observing the process will change it

Yikes, I'm obviously not cut out to keep up with this at this point. So I'll stall by posting a kitty.

How quickly I fall off the wagon.  Here's a pretty clam.

This is what happens when you drink over a gallon of beer and are up at four in the morning. 

Fish: 0 Evil Lobster: 2

This here is my crawfish.  She is very pretty, very active, and growing quite quickly.  She also enjoys slicing bitches up with her big ass claws.  At this point, I think I have to consider it a problem.  Now, it's not so much a monetary problem, this whole crawfish-eating-my-fish thing.  It's a freshwater tank, meaning I don't have a single fish that cost me more than ten bucks, so if one dies (or is murrrrdered), I don't really stress about it.  In fact, the first time it happened, I thought it was kind of neat.  Right before I left for the weekend, I noticed one of my Dwarf Gourami (this one, to be exact) wasn't looking too hot.  However, since he was still breathing, I couldn't bring myself to flush him.  When I got back, he was nowhere to be found, until I spotted some vertebrae on the bottom of the tank.  Pretty ominous, yet kinda neat, because the crawfish picked off a weak fish, as one would expect.
    So, this was all fascinating and nice, until yesterday when I woke up and found one of my favorite (and perfectly healthy) fish laying on the bottom of the tank with it's entrails spilled out.  The crawfish hadn't even tried to eat him.  It was a pure sport killing.
    Part of me enjoys the life and death drama of the aquarium as it is currently structured.  However, I think I am going to place the lobster into a tank of its own.  Apparently crawfish like mine can grow to be fine dining sized....they also apparently taste almost exactly like ocean lobster...maybe I'll just feed her lots of stupid, ugly fish.   And sticks of butter.  Or something.

    Thus far I've refrained from naming any of the fish, because like, they're fish and stuff.  But if anyone has a good name for this assassin crawfish, I'm taking suggestions.

Miniature Sheep

Look cuddly.

Much to my chagrin, this whole intelligent design bullshit doesn't seem to be going away, and in fact seems to be picking up steam recently in the media.  It has been discussed in a ridiculous fashion on Larry King, it made the cover of Time Magazine, and the New York Times has been doing a series of articles about the issue.  While it seems incredibly fucking obvious to me that this is a non-issue, no one in the mainstream media has the balls to call the intelligent design/creationist crowd what they are: ignorant, arrogant fools, who want to destroy science.

This issue drives me insane.  On the majority of issues that polarize society I can will myself to objectively look at the side I disagree with and try to find some minuscule aspect to such a view that makes it valid for those who hold it.  That's not possible on this issue because intelligent design/creation is absolutely fucking wrong.  Yet 54% of Americans believe humans did not develop from an earlier species, which is, you know, kinda what evolution is about.  So this issue makes me feel incredibly lonely and dispirited.  I value education, and above all, truth.  So many people have dedicated so much of their lives to science so the rest of us can gain insight into who we are, where we came from, and what our place is among all the life that has inhabited our planet over the last 3.5 billion years.  It truly bothers me that there are people in this day and age who would use large sums of money to subvert one of the greatest theories in science because they are so blindly devoted to a work of fiction.  Worse than that is how a majority of Americans believe that garbage.

So instead of me ranting, here are a few essays that handle the subject concisely (scroll down to Stephen Pinker's essay), eloquently, and with biting satire.

The picture is of one of my New Caledonian Crested Geckos (Rhacodactylus ciliatus).  Once thought to be extinct, it was rediscovered in the mid-nineties and is now a hobbyist favorite.  They are wily, like to hump, and eat baby food.  Just.  Like.  Me.

RIP Puffer Fish

It was a glorious two days little buddy.

I Suck at Titles

More underwater stuff because it makes me happy. These are many of the aptly named "upside down jelly", Cassiopeia xamachana, as seen at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

There is a new giant octopus exhibit at the aquarium it seems...I don't know about anyone else, but I think I'm more excited about this than I was for the great white. We should go. Soon.

This is an Orange Cup Coral, scientific name Tubastraea. It comes from my friend Jake's aquarium, which is but a mere fraction of his cornucopia of exotic animals. Now, I can take pictures of my cats all damn day long, but it will never satisfy me as much as getting a cool picture of shit underwater. Unless it's Thor doing this. Or this.

Sadly He Isn't Smoking a Hookah

Another sight from the aforementioned backyard. I remember the days when I would have kept my distance from something like this, positive it was going to jump on me and crawl all over me, with all of it's future offspring, for the rest of my entire life. It's nice that we outgrow these things. Even better though would have been if I understood as a kid that caterpillars are all like this, and really not at all like this.