Droves of cats and kittens are swarming into animal shelters nationwide, and global warming is to blame, according to one pet adoption group.

Several shelters operated by a national adoption organization called Pets Across America reported a 30 percent increase in intakes of cats and kittens from 2005 to 2006, and other shelters across the nation have reported similar spikes of stray, owned and feral cats.

The cause of this feline flood is an extended cat breeding season thanks to the world's warming temperatures, according to the group, which is one of the country's oldest and largest animal welfare organizations.

We were wondering just how much global temperatures went up between 2005 and 2006, so we checked with NASA. It turns out the average global temperature actually declined by 0.09 degrees centigrade. Maybe the cats had to go into heat to keep warm.

Ivica Supe, a defender for Zagora FC in Croatia's third division, showed up at work to find 16 sheep waiting for him -- one for each goal he's scored this season -- courtesy of the team's lone sponsor, sheep farmer Josko Bralic. "We are only a small club, and we could not get anyone else to sponsor us," a club spokesman explained to Ananova.com. "There is no industry in the area, it's only a small village, and we were delighted when Mr. Bralic offered to support us with sheep."

The best part is that soccer season's not even close to being over. ("Don't put me in, coach! My apartment's too small!") Here in the U.S., we know for certain that any sheep incentive clause in professional sports would not go over well. Except with Michael Vick, who would figure out a way to make them fight. But, you know, camels; that's another thing entirely.

However, if someone dangles Alotta Fagina for 'Sheed...

Police banned the soup kitchen last month, arguing that the handouts discriminated against Jews and Muslims who do not eat pork on religious grounds.

The administrative court said the distribution was "clearly discriminatory," but could not be stopped because the organisers offered to feed anyone who asked for help. . . .

The food handouts are organised by a nationalist group called Solidarity of the French (SDF). It says its "pig soup," which uses pork fat for stock, is country fare much loved by French traditionalists.

It does sound as though the SDF is doing this just to be provocative, which is pretty obnoxious, but banning the soup is pretty obnoxious too, as is characterizing an insult to Jews or Muslims as "racism," seeing as how neither group is a race.

Which just goes to show, French people are obnoxious.

University of North Dakota athletics director Tom Buning said he was surprised Tuesday that the University of Minnesota has decided not to compete against UND in any sport except men's and women's hockey because of the school's Fighting Sioux nickname.

The University Minnesota's Advisory Committee on Athletics asked the Gophers athletic department to "make every effort to avoid scheduling home events with schools that use American Indian mascots" in an approved policy in 2003. . . .

But North Dakota hadn't been excluded from competing against the Gophers until recently, Buning said. He said Minnesota athletics director Joel Maturi understood the equal benefit from having the schools meet, especially with North Dakota's proposed move to NCAA Division I in the fall of 2008.

Maturi, who was unavailable for comment Tuesday, asked the advisory committee to loosen the policy at a Nov. 2 meeting, but the board strongly agreed to strictly enforce it in all sports except hockey, because the schools are in the same conference, according a published report.

It reminds us of Lincoln's inspiring words:

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion--that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Except hockey.

They will have to work five days a week starting in January. . . . Next year, members of the House will be expected in the Capitol for votes each week by 6:30 p.m. Monday and will finish their business about 2 p.m. Friday, Hoyer said.

This may not sound so bad, but consider what it means for one congressman who lives on the other side of the country:

"It's long overdue," said Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), who lives in Napa Valley and will have to leave his home at 3 a.m. on Sundays to catch a flight to Washington in time for work Mondays. "I didn't come here to turn around and go back home."

It's to Thompson's credit that he's keeping a stiff upper lip about it, but think about it: The poor guy has to leave at 3 a.m. PST to get to work by 6:30 p.m. EST the next day. After adjusting for the time difference, that's 36 1/2 hours' travel time!

If it takes him the same amount of time to get from the Capitol to his home in Napa, that means if he leaves at 2 p.m. Friday, he won't be back until 11:30 p.m. Saturday, leaving him only 3 1/2 hours at home before he has to fly to Washington. And people wonder why Congress doesn't attract the best and brightest.

Never before had the Federation of Students seen so much discussion over a single vowel.

The Federation of Students held its annual general meeting in the Great Hall on Monday, October 30. . . . This year the hot issue was centred around a letter: changing the name of the Womyn's Centre to the "Women's Centre."

The word "women" comes from the old English "wifman" (or "wyfman") which meant "weaver human," "man" itself was a gender neutral term at that time; adult males were referred to as "werman" (or wæpman), meaning "person with a weapon." However, sometime between old and middle English the "wer" was dropped from "werman," making the male gender default (according to various experts and the Oxford English Dictionary.) The feminist movement of the 1970s took offense to the male gender being the presumed default and femininity being relegated to a prefix. . . .

The Women's Centre was founded in 1981 without the alternate spelling--though at some point between then and now, the spelling changed to "The Womyn's Centre" without an official vote by the student population.

However, some women find the "womyn" spelling off-putting. Former undergrad Erin M. O'Leary spoke out in favour of the change. She told Imprint, "I just chose not to utilize the service because the 'y' sent a fairly clear message to me that the purpose of the service was a political agenda and not an informative one -- that could be because the service didn't put out enough information to inform me of what its purpose was."

When the question was called, the motion to change "Womyn" to "Women" passed 38-17-4.

Although they still seem to have trouble with the word center, they did the right thing by ditching womyn. After all, you wouldn't want to perpetuate the stereotype that women can't spyll.

Hypocrisy, Anyone?

"Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois today urged hundreds of blacks not to vote along racial lines next week in Maryland's Senate race. Obama, the only black U.S. senator, came to the state to rally support for Democratic Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin, who is white. Cardin's Republican opponent, Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele, is the first black candidate ever elected statewide and has been courting black Democrats."--Associated Press, Nov. 3

"The nation's only black senator, Barack Obama, D-Ill., asked voters at two black churches and at a Nashville rally to elect [Harold] Ford, a Democrat who is trying to become the first black senator from the South in more than 100 years. 'I know that all of you are going to work the next couple of days to make sure it happens, because I'm feeling lonely in Washington,' Obama said at the Mt. Zion Baptist Church. 'I need my dear friend to join me.' "--Associated Press, Nov. 5

"Prosecutor Naked at Work"--headline, Enquirer (Cincinnati), Oct. 10

Apparently when this guy loses a suit, he loses a suit.

After reading your front-page story, "Even in winter, Arctic ice melting" (Sept. 14) in a Berkeley restaurant, I turned to two men in their early 20s at the next table, and showing them the article, asked them: "What do you think can be more important news than this? Yet people still don't seem to take it seriously, driving their SUVs!"

Laughing, one of them said, "You think it's bad here in Berkeley? If you go to the Midwest or Florida you'll find lots of people saying 'there's no global warming!' " Sometimes it seems as if only I and a small number of people know that life on Earth, as we know it, is coming to an end. Soon.

ELENA A. MAROTH
Kensington

Avast! It's the end of the world as we know it (and we feel fine).

A doctor has pleaded not guilty to stealing a hand from a New Jersey medical school cadaver and giving it to an exotic dancer, authorities said. . . .

The dancer, Linda Kay, kept the hand in a jar of formaldehyde in her bedroom. Friends have said she called the hand "Freddy."

Those must have been the five strangest tips she's ever received.

"Posters and a Web site mocking President Bush have put the spotlight on a small Ontario university that thought a bold and edgy recruiting campaign was just the ticket to attract potential students," Reuters reports from Toronto:

The Web site, http://www.yaleshmale.com, has a black and white picture of Bush, with the caption: "Graduating from an Ivy League university doesn't necessarily mean you're smart."

Bush graduated from Yale in 1968.

A link takes viewers to a site for Lakehead University, in rugged Thunder Bay, Ontario, some 1,375 km (850 miles) northwest of Toronto.

"It was literally a tongue-in-cheek way of getting attention," Frederick Gilbert, president and vice-chancellor of Lakehead University, said on Monday.

First of all, even in Canada it's hard to believe anyone would think that mocking a Republican president's intelligence is "bold and edgy." Even funnier is Gilbert's misuse of the word "literally." We guess being president and vice-chancellor of a rugged Canadian university doesn't necessarily mean you're smart either.