Faster than a Herd of Turtles

I drive by this sign, Monday through Friday, and it always makes me wonder, "Who are all those men so desperate for love that they will go to this length to find it?" Pathetic, really. But then I see the Golden Arches and my thoughts wander to french fries and strawberry shakes and I am over it. I love strawberry shakes. When I need a mental pick me up, that is what I get. Stressed out? Get a large one. Had a bad morning? A regular size at lunch makes it all look better. Don’t bother with the small size. Size matters and what is the point really? A tease of delicious pinkness? Pink is the color of Valentines and little girls, but to me it means spring. I don’t know, maybe its because the color of the M&M bag is pink for Easter or maybe I just like pink and it’s the fashion color of spring, but that is what it is.
Its almost Easter now, which has me thinking of eggs. Boiled, salad sandwiches, deviled, marshmallow, chocolate, hidden, plastic, peanut butter, fudge and my favorite-marshmallow. Not to be out done by fudge, of course. Someone at the theater asked me what chicks and bunnies had to do with Easter, and I told them (because I am the oldest one there and have the most acquired useless knowledge) that it has to do with the eggs. That’s why the Easter bunny hides them for us to find, like the chickens do. It all ties together, see? I guess in the islands of the Caribbean they had to be creative and instead of bunnies and chickens, they look for turtle eggs.

I don’t think I would want to find many of them, they look gross and I don’t think deviled turtle sounds very tasty. However, just like bunnies and chickens, once they are hatched and fluff up a bit they are pretty cute.
Sea turtles are pretty amazing. They are protected in the wild because they throw such out of control parties that the police are always at their house protecting them. They live to be really old and are graceful in their natural habitat-like Bishop Drake. Have you ever seen him working in mom’s yard? In a Navy sweatshirt he is totally a turtle out of water to me.

Unlike fish, turtles can be out of water, they breathe air and everything. That is where they hide their eggs, on the beach. Not anywhere near as creative as the Easter bunny hiding eggs in suit coat pockets. And they only dye their eggs in the one color-egg. Turtles are not the right-brainers of the ocean. They aren’t good mothers either. And don’t get me started on their idea of fatherhood! That turtle in Nemo is not the rule, he was the exception. The dads do their thing and leave the mother, all pg and stuff, to crawl across the beach (like a turtle out of water, too), dig a huge hole until she is so exhausted all she can do is poop out a couple three dozen boring turtle eggs and then bury them (probably out of shame-she is an unwed mother with no creativity) and crawl back to the water (again, like a turtle out of water) and swim away. I might have missed a few steps, like saying a prayer over the ugly eggs. I am sure if I was the mother turtle that I would have a few extra words to say about the cruelty of nature.
After enough time has gone by the eggs start to hatch and little pathetic turtles dig their way out of the hole and start to crawl (how? You guessed it!) to the ocean. And to top it off, the sea birds have been waiting for their hors d’oeuvres for way to long and they swoop down on the boring, newly hatched ugly turtles and fly away with their lunch wiggling in their beaks. If you were lucky enough-or so ugly as to be unappetizing-to not be caught, you might make it to the water. But, again Nature has a different idea for your life’s direction. The waves are constantly trying to push you back to the bird buffet for the second feeding and to top it off-NO ONE HAS TAUGHT YOU HOW TO SWIM YET! Oh the horror! There are no directions printed on your shell, no life preserver or inflatable toy. If you finally manage a doable turtle-paddle past the pounding surf, you are small and weak and can be eaten at any time by something bigger and uglier than you. Sigh. There is nothing more depressing than being eaten by something even uglier than you-and you know that the reason they got big enough to eat you was because they were so ugly. Depressing.

A few years ago some scientists were worried that the turtle population was suffering from a clinical depression epidemic and so they attempted to medicate them. But the stupid ugly turtles proved hard to herd and even harder to convince to swallow a pill twice a day. However, by catching the turtles and wrangling the herd together they did create a new place to visit when cruising in the Caribbean. The turtle population could grow and thrive in a lower stress environment and the incident’s of depression were depressed. Now their parties are filled with noisy games of "Pit" and "Pictionary" and there is no alcohol served. Or eggs, that would be yucky. The fathers have to make occasional visits too, and the mothers can watch their offspring grow up in safety with crooked bangs, like all good moms want.

This is really important stuff-the reduction of clinical depression in turtles. But more important than the turtles, those silly scientists found another way to enjoy a vacation. THE GIFT SHOP! Yep, that’s right. They don’t sell turtle soup or deviled turtle eggs, but you can get a cool t-shirt or shot glass or plastic turtle there. It might be fun to look at the turtle tanks, maybe feed a turtle or two, see the variety and learn about their habitat and quest for survival. BUT at the gift shop you can buy postcards of people doing that exact thing and that is a way cooler way to spend my cash and time. And you know how I can do it? Faster than a herd of turtles, that's how!

BTW, there is a tour that takes you around the island, to the turtle farm, to Hell and back. It is a small charge, somewhere around $60 a person, including entrance into the farm. Its seems to be a lot like the Circle Island Tour of Hawaii, but without Cousin Bob yelling at us. And I am not sure if we can turn our back on the ocean in the Caribbean, but if Aunt Nancy is on this tour with me, I will have my camera ready to watch and see! It doesn’t include postage for mail going out from Hell, though. Or lunch, I don’t think. But I will find out because this is my plan for enjoying a day in the life of the Grand Cayman Island.