Interesting Animals Meme

Julia over at The Ethical Palaeontologist has tagged me for my very first meme! Woooohooooo!

An interesting animal I had

I've got two...the first being my cat, Emily. Emily is the sweetest, ugliest, most annoying cat I've ever lived with. She may also be the dumbest animal on the planet, according to J. I actually agree, but since she's my baby, I have to pretend that I think she's smart. I love her so so so so much. She's the underdog...the smelly-breath fish face...the genital-crusher. Emily's favorite hobbies are standing on sensitive body parts (especially naked ones), eating cheesy foods, ripping out her housemate Zeus's hair and cultivating bad breath. She's my smemilypoo and she's so perfect, in all her imperfect glory:

The other interesting animal I had was Harold...he was a giant African millipede and he was pretty damn interesting:

photo from http://www.riversidereptiles.com/wst_page3.html

An interesting animal I ate

When I was in the 4th grade I went through a phase similar to one that toddlers go through; I ate anything I fancied. During that phase, I ate red ants (I also ate money). They were very sweet, though they had to be chewed immediately or they bit. I've eaten chicken hearts, which look like little people-hearts, complete with valves. I've also had alligator, venison and buffalo... I tend to stick with grains and veggies these days.

An interesting animal in a museum

Confusciusornis...she's the photo up at the top of my blog, but here's a more complete photo:

Saw this bugger at the Miami Science Museum...she was on display to the public for the very first time. There wasn't a lot of information available, but I think she was the oldest beaked bird found at that point, unless her cousin was older (one is dui and the other sanctus). The exhibit was really great...a lot of complete skeletons from China's Liaoning Province. I even saw a video featuring Peter Dodson, who I wrote to frequently as a kid. It was all very exciting.

An interesting thing I did with or to an animal

I had this really violent friend when I was eight or nine...one day he picked up a frog and squeezed it's innards out, so that they were hanging from its mouth. The frog was still hopping all over the place. It was absolutely horrifying and I have never gotten that image out of my head. And for the record, I didn't do it...I just witnessed it.

An interesting animal in its natural habitat

Proteus anguinus...the blind cave salamander, which has completely lost it's sense of sight and skin pigmentation. The salamander has adapted to living in complete darkness... beautiful example of evolution! Plus, it looks like it's got trees growing from its head. And that's cool.

And now to tag some people....hmmm....

Rebecca at Dinochick
Michael at Paleoblog

"Thermochronic" at Apparent Dip

"Rapunzel of the Ivory Tower" at Make No Bones and

Margaret at Tirade Parade

Cool! Thanks Julia!