Duckies!

[mariness]

So last night our class trooped in ready to learn more Fascinating Facts About Marine Viruses, this time from a kindly scientist who works at Miami-Dade County's Department of Environmental Resources Management. One might immediately assume that Miami-Dade, of all places, has little to tell anyone about how to manage environmental resources,

Comments

[simplykathryn]

He obviously doesn't have the right kind of rubber ducky...

[mariness]

Perhaps I should encourage him to start creating protocols, with statistics to back them up, that would allow him to identify Evil and Not Evil Rubber Duckies, perhaps depending upon vibration abilities and rates.

[simplykathryn]

You know, I'm sure there's a government grant out there just waiting for a submission...

[mariness]

It does sound like a classic dissertation topic, doesn't it?

[malterre]

I have to say that I'm now looking at my vibrating rubber ducky in an entirely new way.

*head in my hands laughing quietly at my desk.*

[mariness]

You've come to understand your own rubber ducky feelings through this post, haven't you?

[stevenglassman]

You have heard the March of the Sinister Ducks, haven't you?

[mariness]

Not yet -- but I'll have to wait until I get back to the lab at the oceanographic center to hear this one.

[call_me_robert]

"small businesses notorious for 1) working illegally 2) not particularly interested in following environmental lawas."

I hate to say, but I have to sympathize with those small businesses. My mother always tried to teach me that you shouldn't go following strangers, or strange things, which I feel fairly certain would describe environmental lawas. Environmental lawas sound friendlier than industrial lawas, or feral lawas, but still...they're lawas, and that makes them freaky and strange and not something I'd feel comfortable following.

[mariness]

Environmental lawa (Environmentus lawasisThese skinny green and somewhat slimy creatures inhabit various parts of the United States and other countries; their numbers, general fitness, and habitat will greatly vary depending upon location. For the most part, lawas inhabit dusty courthouses and legal firms, but have been known to take up residence in some of the more enlightened lobbying groups -- that is, professional consultants! So sorry! We return to the correct terminology immediately!. They are apparently completely absent from the United States Department of Commerce, this oddly given that the Department of Commerce supervises NOAA, responsible for many ocean environmental supervisory and research activities. They were once numerous in the United States Department of Interior, but the last four years has put tremendous stress on the lawas population there, and their future survival in this habitat is considered precarious at best

[call_me_robert]

...and thus, my love for you is reaffirmed...

[mariness]

And here you were claiming that you hated everybody.

[mr_perker]

The recent New Yorker article on avian flu also had a part in it about how it is particularly evil that the flu has spread to ducks, as ducks (a) carry human flu viruses, and (b) travel around all over the place. Truly, they are surprisingly evil.

[mariness]

It's actually one of the major reasons Miami-Dade gets so excited about ducks; ducks pollute waterways that seep through the groundwater system which supplies the municipal drinking water. The bacterial counts from a duck-infested lake are shocking.

[mr_perker]

Here we have geese more than ducks - it makes me wonder what the geese are doing to the pond near my house.

Shit. Baby crying. So much for getting our taxes done today.

[mariness]

We have geese here, too, but not quite as many geese as ducks, and they do tend to fly up your way in the summer, unlike the ducks. Mean birds, geese.

And at least you have a better excuse for not getting your taxes done than I do.