Someone at the L.A. Times either has a wonderful or nonexistent sense of the absurd.  I can’t tell which.

With the tiny secret radio transmitters in them? The ones that completely freaked out a bunch of US Army contractors earlier this year?

Um… mystery solved.

That thingy should be instantly recognizable as a replica red poppy flower. In Canada, as in much of the Commonwealth, paper poppies are worn on their version of Veteran’s Day, a practice begun after WWI, when countless men died in the poppy-strewn fields of Europe.

There are almost 30 million of these coins in circulation in Canada. How anyone could think this was some sort of secret device is beyond me. Usually people don’t hide things by making them bright red and sticking them right in the middle of stuff.

But the US Army contractors leapt to the conclusion that they were under numismatic surveillance.

Fifty percent of all American high school students apparently think Sodom and Gomorrah were married.

I’m not much for royalty. But I wouldn’t do this to an old lady, even if I couldn’t stand her.

If Bush ever uses the word QILF, I’m outta here.

OK, this week’s entry is also not a pudu, but it certainly shows a pudu-like level of curiosity.

Those of you who’ve already read Prisoner of Trebekistan, or who’ve seen the videos of me reading a particular excerpt, are familiar with my run-in and freak-out with South African baboons.

Imagine my sheer joy in Barbados, then, to return from a walk in the wildlife reserve and find this rear-view-mounted green monkey:

Fortunately, the windows were rolled up this time.