The Year of the Jellyfish

It's the New Year, and as we all look forward to our new and improved lives, pay vigorous attention to our resolutions, and intensely focus our efforts on altering our lifestyles (yeah right), there is one crucial detail that we should beware: the Jellyfish.

Watch out - they're going to get you!

The number of jellyfish in our oceans is rising (see news article here). I think they might take over the world. Scientists say it's just a cycle - every 20 years or so the number of jellyfish reaches a high - but I don't believe it. Maybe scientists are plotting to take over the world using jellyfish. Maybe the dolphins are about to launch a massive offensive against humans, as a test of which species' intelligence is really higher. Maybe the CIA is training jellyfish to carryout stealth missions against other countries. Maybe NASA is secretly imitating the way jellyfish move to create some sort of awesome spaceship... or are going to use jellyfish as spaceships. Or maybe aliens have tapped into the jellyfish mind and are going to use them to take over Earth.

I mean, imagine it - weird wobbly fish with the ability to zap you with magical poisonous lightning, increasing in population to the point that the ocean water just bubbles with their round little heads - and then they all suddenly ATTACK.

Perhaps 2013 will be the end of the world.

At any rate, here is my New Year's advice: don't get behind on your resolutions, and watch out for jellyfish!

*Picture from here.

Fish... or Alien?

Last week I went to the Boston Aquarium. It was amazing. Giant fish. Lobsters. Jellyfish. Sting rays. Turtles. Frogs. PENGUINS. Dragon fish. Sharks. Luckily, they were all safely contained, so I didn't get eaten. I did, however, get to touch a sting ray.

While I was there, I couldn't help but think about aliens. "Why?" you ask. 

Well, if you've ever been to an aquarium, you shouldn't have to ask why.

For starters, look at this fish: 

It's an Angler Fish.

Now look at this fish:

It's a Mexican Walking Fish. I found the name by Googling "creepy pink fish".

Now what do you get if you add together the Angler and the Mexican Walking Fish? This:

In real life it's a giant Isopod. In unreal life...

You wake up one morning and check the news. It won't work. You have no electricity. Your phone didn't charge and neither did your computer. So you do the next best thing: go find a living person. As you step outside, you notice that the sky is a strange pink, and it is darkening slowly into a blood red. Your neighbor sees you and begins to gesture frantically. You run over. He is watching a news report on the remaining battery life of his computer.

A giant cocoon, larger than any space ship or animal on earth, is plummeting through the sky. It lands gently in the Mojave desert where it is greeted by a team of UN special forces. The ship opens slowly and out crawl giant bugs, the size of elephants, with glowing white eyes and thick, pink crustacean shells...

All of a sudden, a swarm of tiny, thick-shelled bugs land outside your apartment. Apparently, they can fly. Flying fish. Oh good. Just what you always wanted.