Monday, April 4, 2011

Animal Alphabet: A is for Anglerfish

Leave it to our cartoonist pal Ben Towle to light a fire under me and get me posting here on the blog again. Today he announced a new project that he and Rob Ullman are undertaking, to post weekly alphabetical animal cartoons. (Ben did an alpaca today, and Rob did an aardvark.)

I'm going to try to keep up. And since I know lots of peculiar creatures, I'm going to try to stick to the more bizarre corners of the bestiary.



Her tail's like a comb, and her teeth are a tangle;
She married a leech who does little but dangle;
She's a fish with a lure, and she'll teach you to angle.


If you don't know about the marital habits of the male anglerfish, you may not believe your eyes.

Here's to fifty-one twenty-five more weeks of weird animalia.

3 comments:

Mike said...

Not only that, but I find it hard to believe HIS eyes--that is, the eyes of the male anglerfish of the Ceratioid group if, as the text suggests, its eyes atrophy AFTER the brain (!) and the heart (!!).

I also don't believe your math. How is it "fifty-one more weeks of weird animalia" if this is a weekly project? Or are you using some sort of super-enlarged alphabet?

Anyhow, I am glad to see that, sure enough, thepanelists.org is not the death of this blog.

***
PS I just had a guest lecturer in class talk about the first page of the Sirens episode of Ulysses, which features the pun "Ah, lure! Alluring." So nice synchronicity, there.

Ben Towle said...

Fantastic to have you participating! Love the anglerfish. I may collect these all in one place before we get too far. Based on feedback from today's "opening volley" I'm betting there'll be more like 4 or 5 animals for "B."

Isaac said...

Okay, apparently not everyone is familiar with On Beyond Zebra.

I was somehow mixing up the alphabet and the calendar. Although I guess I could go around twice...