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The insomnia was in rare form last night. This wasn't "I'm just not tired" or "oh no brain hamsters." This was sensory amplification. The touch of the bedding, the sound of my breathing—every tiny sensation was dialed up to the "RRNK RRNK RRNK" of an alarm clock.
It wouldn't have been so bad if I'd had "not tired" and "brain hamsters" along with it, because then I take that energy and put the brain hamsters to work.
Per the previous tweet, RARE FORM. It was the truly useless insomnia.
Per the previous tweet, RARE FORM. It was the truly useless insomnia.
So I watched a Nat Geo thing on Hulu: "The Killer Whale That Ate Jaws."
Poorly titled. It was MULTIPLE killer whales, and all they were eating was the livers of their Great White Victims.
Poorly titled. It was MULTIPLE killer whales, and all they were eating was the livers of their Great White Victims.
I did have enough brain to get frustrated at the scientist who called the event "unprecedented." Like, "we just happened to see a thing, and because we'd never seen it before, we assume this is the only time its ever happened in the history of marine alpha predators."
(2020 may have ruined that word for me. And y'know what? Current events ruining a word is NOT WITHOUT PRECEDENT.)
Anyway, the tl;dr on Orcas vs Jaws: orcas have big, mammalian brains, they learned to put a GWS to sleep by turning it onto its back and pinning it there for a few minutes (easy work for two orcas.) Then? They eat the liver, and dump the rest.
May sound wasteful, but white shark liver makes up around 1/3rd of the mass of the shark, is LOADED with nutrients, and is easy to eat. The rest of the shark is scaly and chewy and hard to get at.
I identify with the wasteful laziness of the orcas.
I identify with the wasteful laziness of the orcas.
Oh, and the rest of the white sharks in the area? They VANISH within a day of the observed liverectomies. They may not have mammalian brains, but they can tell when they're being predated upon, and (as we learned after tagging them) they get THOUSANDS OF MILES out of Dodge City.
The winners in this nightmare scenario?
The seals. The orcas are not as good at hunting seals as the sharks are, so by scaring all the sharks away during mob-o-seals-on-a-tiny-island season the orcas probably save dozens of seals from being eaten.
The seals. The orcas are not as good at hunting seals as the sharks are, so by scaring all the sharks away during mob-o-seals-on-a-tiny-island season the orcas probably save dozens of seals from being eaten.
