9/15/00: On the Subject of Cleaning Penguins
So I was watching the news not long ago, and they had a little bit of info on a terrible oil spill somewhere where there were penguins. I think it was South Africa, but it might have been the southern tip of South America. And the poor little penguins were covered in oil, and had to be taken somewhere for cleaning.
Obvious lamentations on the state of our world/ecology aside, here is a true inspiration for me. I want this job. To clean penguins.
Think about it: You have all the penguins in a big, bathroom-like room. Tiled floors, lots of big silver washing bins, and tables covered in penguins. It would have to be cold because, well, you know. Penguins.
I'm just guessing how it would work. You would take each penguin from the big table of dirty penguins to your left, taking it to your station. You'd maybe gently dunk it in the tub, which would probably have some sort of special oil-removing solution in it. Would the penguins have to be sedated? Poor little things, probably not, because they'd already be so wiped out from being covered in oil. But you would probably scrub the penguin on a table, and it might take a little while, because they must have a lot of thick, water resistant feathers. Then you'd put the clean penguin with the other clean penguins to your right.
Just a small thing. To clean a penguin. But when you were done, you would have a clean penguin. At work we make lots of mewing noises about "digital communication solutions" and "information architecture" and blah blah blah, but at the end of the day, all of our penguins are still covered in oil. It's a little depressing.