Category: Animals

Ocean Apes

July 26, 2019

It was our wedding anniversary the other day, and naturally I purchased KLS a gift. To be specific, this:

Just add water for beloved pets! Of course we’ve done these before (and maybe you have too since I’ve given some as gifts) but it’s been many years. But who can resist their own aquatic humanoid shrimpy friends?

Instructions were read:

Water added:

And waiting began:

Now we – and probably you – know that ‘sea monkeys’ are just a form of brine shrimp, and the first packet (the purifier) contains the actual (water activated) eggs with subsequent packets – including the one labeled as eggs – being just food for the little guys. So it wasn’t surprising when only one day after we added the supposed egg packet we saw our first pets!

They are shy and difficult to photograph, but I succeeded more or less in capturing images of two of the half dozen or so that have already joined our family. So with pomp and ceremony let me introduce:

That little guy (circled in red) is Emperor Titanus, aka first-among-monkeys. As the firstborn he is naturally the undisputed leader, and his reign has started off well although his fuse is short and I worry he tends toward authoritarianism. Luckily his more primal urges are kept in check by:

High-Ambassador Alkarab. Third-born he may have been, but he quickly established a seat next to the emperor and attends to matters of state whilst keeping the masses distracted. As his name suggests it seems his true loyalty rests with another colony somewhere, and I fear this distraction coupled with his many day-to-day obligations may make it hard for him to resist the machinations of the unnamed second-born who hides in the depths, whispering madly.

The colony increases daily, with the monkeys simultaneously growing in size. We’re on the edge of our seat watching the politics evolve, and waiting to see if the rumors of a prophet emerging from the proletariat come to pass.

Stay tuned…

Review: Aquaman

December 31, 2018

I went and saw Aquaman yesterday, at an impressively early 9:30 am screening. I momentarily baulked at the ticket price…

But then remembered that the film was going to be awesome and couldn’t throw my cash at the attendant fast enough!

The cinema was crazy big. I dutifully sat in my assigned seat (N-16) and when the projector started I was the only person in there! But then I noticed the first half hour or so were just adverts (including many social engineering PSA’s: exercise more, don’t stay in the sun, start a savings account, etc.) and sure enough the locals knowledgeable about such things shuffled in just before the main show.

Aquaman is about a fish-powered dude that fights a lot and seems to wish he was actually a professional wrestler. I’m not going to spoil the overall plot here but I’ll say it starts off strong and within minutes I was intrigued:

Aquaman’s powers are a cross between Superman and Yoda and are frankly absurd (why is he bulletproof?!?) but you won’t question them because after the crazy start the film quickly evolves into madness and then ascends into bonkers territory.

This was my face during the political scene between the aryan riding the zeuglodon and the Viking riding the dragon:

And then when they introduced a pretty redhead fish girl and the film briefly stopped being about fish and became Indiana Jones meets Jurassic Park I was slackjawed.

This was my face when the murlocs (from World of Warcraft) turned up:

But it wasn’t even close to done! When a futuristic city sequence that makes Blade Runner look like the scribblings of a child was followed by a space battle that featured not one, not 1000, not 1000000, but every fish I was just roaring at the screen with joy:

There’s much to love about the film. Its visuals and design are astonishing, its script unfettered by tradition, its actors unconstrained by expectation and it’s easily got the best depiction of cetacean armies fighting a billion crabs that have ever been printed to celluloid.

It makes you feel every emotion, from love to hate to glee and yes, to terror. It’s unfettered fun, and easily gets my highest recommendation. Best fish war film ever by a mile.

Immediately afterwards I languidly strolled over to the Game Center and found a coin-pusher machine:

I was so full of DC comics appreciation I had to win a card, and quickly targeted this Batman that was right at the edge:

As you can see it was about to drop! So close in fact that a shift of only one atom would have caused it to fall…

…

…it only cost me $25 to ‘win’ it 🙂

2018 in Photos

December 20, 2018

Distilling a year into ten photos is never easy, but this year was particularly tough. Furthermore whilst this post tends to prioritize vacation shots, that’s only because I’ve sorted them way better than the normal day-to-day photos, so there’s probably a few gems that should have been here that aren’t.

The year began, as it usually does, in Oz:

Bernard and I went on a lengthy road trip from the Southern Ocean all the way up to Newcastle and had a blast on the way. We even ran into notorious Australian terrorist Ned Kelly at one point:

In March KLS and I went to the city for the first of three trips this year. It was cold but fun, and we lived like the urbanites we are for a few days:

Our first international vacation was to Scotland, otherwise known as the prettiest country on Earth. This was one of those dream vacations we’ll never forget, and in our little car we saw the length and breadth of the highlands and hebrides islands and enjoyed one amazing day after another, like the puffins on Staffa:

Or the standing stones on Orkney:

Or even just eating fish’n’chips at the northernmost town in Great Britain:

During the summer Bernard and Lakshmi visited! Here we are deep in a dungeon:

We went on another vacation too. After a brief stop in Portland for Florence’s wedding (insert heart emoji here) we jetted off to Hawaii for fun in the sun… and a hurricane!

The first four days were beautiful and warm and sunny and we spent a lot of time at or on the beaches. But then this happened:

And next thing you know the beaches emptied and people wrote SOS in the sand:

As you know we were lucky and the storm dissolved before reaching us. But that was certainly an interesting and memorable experience, and one I don’t want to soon repeat!

I’ll end with a shot of my lovely friend Yossie, which just shows you don’t have to go to exotic places to take photos you’ll treasure forever:

So thats the year in a nutshell. A good one; a memorable one. I hope you enjoyed the blog in 2018.

What’s next? Well in a week I’ll be in Oz once again, and mid January I’ll be flying from Sydney to Tokyo where I’ll meet Bernard for a week of otaku madness. I think it’s safe to say there’ll certainly be some photos worth seeing here in the next few weeks…

Robot Claw