Greetings to our blog readers in England, Pakistan and Malaysia......

Happy 89th birthday to the great Mel Brooks.......

Today, we look at our top ten favorite comic strips from "The Roanoke Times" in Roanoke, Va.

The winner is Stephan Pastis, of "Pearls Before Swine" fame, whom like Jerry Seinfeld did on sitcom television, makes brilliant fun of every day annoying occurrences, like people trying to start a second line for the same bank teller (Image #1: a piggy bank is in reference to the strip).

Second place goes to Dave Coverly's "Speed Bump" in which a third cave man makes stone drawings with his food which seemingly irritates his mates. Our initial choice for an image to go with this was "Captain Caveman," but we couldn't find a suitable image.

Lastly, third place goes to Darby Conley's "Get Fuzzy" in which Satchel the Dog sees a headline in a newspaper that Australia nearly executed Johnny Depp's dogs. We will send Javier the Intern to verify if this actually did happen.

Here is our top ten:

1. Pearls Before Swine

2. Speed Bump

3. Get Fuzzy

4. Non Sequitur

5. Doonesbury

6. Dilbert

7. Jump Start

8. Agnes

9. Garfield

10. Zits

http://www.gocomics.com

Remembering J. D. Salinger (1919-2010)

With the death of author J.D. Salinger, best known for his landmark novel "The Catcher in the Rye," a number of great tributes have been surfacing on the web, including a touching one from my Moviezzz on his blog http://www.moviezzz.blogspot.com

There have also been a number of interesting stories about the reclusive author who lived in Cornish, NH.

One of those was written by "Washington Post" reporter Ian Shapira in today's online edition of the newspaper. Shapira reported that George Mason University (Fairfax, Va.) professor of English Roger Lathbury decided on a lark to contact Salinger about the unlikely possibility of publishing Salinger's short story "Hapworth 16, 1924" from his small publishing outfit in Alexandria, Va.

Amazingly enough, Salinger wrote back! And, the author said: "I'll think about it."

The rest of the story sounds a bit like the 1980 film "Melvin and Howard" about an ordinary man who becomes friends with Howard Hughes (also a recluse).

Salinger contacted Lathbury again in 1996 and for a short while gave the green light. This lead to the two meeting in secret at the cafteria of the National Gallery Art Museum in Washington, DC, but ultimately word of Lathbury's aims got leaked and Salinger changed his mind. The two ended up not speaking to each other again.

I read another Salinger encounter of sorts in "Interview" magazine in which actress Winona Ryder, a devout Salinger fan (like film director Wes Anderson), sent back Salinger's autograph which her ex-boyfriend Johnny Depp gave her while they were dating. Ryder felt that she was violating the author's privacy by owning the highly covted autograph. Salinger wrote back and simply said: "Thank you"