You can break out your electric blankets, guys and girls. Scoop reports the danger of power cuts diminishing fast as water literally floods into the South Island's hydro lakes. As for the economy, there could be signs of an upswing there too, with an unexpected trade surplus for March, but oil remains a wild card. How that affects GDP for the March quarter (and whether we are in a technical recession or not) is anyone's guess.

Be that as it may there is one stock that appears to have fallen sharply. Our eternal muse only managed third place in an FHM poll on the world's sexiest women. Keira Knightly won with Keeley Hazel (who?) second. "What about Toni Marsh?" Stephen asks.

Chris contributes some funny and erudite letters sent by Frank Zappa in connection with the PMRC "Parental Music Resource Centre" (a mid-80s music censorship lobby run by Washington Wives), around the time of the 1985 hearings on music and censorship. Note in particular his superbly barbed letter to Ronald Reagan.

He also likes this: everything you'll ever need to know about knife-sharpening (via BoingBoing). Chris also reckons the participants in Stephen's Robert Fisk debate should read this — and possibly so should Mr Fisk (via Arts & Letters).

Mark reckons this research could be the key to ending my single status (heaven forbid!). I could go bungeeing while eating chocolate and listening to the Eagles on my iPod. Yeah!

From me? Well there's Chirac's project for a French rival to Google, which is very, err, French. Or you could pop over to the Gaurniad's Culture Vulture blog to listen to a podcast of Will Self reading one of his best stories. I keep urging people to go to Slate and check out their Magnum photos display. And, while you are there have a read about big oil trying to downplay their massive windfall profits.

Ciao-arama.

Update: how could I be so forgetful. This humorous piece in the Listener from a certain Mr Broatch is also well worth a read.