Local Wildlife Roundup

Watch out, animal-lovers! Here come some charismatic megafauna:

• Let's start with the good news (well, at least semi-good news). Last week, there were sightings of two different killer whale pods off the Bay Area coast. You can watch the news report here. Did you know that different Orca pods can choose to eat different types of food? As Wikipedia notes:
  

  specific populations show a high degree of specialization on particular prey species.

  One of the pods seen off the coast is a pod of salmon eaters; the other pod was seen killing harbor seals. This is good news because Fosco loves Orcas (he has a stuffed Orca named "Baby Shampu"). Sadly, however, this is bad news, because at least one of these pods is typically known to feed in the waters off Puget Sound and their appearance this far south suggests that food supplies are getting scarce.
  
• And now the bad news. According to this piece in the Santa Cruz Sentinel, "an assortment of factors suggests California's sea otter population is in decline." As you may have noticed, Fosco also adores sea otters. Sometimes I wish I could offer Oz's bathtub as an otter habitat.
  
• But one form of local wildlife is in full swing: roller girls. As in roller derby. This week, the Sentinel featured this slide show of a match(?) between the Santa Cruz Rollergirls and "the L.A. Derby Dolls Sirens." Although they are all interesting, Fosco's favorite picture is probably this one:
  
  I think this photo pretty much captures everything that Fosco wants to believe about roller derby.

And in this corner...

Even though it's almost over, you should spare a moment to think about Boxing Day. The definitive explanation of its name and its purpose can be found in this New York Times editorial. The author, Judith Flanders, argues that Americans could use a little bit of Boxing Day, provided that we stick with its original charitable purpose:

It would be good if Boxing Day were added to America’s list of legal holidays. (From over here, you look awfully light on time off anyway.) But not if it just became another day in the round of shop-eat-family-family-family.

Instead Boxing Day could return as a day of giving. Not necessarily cash — and not material to make uniforms — but rather one day a year to donate skills or effort, a day for sharing something of value in the larger community. Help someone whose first language isn’t English fill out driver’s license forms. Load an old lady’s iPod with Rogers and Hammerstein. Teach the boy next door to throw overhand, so the other kids stop teasing him.

What we really need to do is put down the punch bowl and pick up on what Punch magazine wrote more than 150 years ago: Don’t just keep “the Christmas of the belly: keep you the Christmas of the heart. Give — give.”

Fosco is onboard, except for that weird part about "teach the boy next door to throw overhand." That's pretty much like saying: "use your time to make the neighbor kid heterosexual." But, I suppose we don't have to take Flanders's advice. And, if your charitable contribution happens to involve a little foxy boxing, I think you should get double points in heaven.