Trendy

Well, the world's still here. Frankly, we didn't prepare for this eventuality. We thought our blogging days--everybody's days, really--were over. But, here we still are, still feeling the pressure to enliven the days and embrighten the nights of Solipsist Nation. And we are not prepared! Thanks a lot, Mr. Camping.

Well, let's count down what's "Trending Now," at 3:46 PM, PST, on Sunday, May 22, 2011:

10. SOCIAL SECURITY: Starting May 1, the Social Security Administration will no longer issue paper checks. Instead, seniors will receive their payments via direct deposit. The fact that this item is "trending now," on May 22, some three weeks after the direct-deposit program began, provides appropriate commentary on the wisdom of implementing a high-tech program for the senior set.

9. OWEN WILSON: Because he's in a Woody Allen movie that is actually doing well at the box office. While we're on the subject of Owen Wilson, are other people out there as disturbed by his nose as we are?

8. STOCK PRICES: Because, in a true oddity, the Dow was at EXACTLY the same level at the end of the day Sunday as it was at the beginning!

7. KIM CLIJSTERS: It turns out, the 'j' isn't silent.

6. NOODLING: "Noodling" is the "sport" of "catching" catfish "with" your bare hands--or, more specifically, by letting the catfish swallow your arm up to the elbow. The Texas legislature has just legalized noodling. This will come as a relief to all those who desperately wanted to stick their arm down a catfish's guller but feared running afoul of the law.

5. RANDY SAVAGE: Still dead. His body was buried at sea in a dignified ceremony befitting the greatest wrestler never to hold elected office in Minnesota.

4. LADY GAGA: No particular reason. But Lady Gaga's appearance on a list of "trendy things" is akin to Meryl Streep's appearance on a list of Oscar nominees: Legally mandated.

3. PARALYZED MAN IMPLANT: A London man, Rob Summers, paralyzed after a car accident has begun to walk again thanks to a revolutionary spinal implant. Coincidentally, last night, WOS and the Solipsist watched "Extreme Measures," in which Gene Hackman plays a neurosurgeon who develops a technique to, yes, regrow damaged nerves to cure paralysis. Unfortunately, he has to experiment on homeless people, who die horribly shortly after receiving Hackman's implants. All we're saying is, congratulations to Summers and his doctors. But the London police may want to carefully investigate any disappearances among the City's homeless population.

2. JODIE FOSTER: Her latest directorial endeavour opened this weekend. In this movie, "The Beaver," Mel Gibson plays a mental patient who needs to communicte through a beaver puppet that he wears on his hand. Insert your own Mel-Gibson-talking-through-Jodie-Foster's-Beaver joke here.

And, the DAY'S TRENDIEST STORY is. . . .

1. RACHEL MCADAMS: Apparently she's an actress, and apparently she's dating Michael Sheen, not to be confused with Charlie Sheen, which we assume is what happened 'cause otherwise why would this be the day's trendiest item?