thursday hangovers (Updated)

A few things:

• How the Japanese dump trash in the NYT. (Via Mr. Barzak.)

• BookLust with another fabulous post, this time about the nature of humor. She quotes another of my favorites, Literaisons, quoting Dave Barry:

"A sense of humor is a measurement of the extent to which we realize that we are trapped in a world almost totally devoid of reason. Laughter is how we express the anxiety we feel at this knowledge."

• Jonathan Strahan takes a sick day with Justine Larbalestier's amazing Magic or Madness. (You've read this already, right?)

• I really, really, really, really want to read Martha O'Connor's The Bitch Posse. See her boyfriend list on E. Lockhart's blog and what Sarah Weinman has to say about TBP.

• Storytelling has an excellent story I hadn't heard about the Louisville Public Library. (I couldn't find the story, so I'm stealing her excerpt.)

The Louisville Free Public Library is tied up in probate with the family of the late Audrey Jean Knauer over a $290,000 bequest and that the outcome might depend on whether the actor Charles Bronson wants the money. Ms. Knauer died in 1997 and inexplicably willed her money to Bronson, whom she labeled a "talented character actor" but whom in all likelihood she had never met. Ms. Knauer's mother wants the money; the Library says it could buy 20,000 books; and Bronson has not yet responded.

(Update: Bill points out that Bronson is dead, and has been since 2003, so that either explains his nonresponse or means this is an old story with a hopefully happy resolution. For everyone except Bronson.)

I'll probably have a post up at the LBC later. I know everyone's getting impatient for the first Read This! selection. The good news is, you only have to wait a few more days: May 15's the announcement. Yippee.