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| Home > Random > Random thoughts on Penguins, Law Firms, and Bears... |
| Random thoughts on Penguins, Law Firms, and Bears... | | Date Created: Aug 09, 2005, 10:38 PM |
1) We saw March of the Penguins last night and it rocks. I've always loved penguins. The quiet dignity mixed with the complete silliness is endearing. The moment when the daddy penguin sings to his little baby penguin so they'll recognize each other when he returns was just too damn cute (and frakin' amazing.) If I could type in baby talk, I'd be doing it right now.
The precarious balance between these birds and the land they live on, and they ocean they feed in is amazing. But they are only just barely adapted for the conditions in which they live. Think about it....the whole reason that they walk so far inland before they mate is because, come spring time, the ice will have melted to within a couple hundred feet of their mating grounds. If they had misjudged it by half a mile, they'd all be in the big drink. Or, they'd have to waddle with their chicks on their feet half a mile father inland. That's a pretty delicate balance.
If there's a better argument against Intelligent Design (other than the existence of George W. Bush), I can't think of one. Evolution basically theorizes that a species is going to be just as adapted as it needs to be to its environment, but not much better. One would think that an Intelligent Designer would have designed penguins with solar cells, or retractable wings that actually help them fly, or wheels, or cannibalism, or something like that.
2) Considering that 9 months of their lives is involved in mating and caring for chicks, I now understand why all the penguins at the zoo just swam around and around and around in that big tank -- very fast. Even penguins have to work off sexual frustration, apparently.
3) Every day on the local NPR station, I have to hear an advertisement for a certain law firm. Now, I know that it's traditional to list the partners of the firm in the name. But really, in this case, I think something like "Legal Specialists, Inc." would have been better. The firm? "Harness, Dickey, and Pierce." The problem is that even in a different order: "Dickey, Pierce, and Harness" or "Pierce, Dickey, and Harness" it still sounds wrong. Only "Pierce, Harness, and Dickey" sounds even remotely OK, and that's still a stretch.
4) Watching people leave the theater after March of the Penguins was hilarious. It was like watching ... well ... it was like watching March of the Penguins.
5) As we left the theater, people were in line at the concession stand because 2001, which was playing in the other theater, was at intermission. All I could think of was Morgan Freeman saying something like, "And as one partner makes its long, silent journey for popcorn, the other is left to care for the seat. Soon, they will trade, and the seat will be cared for by the other partner...."
6) In a couple weeks, the penguins at the Michigan Theater will be replaced by bears. They're going to be showing a movie called "Grizzly Man," which sounded like a movie that would be very much fun indeed. Alas, it isn't that kind of movie. Instead, according to the theater's website the movie is "Director Werner Herzog’s devastating and heart-wrenching documentary about the life of Timothy Treadwell, an activist who thought he could live safely among the grizzly bears he studied in the Alaskan wilderness. Treadwell and his partner Amie Huguenard were eventually killed by one of the bears."
Um. Well then. Not quite a cheery as happy, silly penguins, I guess. Rarely do the happy, silly penguins eat the filmmakers. (Though, thousands of starving and cold Emperor penguins attacking the parka wearing, meat-filled filmmakers would have made for a truly riveting scene.) |
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