin, the quirky Australian zookeeper known to the world as the Crocodile Hunter, met his untimely fate today while filming on location. Though he was best known for wrestling with crocs, it wasn’t the monstrous reptiles that did him in but a rather harmless sting ray whose stinger pierced his heart.

It always seemed more en vogue to imitate Irwin’s over-the-top Australian accent than his dogged determination to preserve wildlife. But beneath the cries of “Oy” were true attempts to protect nature, and that’s something that he should be remembered for. Instead of seeing ten more goofy, khaki-clad Animal Planet hosts take his place, let’s hope that we see some kind of fund for conservationism formed in his name.

Crikey.

The entire basis for my elementary education was shaken today, when a bunch of men in white coats decided that Pluto is no longer a planet. Now, children everywhere will have to remember the planets by the mnemonic device “My Very Earnest Mother Just Served Us Nine Pickles, but then took the pickles away 76 years later.” Largely because it has a funky orbit that intersects with Neptune (clearly the one interesting thing about what otherwise is a big rock), Pluto now is classified as a “dwarf planet,” as are Cerers (an asteroid, which I thought was classified as “asteroid”), and Xena the Warrior Planet. I’m sure Happy, Dopey, Sleepy, Sneezy, Grumpy, Bashful, and Doc are happy to have them along.

The biggest problem with this decision? Fifty years from now, when these scientists’ children discover that Pluto once sustained life, we can’t say that there’s life on other planets, just that there was once a thriving society on some ice ball.