On the Gates/Brokaw story, speaking of trivial, it strikes me as odd that the Register would mock CNN for covering a story that the Register was covering. Seems to me they can have it one way (this story is important enough to cover), or the other(left as an exercise for the reader), but not both. (The remaining main possibility that occurs to me is that the Register is taking the rather odd line of promoting itself as the news source with the slogan "We Cover The Boring And Unverified Trivia That CNN Shouldn't!")

Thanks for the polar bear story, by the way (and all the other typically interesting stuff, of course); picked it up for posting from you.