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A tiny, weeny WTF_Nature wank...
I was unsure whether to post this here or iwank, but I posted twice, once to LOL and once to say, "Dude, you're being really annoying", so I figure it might go better here. Right.

WTF_Nature is a super fun community on LJ devoted to the crazy shit nature comes up with. Freak storms. Animals we didn't know existed. Animals that do exist but mutate. If it's in nature, and it makes you go "WTF", it's in the comm.

Yesterday, writerspleasure decided to post about a species of goby in South African waters that has turned on its natural predator, the jellyfish, and made those squishy suckers into their dinner. A really interesting subject, full of fascinating ramifications for the local ecosystem in that area. For some reason, he brought in an Ayn Rand reference.

markslj is tired of this political bullshit.

Wank is soon in the waters once the first blood is shed.

pazi_ashfeather makes a comment on writerspleasure's behaviour.

Thing degenerate and get mighty personal after that, all while the both of them argue about Ayn Rand. I don't know why, but people arguing about Ayn Rand always makes me laugh.

So anyway, one minute you think it's over, but those crazy kids start up the argument again in another thread. Are the Bearded Gobys Libertarians or Bolsheviks? A question for the ages!

Ahhh... Ayn Rand. *chuckle* Tiny, to be sure, but like the Bearded Goby, kind of cute as well.

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	sistercoyote 2010-07-21 06:27 pm UTC (link)
	That should really be disturbing, but somehow I'm over here laughing. says the former rat-owner, who's thinking about getting more. Maybe. Snakes eat rats. It is what it is. Rats will eat snakes, given the chance. Also: Feeder rats and fancy rats are not exactly the same thing. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

platedlizard
2010-07-21 06:42 pm UTC (link)

Yeah, I was a rat-owner as a kid before I started volunteering there in high school, so it was a bit of cognitive dissonance for me to see these animal lovers chopping up dead rats. Mind, I knew what I was getting into before hand, hawks eat rodents after all. But it was still strange.

The finger-puppet thing was actually a coping-mechanism for some of the volunteers. A way of laughing at their own discomfort I think.

Also: Feeder rats and fancy rats are not exactly the same thing.

actually, they totally are. our trained rats came from the zoo's feeder-rat breeding program. sorry!

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sistercoyote
2010-07-21 06:58 pm UTC (link)

Don't apologize; you're right.

I dropped the word "exactly" in there because I know that some pet stores strongly differentiate (usually by price); but I also know that if I went in to one of those pet stores and purchased "feeder" rats (at the lower price) they would be the same in temperament and behavior as "fancy" rats. Heck, a friend of mine had two pet rats whose names were "Lunch" and "Dinner" that were feeder rats his snake refused to eat. :)

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	tofuknight 2010-07-23 12:44 pm UTC (link)
	My beloved pet rat came from a pet store feeder bin. shrug (Reply to this)(Parent)

napalmnacey
2010-07-22 12:39 am UTC (link)

I have rather a black humour about the rodents whose deaths I've had to deal with. Once we had a mice problem, so my brother and I set up traps in our rooms. We named the traps, mine was Jane Mansfield and his was... oh, the name of a WW2 pilot that got decapitated, I forget the name. The were both running tallies. It was so depressing a job, we needed the black humour to get through it. Cause mice, they're so fucking CUTE, you see. :(

Then there was the time that our old cat Melma, before she lost her teeth, pounced on a mouse in the kitchen and made short work of it. There was rather a creative mess of mouse bits left behind, so as a joke, I drew chalk outlines around them and took crime-scene photographs.

And then there was the times my cat Xena would artistically arrange the rejected rat pieces after she'd made a kill. One time, a rat's own back foot was sticking out of its ear like a moose antler. I had to photograph that too, it was ridiculous.

... Yes, I'm very strange.

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	sistercoyote 2010-07-22 01:09 am UTC (link)
	I think I would have had to take a picture of the rat in particular myself, because I'd know no one would believe me. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	napalmnacey 2010-07-22 01:38 am UTC (link)
	I went to fine art school, and I'm half German. I have a slightly perverse sense of humour when it comes to art. I thought it would have made a great installation piece with panels of dead animal, the piece de resistance being the shot of the rat with its own foot sticking out of its ear. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	artimusdin 2010-07-22 01:56 am UTC (link)
	... I think your sense of humor is rather awesome, myself. <3 (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	napalmnacey 2010-07-22 02:23 am UTC (link)
	Why, thank you! :) (Reply to this)(Parent)

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