cephalopods
pharyngula | January 14, 2011Phil and Kaja Foglio, the creators of Girl Genius, are giving away fabulous computer wallpapers for a donation this week. It's a squid attack!
As much as I like Agatha Heterodyne, I still see this as a representation of her last moments, just before the bespectacled squid gulps her down.
pharyngula | January 12, 2011…is an Octothrone.
This belongs in my house. Unfortunately, if you have to wonder how much it costs, you can't afford it.
(via Bioephemera)
pharyngula | January 6, 2011Unfortunately, it's learning the hard way, and I think it's a terminal lesson.
(via Don Strong via Ted Grosholz via Galen Leeds)
pharyngula | December 22, 2010By the slimy tentacles of Cthulhu, Cephalopodmas is here today, and I'm not prepared! I only got my grades submitted at 11:00 last night, and I slept in, and now I've got to get the tree up and drape it with squid and octopuses and do my cephalopodmas shopping, all at once. Why can't we have finals in like October, where they aren't tromping all over our holy sacred days?
pharyngula | December 13, 2010And look at this holiday cake:
What makes it look even more delicious is the thought that Bill Donohue would find it sacrilegious and in violation of his traditional American Christian iconography.
pharyngula | December 9, 2010OK, I bow to popular opinion: almost 100 people have sent me a link to this story about a prosthetic tentacle. It's a brilliant idea, but I don't know anyone who has lost a limb who would suggest that their prosthesis is even an adequate alternative. It's a little insensitive to swoon over one, then…but still, I like the idea of going outside the bounds of the human model to come up with a solution.
But I wouldn't be satisfied until it had full sensorimotor integration and color-changing technology.
pharyngula | December 6, 2010Bigtime cognitive dissonance here. This is a promotional video for an organization opposing the current predatory banking system, and what do they use to represent the evil banks? "A great vampire squid, wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnell into anything that smells like money."
I admire vampire squid, you know. Lovely creatures.
Also, vampire squid live in practically anoxic deep water environments, where metabolic activity is limited. They're also very soft and fragile. They really get a bad rep, and are much, much nicer than bankers.
By the way, this…
pharyngula | November 30, 2010These are a pair of movies made of a Loligo opalescens mating frenzy off the shores of La Jolla. Squid do everything with gusto.
Squid Run from David R. Andrew on Vimeo.
Squid Run at La Jolla Shores - Nov. 22, 2010 from Walter Chung on Vimeo.