One of the first things a father should do is teach his son about the birds and the bees. Literally. Growing up my house was full of books about birds, reptiles, insects, and other odd bits explaining what things ate what things and where things were when you didn't see them and what they were doing there. To me, it was like part detective and part fantasy. I found myself looking at these types books more than any other type in our home library (excluding everything written by Shel Silverstien, who feels to me like an uncle I never met.) While I haven't consciously seen most of the animals in those books I have definitely seen more than what is cataloged in the books. A white slug fits into the latter category. However, what childhood information about slugs I do remember came a from a beat-up nondescript grey notebook I found in the bottom of a drawer in my old underground house. The book contained sketches and notes from when my dad was in getting his degree in Biology, I think. Because of this notebook I knew about flagella long before fellatio; that tidbit of biography alone probably something about childhood. Among the many drawings was a diagrammed and labeled mouth of a slug. I remember rows and rows and rows of teeth. There might have been a profile view too, but I could be imagining that. None the less, from that point on I never saw snails and slugs as slow and peaceful grazers. I saw them as wild and deadly teeth bearing predators. When The Never Ending Story first came to video I didn't think "Oh neat, he rides a racing snail." I thought, "Holy Crap, Run!!! That thing would eat your arm off if it had the chance." I never trusted that guy in the movie. It would be like me trying come off as gentle and caring as I rode on the back of a velociraptor. That is actually pretty accurate, I put Slugs, Snail, and Velociraptors all in the same category. Maybe now I understand where my odd thoughts come from; Not from some other alternate reality or a quirky way of creating inter-relationships between dissimilar things. The oddity comes from growing up with hunters and fishermen and storytellers, all accidental biologist and part time liars for entertainment; and growing up with one trained biologist who stocked a room/library full of natural history books and natural science books, books on myths dictionary the size of a giant hat box, books most people would have told me I was young to read. Books that I didn't fully understand so I just filled in the blanks with what seemed right at the time. Thank goodness for boredom. I guess what I am trying to say is, happy belated birthday to a biologist that, luckily for me, knew just enough about 'the birds and the bees' to get things done. (And also for filling a few library shelves worth of books about them afterwords. And only once tell me that I was too young to read a book, (which I tried read anyways when I was 8 or 9-- A World of Ideas by Bill Moyers.))

One of the first things a father should do is teach his son about the birds and the bees. Literally. Growing up my house was full of books about birds, reptiles, insects, and other odd bits explaining what things ate what things, where things were when you didn't see them, and what they were doing there. To me, it was part detective and part fantasy. I found myself looking at these types books more than any other type in our home library (excluding everything written by Shel Silverstien.) While I haven't consciously seen most of the animals in those books I have definitely seen more than what is cataloged in the books. A white slug fits into the latter category. However, what childhood information about slugs I do remember came a from a beat-up nondescript grey notebook I found in the bottom of a drawer located in my old underground house. The book contained sketches and notes from when my dad was in getting his degree in Biology, I think. Among the many drawings was a diagrammed and labeled mouth of a slug. I remember rows and rows and rows and rows of teeth. There might have been a profile view too, but I could be imagining that. None the less, from that point on I never saw snails and slugs as slow and peaceful grazers. I saw them as wild and deadly fanged predators. When The Never Ending Story first came to video I didn't think "Oh neat, he rides a racing snail." I thought, "Holy Crap, Run!!! That thing would eat your arm off if it gets the chance." I never trusted that guy in the movie. It would be like me trying come off as gentle and caring as I rode on the back of a Jurassic ParK velociraptor. I put Slugs, Snails, and Velociraptors all in the same category. Maybe now I understand where my odd thoughts come from; Not from some other alternate reality or a quirky way of creating inter-relationships between dissimilar things. The oddity comes from growing up with hunters and fishermen and storytellers, all accidental biologist and part time liars for entertainment; and growing up with one trained biologist who stocked a room/library full of natural history books and natural science books, books on myths dictionary the size of a giant hat box, books most people would have told me I was young to read. Books that I didn't fully understand so I just filled in the blanks with what seemed right at the time. Thank goodness for boredom. I guess what I am trying to say is, happy belated birthday to a biologist that, luckily for me, knew just enough about 'the birds and the bees' to get things done. (And also for filling a few library shelves worth of books about them afterwords. And only once tell me that I was too young to read a book, (which I tried read anyways when I was 8 or 9-- A World of Ideas by Bill Moyers.))