With the Razzie nominations announced today, that can only mean one thing: That tomorrow, at the precise stroke of 5:30 a.m., Phineus the Oscar Ferret will crawl out of his subterranean lair, vigorously shake himself awake, then scamper up the podium to whisper the Oscar nominees into the ears of whatever protocol-and-stardust pairing has been assigned to read them to an enraptured nation. (Last year gave us Academy President Sid Ganis and Salma Hayek.) Of course, all bets are off in this dark, dark Hollywood period of awards show cleansing, from which not even the Oscars—the Rolls Royce of Hollywood Reacharounds!—is safe. Still, all hope is not lost:

Gil Cates has promised us a bloated, overlong ceremony, even if that means nothing but four hours of silhouetted contortionist dance troupes and Giuliana Rancic occasionally calling out the names of absent nominees like Javier Bordem and Marion Cantone to a 1/7th full Kodak Theater. So perish your fears—we're all but certain Phineus will arrive on time, and that the beloved critter won't be hanging lifelessly from the bloody maw of a coyote when he does. We'll have a full report tomorrow, but in the meantime, the Gold Derby blog has narrowed down the major categories to "likely" and "possible" short lists.

• Your Oscars cheat sheet: Let's predict the nominees! [Gold Derby]

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