Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Creepy crawlies in the news

(Or, "How I tied several unrelated news items together." But I digress. Ahem.)

So many new items have come out recently that have something to do with creepy crawly beasties, or remind me of them, that I'm weirded out by it all!

Speaking of being reminded of "them", actor James Whitmore passed away; he starred in the sci-fi movie classic Them, about gi-normous ants (gi-ants?). One of the most versatile of American character players, he is probably known by those under 40 for his part in the film The Shawshank Redemption, and for Them by older folks. (Whitmore was once asked by a young actor just what he had done, and he replied, "Well, I saved the world from giant ants once.")

And Lux Interior, lead singer of the band The Cramps, died. His most famous song was likely Human Fly, with clever lyrics like "I've got 96 tears and 96 eyes."

Then Bill Gates made the news recently for bugging people--literally. He was speaking at a conference on the need to stop the scourge of malaria, and released a swarm of mosquitoes into the room.

"Malaria is spread by mosquitoes. I brought some. Here, I'll let them roam around. There is no reason only poor people should be infected."

Gates waited a while before telling the audience that the mosquitoes were free of malaria. Even as a philanthropist now doing good work with his money, he's still an arrogant nerd (and still releasing bugs, only not ones of the virtual kind.)

And finally, the fossilized bones of a long-extinct gigantic snake (bigger than the one seen in the movie Anaconda), was discovered. This species was so gargantuan it could have eaten people--if any had been around then. Almost too bad Gates wasn't.

And if all the above wasn't enough to weird me out, creepy, crawling Rod Blagojevich called me, wanting to be interviewed! Boy, he is desperate! ' Course, I turned him down. I won't talk to man who has ten time more hair on his head than I do.



Related old weird animal news: A RODENT AS BIG AS A BULL


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