Today is Paczki (poonch-key) Day!

A Paczki is like a jelly doughnut, but a bit different. It’s a piece of fried dough that has been sliced and filled will various fruit fillings (prune is a popular one) and dusted with powdered sugar.

They were originally made to use up the sugar, lard and fruit in the house before Lent.

I just like them. I’m buying my King Cake today too.

Paczki	King Cake

The American Princess has her own Paczki picture and a slightly different pronunciation.

Found via Leslie’s Omnibus:

Bill would allow only ‘fire-safe’ cigarettes

February 27, 2006

BY TRACY SWARTZ Sun-Times Springfield Bureau

SPRINGFIELD — As if being a smoker in Chicago wasn’t enough of a drag. Now some state lawmakers are pushing to restrict cigarette sales to brands that meet fire safety standards.

Only self-extinguishing cigarettes would be sold in Illinois under a plan intended to reduce the number of fire-related deaths. If such a bill passes, Illinois would join three other states in forcing tobacco companies to make cigarettes the companies say aren’t really “fire safe.”

read the rest…

Then we’ll need fire safe candles too, and gas that doesn’t ignite, how about water you can’t drown in? And knives that don’t cut!

Much as some people would lilke it to be so, it isn’t government’s job to save us from ourselves.

And what about all the potential lawsuits! “I bought fire-safe cigarettes and my house still burned down! Now I have no place to live! I must sue the tobacco companies for millions and millions of dollars so I can get a really, really big house!”

We were down for some time this morning but we are back up now. I’m not sure what the problem was but it has been fixed.

We have a back up site at musingminds.wordpress.com if you can’t find us here, we’ll be there…

Via GOP Bloggers.

Our governor, Rod Blagojevich (D-IL), was on the Daily Show a couple of weeks ago and didn’t know that it was a comedy show. AP reported on the story and CNN picked it up. The stories are identical except for one word. Democratic.

The first paragraph of the AP story:

ST. LOUIS (AP) – Gov. Rod Blagojevich wasn’t in on the joke. Blagojevich says he didn’t realize “The Daily Show” was a comedy spoof of the news when he sat down for an interview that ended up poking fun at the sometimes-puzzled Democratic governor.

The first paragraph of the CNN story:

Blagojevich says he didn’t realize “The Daily Show” was a comedy spoof of the news when he sat down for an interview that ended up poking fun at the sometimes-puzzled governor.

Now CNN may have just assumed that “everyone knows” that Rod Blagojevich is a Democrat, but they did deliberately remove the word from the story. There is the “labels apply to conservatives, not liberals rule” to consider as well. You know, liberal expert A is just listed as “Expert A from Organization X”, but the conservative expert is listed as “Expert B from Conservative Think-Tank Y.”

I think Matt’s right, media bias all the way…

I’ve been tagged by The Lady Jane over at A Lady’s Ruminations

List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now. Post these instructions in your blog along with your seven songs. Then tag seven other people to see what they’re listening to. Just link here and trackback when you make your list, and tell the folks you tag to do the same so you can enjoy their posts.

These are the songs I’ve been listening to lately:

Victor Vito and Freddy Vasco by Laurie Berkner (This is on Noggin a lot and we have the CD) “They ate their rice, they ate their beans, they ate their rutabega and they ate their collard greens!”

You Raise Me Up – Josh Groban

To Where You Are – Josh Groban

Angels Blush – Basia

Time and Tide – Basia

We Will Rock You – Queen (Mommy, play the We will Rock Song again!)

We Are The Champions – Queen (follows We Will Rock You on the CD)

Another One Bites The Dust – Queen (play the Dust song!)

I’m not going to tag anyone with this, feel free to Follow That Meme! if you want to…

bonus song my 5-year-old sings:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Once I caught a fish alive.
6, 7, 8, 9, 10
Then I threw him back again.
Why did you let him go?
Because he bit my finger so.
Which finger did he bite?
This little finger on the right.

This is Bitsy. She’s almost 9 years old and weighs only 6 pounds. She is a perfect miniature cat. (comparable to a six-month-old kitten)

I just love her crossed paws with the tail wrapped around them…

Cavuto: In addition to violent protests, Arabs in the middle east have been boycotting anything Danish and now, word is, that those boycotts are starting to work. It’s costing Danish companies millions. That’s why Michelle Malkin says it is high time for us to buy Danish, and not just the pastries I gobble up every morning. What do you mean Michelle?

Malkin: Well I think that Denmark has been unfairly targeted here. They are a convenient scapegoat for Islamists who are waging a larger war on the west. And right now this small little country is bearing the brunt of the anger, irrational anger, of a lot of people througout the middle east.

Cavuto: All right, let’s spell, let’s spell it out. We know it’s cost them upwards of 30 million U.S. dollars. You’re saying if you want to buy Danish you should do it now and there are some examples of that. Let’s go through some of them.

{graphic listing Havarti cheese, LEGO toys and Skagen Watches}

Malkin: Sure. There are at least a dozen websites now that have been set up for people to buy Danish. And we’re talking about everything from Danish food shops, to the LEGO company, to a lot of liquor and beer manufacturers, Carlsburg for example. There were a lot of people on Superbowl Sunday who traded in their Velveeta Cheese for Havarti Cheese. And even though it seems like a minor and inconsequential thing, I’ve heard from a lot of Danes who are very appreciative of these kinds of efforts. Let’s talk about the bottom line. You’ve got large retailers like Arla Foods who are suffering and feeling real pain. They temporarily laid off some 125 workers. And this is largely affecting more the consumer goods retailers than it is capital goods exports. I think that Denmark will ultimately be able to weather it, but as I say, there are a lot of individual companies that are feeling pain. You even have a pharmaceutical company Novo-Nordis which had a huge contract with Turkey cancelled over these cartoons, which means a lot of people in Turkey are not going to be getting insulin – over pictures.

Cavuto: But are we overstating it? $30 million sounds like a lot in terms here, but to many I’ve talked to Michelle, it’s really just, you know, “chump change.” And that we are making a bigger deal of this by vowing to buy Danish products, when in fact, the hit on the Danish economy is minimal.

Malkin: Well, look, I mean there are two aspects of the Support Denmark campaign. One is to try and help the bottom line of these companies, and sure, Neil, you’re right that in the larger scheme of things, Denmark will be able to weather it. But there is also a moral component here, a show of solidarity for a country that’s been singled out over ridiculous purposes and which, as I say, this whole thing was orchestrated from the beginning and the cartoons that the Jyllands-Posten published are a pretext for some larger issues going on here.

Cavuto: Michelle, thank you very much. Always good seeing you.

Michelle has tons of links at her blog to GO BUY DANISH!

You don’t have a right to exist and we won’t abide by Oslo but…

don’t stop sending us money…

See GOP Bloggers.

Just One Minute provides a link… here.

Let me say at the outset that I was wrong to lose my temper at Scott McClellan. I’ve worked well with Scott since we first met during the 2000 campaign. Monday, he suggested my aggressive questioning about the disclosure of the hunting accident was a stunt for the cameras. He said this during a morning OFF CAMERA briefing, which undercut his point. Furthermore, I considered it a cheap shot. I said, “Don’t be a jerk to me personally, just answer the question.” I regret saying that because it’s never appropriate to speak that way and because it created a distraction from the issues at hand.

Read the rest.

Mark Steyn cheers up: Cheering Tidbits Lighten Otherwise Grim Week (via Blogs for Bush)

John Leo on The Attack of the Memes (via Betsy’s Page)

Terry McAuliffe gets tag-teamed.

Former Senator Alan Simpson “But let me tell you, you’ll never find it if you just follow the Washington media. You’ll never know the good. All you get is controversy, crap and confusion.” (Via Michelle Malkin)

Powerline document’s the DFL’s “it’s un-American to support the Government’s policies in Iraq” in The Compleat Democrats’ Disgrace.

Stop the ACLU discussed Bin Laden’s “You’ll Never Take Me Alive“.

Jeanette at Oh How I Love Jesus remembers celebrating Lincoln’s Birthday and Washington’s birthday from six-year-old’s point of view…