Oct 08 2011

Anti-Caturday post

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It’s no contest. The sea pig has everything a mere cat lacks: it’s cute and adorable, it’s pink, and it’s got tentacles. Once you’ve gone holothurian, you’ll never go…uh, I’m sure the local poet will be along to provide a catchy rhyme.

(Also on Sb)

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32 comments

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1

Zeno

8 October 2011 at 1:39 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

The sea pig is one day late for Garbanzo Day!
2

abadidea

8 October 2011 at 1:51 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

The closest rhyme I can think of is Epicurean.
3

ChasCPeterson

8 October 2011 at 2:00 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Why, I was just extolling the many virtues of the sea-pig yesterday in class. What could be cooler than a bilaterally symmetrical motile animal with radially symmetrical sessile ancestors with bilaterally symmetrical motile ancestors with possibly-radially-symmetrical sessile ancestors? They have reinvented walking legs. Essentially scaled-up tardigrades without the exoskeleton. So, so cool.

Almost as cool as yer pelagic swimming sea cukes.
4

Father Ogvorbis: It's Good for You. It Builds Character

8 October 2011 at 2:00 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

The closest rhyme I can think of is Epicurean.

Golgafrinchian?
5

Cuttlefish

8 October 2011 at 2:03 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

An adventuresome, bold Epicurean
Thought he’d whip up some friend holothurian
His attempts, though, at makin’
Delicious sea-bacon
All failed. So sea-pigs, stop worryin’
6

abadidea

8 October 2011 at 2:19 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Honored to have been of assistance, Mr. Cuttlefish, but would sea-pig count as one of those excessive delicacies Epicureans are admonished to avoid? :)
7

Viva

8 October 2011 at 2:53 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

You know, that thing made me think of the burgess shale fossil hallucigenia. that is a good thing! Fossilized animals are cute by definition. Especially ordovician sea scorpions.
8

tushcloots

8 October 2011 at 3:05 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Sea pigs don’t piss on everything, either.
How to stop cats pissing on your car
9

Baktru

8 October 2011 at 3:11 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Meh not too impressed by the sea pigs. Sea Angels however are kind of cute:
10

Defaithed

8 October 2011 at 3:25 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

While I tapped at a text editor, Cuttlefish beat me to the poem. Here’s my attempt anyway:

==
Ode to Eating Sea Cuke

Just stop your worryin’
and go holothurian;
the texture is burry ‘n’
nice.

It’s no worse than durian;
a true Epicurean
eats them with curry ‘n’
rice.
==

Ahem. Sorry, I guess I’ll leave it to the pros. But for the record, I have eaten raw sea cucumber, smothered in hot sauce, at a Korean restaurant (and dang it if “Korean” doesn’t *almost* make for a good additional rhyme…).

Mmm, rubbery stuff. Not as crunchy as jellyfish.
11

llewelly

8 October 2011 at 3:25 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Cuttlefish | 8 October 2011 at 2:03 pm:

An adventuresome, bold Epicurean
Thought he’d whip up some friend holothurian
His attempts, though, at makin’
Delicious sea-bacon
All failed. So sea-pigs, stop worryin’

(Emphasis mine.)
Er, friend?
“Adventuresome, bold Epicurean” tried to cook a friend?
I’ve heard tell of people cannibalizing a fellow raftmate when lost far out to sea, or a fellow pioneer when trapped by deep snow in the Sierra Nevada mountains, but eating a friend for the sake of “adventure”?
12

Brian

8 October 2011 at 3:39 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Perhaps in his haste, Cuttlefish was too fried to properly spell-check his post.
13

RFW

8 October 2011 at 3:52 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

The French composer Erik Satie wrote Embryons desséchés (“Desiccated embryos”), a suite of three short pieces for piano. The first is D’Holothurie, “Desiccated embryo of a Holothurian.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK2PfFtQPWM

Music to stroke your pet cephalopod or holothurian by.
14

Glen Davidson

8 October 2011 at 4:00 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Wait until they become accessories for socialites like Paris Hilton

We’ll see them all over the place. Smaller and more convenient than a dog, and clammier too!

Glen Davidson
15

happiestsadist

8 October 2011 at 4:27 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Aww, they’re all pink and adorable!

I love the cat purring in my lap, but I kind of also want a sweet little sea pig in a tank.
16

Kent Damgaard

8 October 2011 at 6:52 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I don’t think Satie is right, this looks more like it needs some old Barry White tunes :)
17

CriticalDragon1177

8 October 2011 at 7:59 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

PZ Myers,

What is the point of these Anti-Caturday posts anyway? What does the word Caturday mean anyway?
18

'Tis Himself, OM

8 October 2011 at 8:12 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

But do sea pigs barf all over the bath mat, leaving a present for you to discover as you stumble barefoot towards the toilet at oh-dark-hundred?
19

dexitroboper

8 October 2011 at 8:56 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Caturday: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=caturday
20

Troy Britain

8 October 2011 at 10:29 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Wow, a deuterostome… Who are you and what have you done with P(‘protostome’)Z Myers?!
21

pj

8 October 2011 at 10:53 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

@CriticalDragon1177

Saturday is Caturday for cat lovers. There are three possibilities that I can think of for Anti-Caturday:

1) PZ opposes all cuteness
2) PZ tries to keep up his appearances as a baby-eating atheist internet overlord
3) it’s a willy-waving contest with non-blogger Jerry Coyne who has Caturday regularly in his non-blog Why Evolution Is True
22

CriticalDragon1177

8 October 2011 at 10:58 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Dexitroboper,

Oh so, Caturday, means funny pictures of cats? Interesting.
23

Tethys

8 October 2011 at 11:06 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment

um..I could very well be wrong but I think Caturday started on icanhascheezburger.com
24

vltava

9 October 2011 at 12:20 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Caturday, like most everything on the Net, started on 4chan.
25

John Morales

9 October 2011 at 12:37 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

pj, I can think of more.

(Your (1) is confuted by this very post, BTW)
26

pj

9 October 2011 at 12:54 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I admit I didn’t read the actual text this time. So anti-cuteness is refuted. Other possibilities:

- PZ hates cats (but it would shameful for a biologist to hate an entire species IMO)
- PZ wants to challenge fluffonormative views of cuteness

What do you have, John Morales?
27

Ragutis

9 October 2011 at 1:34 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Cute, but it’s no “Barry the worm”.
28

Katkinkate

9 October 2011 at 2:31 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Another alternative: PZ likes to be a contrarian. That’s not a problem though. I do myself at times. It’s quite fun. Does anyone know what the little swimming things are under the beastie?
29

John Morales

9 October 2011 at 2:53 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

pj,

What do you have, John Morales?

An unfettered imagination, and no need to speculate. :)
30

chimaera

9 October 2011 at 3:25 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Not all sea pigs are as cute as this one…
31

WMDKitty

9 October 2011 at 5:58 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

I just snatched your “anti-caturday” icon. Love it.
32

scotthatfield

11 October 2011 at 3:45 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment

Once you have gone holothurian,
You will desire no other friend.