Dear Media, Stop Covering Shark Derbies/Rodeos – National Oceans Month, Part 4.

This is how I like to see sharks – in the wild, doing shark-y things.

My favorite thing about shark pups is how they are more or less the same from the moment they are born to the day they die. There are, of course, important physiological and behavioral differences, but from an aesthetic point of view, they’re just… smaller (and dare I say, cute?).

This is how I do NOT like to see sharks (from the website BNQT, apparently associated with USA Today – and used under the Fair Use Doctrine):


Epic battle with giant thresher shark could be one for the record books

Oh, well if it’s “one for the record books”, this is totally OK.
Continue reading “Dear Media, Stop Covering Shark Derbies/Rodeos – National Oceans Month, Part 4.”

Your Mailbox: Paper AND Plastic – National Oceans Month, Part 3

“…the mail never stops. It just keeps coming and coming and coming. There’s never a let up – it’s relentless!  Every day it piles up more and more and more!  You gotta get it out, but then more you get it out, the more it keeps coming in!” – Newman, “Seinfeld”

Confession: I love the U.S. Postal Service.  There is no other service in the world like it.  You want to mail a letter from Nome, Alaska to Supai, Arizona? We’ve got snowmachines and a mule train ready to go and that’ll be $0.49, sir!  Forty-nine cents! You can’t buy a can of soda for that.  Plus…  have you seen these?


SHARK STAMPS.  I’ve got like 20 sheets of these – and since they are Forever stamps, it’s unlikely that I will EVER run out, barring an apocalypse of some kind, and even  then, we’ve got someone to handle the mail.
Continue reading “Your Mailbox: Paper AND Plastic – National Oceans Month, Part 3”

TJ Shope Would Like You to Do Something About Him Not Doing Anything – National Oceans Month, Part 2

Never read the comments.

So, I woke up in a pique and grabbed my phone and went onto Twitter and Facebook, as one does in the 21st Century at 3AM in the morning.   As the tides of fate would have it, I first saw this, tagged in a post by Sister Klute.


From the Huffington Post:

“A whale found in a canal in southern Thailand has died after eating more than 80 plastic bags, according to officials.

The small male pilot whale was barely alive when he was discovered on Monday in the southern province of Songkhla, Thailand’s Department of Marine and Coastal Resources said. Rescuers attempted to nurse the whale back to health, but he died on Friday after spitting up five plastic bags.

A necropsy revealed over 17 pounds of plastic, including more than 80 plastic bags, in the whale’s stomach.”
Continue reading “TJ Shope Would Like You to Do Something About Him Not Doing Anything – National Oceans Month, Part 2”

Of Presidents, Policy, and Faith – National Oceans Month, Part 1

It’s National Oceans Month here in the United States, but if you’re like me – every month is National Oceans Month!

What is National Oceans Month?  Well, it’s basically when the government acknowledges that while we may be a terrestrial species, we’re still at the mercy of the tides.  And as Chief Executive of the United States Government, the President is the one who dedicates us to the seas during this month of June.

The great orator and 35th president, John F. Kennedy, spoke of the sea in personal, human terms. I could quote him, but in this video, you can hear the man speak…


Continue reading “Of Presidents, Policy, and Faith – National Oceans Month, Part 1”