cowcod's Journal

Boredom has taken on a whole new meaning. Such is my fate that I am reduced to conversing with invertebrates. And not just any invertebrate. Oh no, not for me the at least somewhat rarified rhetoric of the octopus or the glitzy, kitschy perambulations of the spot prawn. No, today circumstances forced me to endure the company of the rather bilious seastar that occupies the ceiling of my cave.

But for the calcareous ossicles in its exoskeleton, I would have eaten it long ago out of spite alone.

But it was not to be and so I found myself holding court with an animal lacking a brain, or even a fused ganglia that might masquerade as one. Yes, listening to the opaque maunderings of a creature within which resides but a diffuse nerve ring is a sponge of a different color, indeed.

Alright, I must admit to a certain fascination with this tubefooted individual as he spun yet another tale about the so-called "Dry World." This is a fabulous place, if the seastar is to believed, where creatures actually exist without being immersed in water. And some of these creatures are said to have the ability to enter our world and draw us into theirs. Well, this is clearly an impossibility, but it is a story that does afford a rather simple and harmless modicum of entertainment. And, if I might dip into superstition for just a moment, it does explain in a rather perverse way why there are so few of us left on this reef. Perhaps that is the reason I don't eat the seastar.

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