Let’s get to the news … In Hungary a small-town entrepreneur managed to secure governmental grounding to build an elevated wooden canopy to enable neighbors and visitors to enjoy the beautiful forest outside his village. The money was approved, the canopy built, and everything is great.

Oh, not so fast. It turns out that slick entrepreneur had all the trees in the forest cut down before the canopy was constructed, so now the raised walkway offers visitors a view of — wait for it — absolutely nothing. Just a plain piece of flat, bare land.

You can count the number of visitors now on one finger…

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Never say that everyone needs constants in their life. A French mathematician has won a $700,000 prize — a really notable honor — for his studies in randomness. And by randomness we mean he has been researching the differences in the height of ocean waves, the weight of newborns, and the probability of coin flips.

Amazing stuff. I guess. I’m sure there are real-world benefits that I am too obtuse to recognize, and I wish the professor well. Probably.

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First England’s poor Princess Catherine got all the blame for her photoshopped picture of her royal family. Shame on her for trying to deceive us. Now she being hailed as a victim because of the criticism she received. Neither view seems much to the point.

Rather, given the exalted position of the royals and admitted public interest in them — often just nosy — there would seem to be at least a minor obligation on them to oblige and thereby earn their money (or status). So, couldn’t the palace have provided a few significant details about Catherine’s health, the issue that led to all of this silly hoorah? We can skip the details, but letting us plebeians know whether she’s got a hernias or is dying would be appropriate and not too serious an invasion of that heralded royal privacy.

After all, we need to know thew truth. And did you know that Princess Diana is actually working at a diner in Idaho?