The Old Farmer's Almanac = the Terrorist's Bible. Those preparing for future Wombat File Quizzes take note.

This year saw so many amazing films, books, records, and flash mobs that I can hardly remember anything other than an amorphous, blurred experience of excellence. But I'll run down a few of my picks for the best of the year:

Book -- Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code

Hands down, this thrill-ride of a modern-day thriller combined the rollercoaster thrills of a technologically up-to-the-nanosecond nail-biter, and the savory, intellectual treats of ten or twelve of Harold Bloom's most recent books. The best thing about this tale of nonstop suspense is the character of Robert Langdon, the dashing, improbably handsome and stylish Harvard professor whose love of thrills (and coded puzzles) will no doubt inspire a generation of young readers to enter the field of "symbology." Warning: author Dan Brown isn't afraid to present the latest in academic art-history debates, such as whether or not Leonardo Da Vinci's paintings contain the secrets of the Knights Templar, or whether Christ and Mary Magdalene have living descendents living in secret among us. If you're not up for such a tour of cutting-edge scholarly concerns, it can be a bit heady. But that's what makes this an intellectual thriller par excellence. Simply thrilling.

Book -- Ann Coulter, Treason

After being named Poet Laureate, many thought that Coulter would stop pushing the envelope. No fear -- the "Nordic Muse" has produced her greatest and most challenging work since the devastatingly sonorous "Kill Their Leaders and Convert Their Children to Christianity (Homage to Paul Celan)." I sat down with a copy of Treason while having a late breakfast in a noisy Au Bon Pain, and when they kicked me out at closing time (eight hours later!), I hadn't even touched my rasberry cheese croissant. Beginning with "Sexing Truman," Coulter proves that her metrical chops have never been stronger (the half-rhyme of "Julius and Ethel" with "bestial" for example -- a sly and unforgettable nod to Yeats) and by the conclusion of "Katie/Eva", with its stately peroration by Bernhard Goetz, it's clear that American poets are still in the vanguard. Michael Savage may have brio, but even his wickedly arch sonnets have nothing on Coulter's full-throated birdsong.

Music -- Bob Seger, Bob Seger Sings the Ray Stevens Songbook

Accompanied by the Detroit Philharmonic under the direction of Kurt Masur (an old Seger pal from bar-band days), Seger's long-awaited double-CD of the master's (nearly) complete songbook was a daring undertaking. Could Seger pull together the diverse moods and musical styles of the polymathic Stevens? Attempts by Andre Previn, Johnny Mathis, and The Residents had all fallen flat in the past. But Seger's persistence and musicological research paid off, as new, musically precise versions of "The Streak" and "I Saw Elvis in a U.F.O." reveal a depth that previous, slapdash interpretations have lacked. It's the majesty of Seger's voice, though, that comes through on earlier Stevens classics -- "Ahab the Arab" is rendered a capella, and the grizzled rasp that once spoke for the American Everyman now perfectly ventriloquizes this song-story of a man whose lonely office as "king of the burning sands" might well be said to be a stand in for the driven, iconoclastic Stevens himself. It's sad that Stevens refused to give Seger the right to include "Osama Yo Mama" on this disc, but I hear you can get it on the British version.

Film -- Peter Jackson, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle

Speaking of achievements, the young auteur put finally to rest his doubters with Part Seven of The Chronicles of Narnia, creating the definitive filmic version of C.S. Lewis' vision. Christian Bale makes a great King Tirian, and while Morgan Freeman might be said to phone it in a bit as the voice of Aslan, the computer animation really is stunning. I know that some of the bits with the monopods in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader looked a little flat, but they've clearly amped up the processors for this final installment. Puzzle the Donkey (expertly voiced by Sir Mick, I might add) is perfectly modeled -- you can actually see the individual hairs in his mane. And it's not at the cost of emotional complexity: when Eustace and Jill try to work through the application of Lewis's modified Platonism to their feelings for one another, it's deeply moving. Six and a half hours is a long time in the theater, particularly wearing 3-D glasses, but it's worth it for the scene in which the many-infolded layers of Aslan's Country are revealed. Best allegorical Christian fantasy spectacle since Coppola's live-action Davey and Goliath.

Television -- Donald Rumsfeld Presents America Victorious

I still say that Shogun remains the standard for a really boss mini-series, but Rumsfeld came through after a lot of hype, in this compelling multi-part entertainment. Just think about the episodes like "Statue Coming Down" -- the delicate choreography of images was the work of a master. And in "Touchdown", the sight of POTUS wrestling his fighter onto the deck was the kind of thing that's immediately burned into the brain. Now, of course, with all the publicity the whole thing has been spun off into the regular season, and I confess that the plot has sort of bogged down into a kind of blah-blah quagmire sameness, and all this piecemeal violence is getting depressing. And even "The Spidey Hole" wasn't as thrilling as you would have expected. Maybe they'll get the special-effects wizards at Halliburton to come up with something really exciting, like an oil field fire. But I confess I'm more and more intrigued by Tommy Thompson's Tom Ridge's lower-budget series, "Condition Orange" -- I know that nothing much is going on with it yet, but you have to figure that something big is bound to happen. After all, Sweeps month is just around the corner.

As I type this, I have a ten-pound creature suspended, in the device with the absurd but undeniably catchy name, from my torso. (The marsupial overtones of this arrangement have not escaped me, incidentally.)

My regard for her has, quite naturally, become the predominate fact of my existence. Her need for comfort, consolation, aid-in-getting-to-sleep, and a general hey-quit-talking-to-her-while-you’re-holding-me-you-inconsiderate-bastard level of undivided attention has become the corresponding predominate condition with regard to the question of getting anything written, in any context, to or for anyone at all.

This is evidenced by the fact that although the twelve-week-old empress of my affections is currently snuggled up to me in that state reminiscent of bugs in rugs, and although my hands are marvelously free to clickety-clack away, composing these few dozen words is taking the better part of an hour, as every few moments I receive, nonverbally yet with a surpassing clarity, instructions to the effect that I had better bestir myself in the direction of walking, rocking, bouncing, jogging in place, or any other activity which might constitute soothing.

I offer this meta-meditation not as an excuse for not bringing you more of my patented blend of sentence fragments, uncorrected typos, pointless digressions, irritating examples of litotes, and questions nobody else wants answered. Indeed, in the coming year I hope to return to some semblance of regular output, as the Wombat File approaches, god save the mark, its third anniversary. (This increase in the number of posts here should, if early calculations are correct, be accompanied by a decrease in quality.)

I bring this laboriously constructed moment of self-regard to life with only one purpose: to suggest that, if your expectations, when browsing in these environs, aren’t set at the lowest level possible -- one you reserve, for example, for the anticipation of the 22nd Pringle in the can, or the waiting-room flip-through of an Esquire “Women We Love” feature – you should consider recalibrating downward. Because, appalling as it may sound, this brief interval (when Helena fitfully dozes as she sweats into my t-shirt, and the building sense that a pair of pliers is being applied to one of my vertebrae has not yet peaked) is, from the standpoint of opportunities to contribute to the blogosphere, probably as good as it gets.

Carrying on the 16th/17th-century fun from last-week's nail-biter: Familiar though most of us liberal arts types are with the big names among English dramatists of the Renaissance, but Shakespeare's prolific Spanish contemporary Lope de Vega is less well known. The author of hundreds of still-extant plays (and the putative creator of hundreds more), the author of Fuente Ovejuna (The Sheep Well) he was a child prodigy who wrote Latin at age five, imprisoned for libel (after lampooning the former producer of his plays, who had refused to sanction Lope's relationship with his daughter), a sailor in the Spanish Armada (escaping the general destruction in one of the few ships to return to Spain unscathed), ordained a priest (though he still carried on multiple affairs), and dedicated to self-scourging.

His last words were "All right then, I'll say it: [author's name] makes me sick."

Who did Lope de Vega name as he breathed his dismissive last?

Bonus question: what other famous figure of Spanish heritage said, in his last words, to reporters "Don't let it end like this -- tell them I said something."

First correct answer posted to comments wins a half-sour pickle. Really, half-sours are the best. Why can't you get them in most supermarkets? No Googling or using Amazon's new deal where you can search for the dirty parts of Ulysses. One guess (on each part of the question) per comment, but post as often as you like.

I'm late, I'm late! No time for psuedo-wittery by way of introduction. Headlong we plunge down this week's quizly rabbit-hole, which returns us once again to the land of history you never thought you'd care about...

In the last decade of the sixteenth century, King James VI of Scotland (soon to become the King of England as well) was moved to compose an epic poem in commemoration of a great feat. In the preface, he noted that "contrary to my degree and religion, like a mercenary poet" he, a Protestant potentate, had found himself in the unlikely position of writing "in praise of a foreign Papist bastard." The Catholic in question was Don John of Austria, the illegitimate brother of King Philip of Spain. James concluded his poem by saying "God doth love his name so well/That so he did them aid/That serv'd not right the same."

What achievement did Don John accomplish that James had to grudgingly applaud? A clue which is also our extra-credit point: according to historian Diarmaid MacCulloch, the act in question represented the last large-scale event in Europe which involved a particular technology. What was it?

First correct answer posted to comments wins a rare Hello Kitty scapular. No Googling or enrolling in any last-minute graduate seminars. One guess per comment, please, but post as frequently as you like.

Update Saturday 4:30 PM: No correct answer as of yet. Hie thee to the comments to read the latest clue and snatch victory out from under the noses of the dozing, Friday-only players.

Update Sunday 11:30 PM: We have a winner. Go to the comments for the results, rendered in the dilatory style to which, dear reader, you have no doubt become accustomed.

For the discriminating appreciator of infant beauty, we now offer a selective gallery of H.C. Claire-themed images.

With apologies for your editor's general lack of photo editing/html layout know-how. Improvements are scheduled, right after I get about sixty more hours of sleep.

The Elder Gods speak through their vessel, Jack Chick. (via MeFi)

New York is buried under an avalanche of Winter Storm Hype. We're hunkered down here in Wombat Central, trying to stay insulated from the howling maelstrom of watches and warnings. Well-padded with trivia, we will ride out the blizzard of prognostications and advisories. Today's question:

In the 1990s, one former member of a U.S. President's cabinet and one future member of a U.S. President's cabinet had books, each of which became one of the 10 bestselling nonfiction titles for the respective years in which they were published.

Name both authors. For extra credit, name the elected U.S. legislator whose book rose to the same level in that period.

First correct answer posted to comments wins a bag of Mr. Nature Raisins (which contain "0% Fat"). No Googling or calling your source at the Library of Congress. One guess (of two names) per post, but you may post as often as you like.

This raises two questions. First, who is the all-time champion perpetrator of bad literary sex (my vote: Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, although I'm pretty sure that Robert Heinlein's I Will Fear No Evil, where the old rich guy has his brain transplanted into the body of his recently-dead-and-still-superhot secretary, is a very close second)?

Second, when Sting was asked to present an award meant to satirize cheesy, pretentious compositions, did he say to himself "That's rather ironic"?

1. Sorry that there was no announcement, but, indeed, the Friday Quiz took a Thanksgiving-week hiatus. It got invited to dinner with a couple of crosswords from its old college paper. Came home late, a little drunk, overslept on Friday morning, and then took off for the mall.

2. Shocking Book Review News courtesy of Janet Maslin and the Times-- the latest James Patterson thriller isn't any good!

3. I don't have time to write anything else because my daughter is making that sound she makes, like an elephant seal heaving its way up onto the beach, a set of an exasperated wheezing sighs, which when they arrive in this quick and volube succession comprise the drum roll, the fanfare, the personal theme music which accompanies the imminent, the inevitable wail...yeah, that's it.