Nyanko's Basket

These are links which I felt didn't need their own post or much explanation:

Rozen neko~ (if this link is dead by the time you view it, ask me for the image) (replaced link to 2chan with this link because the original image is 404'd now...)
This image should make complete sense if you have ever watched Rozen Maiden (which I finally did yesterday). It also reminded me a lot of Shinku and the person who uses that nick (sometimes) on IRC. :P

This is the description included with the image:
近所で猫が増えすぎた為、駆除が始まりました。
先程買い物に行ってる間に、近くにいた野良ちゃんも連れて行かれたようで、隣の奥さんが教えてくれました・・・。
一匹でも多く逃げ延びますように・・・。

A (rough) translation using Excite is
"Exterminating started because the number of cats had increased too much in the vicinity. It escapes safely a lot by even one. "

Hurricane Katrina: One Year Later
This article talks about some of the post-Katrina devastation still present and how some peoples' lives are still affected now, more than a year after it occurred. I think these quotes from the article sum it up nicely:

You should understand that any story you hear about something this vast will bear the mark of the person telling it. A visitor, no matter how well-intentioned, will not see it the same way as one who calls the area home. Someone who lost their house will not see it the same as one whose losses were minimal. One who rode out the storm in New Orleans will not see it the same as an evacuee, nor will one who endured the belated and ham-handed evacuation of the Superdome and Convention Center see it the same as one who waited patiently in the suburbs for the electricity and relatives to return.

One who lost relatives or had to swim for his life in the flood will see it a lot differently from those of us who watched it on TV.

Thousands of rural communities were cut off from civilization by downed power and phone lines and rural roads choked with fallen trees. Many of those people had to rescue themselves with chainsaws and repurposed construction equipment because all of the available resources were being directed toward New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

Trees which fell on houses rested there for months, even in areas not generally considered part of the "disaster area." Today, most of that damage has been repaired, and the millions of trees felled by Katrina have been harvested in a tidy little windfall for the logging industry. You can still see the scars, trees not felled but left leaning and trunks snapped off forty feet up, all along every road. But the most enduring legacy is a certain bitterness that it took so long for help to arrive.

THE GREAT FAILURE OF WIKIPEDIA
This is a link to the transcript of this talk which was delivered on April 8, 2006. A link to download the talk is also provided at the beginning of the transcript. I still haven't listened to the talk yet, but I think it would be considerably more interesting than reading only the transcript. :P

US population nears 300 million
I didn't know the US was now the third-most populous country in the world. It's also interesting that it's the only major country that seems to be bucking the trend of declining birth rates, even if a large proportion of that is through immigration...

Birds of Prey: The Feathered Killing Machines
When I was young (and before I grew up), I dreamed of owning falcons and raising them, and delighting in seeing them swoop across the sky. While I don't really feel that way any more, it's still an interesting subject for me, and that's why I liked reading this article. It also offers advice on how to raise your birds of prey.