In 1973, after a student complained about the language in Slaughterhouse Five, the administration at Drake (N.D.) High School decided to take rather dramatic action (see above). When informed of what had been done to his creation, author Kurt Vonnegut responded in the appropriate manner: Vonnegut, asked for his reaction, said, “It’s grotesque and ridiculous. […]
Tags:books·censorship·Kurt Vonnegut·North Dakota·sharks·Slaughterhouse Five
I surely can’t be the only aquarium patron who, when confronted with a vast array of exotic sealife sealed behind glass, can only wonder how the largest of those captive animals was transported to their new homes. Sharks, of course, present special challenges, given their size and potential ferocity. And no shark species has proven […]
Tags:aquariums·Deep Blue Sea·hammerhead sharks·movies·sharks
Okay, so maybe our species doesn’t really kill 100 million sharks per year, as is so widely reported. But even if the true figure is closer to 26 million, that’s still a heckuva lot of fish—and far out of proportion to the number of humans who annually perish in shark attacks. Blame Jaws if you […]
A bit hectic today, as I’m packing and prepping for a trip out to my hometown of Los Angeles. Haven’t been out there since early 2006, before I added the Grand Empress and Microkhan Jr. to the fold. Should be interesting to see how I view the city that made me through a family man’s […]
Tags:Greenland shark·housekeeping·Inuits·Jaws·movies·mythology·sharks
It’s probably a bit of stretch to file 1999’s Deep Blue Sea under our ever-popular Bad Movie Friday heading. While the premise of the film could scarcely be more ridiculous—hyper-intelligent mako sharks?—the sunken-laboratory thriller is not without its guilty pleasures. Chief among them is this classic scene, which features Samuel L. Jackson at his edgy […]
Tags:animal attacks·Bad Movie Friday·Deep Blue Sea·movies·Now the Hell Will Start·Samuel L. Jackson·sharks
The holiday weekend’s just hours away, and we’re mighty spent from a long week of writing and tending to Microkhan Jr. So we’re gonna outsource this week’s Bad Movie Friday to the late Richard Jeni. His target? The egregiously awful Jaws: The Revenge (aka Jaws IV). As Jeni rightfully points out in his routine, there […]
Tags:aviation·Bad Movie Friday·Jaws IV·movies·Richard Jeni·sharks
The Australian Navy is hunting for the shark that recently mauled one of its more experienced divers. How will the Aussies know when they’ve found the real culprit, rather than just another shark? It ain’t easy.
