Peter Rabbit is sitting on top of the world

We're sittin' on top of the world. The New York Times's online "World" section, that is, where "Peter Rabbit's Soup," our latest "Cold Turkey Cookbook" post, has turned up at the top of "Headlines Around The Web" (highlighted, above right). According to the Times's own explanation, "Blogrunner automatically monitors news articles and blog posts and tracks news events as they develop across the Web [and] alerts you to topics that are frequently linked to and commented upon. The publications tracked by Blogrunner are chosen by New York Times editors."

"Someday they will invent a bot smart enough to sniff the context and distinguish a turkey from Turkey!  That's so funny! Good company, though, by any means necessary," emails blogfriend Annie of Ambivablog in response to our alerting her earlier this morning that her excellent Turkey-related post "Fatal Naïveté" and our own Cold Turkey Cookbook post "Peter Rabbit's Soup" were both linked on the front page of the NYT's online "World" section this morning, where a brief item headlined "Turkey" was the top story.

If it's true — as the NYT itself explains under "What's This?" in the "Headlines" box — that "the publications tracked by Blogrunner are chosen by New York Times editors," then one of two possibilities suggests itself. Either someone is asleep at the switch or someone has a sense of humor.

Our moment in the sun as Top Turkey Blogger at Blogrunner and the Times was soon eclipsed by a newer Turkey-related post (above), this time a Huffington Post offering about neither a bird nor a country but a place of the heart somewhere in these United States called Turkey Hollow.

We alerted Annie to the fact that the links to her post at both Blogrunner and the Times were not working properly. She emailed back to call our attention to the fact that the title of her post was also not working properly, her nuanced "Fatal Naïveté" having been misread by the Blogrunner bot as "Fatal Navet." We were delighted with her priorities:

Omigod . . . forget the rest: I'm making that recipe.

(By the way, they also title my post "Fatal Navet." Fatal Navel?)

"Too darned smart for your own good!" we emailed Annie back. "That's why you're so much fun to read. I don't blame you for wanting to try the [carrot soup] recipe. Peter Rabbit will be so pleased." Image is from Peter Rabbit™ "Official Online Store."

The "Fatal Navel" reference was to the content of her post itself:

Hitchhiking across Turkey in a wedding dress to symbolize peace and the marriage of cultures, Italian flower-child performance artist, vegetarian and environmentalist Pippa Bacca, 33 (old enough to know better?), was a lamb to the slaughter …

This could have, and probably would have, happened anywhere. These two are archetypes that have a way of finding each other: Pollyanna and the troll. Denial of evil, and evil. It's a sad story, but it's also a Darwin Award.  And perhaps a fable for our time.

"An Aesop's Navel for our times?" we emailed back.

Update: Checking back with the Times late afternoon, we notice the current post is listed there as #1, with "Peter Rabbit's Soup" having disappeared down the rabbit hole (but it's still listed at Blogrunner, suggesting there really is a NYT editor behind the screen).

Update II: Blogrunner is "a service from The New York Times." FAQ:

The site is automated. Headlines are selected based on a recipe that takes into account their popularity on the web, but editors can intervene at any time to showcase individual articles or blog posts.

I'll gaze at your navel if you'll gaze at mine?

Update III: Lots more madness at Dr. Sanity's Carnival of the Insanities.

Comments

[amba]

Or a cautionary tale about the wages of navel-gazing!

Love this. Thanks . . . some Times and Blogrunner people will even find me, via you.

[Sissy Willis]

Amba:

I navel gaze, therefore I am?

[goomp]

You can't keep a good Turkey down.