Well, here we are in Part II and as threatened, I’m going to discuss more Official State Attributes including, Buckminsterfullerenes (aka Buckyballs), Dessert, Fly-Fishing Flies, Glacial Erratics and Marsupials. Don’t be mislead into thinking that I’m going to start by taking a swing at Buckyballs though. Instead, I’m angling for a few laughs by starting with the Humuhumunukunukuapua`a, aka Triggerfish aka the Official State Fish of Hawaii. This fish really had to swim upstream to secure that perch.
Triggerfish still feeling a little sulky about the fact that it took so long to gain Official Hawaiian State Fish status
I was talking to my daughter one day recently and somehow we got on the topic of how each State in the United States has a bunch of officially-legislated State Symbols although a better moniker would probably be State Attributes. You know, things like the Official State Particle Accelerator, Official State STI, Official State Mustelid Including But Not Limited To The Weasel, The Stoat, The Fisher, The Marten, The Badger, The Polecat, The Wolverine And The Ferret.
Up here, north of the 49th parallel, each Province and Territory also has a handful of Symbols/Attributes but for the most part they’re pretty pedestrian: flowers, trees, fish, snow tires. That said, I noticed that a few more-sophisticated USA-type attributes have managed to inch their way into the portfolio of each Province or Territory. The technical name for this is Attribute Creep.
Somehow, the notion of all these Official Attributes waiting to be analyzed spoke to me and I wound up spending quite a few hours dissecting the Official USA State Symbols/Attributes site in considerable detail.
Maybe all this would have had something to do with my running out of OCD medication if I actually had OCD. But I don’t. Just saying.
Long story short, I wound up constructing an Excel sheet summarizing all 181 Official Primary Attributes spanning all the States in the USA. As luck would have it, about 60 of these Primary Attributes also had anywhere from one to 18 Sub-Attributes. This made for a grand total of 375 Attributes: give or take a few. That is a shit-ton of attributes if you ask me. But the USA is a pretty big country…
Years ago I read a three-volume set (of books) by John Nichols entitled the New Mexico Trilogy. The Trilogy wasn’t a real trilogy as there was no continuity between the books. Really, the only thing the three books had in common was that they were set in New Mexico.
The first book in the not-a-trilogy is The Milagro Beanfield War. It involved a skirmish/heated dispute between the townsfolk of Milagro and a real estate developer. Suffice it to say, if you liked Swamp Story and other Dave Barry books, you will probably like The Milagro Beanfield War. It’s full of zany, interesting characters and interlocking plot lines.
The reason the Beanfield War came to mind is that my son, Tyler aka Ty (not his real name), together with his partner Andrea (not her real name either), moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, earlier this year. (State Motto: We are too close to Texas.) The pseudonymous couple quickly noticed that they had an ant problem in the house. By the way, I think Taylor Swift wrote a song called Ant Problems. No, wait! That was Champagne Problems. My bad.
Full disclosure: today, June 30, is my birthday. This puts me close to the middle of Cancer “aka The Crab” in the Zodiacal Astrological Universe, a subdomain of the Marvel Universe, inhabited by ultra-intelligent Florida Stone Crabs like the one in the Featured Image.
Putting any reference to Astrology in print will drive my buddy, whom I’ll call “Bob” for the sake of argument, completely bonkers, as he thinks Astrology is utter horseshit. I beg to differ. Also, being that it’s my birthday, I don’t really care what Bob thinks. Here’s why I think Astrology is NOT utter horseshit.
Before I delve into this new development in the avian world, I need to tell you about what happened to me a couple of nights ago. I set out to walk my dog Sarge in a gentle rain. Since I don’t have a thick fur coat I deployed an umbrella. Suddenly there was a big lightning flash followed 4-5 seconds later by some pretty righteous thunder. So I knew that the strike was probably a mile or so away. (We’ll get into that logic some other time.)
Before I could lower my umbrella there was a small lightning flash somewhere behind me accompanied by a pop. At the same time, I felt a small zap in my right ring finger, which happened to be connected to my arm. This is what’s known as “dodging a bullet.” I swear on Nikola Tesla’s headstone that I am not making this up.
But ever since then, out of the corner of my eye, I can see this cascading sheet of green alphanumeric characters raining down a black background. If I try to focus directly on it, the “rain” disappears. I feel like I might have seen that in a movie years ago but I’m not for sure. Very weird.
Basically, the parrots in the study quickly learned to make calls and some chose to talk preferentially to one or more other parrots, i.e. they made parrot “friends”, showed each other their toys, cavorted around on camera, bopped in synchrony to the Psy song Gangnam Style and so forth.
Two macaws became very close and even called out to one another “Hi! Come here! Hello!” from their respective screens. That’s a pretty big cognitive leap for a birdbrain. I love my dog, but I think that parrots are way above his pay grade when it comes to intelligence. Some parrots apparently have cognitive skills exceeding those of a human five-year old (or maybe an aging human politician) including gambling, composing bogus blog posts, playing Bridge and passing the classic two-nut, four-cup test. Parrots are also master mimics and can make almost any kind of sound you can imagine.
I’m wondering what other skills the parrots are sharing among themselves on these video calls though.What could go wrong? For example, they could start sharing 1-900 numbers or maybe strike up conversations with Siri and order bigger cages, tasers, pitchblende (aka uranium ore) and so forth. Time will tell I guess.
Anyway, in addition to seeing that scrolling alphanumeric display out of the corner of my eye, now I also seem to have gained the ability to tune in to random cell phone conversations from time to time. Here’s a recent conversation I eavesdropped on:
Jackson the Parrot: Awwwk! Hello? Isabella? Jackson here. Awwwk!
Isabella the Parrot: (makes trilling sounds, Awwwk!) Jackson! Why are you (whistle) hanging upside down (whistle)?
Jackson: I’m (gurgling, clicking, whistling noises) not upside down. (Screeching) Turn your phone around.
Isabella: (makes futuristic beeping sounds) OK. Jackson, are you reading The Jerusalem Post? A guy named Aaron Reich has been writing about all these different asteroids that are passing close to Earth. Like asteroid 2023 JK! It’s the diameter of 18 adult walruses (roar, snort) laid side by side and it’s supposed to pass by Earth on May 21st! (raucous shrieking ensues)
Jackson: I thought 2023 JK was the diameter of 46 Dutch men of average height laid head to toe (Er Is Niks Aan De Hand) or maybe it was the size of a Pembroke Welsh Corgi with the mass of 4 baby elephants (loud trumpeting and ear flapping sounds follow)
Isabella; That is one dense Welsh Corgi (arf, arf, whimper) But what about 2023 CX1? It was the size of two Super Bowl trophies (crunch, oof, grunt)) but luckily it exploded in the atmosphere somewhere over the English Channel.
Jackson: Yeah I think it was sent by aliens (imitates ET: says phone home) to eradicate the ancestral nesting mounds of those (yip, yip) Welsh Corgis.
Isabella: (Snorting) They’re dogs: they don’t nest in mounds. You’re thinking of termites (makes clicking noises that sound like chewing).
Jackson: Actually, I think the Dense Welsh Corgis is a pretty good name for an avant-garde rock band (Isabella then proceeds to churn out a pretty good rendition of Todd Rundgren’s lead guitar solo from Number One Lowest Common Denominator)
Isabella: (now panting heavily) Thanks Jackie-Boy. Now my owner is yelling at me and says I’m making too much noise. I have to literally get off the phone seeing as I’m perched on it.
Jackson: Awwwk. Oh-kayyy. (in a somewhat no-pun-intended-crestfallen tone). Squawk to you later!
In the movie Kindergarten Cop, Joyce (Penelope Ann Miller) said to Arnold Schwarzenegger: “Kindergarten is like the ocean-you don’t want to turn your back on it.”
You may not know this but apart from my duties in The Department of Lateral Thinking, I also write medically-themed posts for my wife’s clinic’s blog and… Wait, wait, wait!
That phrasing seems a bit awkward and I’m thinking that the apostrophe in “clinic’s” shouldn’t be there just as you would never think to use “it’s” when you aren’t referring to people or dogs. (Let’s face it: some dogs are basically people. And possibly the same for cats.) I should have said, “I also write posts for the blog attached to my wife’s clinic.” But then the image of a couple of sheets of paper stuck on the front door of the clinic, like an eviction notice or something. popped into my mind so I decided to just leave that intro sentence the hell alone.
It’s so easy to get distracted these days.
Apparently that hasn’t changed since August 2017 when I wrote a post entitled Man vs Voles about voles in my backyard and somehow segued into distracted walking, distracted archery , distracted philosophers (Socrates: “I drank what??”), etc.
Celebrity endorsement/branding is nothing new. Pro athletes have their names plastered on all kinds of sports gear; supermodels are linked to cosmetics; there’s even a Lego set for every DC and Marvel Comics superhero that was ever created by global warming, global cooling, toxic exposure, insect bites, supernatural intervention, pickle ball addiction, etc.
Here at The Department of Lateral Thinking we, well really just Sarge and I, feel compelled to share some breaking celebrity endorsement news with you, as it were, the alert readers. This breaking news concerns a development in the world of natural anti-fungal compounds. This will be especially relevant to those of you watching “The Last of Us” television series.
The Last of Us is a post-apocalyptic pandemic tale in which a remnant of humanity, apparently located in and around Calgary, Alberta, fights to survive ravening hordes of zombies created by the mushroom Ophiocordyceps unilateralis. Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, otherwise known as the “zombie ant fungus,” infects ants and eventually causes them to lie down and wait for baby mushrooms to sprout from their heads. This might be the same fungus that causes teenagers to, zombie-like, leave their PE equipment at school until it becomes self-aware.
Anyway, in The Last of Us, Ophiocordyceps, driven by global warming and pronoun overuse, mutates and gains the ability to infect humans. Other factors contributing to the pandemic include rampant abuse of prescription toenail fungus medication (in turn driven by incessant TV ads for prescription toenail fungus medication) and also dirty socks.
Today, in the Department Of Overstatement And Also Stating The Obvious, I am impelled to tell you about a video clip of US Vice President Kamala Harris that resurfaced recently. In it, she recounted events leading up to the May 2020 history-making first manned commercial spaceflight, which carried Bob and Doug McKenzie to the International Space Station. Here’s The Mission:
And here are the astronauts:
Ooops! No wait! I got confused! Those aren’t astronauts. They’re the Canadian toque-wearing hosers Bob and Doug McKenzie, who made history in 1981 by performing the first rendition of The Twelve Days of Christmas to feature back bacon in its lyrics. (And toques.)
Here are the astronauts: Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley.
Honest mistake.
Astronauts
And here are some definitions:
Trust me. This may all begin to make sense. Soon.
I embedded the Kamala video clip in this post a few days ago when I started writing it. When I reopened the draft this morning, I got this message where the clip was supposed to be:
So weird. You would almost think YouTube (owned by Google) is censoring content! Probably it’s just a mistake. Because you know, there’s supposed to be this thing called the First Amendment. Anyway, since you asked, you might be able to find the video here: https://www.foxnews.com/video/6319561764112
However, in case THAT clip also gets taken down accidentally, all is not lost. I found it on Twitter (not owned by Google) and transcribed a chunk of Kamala’s soliloquy word for word. I also grabbed some video frames for emphasis. Evidently I have a lot of time on my hands.
But here goes. Remember to brace for impact.
“…which brings me to May 30, 2020. Bob and Doug returned to the Kennedy Space Center. They suited up. (Pauses to execute elbow-tuck fist-bump).
———————————————————————————————————————-
“They waved to their families. (Demonstrates)
———————————————————————————————————————-
“And they rode an elevator up nearly 20 stories. (Points skyward)
———————————————————————————————————————-
“They strapped into their seats (pause) and they waited as the tanks beneath them filled with tens of thousands of gallons of fuel. (Points at audience and mentally says to herself, ‘You think I’m kidding, don’t you? I’m deadly serious. We need electric rockets. Now.’)
———————————————————————————————————————-
“And then (pregnant pause…) they launched (said in a half whisper)!
———————————————————————————————————————-
“Yes they did! (cackles exuberantly and points to the audience)
———————————————————————————————————————-
“Millions of Americans watched that day: in the hills, the sand dunes, Cape Canaveral, in living rooms, dorm rooms, classrooms across our Nation. We watched Bob and Doug’s rocket ride from the launchpad. We watched it climb into the sky and then, disappear from our view.”
THE END
———————————————————————————————————————-
What you have just read is what I call Kamalasplaining or K-splaining for short. It’s a way of stating the obvious in terms that a newly-hatched marine iguana could understand. It feels patronizing. It’s dramatic and eldritch. Or maybe dramatically eldritch. There’s repetition of a theme. Appendages are involved. And whispering. It’s just weird. It’s almost like the speaker is disseminating some crucial knowledge that they have only learned just minutes before gaining the podium. Or maybe there’s a private joke in there somewhere that only they know. Or maybe it’s drugs.
Anyway, to inject some scientific rigor into this post, I put together a short checklist to help you determine if you have been Kamalasplained.
The K-Score
Instructions: Tick all the boxes that you feel might apply. If you don’t have a dog, substitute a parrot, or maybe a marine iguana. Apparently they make great pets. Anyway, count the ticks. Three or more ticks means that there is a strong probability that you have been Kamalasplained.
I don’t know about you but I feel like 2022 flew by like a video of a chinchilla taking a dust bath, played at 2X speed. And since you brought it up, here’s actual footage of a chinchilla taking a dust bath. You can play it at 2X or not. It starts slowly, then builds into a frenzy of activity, just like 2022! At least that’s my perspective.
This past Christmas was especially hectic, what with Nor’easters, Alberta Clippers and Polar Vortices wandering around and disrupting travel plans with reckless abandon. We had to rejig our travel plans at the last minute to avoid spending Christmas in the Toronto airport. I felt like a hatchling marine iguana fleeing for its life with a pack of ravenous snakes in hot pursuit: or maybe cold pursuit, since snakes are cold-blooded.
In fact, I wrote about an actual hatchling iguana caught on camera fleeing for its life from a pack of ravenous snakes in a previous post saying the following: “That clip is the best thing I have ever seen. Seriously. Even better than that picture in which two guys are dueling with van de Graaf generator-based weaponry. You will be on your feet cheering your heart out for that iguana.”
Immediately after I embedded that clip (below) in this post I watched it again and sure enough, there I was, up on my feet, cheering my heart out for that feisty little bugger. If Tom Cruise and Gal Gadot (aka Wonder Woman) got together and somehow produced an iguana baby instead of a human baby, that hypothetical love child iguana’s butt would totally be kicked by the Planet Earth II iguana featured below. Trust me on this.
I know, I should get on with the python stuff but I also want to say that if Planet Earth II iguana had a Mom like the one in this next clip, the snakes would be a non-issue. Especially if they in any way resembled elongated, streamlined raccoons. The Mom in question, who I’m almost positive works part time as a baggage handler for (insert the name of any major airline here), starts her day by rushing out the front door when she hears her daughter Reilly screaming whilst waiting outside for the bus.
Mom finds a plus-sized raccoon clinging to Reilly’s leg and promptly disengages it while Reilly attempts a fairly complicated horizontal gymnastic manoeuvre against Mom’s hip. Mom calls for help, shouting something about rabies and shoos Reilly back inside after detaching her daughter from her hip with one arm whilst the raccoon clings tenciously to her other arm. After giving the raccoon, still clinging tenaciously to her arm, a practice swing, Mom yeets it a good 20 feet or so into the front yard. It’s awesome. Unharmed and possibly feeling a little sheepish, the raccoon gets up and waddles away nonchalantly. You actually wind up feeling a bit sorry for it. Reilly and Mom got away with a couple of scratches and a brace of rabies shots.
OK, now I REALLY need to get on with the python stuff.
Late in 2022, somebody in the know told me about a Burmese Python in Florida that died after eating a 5-foot alligator. I got the lowdown from the WSAZ News Channel site. Motto: We need better news correspondents. Or maybe just better proofreading.
Here’s a photo of the victim, freshly excavated from an 18-foot python:
According to Jeanne Moos, CNN National news correspondent: “The state of Florida encourages people to kill Burmese pythons because they eat so many other species and produce rapidly.”
OVERTHINKING ALERT!
“They” can be a dangerous word, sometimes leading to needless confusion. You’ll notice that I struggled a bit with the use of “her” in the description of the raccoon battle although I think I managed to avoid needless confusion.
Anyway, my first question is: Who’s doing the eating: the people or the pythons? My other question is, (assuming that they refers to the pythons) is: What do they produce?
Methane?
Ophidiophobia (fear of snakes)?
Herpetophobia (fear of reptiles in general)?
Vorarephobia (fear of being eaten alive/swallowed whole)?
I feel like a pretty good case could be made for any or all of the above phobias. And possibly the methane.
Interestingly, Rosie Moore, one of the scientists who necropsied the python, has also made a name for herself as a successful free-diving bikini model. I am not making this up. The footage Ms. Moore posted on Instagram pertaining to the necropsy rapidly went viral. For some reason.
Turns out that alligator-snacking pythons are old news. I got to poking around and located another article detailing the October 2005 discovery, made by South Florida Natural Resources Center researchers, of a dead, headless python sporting a mostly-intact alligator protruding out of a hole in its midsection. The headline on the Mongabay blog post was “Python explodes after swallowing 6-foot alligator in Florida Everglades”.
I swear on an Exploding Kittens card game that I am not making any of this up.
Exhibit A:
Exhibit B:
Tail of alligator protruding from midsection of headless python
There are various competing theories about what happened:
(a) The python successfully engulfed and suffocated the alligator but eventually exploded due to intestinal gas buildup.
(b) The alligator was engulfed but somehow remained alive and fought part way out of the python before expiring.
(c) The python successfully engulfed the alligator but a second alligator came along, ate the head of the python in retribution but was unable to free the imprisoned alligator.
Those are pretty improbable theories if you ask me because (a) and (b) don’t account for the missing head and in (c) we don’t know if the snacked-upon reptile was still alive or “just resting” as the saying goes. Why would the second alligator attempt to rescue a dead alligator? Admittedly, I might be overthinking this.
My theory, shamelessly modified from a theory posited by the person who told me about all this python-alligator stuff in the first place, is that the alligator in question may have contained the long-sought-after carcass of disappeared notorious former Teamster’s Union President and convicted felon, Jimmy Hoffa. Before his demise, and in an eerie twist of fate, Hoffa could have accidentally ingested a set of nesting Matryoshka dolls bearing the likenesses of, in no particular order, various ruthless political leaders such as Nancy Pelosi, Genghis Khan, Erik the Red, and Margaret Thatcher. The innermost doll probably contained a grenade which was eventually detonated by powerful pythonic contractions.
Maybe that’s not such a great theory but “The Pythonic Contractions” might seem like a pretty great name for a band. Or at least an OK name. If you happen to be somebody who was fifteen years old in the early 70’s.
Not that I’m getting maudlin or anything but I felt like I wanted to say a few words about Reggie aka “The Reg”, faithful Corgi canine companion of my good friend Bob. Reg passed away yesterday after struggling with some health challenges over the course of the past year. I didn’t know Reg for that long but he was a real character, low-slung and feisty. He would have made a great character actor. Reg and my dog Sarge got along OK despite the size disparity. If he had enough, Reg would grumble a bit. Not a growl. Just low-pitched muttering in the back of his throat.
Bob got Reg when he was a year old pup. Reg had to literally hit the ground running because he was joining a pack that already consisted of two Golden Retrievers. He learned to swim and fetch in short order and when he looked at himself in the mirror, Bob was pretty sure Reg saw a Retriever looking back at him. A small one, but one with a heart as big and as faithful as those of his larger adoptive brothers.
According to Bob, The Reg was, “As fast as a rabbit. Loved to chase birds and squirrels. Stood guard day and night. Loved to play the ‘out and in’ game in which he would charge you in the nards until you let him out, then wanted back in two seconds later. Friendly to all but took no crap from other dogs no matter their size. Always wanted to be with us even if it meant just waiting in the car. Always called shotgun.”
I know Reg accompanied Bob on many rambles through the bush and many long car trips. He was much loved and will be sorely missed. Hopefully he’s now happily reunited with the two other members of “Gold Squadron” who went before him.
The Department of Lateral Thinking 
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