Over spring break, we took the kids to a National Geographic IMAX movie about great white sharks. It was long. It was really long. In fact, if I ever do see a shark in the wild, my natural reaction may now be to just get drowsy. Since it was made by shark nuts, they spent the whole time explaining how wonderful these animals are. (In an Australian or South African accent.) “We as humans are much more dangerous to the shark than they are to us.” That’s all well and good, but when those nutballs went free diving with the sharks they were like, (again, Australian accent) “We always go into the water in groups of three, so we can maintain eye contact with the animal at all times.” As funny as that is, they are right about your chances of being eaten by a shark. They are virtually nil.
Summer is almost upon us, and it is almost time for our family to go somewhere warm, where I can spend the majority of the day in the water. I may have mentioned that the movie Jaws scarred my wife for life. I have been trying to undo that damage for a while now. Before we had kids, we took one of our almost annual trips to see family in Puerto Rico. While we were there, we took a boat ride to a small island called Caja de Muerto (Coffin Island) off the south coast. I dragged my wife to the end of the main island so we could snorkel in the channel between it and another small island. You may ask why I couldn’t just stay at the beach where everyone else was. Because,,,,,,just mind your business. We really didn’t see much of anything out there except for sea urchins with spines that were twelve to eighteen inches long. We didn’t stay long either. My wife freaked out like she saw the kraken, which in turn scared me, so we swam back to the beach. She told me that the whole time we were out there, she felt like she was in the middle of a shark highway.
So, to prepare her and everyone else for beach vacations, here are your chances of getting killed by stuff other than sharks.
- Bicycle accident. 1 in 4,535
- Pedestrian accident. 1 in 704
- Falling off a building. 1 in 6,115
- The cold. Not only is it awful, it can kill you. 1 in 7,399
- Falling from some kind of furniture. 1 in 4,238
- Dog bite. 1 in 116,448
- Lighting strike. 1 in 164,968
- The flu. 1 in 63
Shark attack. 1 in 3,748,067. The most important thing to remember is that you have a 100% chance of eventually kicking the bucket, so get in the water and enjoy yourself while you’re still here. Chicken.
LINKS
- Mila Kunis is being sued by a childhood friend for,,,,,,,,, wait for it,,,,,,,,,, stealing a chicken.
- We were visiting some friends recently, and they were telling us all about their trip to Sri Lanka. Add another one to my travel wish list.
- If you lived in north Jersey or New York in the 80’s, then you remember Crazy Eddie’s. Here’s the story of the chain’s rise and fall. Click it just to see the hair on the Federal Marshall in the picture. Legendary.
- Cool photos of the volcanic eruption in Chile.
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