eTurboNews found a stunning picture to go with the NBC Channel 4 text:
It was of course squid plural, not squid singular. And they were Humboldt squid, who get to about 3 feet long (with tentacles) and can weigh up to 40 pounds. Not quite the Giant Squid which came to mind initially, huh. But still, look at that picture! The Kraken live!!!Now why didn't I know about this? Did I overlook it in Sunday's paper? As I tried to find out more, I started to wonder if any of it was true: there's a suspicious absence of photos online, just the news reel from the local NBC station. Is it a hoax? As far as I can tell much of it seems to be true, but not all of it. There was an earthquake, and there were Humboldt squid on the beach. But the squid started arriving a few days before Saturday, so the quake wasn't the cause. (Nobody knows the cause yet, though Humboldt squid do pass by these parts in this season; recent swings in ocean temperature might have confused them.)
And these aren't the first squid to turn up at La Jolla either. Turns out the canyon off the beach is a renowned place for scuba diving to see squid, though it's the smaller white market squid rather than the red Humboldt variety. (Check out this groovy video.) Red, did I say? Yes, red. The picture above is indeed of squid on the beach at La Jolla, but not last Saturday, which messes up the story in all sorts of ways. As eTurboNews' source duly reports, it's a 2002 event with many more (but smaller - 1-2 foot) squid, the last time (perhaps) that bystanders who'd lived there all their lives said they'd never heard of squid at La Jolla.
(But isn't the truth in this really about the way the imminent implosion of the state of California is being blamed on the economic downturn when, in fact, things have been fishy for a long time?)
[16/7: Scott Meyer's cartoon in the newest Reader shows how it's done.]
