Archive for December 2011

The Yodeling Cat…

December 28, 2011

— Some have referred to the Yodeling Cat as being “creepy” or “disturbing” or even “horrifying,” but the holiday season seems to spawn such things,  and one may see the creepy and disturbing prowling the aisles at Walmart anyways, so I welcome this white-furred warbler as a twisted commentary on where the excesses of Xmas can lead us. It’s also perhaps the most significant intrusion of yodeling into pop culture since the late great Andy Kaufman  yodeled to an African drum rhythm,  or yodeling was used as a potent weapon against alien invasion in the movie,  Mars Attacks!  

As one who loves dementedly random things as well as juxtaposition,  by extension I’m also led to wonder if perhaps by yodeling we who are furry might also also use it as a force for societal change, or at least by yodeling cause Donald Trump’s head to explode as those of Tim Burton’s aliens did.- – It’s worth a try…

We’ve come a long way since the 1955 novelty hit, “Jingle Bells” by the Singing Dogs, right?– No, I didn’t think so either…

Honey Badger…

December 24, 2011

 – – Although only the size of a medium dog and weighing in at about thirty pounds, it’s hard to find a more vicious and tenacious predator than the African Honey Badger (Mellivora capensis), also known as the Ratel.  A relative of the Wolverine, the Honey Badger has been listed in the Guiness Book of World Records as “The World’s Most Fearless Creature.”  

The Ratel’s well-deserved fearsome reputation has been earned based on the fact that it has no known natural predators, and has been known to attack jackals, wildebeest, wild boars, buffalo, humans, monitor lizards, and even lions and cheetahs!  Armed with razor-sharp teeth and inch-and-a-half long claws, the Honey Badger routinely eats poisonous snakes, spiders, and scorpions.  The Ratel also loves honey, from which he gets his name, acquiring such by boldly invading a beehive and using his quarter-inch thick skin to absorb the hundreds of stings he’s likely to receive in the effort. 

Not registering fear, pain, or any emotion other than anger, the Honey Badger has become a popular internet meme, and may be seen in commercials opening pistachios by flailing them with a cobra…

 

Feline Survival Tale…

December 23, 2011

– – A large black and white cat survived a road trip of 200 miles and four hours duration while traveling under the hood of a car in Ohio last Sunday afternoon.  The driver of the car smelled something burning when he stopped at a rest area near his Cleveland destination, and raised his hood to discover the feline hitchhiker stuck in the engine compartment!

Although the cat suffered burns to his right side, he survived his ordeal remarkably well, and a vet who checked the cat out said that he’s going to be fine.  The cat has been named “Eclipse” as that was the model of the car, and the SPCA is trying to find the cat’s owner…

Rats Who Care…

December 20, 2011

 – – It’s OK to call someone a “dirty rat,”  as rats do get dirty;  it might not, however, be scientifically supportable to refer to rats as uncaring in light of a new University of Chicago study on empathy-driven behavior in rodents. 

Appearing in the prestigious journal Science, the results of this landmark study show that untrained laboratory rats will free restrained companions,  even when those restrained rats are not in pain.  Rats will even choose to free other restrained rats when offered the alternative activity of feasting on chocolate!  Greater love hath no rat than this…

The new study on rats sets a precedent for future research on sentient and empathic animals; it’s also safe based on what we know to assume that numerous other animals display empathy, which is thought to have deep evolutionary, biochemical, and neurological underpinnings. 

Findings of empathy in animals may force uncomfortable questions about how humans treat animals, especially with regards to horrific invasive research.  Birds, rats, and mice are presently excluded from some federal legislative definitions of animals, with only about 1% of the animals used in research in the United States currently protected by legislation.

Pepto Bismol’s “Turducken”

December 15, 2011

 – – A turducken by definition is a boned turkey stuffed with a boned duck that is itself stuffed with a small boned chicken which sometimes also contains a breadcrumb or sausage meat stuffing!   It is perhaps a commentary on western society that with starvation still rampant in the third world and even parts of the west, a way has been  found to combine and consume the flesh of three (perhaps four) animals simultaneously, but we’ll leave such musings to the philosophers…perhaps such could be considered at the next Republican debate, which might prove amusing…

Governor Perry:  “If one of them things comes near me, I’ll shoot it and eat it myself!”

…but for our purposes, we are left to consider what a mythical creature such as a turducken might actually look like, and Pepto Bismol has come to our rescue here in both gastric and  imaginative terms!  The Smoke & Mirrors design, animation and VFX studio created a vision of the turducken that combined the green-hued head, beak, and webbed feet of the mallard duck with the comb and wattle of a chicken and the wings and tail feather configuration of a turkey.  The body incorporates a gradation of the feathering of all three animals. 

We may see the fruits of these creative efforts in the latest Pepto Bismol commercial, where we are shown a flock(?) of the mighty turducken as they move in a great tide over the plains!  The creature might be a natural for an animated kiddie series…

Cabela’s “Big Game Hunter” Buck

December 13, 2011

 – – I don’t like hunting, even in its video game incarnations since the goal is killing the most helpless, majestic animal that you possibly can.  The commercials for the PS3 version of the product, however, are a hoot, featuring as they do a sentient and articulate buck who sits on the couch while playing the game and winging comments at his human host as he does so.  In one commercial version (not depicted) the buck even mocks an outrageous sweater that the host is wearing!

While it’s arguably creepy that a deer would be depicted killing other animals including his own kind, perhaps he’s just imitating his human models…and I’ll take as much of a deer trash-talking humans as I can get!

Female Lycanthropes…

December 9, 2011

 – -Males tend to dominate the werewolf world, but accounts of female werewolves do exist and are noteworthy!  One such tale takes place in the Fichtel Mountains of Germany, where in the 18th century a local shepherd hired a hunter to kill a strange, huge wolf which had been devouring lambs in his flock…

…well, the marksman supposedly located and fired upon the creature, and although at least one hit the predator head on, the bullets had no apparent effect!  The plot thickened when the shepherd the next day observed an old woman long suspected of practicing witchcraft hobbling down the street as if wounded!  The shepherd deduced that the witchy woman was a female werewolf who would transmogrify herself into a large wolf at night to attack his sheep.  The shepherd reported the woman to local authorities who arrested her and chained her to the floor of a prison cell, Miranda rights being unknown in the 18th century.  The resourceful werewolf had vanished, however, when authorities went to question her the next day!

Two nights later, the shepherd was again out in the woods with the hunter looking for the shapeshifting witch when she obligingly sprung at them!  Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on whose side you’re on, the hunter had in his possession a silver knife with which he slashed at the poor lycanthrope,  causing her great pain and to writhe on the ground in agony where she morphed into the human form of the old witch, proof positive that she had been a female werewolf!

Since such things seldom end well for those of the furry persuasion, the wolfy witchy was buried 20 feet deep (“that oughta hold her!”) in a grave topped with what is now called the Wolfstone cross, erected in the hopes of sanctifying the location and containing the evil…

…but to this day, locals claim that eerie phenomena such as spectral lights are seen near that accursed site…ahahahahaha!

Pliocene Park?

December 7, 2011

 – – I dunno if it will sound like Ray Romano in Ice Age, but Japanese and Russian scientists are working to bring back woolly mammoths via a cloning process within five years!   ‘Ya see, a mammoth thigh bone was found under permafrost soil in Siberia with its marrow in unusually well preserved condition, and a Russian/Japanese team will seek to recreate the mammoth using DNA taken from the marrow that is then put into the nuclei of eggs cells of common elephants.  Embryos so obtained would then be implanted into elephant wombs to be delivered.  Since the two species are close relatives, scientists are not foreseeing many complications.

Despite the usual cries of science running amok, this is very cool technology and an exciting prospect!

Doomsday Reprieve?

December 4, 2011

 – – Alright, it looks like you may be able to relax a bit on December 21, 2012 after all!   That was supposedly the date when the Mayan Long Count calendar ran out, and all heck was supposed to break loose, culminating in the end of the world as we know it or hopefully at least of Facebook

Anyways, never mind!  A revisionist Mayan archaeology expert,  Sven Gronemeyer, says that his interpretation of certain hieroglyphs on a 1,300 year old  stone tablet found at Tortuguero in the Mexican province of Tabasco indicates that the 12/21/2012 date indicates the reappearance on Earth of the Mayan god of creation and war, Bolon Yokte, who will usher in a new  era on the planet, but not necessarily a destructive one.

That’s certainly a load off my mind!  I plan on putting together a nice fruit basket for the returning god, and then maybe we can organize a friendly soccer game or something…

Fox Guarding the Chicken House?

December 2, 2011

 – – People are forever saying don’t let the fox guard the chicken house, presuming that if such occurs we are going to eat our charges.  Not all foxes like to eat chicken, however, I myself greatly preferring pizza, cheese steaks, Chinese food, or even a nice peanut butter and jelly sandwich!  The notion that mayhem will ensue when a fox guards a hen house is just another of those vicious stereotypes, and you know that we all are subject to them in some way, shape, or form…tell me about it!

What then usually happens when a fox guards a hen house? – -Well, we often wind up playing board games, usually simple ones as chickens are relatively mundane creatures not celebrated for their intellect.  I also find that I occasionally have to let the chickens win at the games lest they become unduly frustrated, and then I’ll have to listen to their knock-knock jokes, or something equally abhorrent!

…now you know, and perhaps one of you will be kind enough to send in a relief for me the next time that I’m called upon to guard a chicken house…it’s really no picnic!