We've all been enjoying the Times' block-by-block flash map thing of America. But let's not forget that it's based on sampling. Here's a cartoon about that!

Nerds: they talk about nerd things. Here, nerds Becky Ferreira and Miles Klee discuss the return/reboot of Futurama, now airing its sixth season on Comedy Central.

Miles Klee: Becky! I was half-watching Fellini's Satyricon last evening, and there's this mini-rant from a Roman poet about how Nero's empire doesn't produce art or theory, or anything to stimulate the national synapses. Where have all the philosophers gone? Pretty sure they're writing for Futurama, our animated authority on matters of bioethics, transhumanism and quantum fates. And as luck would have it, my DVR was recording the Futurama reboot at that very moment.

I'm more than a little troubled/confused by the story of Kurt Westergaard, the Danish cartoonist who survived an attack this Friday from an axe-wielding critic by hiding in a semi-fortified panic room. (Westergaard drew one of the controversial Muhammad cartoons in 2005). I mean, there are any number of complexities about the story, but here's the one that I'm most perplexed by.

If you're like me, one of your favorite ways to unwind in the evening is to get super-high and watch Nickelodeon cartoons. (I think "Fairly OddParents" is nothing short of genius, but I am generally stoned out of my gourd when I watch it, so who knows.) A friend of mine is a gigantic fan of SpongeBob SquarePants, the absorbent and porous fast-food employee whose booty was so recently admired by Sir Mix-a-Lot. "He's just so happy," she says, and it's true. The sheer joy contained within that iconic yellow frame is indeed infectious, especially if you are baked to oblivion. Anyway, James Parker offers an appreciation in [...]

"While I really can only speak for myself–and, to an extent, for my friends Josh Cagan and Storm DiCostanzo, the other two initial developers of the meme–I would say (hopefully in a slightly more civil manner than a couple of the other commenters) that these cartoons weren't intended to be seen out of the context of the associated hashtag. So that you couldn't *not* know that they were Kanye West tweets–just like you couldn't not know they were New Yorker cartoons. And as such, they're not *intended* to be funny outside of that context/label, because the humor is entirely *based* in the context, and not in some innate "meaning" [...]

This summer, gay group GLAAD, which concerns itself with "gay representation" in the "media," announced that they were horribly offended by something! Again! "In a July 22 comic, The Denver Westword published a cartoon in its 'Kenny Be' series that used the anti-gay slur f*g. The comic depicts a series of camper archetypes, one of which illustrates a type of camper who spends exorbitant amounts of money on camping gear-a person the comic calls a 'Gear f*g.'" We have just been alerted that, last week, Kenny Be has responded-in great, hilarious detail.

A little bit more on the New York Observer's firing of the long-time cleaning lady: apparently the paper's owner, Donald Trump's maybe-soon-to-be son-in-law Jared Kushner, offered her the possibility of staying on-if she worked for half the pay! What a world. (Perhaps she was pulling down six figures? We suspect: no.) And also, who knew Dilbert was so totally on the money these days?

You probably didn't think you need this, but you do: Kanye West's tweets as New Yorker cartoons. Memeriffic? Close enough!

File this under things I thought I would never type, but today's cartoon by Sean Delonas, the New York Post "illustrator" whose crimes against both art and taste are too numerous to elaborate upon in this small space, actually induced something almost resembling a chuckle this morning. I hope I'm not getting sick.

The British press reacts to Stephen Hawking's illness.