That's Gneiss! #168 ~ Roadside attractions: gators, bunnies, and giant prairie dogs
Plus: Trumpton riots
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Hello friends,
Another high-stress week is behind us. As I’m writing this newsletter today I keep heading off on tangents and down rabbit-holes or hitting dead ends that have me turning back - thus the late arrival to your inbox.
Let’s talk about roadside attractions today!
Every weekday morning part of my routine is taking a look at an email from The Nib, a website that curates the work of many comics artists. I look forward to seeing what might show up as I like to start each day with a bit of humor. This week’s fare included this one by Elizabeth Haidle:
Touring America’s Beastly Roadside Attractions
I thought it would be fun to do a bit of armchair traveling to some of the locations she writes about. Fasten your seatbelts…
First stop!
Colorado Gators Reptile Park
Mosca, CO
The park started out as a Tilapia farm, taking advantage of geothermal resources in the area.
In 1977 they purchased the 80 acre farm that is now Colorado Gators Reptile Park. It wasn’t until 1987 that they purchased 100 baby alligators to dispose of dead fish and the remains of filleted fish.
Those baby gators grew quickly in the warm geothermal water (87° F) and the locals wanted to see them, so we opened to the public in 1990. Soon we were in the spotlight of many media programs and articles. Individuals with overgrown alligators and other reptiles such as large pythons, tortoises, iguanas, and more started dropping them off with us.
The next thing you know, they’re offering reptile handling and gator wrestling classes! You too can earn your “Certificate of Insanity” if you complete the 8-footer level. Not to fear - the owners use these classes to inspect the gators for injuries because the gators apparently don’t always get along with each other. You’re helping! And yes, gators do just fine in the snow when the water is warm.
The next stop on our journey takes us to California.
The Bunny Museum - “The Hoppiest Place in the World”
Altadena, CA
Sadly, the Bunny Museum is hurting due to the pandemic shutdowns. In better times, you can visit the museum and see its collection of over 40,000 bunny objects. Here are a few peeks from the Atlas Obscura article about the museum.
Good lord.
Your job: count and catalog the bunnies.
I think I’ve seen enough. Let’s see if we can figure out what’s up with the giant rodent, which according to the comic was closed to the public several years ago.
The World’s Largest Prairie Dog
Badlands Ranch Store, South Dakota
This giant fella is 12 feet and 6-tons of prairie dog fun, located just outside the Badlands - WHYYYY did we not see this on our 2007 trip to South Dakota? I suppose we were not in the right area. Too bad, it would have been a fun stop.
What a handsome pink and yella’ fella.
But wait! I think the location referenced in the comic is not the the Badlands Ranch Store!
Prairie Dog Town
Oakley, KS
Folks, we’ve got a problem here. One that’s typical amongst roadside attraction proprietors who claim they have the world’s largest [fill in the blank].
Do they? Do they really?
Somebody is lying.
The Kansas giant prairie dog claims to be 4-tons. That’s a shade smaller than the South Dakota prairie dog (if their claim of 6-tons is accurate). The Kansas prairie dog also claims to be a prairie dog, which is a completely different issue.
The Kansas Prairie Dog Town did indeed close in 2014, so it’s definitely the attraction mentioned in the comic. Michael is pretty sure he stopped there on a cross-country trip long ago - he remembers the 5-legged live cow. Or maybe it was the 6-legged live cow. There were cows with extra legs.
I’m just disappointed I’ll never be able to visit both places to see which one is truly the largest. I think my next career will be driving around to every roadside attraction I can find and verifying their claims of superior size.
Until travel is safe again, I’ll just keep enjoying them from afar. Do you have a favorite roadside attraction?
Tidbits
COVID Relief for Wild Koh Kong Project, Cambodia - Nolan is doing some fundraising to support an indigenous-owned environmental non-profit organization (and hoping he’ll be able to get back to Cambodia this year for more botanical research)
Newsletters you may enjoy…
An Irritable Métis - Chris La Tray writes thoughtful essays, and is sometimes irritable
On the Commons - Antonia Malchik writes about walking, and other things
Field Notes - Christopher Brown writes about urban nature in Texas
Wild Life - Amy Jean Porter shares her art and writes about the common animals around us
Harold, America’s Cat - he’s a cat
Making: I’ve been doing all sorts of artsy things, a little something every day. Here’s a sneak peek at something I’m working on a little bit at a time.
Reading: This week I finished A Children’s Bible - an apocalyptic tale of a group of kids left to their own devices as a giant storm descends upon their summer vacation. Not too shabby, but there was a section that hit a little too close to home with current events. Still recommend! I also finished Print/Maker from UPPERCASE, and ordered two more books in the Encyclopedia of Inspiration series. Next up: Moss by Klaus Modick, and I’ve also started Libra by Don Delillo.
Art Zone
Here’s the dead end I mentioned. I was planning to share a particular artist with you, but the more I looked at his work the less I liked it. Oh well. I’ll share the work of Amy Jean Porter instead! I recently subscribed to her newsletter Wild Life, in which she writes about a variety of common animals. She is also the author/illlustrator of several books, some of which you may be familiar with. Fungipedia!
After looking at the work of the other unnamed artist, I’m feeling much better with Amy Jean’s work. The other art had a lot of animals, but the proportions on many of the works were off and I was left feeling somewhat disturbed. I like weird art, but that was just bad art.
Anyhow, here we are with Amy Jean and her menagerie! Here’s an opposum.
Opossums will gnaw on the bones of dead animals for calcium. They are an important part of nature's clean-up crew and are beneficial creatures as far as humans are concerned. They also eat thousands of ticks. Their long fur acts like a broom, sweeping up ticks from the grass. As they groom themselves (like house cats), opossums pick the bugs out of their fur and eat them up. It's a handy system.
Hello little brown bat.
Ahhhh, I feel better now.
You can see more of Amy Jean’s work on her website and her Instagram.
Videos of the Week
This song popped up here yesterday and we were getting quite a chuckle. On any day, Half Man Half Biscuit’s songs are brilliant satire of British culture and celebrities. Even if you’re not up on the daily details, their songs are quite catchy. An excellent entry into their work is Joy Division Oven Gloves. Having a knowledgable guide to their music makes it that much better.
Michael explained the backstory of this song - Trumpton is an imaginary place from a series called Watch with Mother, the long-running BBC children’s program. Aimed at the preschool audience,
The choice of Watch with Mother for the title of the series was intended "to deflect fears that television might become a nursemaid to children and encourage ‘bad mothering’" (source).
The Trumptonshire Trilogy aired from 1966-68. Like many other shows of the time, it was filmed with stop-motion animation. Watching today, there’s a certain creepiness to these older programs for children.
Back to HMHB’s song.
Released in 1986, “The Trumpton Riots” imagines a violent uprising in the quiet country of Trumptonshire, from the BBC children’s TV series Camberwick Green (1966), Trumpton (1967) and Chigley (1969).
You’ll surely want to sing along - here are the lyrics!
To help visualize what the Trumpton riots might look like, here’s some clips from the original shows with characters mentioned in the song.
Enjoy!
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