Just a couple of stories that came across my desk that I thought were interesting.
In Northern California near the town of Fort Bragg a dead blue whale has come ashore. Sadly it appears that the noble creature was struck by a ship that was mapping the ocean floor. It does not appear that the ship was to blame, the odds of such a collision happening are pretty small and it is sadly just something that happens. The whale normally lives much further off the coast and so this kind of incident is luckily rare.
The problem now however is what to do with the whale. It is 70 feet long and weighs in somewhere around 50 tons (or 100,000 pounds). The animal is located in a cove that is not very easy to access. A few students from Humboldt University have managed to make it down to examine the scene but there is not really any way to remove the body.
Attempts in the past to dispose of carcasses with explosives have, to say the least, turned out badly.
This means the whale will continue to rot for the next 3-6 months. There are a number of very expensive homes located on the cliff above the scene and they will be spending the Christmas season with an odor that we can only imagine.
On that theme, consider what the smell is like when you have a dead mouse in your garage ? That’s a pretty nasty odor and the average mouse weighs perhaps 8 ounces, maybe a pound. Thus this spell could be 100,000 times as strong.
Not pleasant.
In the category of people who ought to be made to clean up the mess is a story out of Davis, California. This story is not being covered so my ability to give details is a little more limited, but I heard it on the radio from people who were there at the time.
A student on the JV volleyball team missed a team practice. As is the common rule she was told that because she missed practice she would not be starting in the next game. After the game had been going for a while she was allowed to play and did pretty well.
But her Mom was not pleased that her precious one didn’t get to play so she confronted the coach, a 20 year old volunteer college student. The coach explained why she didn’t start the player and suggested that if the Mom still was unhappy she could talk to the Athletic Director and that she (the coach) would be happy to abide by any decision.
That wasn’t enough and so now the dad jumped in and started screaming at the coach, calling her names that really don’t belong in mixed company. The man is described as being quite large and ‘scary looking’. As it turns out the coach’s dad was also there and he didn’t take well to his child being attacked.
So he asked the dad to calm down, tried to tell him that it wasn’t the time or place.
Team player’s dad responded by beating the man into unconsciousness. Many in the room thought he had killed the man over a volleyball game. Word is that the victim will survive and that charges are likely against the attacker.
Now I understand getting into the game and wanting to defend your child. But rules are rules and there is no excuse for physical violence in a situation like this.