Today’s assortment of shark (& shark related news):
16-year-old spots white shark off La Jolla
Fatal Shark Attack in New Zealand
The cookie cutter shark strikes again
Day 106 10/16/13: Halloween, Jaws & Me
Halloween, that most sublime of all holidays, is nearly here. These annual round-ups of the creepiest and freakiest (from the primitive, rural corn assassins to the nadir of 70s mass culture), always remind me of my **favorite costume ever… JAWS.
I remember marching in the humble 3rd grade Halloween parade around the leaf-strewn New Hampshire schoolyard, and sweating that cold, creepy perspiration that happens only inside a flimsy Halloween mask. Despite how superior I felt to the rag-tag assortment of (other) dime-store cheapies and shoe polish hobos, a stubborn confusion haunted me.
I wanted nothing more to BE the shark, and yet technically, since I was peering out of eye holes in the shark mouth I felt more like a dismembered Jonah, trapped inside the so-called “massive gullet.” My young body, clad in that odd hospital gown, became a walking billboard for the movie, rather than some crude approximation of a shark’s body.
Alas, communion with one’s beloved is seldom easy.
**(besides a spare, but evocative turn as Yoko Ono, (circa 2003), and a truly inventive Woodsy Owl (2007).
Day 112 10/15/13: Endangered Sharks & Disappearing Moose
English: A timeline of the largest mass extinctions on Earth in the past 500 million years. Made using the numbers at Extinction event (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
At my writing class today, a wonderful woman who knew that I write about sharks, said I ought to find out why the moose are disappearing, which led us both to remark on extraordinary fact that we are living through a mass extinction that, in day to day life, few people really talk about.
Here’s a gesture against forgetting:
Although CITES granted protection for hammerheads, manta rays, white tips and porbeagles, five countries (Japan, Iceland, Denmark, Yemen and Guyana) still refuse to recognize these treaties.
Please sign this petition to ask President Obama to apply sanctions against these countries.
Related articles
- Moose die-off: 100,000 ticks on just one moose, is Lyme disease culprit? (sott.net)
- Moose Die-Off Alarms Scientists (nytimes.com)
Spiritual Awakening
Day 111 10/14/13: Not So Mindless: Inside the White Shark Brain
Great white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) off South Africa (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I wanted to call this entry “God don’t make Junque” but I felt the reference might be too obscure. Still, I feel compelled to tell you that the late 1970s often return to me in a blur of tote bag inscriptions: Le Bag. Le Junk. Le Junque. (This was also the era of Le Car). Sometimes I crave the simple, homely popular humor of that era, but mostly I remember how stupid it all was.
(Strenuous transition to shark-related subjects)
The white shark, however, is not stupid.
After watching the great white dissection movie, I wanted to know more about the shark brain and found this fascinating article on white shark intelligence.
ENJOY!
P.S. This isn’t related, but it is FABULOUS…..
Related articles
- Seal balances on great white shark’s nose to escape jaws (grindtv.com)
Day 110: 10/13/13: Five Fascinating Shark Distractions
Great white shark (Photo credit: 126 Club)
I got a little distracted while correcting papers:
1. Check out this video of white sharks feeding on a dead whale near Anacapa Island.
2. Make a cup of cocoa and curl up with the latest Pacific Coast breathings, attacks and other shark encounters here.
3. Read the story of an Australian diver who survived his second shark attack in 10 years.
4. Behold gorgeous underwater images of a wily sea lion teasing a white shark near Guadalupe Island.
5. Ethics, Activism and Appetite: Read David Shiffman’s controversial “shark buffet” post on Southern Fried Science. Click here to read Shiffman’s later apology.
And the Winner of the Breaching Competition is….
Day 109: 10/12/13: Shark Coffins & Doomed Stuffed Animals
These innovative creations are a welcome break from correcting a batch of opaque papers on sharks and fear.
I like the spare yet surreal look of this art show, but I LOVE that it’s
happening in Shanghai!!
Check out Banksy’s “Sirens of the Lambs,” a sad and weird traveling piece on animals
slaughtered for food.
Fish Ham: Just Like Mother Used to Make
Do you think that going vegan means the end to traditional foods rich in flavor and in memory? Before you jump ship, try a tender slice of this new spin on a traditional favorite.
Day 108 10/11/13: Shark Fins for Vegans
My friend Renee & I went to check out the new Viva La Vegan store in Santa Monica.
I spotted this immediately:
While I applaud the non-animal alternative, even the vegetarian version of shark fin sort of creeps me out. Fortune was with us, as Viva La Vegan offered an array of extremely delicious samples from quiche, pad Thai, salad, pizza, and coconut and kale chips and lovely Japanese ice tea sweetened with tapioca. Amid the typical things like crystal rock deodorant I found odd products like gluten-free ice cream cones, every sort of fake meat product (see above) and vegan hobby glue so that enlightened crafts people don’t have to assemble popsicle stick houses with hoof-based adhesive. The vegan donuts imported from Las Vegas looked amazing, but too much sugar sends me on a melancholy bender, so I abstained. Wandering the specialized aisles, I wondered if vegan children might be humiliated and beaten at school if anyone discovered (or smelled) their “blue algae nut butter” and jelly sandwich.
After eating until we were swollen, Renee and I headed to the beach. An hour passed effortlessly. I’m truly blessed to have friends willing to help me pick up trash. (thank you all). We walked along the sun-drenched beach collecting cigarette butts, old balloons, and a stubby pencil that read PROTECT OUR COASTS AND OCEANS, we exchanged ghost stories. Renee paused to draw in a map of her grandmother’s house in the sand, indicating with her big toe a hallway down which she’d seen a mysterious man pass by. I mentioned the figure of a fog-colored boy I’d seen in Massachusetts. We found an abandoned sand castle with a drawbridge made of driftwood. Everything felt immediate and far off.
A day rich in companionship and natural beauty makes me feel more generous and even the abandoned, half-buried plastic cup decorated with children and animals that urged the drinker to Respect Nature seemed, however ironic, at least somehow well-intentioned.
Shark Dreams 