Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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Out, Out, Darned 2013 by PITT DICKEY Where is Lady Macbeth when you need her? This time of year publications a floating Home Depot lumbar yard, would then mosey over to grab the sticks run articles summarizing the swell events that took place during the preceding from the submerged croc's nose. Bad plan if you are Mr. Egret. Excellent plan 12 months. Being one to always follow the herd, I thought I would do the same. if you are Mr. Croc. Whereupon Mr. Croc would drop the sticks, grab the egret After research, I concluded 2013 was filled with more rancid stuffing than an old and winner, winner, chicken dinner. Twinkie in an abandoned lunch box. Not much went on in 2013 that was good, To Vlad this appeared to be pretty sophisticated tool usage by a critter mainly funny, mildly entertaining or merely morbidly depressing. The year was grim. admired for its ability to be turned into expensive luggage and ladies handbags. One of the history websites I visited to research current events in 2013 can best Possessed of the scientific method, Vlad wondered if this was a fluke or some be summarized as a litany of looniness. Not to go into much depressing detail, sort of reptilian worldwide plan to take out the egret population. Vlad conjured but the year was filled with more killings by man and nature than up a grant and flew to Louisiana where if the skeeters don't get you can shake a stick at. It was replete with flash floods, suicide you then the gators will. According to the article, Vlad checked bombings, Syrian chemical gassings, Boston Marathon bombing, out four different swamps in Louisiana and discovered that mosque bombings, train and bus accidents, gang battles, crime American gators had also mastered the trick of balancing sticks stories, shopping mall attacks, cruise ship wrecks, the rise of Ted on their noses to grab a fast food egret dinner. Who taught Cruz and a government shut down. Ugly, ugly, ugly. gators how to balance sticks? A gator Twitter account? The best thing that happened all year was the Boston Red So what are we to make of the newly discovered tactical Sox whipping the Cards in the World Series. Not wishing to brilliance of crocodiles and alligators? Darned if I know. But swim further into 2013's slough of despair, I turn instead to next to the Red Sox taking the Series, this was the best news a different swamp populated by our friends the alligators and I could come up with to leave you pondering the late, not so It turns out alligators and crocodiles crocodiles. It turns out they are smarter than we think. An article are smarter than we think. great, 2013. in Science Now reported a recent fascinating study done on our It does give me the opportunity to give a shout out to Lewis reptilian buddies. Carroll, author of Alice in Wonderland, who knew way back in It turns out that a behavioral ecologist, Vladimir Dinets, is knowledgeable in 1855 that crocodiles were smarter than the average bear. (My apologies to Yogi.) all things alligatorian and crocodilian. One day Vlad was hanging out watching Let us ponder the wisdom of Lewis' poetic ode to the crocodile. "How doth the the crocodile pit in a zoo in India. He gets paid to go to the zoo. This is what little crocodile/Improve his shining tail/And pour the waters of the Nile/On every behavioral ecologists get to do while the rest of us work. I would like to be a golden scale!/How cheerfully he seems to grin/How neatly spreads his claws/ behavioral ecologist as soon as I figure out how to do it. Or at least a marine And welcomes little fishes in,/With gently smiling jaws/" biologist like George Costanza. Vlad noticed that the crocodiles were balancing As the Egret sinks slowly in the west into the gently smiling jaws sticks on their noses near where a flock of egrets were building their nests out of a Louisiana alligator, let us bid a not so fond adieu to 2013. of said sticks. Vlad, being naturally inquisitive, wondered to himself, "Vlad, why Let us trust that 2014 will be better doth the crocodile balance sticks upon his nose?" for man, crocodiles and egrets alike. PITT DICKEY, Attorney, Contributing Writer. COMMENTS? Editor@ This is what he saw: Mr. Croc would swim up underwater toward the egrets Happy New Year. upandcomingweekly.com. with the sticks balanced on his nose. The egret, thinking he had stumbled into SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE! Register for these January 2014 classes and receive a discount in the registration fee! FTCC Online Medical ICD-10 Coding Part 1 FTCC Online Medical Transcription Editor Part 1 Call 678-8404/8446 for information on how to register today! (Registration currently under way.) Let FTCC be a part of your next step Offering over 189 programs leading to the award of associate degree, certiļ¬cate or diploma. A military friendly school! www.faytechcc.edu 8 DECEMBER 18-24, 2013 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM