Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Creature future production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: I'm your host of Mini Parasites, Katie Golden. I studied
Speaker 1: psychology and evolutionary biology, and I'm one of the world's
Speaker 1: leading Garfield fans love that orange cat. He sounds disrespectful
Speaker 1: and lazy. I'll laugh riot, But that poor old cat
Speaker 1: has been eating lasagna and kicking Odie off a table
Speaker 1: for such a long time. Seems like it's about time
Speaker 1: for him to retire. So today on the show, we're
Speaker 1: scouring the animal kingdom to look for a new species
Speaker 1: of animal to cast as the replacement Garfield. Will it
Speaker 1: be the pygmy blue tongue skink, the goulper eel, reticulated python,
Speaker 1: or another candidate. Discover this and more as we answer
Speaker 1: the age old question. Is Garfield measured more by his laziness,
Speaker 1: his hatred for Monday's or his ability to eat an
Speaker 1: entire tray of lasagna in one bite. Joining me today
Speaker 1: are my fellow Garfield friends and other members of the
Speaker 1: Garf skeatars, comedians Joey Clift and Hannah Michael's. Welcome you guys,
Speaker 1: so excited to be here to talk about Garfield with
Speaker 1: two other people who love Garfield. Me too, So welcome
Speaker 1: to our first bi annual meeting of minds of the
Speaker 1: Garfield Heads Society. You guys like Garfield, right, I actually haven't. Um.
Speaker 1: An eBay page opened right now coincidentally for Garfield toilet seats,
Speaker 1: and that has nothing to do with any any of
Speaker 1: the podcast. I just want one. I have some questions
Speaker 1: about the Garfield toilet seat. Mainly is the opening for
Speaker 1: the toilet seat his mouth, so it's like you're pooping
Speaker 1: into his mouth? This is the wish. This is not
Speaker 1: what I've found so far. Um. What I've found so
Speaker 1: far are many different styles, though they're all kind of cushy,
Speaker 1: which kind of weirds me out, but it's also comforting. Um.
Speaker 1: And some are holiday themes, so you can switch out
Speaker 1: your regular Garfield toilet seat for like an Easter Garfield
Speaker 1: toilet seat. As somebody who has multiple Garfield toilet seats
Speaker 1: for every occasion, including a special Garfield toilet seat that
Speaker 1: I used just on my birthday, I get it. Well,
Speaker 1: I have a Garfield enema, but so I just I
Speaker 1: just think that like when we talk about Garfield and
Speaker 1: casting Garfield, we should talk about what Garfield means to
Speaker 1: us maybe not like the original intention of Garfield, because
Speaker 1: the original intention of Garfield was just to make money,
Speaker 1: was just to make a mass marketable cartoon, to be
Speaker 1: friendly to merchandise. And I understand this, and I don't.
Speaker 1: It's my love for Garfield is not really. It's not
Speaker 1: because oh yeah, he's a cute cat and hilarious, because
Speaker 1: it's not actually that funny. There's an almost nihilistic aspect
Speaker 1: to Garfield where he desires to consume everything to nap.
Speaker 1: He hates mondays, and he hates all other living creatures.
Speaker 1: And I find that interesting from an evolutionary biology perspective. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I find he sort of hearkens back to a
Speaker 1: time that was I don't want to say normal. I
Speaker 1: don't want to say normal. Garfield is hyper normal in
Speaker 1: a lot of ways, and there's something fascinating about that.
Speaker 1: And and the sort of world that he takes on
Speaker 1: in each of our minds is the opposite of that,
Speaker 1: I think, because in our childhood s, Garfield was hyper normal, right.
Speaker 1: He's the opiate of the masses. And it's one of
Speaker 1: those things where you imagine in a post apocalyptic world
Speaker 1: where it's just a barren, dust covered earth. But then
Speaker 1: you the dust, the wind blows, and the dust parts
Speaker 1: to reveal the face of a plastic Garfield. And I
Speaker 1: feel that that really encapsulates the human race. I I
Speaker 1: hate to stop being so philosophical, because I do enjoy
Speaker 1: discussing the philosophical ramifications of Garfield, but I we do
Speaker 1: need to get on task here, and what we're doing
Speaker 1: is we are recasting another species as Garfield. Because look,
Speaker 1: this has been He's been a cat for over forty years.
Speaker 1: I hate to say it, but cats don't actually have
Speaker 1: that long of a lifespan, so it's you know, he's
Speaker 1: probably been played by several cats, and I just think
Speaker 1: that we need to, you know, have a different casting.
Speaker 1: I think it's getting stale. The the having Garfield be
Speaker 1: a cat is officially getting stale, and I want to
Speaker 1: recast him as another species of animal. And I am
Speaker 1: going to make the best case I can for each
Speaker 1: of these animals for you guys to judge as the
Speaker 1: pre eminent Garfield scholars that I know whether these animals
Speaker 1: encapsulate the credo of Garfield. And let's be real, cats
Speaker 1: live for about ten to twenty years. I feel like
Speaker 1: there's probably been forty three different garfields. They get a
Speaker 1: new one every year because you just feed a cat
Speaker 1: that much lasagna, it's not going to live that long. No,
Speaker 1: his eyes keep getting bigger. Yeah, that's that's why. That's
Speaker 1: why there's a garfield model change. And how he looks
Speaker 1: different every year, is it's a different garfield. Yes, every
Speaker 1: time he's drawn slightly differently. That's actually a new garfield,
Speaker 1: sort of phoenix like erupting from the blow to the
Speaker 1: lasagna field carcass of the old garfield. By that that's
Speaker 1: how garfield reproduces. I mean as a as a as
Speaker 1: a Garfield biologist, I'm making decision that yes, garfield explodes.
Speaker 1: A new garfield explodes from the carcass of the old garfield,
Speaker 1: much like a caterpillar turning into a beautiful garfield. So
Speaker 1: my first animal for you guys to judge the garfield
Speaker 1: worthiness of is the pigmy blue tongue skink, which sounds
Speaker 1: a little bit insulting, but that's its actual name. So
Speaker 1: the pigmy blue tongue skink is found in South Australia.
Speaker 1: Skinks are a type of lizard. They're sort of chunky
Speaker 1: and tubular lizards. They have like little stubby legs. And
Speaker 1: these guys, the pigmy blue tongue skinks, are about the
Speaker 1: size of a thumb and they're extremely lazy. And in
Speaker 1: this first section, I'm going to talk about animals that
Speaker 1: I think represent the sort of like lazy Margaritaville aspect
Speaker 1: to Garfield's personality. So pigmy blue tongues. One interesting thing
Speaker 1: is their tongues are actually pink. The reason they're called
Speaker 1: pigmy blue tongue skinks is because they are. They seem
Speaker 1: like they're smaller versions of their much larger relatives, the
Speaker 1: blue tongue skinks, which are about the size of a
Speaker 1: whole hand, And those guys do have blue tongues, but
Speaker 1: these ones don't. But they're smaller and people, I guess
Speaker 1: the people naming them just didn't bother to check to
Speaker 1: see if their tongues are actually blue before naming them, which,
Speaker 1: you know, whatever that this is a common problem with
Speaker 1: the naming of animals is it's often you just name
Speaker 1: it the opposite of what it is. Like this is
Speaker 1: the yeah, this is the long neck shrewe, and it
Speaker 1: just doesn't have a neck at all. It's very straight.
Speaker 1: It's Australia. They have a lot of listens, just like also,
Speaker 1: just checking info is hard. It's like, what are you
Speaker 1: expecting every scientist to look into the mouth of every
Speaker 1: animal that they name based on their mouth color. Give
Speaker 1: me a break. I feel like every biologist wants to
Speaker 1: look into the mouth of every animal to be honest.
Speaker 1: So they are very lazy homebodies. They just want to
Speaker 1: sit in their little burrows all day long. In fact,
Speaker 1: they are much home bodies. They were thought to be
Speaker 1: extinct up until the nineties when they were rediscovered because
Speaker 1: they spend almost all of their time in their burrows
Speaker 1: hanging out, so they're very hard to find out in
Speaker 1: the wild. And when I say they're burrows, I actually
Speaker 1: mean a burrow that they've stolen from spiders. They're too
Speaker 1: lazy to dig their own burrows, so they live in
Speaker 1: empty spider burrows. And what they like to do is
Speaker 1: wait at the entrance of their burrows for prey to
Speaker 1: walk by, and essentially waiting for the prey to just
Speaker 1: like fall into their mouths. They will snap at prey
Speaker 1: as they walk by. It is called ambush predation. In
Speaker 1: this case, I think it's just pure laziness, though. It
Speaker 1: is these lizards waiting for an insect to be unlucky
Speaker 1: enough to basically crawl across their nose or mouth and
Speaker 1: then they just snap them up. On a scale of
Speaker 1: one to Garfield, how much how many field garfs does
Speaker 1: this rate at? Garf garves g P I garves per.
Speaker 1: I'm going to base my Garfield rating on three equally
Speaker 1: very important factors. One do I think that they hate mondays?
Speaker 1: To do I think they could put down a whole
Speaker 1: plate of lasagna? And Three do I think they could
Speaker 1: kick an odi off a table? So, you know, like
Speaker 1: going into you know, using those ratings. Looking at this
Speaker 1: blue tongue skink, I feel like, based on the look
Speaker 1: at this animal's face, I think it's a ten out
Speaker 1: of ten on hating mondays. I'm gonna give it. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna give it a solid garf for just looking like
Speaker 1: it hates mondays. It doesn't even approach mondays. It's stage
Speaker 1: by that. It's like, yeah, like mondays are a foreign
Speaker 1: concept to this thing. It dislikes it so much. Do
Speaker 1: I think it could put down a full thing of lasagna?
Speaker 1: I mean probably not, Like it's just it's kind of small.
Speaker 1: It's like I'm not sure, you know, like if it ate,
Speaker 1: I feel like you could probably eat a piece of lasagna,
Speaker 1: but like not like a not like a pan of lasagna.
Speaker 1: And that's like a very important thing that I looked
Speaker 1: through for any Garfield one out of ten on the
Speaker 1: on the eating a panel las on your writing. So
Speaker 1: that's like a just a not a full garf. And then, um,
Speaker 1: do I think it could kick an ODI off a
Speaker 1: table if it was like a tiny ODI? Maybe, but
Speaker 1: like probably not like a full sized odie. So I
Speaker 1: think I'm giving the pigmy blue tunk skink just just
Speaker 1: one garf, just one garf, just one garf. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: no that's fair. What do you think, Conna? Since Joey
Speaker 1: covered a lot of the specifically you know, solely Garfield aspects, Um,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go a bit on do people own this?
Speaker 1: I may go on a John scale here, I see
Speaker 1: on a John scale. Yeah, that the John scale. I
Speaker 1: don't think people own this. This is very rare. I
Speaker 1: don't know of it being owned as a pet, at
Speaker 1: least not responsibly. So it's a terrible pet to have. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, let's let's toss ethics right out the window.
Speaker 1: We are talking Garfield here. Ethics boy, Yeah, and we
Speaker 1: are talking John who. Yeah, John like allowed his brother
Speaker 1: to I think die in his basement, right, is like
Speaker 1: they're used to he used to have a brother. Seriously,
Speaker 1: why when he mysteriously disappeared was probably killed and eaton
Speaker 1: by Garfield. And John does not just over his dog, yeah, right,
Speaker 1: turns a blind eye to all of Garfield's crimes. So
Speaker 1: I feel like ethics were as much as I care
Speaker 1: about being ethical, John certainly doesn't. Yeah, it is. It
Speaker 1: is actually cannon in Garfield. There was a Garfield um
Speaker 1: point and click adventure game that came out in the
Speaker 1: nineties or early two thousand's. It was like Garfield's Halloween
Speaker 1: Quest or something like that. And um, there is an
Speaker 1: easter egg where if you go into Garfield's basement you
Speaker 1: do see Lyman's skeleton chained to a wall. And it's
Speaker 1: definitely definitely so you know, I mean, like, look, this
Speaker 1: isn't anything I need to tell you know, the two
Speaker 1: of you, we get it. But yeah, so in canon,
Speaker 1: Lyman is chained to the basement, to John Arbuckle's basement.
Speaker 1: John probably did it John probably did it. Okay, this
Speaker 1: this is actually telling me nothing. I'm just going to
Speaker 1: get two girls, all right. Onto The next girf contender
Speaker 1: is the starfish. Now, there's a reason that marine biologist
Speaker 1: and creator of SpongeBob, Stephen Hillenberg, portrayed Patrick Star a
Speaker 1: starfish as a lazy, brainless Now. I love SpongeBob. I
Speaker 1: very much missed Stephen Hillenberg. He was a wonderful creator
Speaker 1: because he was actually a marine biologist and a lot
Speaker 1: of the things in SpongeBob had references to marine biology
Speaker 1: that we're really charming. Um, But yeah, the Patrick star
Speaker 1: is actually a pretty accurate depiction of what an anthropomorphic
Speaker 1: starfish would be like. Starfish are radially symmetrical kind of dorms,
Speaker 1: which are related to sand dollars and sea urchins. They
Speaker 1: have no brain, but they do have a radial nervous system.
Speaker 1: They have very limited sensory organs. They have simple eye
Speaker 1: spots on each arm, and they are able to respond
Speaker 1: to touch and smell and light and dark and that's
Speaker 1: about it. So they can move very very slowly with
Speaker 1: the help of many rows of tiny tube feet called
Speaker 1: podia on each arm. So each of those arms have
Speaker 1: all of these little tiny they look like little tentacles
Speaker 1: or like fur or something, but these are all little
Speaker 1: moving arms, and they actually move with the help of
Speaker 1: a complex hydraulic system inside the starfish. Uh. And so
Speaker 1: it's like the starfish is this really interesting machine of hydraulics.
Speaker 1: And the each of the little podia, the little tiny feet,
Speaker 1: has adhesive chemicals in it that allows it to cling
Speaker 1: to substrates. So it's actually mechanically very complex in terms
Speaker 1: of its ability to think not nothing really going on there.
Speaker 1: So another interesting thing, and as a lot of people
Speaker 1: actually do know, they can digest externally, so they can
Speaker 1: avert their stomach, which basically means spitting out their stomach
Speaker 1: inside out, you know, like you take a sock and
Speaker 1: you turn the sock inside out. They do that, but
Speaker 1: with their stomach outside of their mouths. And why they
Speaker 1: do this is that once they spit out their stomach
Speaker 1: like that, it's still attached their body. But by averting it,
Speaker 1: they allow all these digestive enzymes to spill out over
Speaker 1: their prey and dissolve the prey externally, so then it
Speaker 1: can suck up prey that would be too large to ingest.
Speaker 1: Through its mouth without turning it into like a smoothie.
Speaker 1: Uh So one trick that they do. I've actually have
Speaker 1: a video on here if you guys want to look
Speaker 1: at it, is this is a sunflower starfish prying open
Speaker 1: a bi valve, which is like a clam, and it
Speaker 1: pries open those those shells, spits its stomach out uh
Speaker 1: into the bivalve, and then it can dissolve it it's
Speaker 1: in sides and then suck them back up. So that's
Speaker 1: one way it feeds. It's just yeah, it's surprising to
Speaker 1: think of these guys as predators because when you see them,
Speaker 1: they don't really move that much. They almost don't seem
Speaker 1: like a living animal. You can only really see how
Speaker 1: they move by speeding up camera footage of it and
Speaker 1: seeing that they do move around in chase after prey
Speaker 1: and prey after other slow moving animals. Another interesting thing
Speaker 1: about the starfish is they have gonads on each of
Speaker 1: their arm tips, and with mating, like everything else, they
Speaker 1: are rather passive and lazy. Most species do actually have
Speaker 1: separate males and females, even though they're almost completely identical.
Speaker 1: They just have different like male and female gonads on
Speaker 1: their arm tips. And typically what starfish will do is
Speaker 1: they release the egg and sperm into the water for
Speaker 1: external fertilization, and then these fertilized eggs will hatch and
Speaker 1: become zooplankton tiny larval starfish. In some species there is
Speaker 1: internal fertilization and in other species, like it's not that common,
Speaker 1: but females may even brood their eggs, so sitting on
Speaker 1: their eggs like a chicken or keeping them inside a
Speaker 1: special brood pouch. The cutest mating ritual between starfish is pseudocopulation,
Speaker 1: so they don't actually have to copulate like a lot
Speaker 1: of other animals where there's you know, insertion of genitalia
Speaker 1: and this. They are just like the male gets on
Speaker 1: top of the female and they link their arms together
Speaker 1: like they're holding hands and then do external fertilization. So
Speaker 1: there's no real reason for them to get on top
Speaker 1: of each other other than to sort of encourage each
Speaker 1: other to release their gonads into the water. Then it
Speaker 1: is externally fertilizes in you know, the beautiful, wonderful process.
Speaker 1: So the reason I'm nominating this as a garfield is
Speaker 1: its ability to eat things larger than itself by literally
Speaker 1: spitting out its stomach and digest staying externally and sucking
Speaker 1: it back in. It's extremely laid back in lazy attitude
Speaker 1: towards romance, like you know how like Garfield has been
Speaker 1: dating Arline for years, but it's just always so like
Speaker 1: he's so passive. It just seems like he's waiting for
Speaker 1: something to happen, but it never does happen. And also
Speaker 1: it's very slow and sometimes orange. So that those are
Speaker 1: my reasons for nominating the starfish. I would say that
Speaker 1: the only downside to the starfish is that I don't
Speaker 1: think Garfield is stupid. I think he chooses not to
Speaker 1: use his brain, like it's an active choice, like he
Speaker 1: could think if he used a hundred percent of his brain,
Speaker 1: it would actually turn out he's like a super genius.
Speaker 1: He just elects not to think that hard about things.
Speaker 1: So what do you guys think? I was actually going
Speaker 1: to ask if Garfield because of the Garfield and Arline situation,
Speaker 1: because we know Garfield and Arline do have gon ads
Speaker 1: on their arm tips, but right do they? I think
Speaker 1: it again, it's like an external fertilization situation where they
Speaker 1: kind of like maybe it's like they externally fertilize. Garfield
Speaker 1: then absorbs the eggs into his brood sack, and then
Speaker 1: the brood erupt from, like we said earlier, from his
Speaker 1: lasagna bloated carcass and feed off of him uh in
Speaker 1: their sort of early larval stages. And that's how we
Speaker 1: get a new Garfield. Okay here there have been a
Speaker 1: lot of like, you know, really great biological thinkers on
Speaker 1: the Internet who have also hypothesized the question of if
Speaker 1: Garfield takes and you know, I mean, like, I like,
Speaker 1: I've done a lot of research googling Garfield on the Internet,
Speaker 1: and you know, some images come up that like, really,
Speaker 1: I think, just show that, you know, it shows some
Speaker 1: good info there that I think just like shows. It's
Speaker 1: like documentaries, you know, it's beautiful. I was looking at
Speaker 1: the image earlier today of uh, Garfield totally act his
Speaker 1: research for this. I was looking at an imagin earlier
Speaker 1: today of Garfield holding a baby that he made with
Speaker 1: Sonic the hedgehog. So you know, he's yeah, yeah, he
Speaker 1: was capable of He's capable of having brood outside of
Speaker 1: a species too. I I think that there, once again,
Speaker 1: you're going back to my three factors. I think if
Speaker 1: you look at the starfish, you know, the ability to
Speaker 1: put down a plate of lasagna or pan a lasagna.
Speaker 1: I think this starfish has got that in spades. That's
Speaker 1: a solid tan. Of course, you know, ability to kick
Speaker 1: Odie off a table. I'm gonna say, I think that
Speaker 1: this starfish could probably do that. Um, I think, you know,
Speaker 1: it's like, it's probably not gonna be very fast, but
Speaker 1: it looks like it's got enough mass that could pull
Speaker 1: it off. It could probably set off like a Rube
Speaker 1: gold device that kicks Odi off by sort of like
Speaker 1: slowly crawling over, lulling ODI into a sense of security,
Speaker 1: and then setting off the Rube Goldberg machine that kicks
Speaker 1: Odie off into a box that gets mailed to Australia
Speaker 1: or something. I buy that that's within the Roman possibility.
Speaker 1: So once again going to give that a perfect ten.
Speaker 1: You know, do I think that the starfish hates Mondays? Honestly?
Speaker 1: You know, like you said, it doesn't really have a brain.
Speaker 1: So I don't think that the starfish hates the Monday
Speaker 1: hates Mondays. So I'm gonna give a zero on that.
Speaker 1: But there is one, one, one additional important factor I
Speaker 1: think with thinking about a replacement Garfield in um number
Speaker 1: of gonads, and as we know, Garfield has a sexually
Speaker 1: reproductive organ on the tip of each of his appendages.
Speaker 1: Classic Garfield fact, right each of his classic Jim Davis
Speaker 1: fact that just you know, that's like why you made
Speaker 1: the character. So I'm gonna give this character a three guards,
Speaker 1: you know, three three out of four. Yeah, that's solid.
Speaker 1: It's a good number of garths. Hanna, do you concur
Speaker 1: I do? I think on the on the John scale,
Speaker 1: which I'm gonna abandon after this because it's it's it's
Speaker 1: a mess. Who about John anyway? But in terms of
Speaker 1: a starfish, John would absolutely own this. He would wear
Speaker 1: it on his lapel. He would try to impress ladies
Speaker 1: that works. It would be stuck to his face and
Speaker 1: slowly digest one of his eyeballs. I agree, yes, that
Speaker 1: would also absolutely happened while he's hitting on the vet. Who,
Speaker 1: by the way, take a class at the learning annex
Speaker 1: about hints. Yeah, also like way to say, yeah, let's
Speaker 1: trash talk to John. Liz is just doing her job,
Speaker 1: She's just at work. Why would you just I don't know.
Speaker 1: I also could definitely imagine John going to Liz with
Speaker 1: Starfish Garfield. Garfish um on his face, it eating one
Speaker 1: of its eyeballs by averting its stomach into his I
Speaker 1: sock it, and then he quips to Liz, I guess
Speaker 1: we just don't see eye to eye and Liz is going,
Speaker 1: oh my god, John, how did you Why is there?
Speaker 1: Oh my god, your eye You're gonna be blind John,
Speaker 1: and he's He's going, I guess we just don't see.
Speaker 1: I I feel dizzy. She's also just like, did you
Speaker 1: think that this would get me to say? Yesterdating you? What?
Speaker 1: How did your brainwork? You definitely just wrote a Garfield
Speaker 1: strip that is canon. I'm gonna say it has to be.
Speaker 1: I feel like, after this episode end, we need to
Speaker 1: just write a book of Starfield Garfield short right Starfield
Speaker 1: Sharfield strip number one rights itself. I just wanted to
Speaker 1: give a quick honorary mention to one of the world's
Speaker 1: most lovable lazy animals, the manatee. Manatees are a mammal
Speaker 1: that lives an entirely aquatic life. Their closest living relatives
Speaker 1: are elephants and hieraxes. Hieraxes being an African mammal that
Speaker 1: looks a bit like an overgrown gopher combined with a
Speaker 1: guinea pig. But manatees are wildly different in their behavior. Namely,
Speaker 1: they're very lazy. They spend half their day snoozing in
Speaker 1: the water, surfacing for air every twenty minutes or so.
Speaker 1: The other half of their day they spend grazing aquatic plants.
Speaker 1: And that's about it. That's the manatees life. They swim
Speaker 1: at only about three miles per hour five kilometers per hour,
Speaker 1: They only breed once every couple of years and give
Speaker 1: birth to a single calf. And they're not necessarily stupid.
Speaker 1: They seem to have long term memory and can learn
Speaker 1: to associate events. They can also live quite a long time,
Speaker 1: up to sixty years, which would allow it to actually
Speaker 1: live as long as the comic strip has been running
Speaker 1: a little over forty years. When we return, we're going
Speaker 1: to rate animals based on another Garfield characteristic, their ability
Speaker 1: to eat a lot. Garfield loves lasagna, So should you
Speaker 1: feature Kitty a big old tray of the Italian treat. Sorry, folks,
Speaker 1: but only in your cat's dreams. Lasagna often contains onion
Speaker 1: and garlic in the seasoning, which is very toxic to cats.
Speaker 1: And dogs too. Sorry Odie. The carbohydrates aren't great either,
Speaker 1: nor is the dairy content, as cats are generally lactose intolerant,
Speaker 1: so it'll give them even more tummy troubles. I wonder
Speaker 1: why there's no Garfield strips all about the awful garf
Speaker 1: farts that are almost certainly inevitable. So we've talked about
Speaker 1: some lazy animals who I think could embody that aspect
Speaker 1: of Garfield. That's like their strongest I think correlation to Garfield,
Speaker 1: although the Starfield or garfish I think is strong also
Speaker 1: in the eating category, which is what this section is
Speaker 1: all about. So we're gonna talk about animals that eat enough,
Speaker 1: and I think these are going to get a tin
Speaker 1: out of tin on the entire tray of lasagna eating capability.
Speaker 1: So first let's talk about the gulper eel also known
Speaker 1: as the pelican eel, which is basically a mouth with
Speaker 1: a tail, which I think, again, like Garfield, has changed
Speaker 1: over the years, he's gotten more simply drawn, sort of
Speaker 1: like bigger eyes, smaller body. I think, just get out
Speaker 1: of the body. I think, just be a mouth with
Speaker 1: a tail, like a mouth, eyes and a tail. So
Speaker 1: the pelican eel is a deep sea eel with a long, thin,
Speaker 1: blackish brown body about two and a half feet in length,
Speaker 1: which is like point seven five meters, But it's mostly
Speaker 1: a giant set of jaws with tiny needle like teeth
Speaker 1: a pair of little beady eyes connected to the eel
Speaker 1: part of it, which it's technically not all tail, but
Speaker 1: it's it basically looks like a tail. It's just it's
Speaker 1: body like imagine an eel, but the eel part is
Speaker 1: pretty small relative to the head, which is just got
Speaker 1: just a big mouth. I've got a we all have
Speaker 1: a photo up right now. What's that on the on
Speaker 1: the but end of the tip, I want to say,
Speaker 1: but it's the end of the tail. I think that
Speaker 1: might be a biouminescent bulb was going to be it
Speaker 1: was a little bit of design here, yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: looking at this balcony eel. I don't know how many
Speaker 1: garths to give this thing, because there's just this is
Speaker 1: a perfect garfield right here. It's like it's got a
Speaker 1: giant mouth, looks like it's real mad at everything, not
Speaker 1: just mondays uh. It looks like a love crafty and
Speaker 1: horror thing, which we all know was Jim Davis's original
Speaker 1: goal for Garfield was for him to be like a
Speaker 1: Lovecraft horror monster. I think there's a book called Garfield
Speaker 1: in his Nine Lives where Jim Davis draws different styles
Speaker 1: of Garfield in different stories, and one is very horrific
Speaker 1: and similar to this but more subtle. But no, I agree.
Speaker 1: I think goulper eels are a very strong contender. Oh
Speaker 1: and also, Hannah, I did look it up. That bulb
Speaker 1: on his tail is indeed a bioluminescent bulb, and it
Speaker 1: glows pink, which is cute. That is cute. I guess
Speaker 1: what I'm saying is looking at this pelcon eel when
Speaker 1: I close my eyes and think of Garfield, this is
Speaker 1: definitely what I see. So you know, one thing that
Speaker 1: the goulper eel does is it uses its giant mouth
Speaker 1: like a net. It can suck in huge gulps of
Speaker 1: water and take in crustaceans and invertebrates, anything that can
Speaker 1: like fit in in there, and then it can get Basically,
Speaker 1: its stomach is like a balloon that can expand and
Speaker 1: hold this food. It doesn't usually eat like that big
Speaker 1: of prey, but it's capable of it. So you know,
Speaker 1: you don't know what it's capable of, essentially, and it
Speaker 1: turns itself into a water balloon, so sucks in a
Speaker 1: huge amount of water until it literally looks like a
Speaker 1: water balloon with a tail, and then it can push
Speaker 1: all of the excess water out of its gill slits
Speaker 1: and keep the food in its stomach. Uh. And there
Speaker 1: is a video. I'll include all of this in the
Speaker 1: show notes, but you guys can look. It's of a
Speaker 1: gulper eel uh in water ballooon form. And marine biologists
Speaker 1: are watching this on a deep sea cam and they're
Speaker 1: losing it there. It's so funny to hear researchers lose
Speaker 1: it overseeing something and they're like, what, it's a muppet.
Speaker 1: It looks like a muppet. One question I had about
Speaker 1: the Pelican eel that um is it's very important for
Speaker 1: me and kind of like helping decide the future, Garfield
Speaker 1: is do you think that this Do you think a
Speaker 1: Pelican eel could survive swimming in a cup of coffee?
Speaker 1: M hmm, this is an interesting hot cup of coffee. Oh,
Speaker 1: I don't think too hot. No, maybe, Like I mean,
Speaker 1: first of all, it's a deep sea fish, so bringing
Speaker 1: bringing it up to the surface to put it in
Speaker 1: coffee is probably gonna kill it. I think if you
Speaker 1: have somehow have like a cup of coffee in the
Speaker 1: deep sea, which is gonna be hard because again, if
Speaker 1: you have it in a styrofoam Starbucks cup, it's gonna
Speaker 1: get crushed. So I think introducing this eel to coffee
Speaker 1: is either going to destroy the coffee or destroy the eel.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure you can have these two things exist
Speaker 1: at once in the same dimension. In that case, I mean,
Speaker 1: I think, how are you thinking this would be? I
Speaker 1: need to know, like, how would this work? Like? Is
Speaker 1: Garfield known for swimming in commun Oh? Yes, I mean
Speaker 1: there are a lot of you know, looking at the
Speaker 1: original texts of Garfield, there are definitely a lot of
Speaker 1: a lot of clips of him, you know, on a
Speaker 1: Monday sitting in a giant cup of coffee like it's jacuzzi,
Speaker 1: And you know, I guess I just want to make
Speaker 1: sure that the future Garfield is capable of, you know,
Speaker 1: it was capable of living his true life, you know, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would say unfortunate. I have to be honest about
Speaker 1: each candidate also because I am concerned with their welfare.
Speaker 1: I don't want to cast an animal as a garfield
Speaker 1: and have the new garfield be in danger by being
Speaker 1: in a giant, uh sort of kitty pool sized cup
Speaker 1: of hot coffee and have that hurt them. Although I
Speaker 1: would say again for most of these animals, I would say,
Speaker 1: boiling coffee is not gonna work. It's gonna have to
Speaker 1: be a tepid coffee. I think I'm okay with Like,
Speaker 1: doesn't a boiling just like room temperature, you know, just
Speaker 1: like the coffee part's important, right, if you can get
Speaker 1: that down to the bottom of the ocean, it maybe
Speaker 1: it'd be fine. Sure, why not? But probably like if
Speaker 1: you want it to be floating in a cup of coffee,
Speaker 1: like a comically large cup of coffee on the on
Speaker 1: the surface, sort of like with sunglasses. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't think. I'm not sure about that. I can't
Speaker 1: honestly say I think that would work. Okay, I'll keep
Speaker 1: that in mind in my in my uh, in my decision,
Speaker 1: I think analysis, how many garths, Hannah do you think?
Speaker 1: Um mouth ten? Lasagna ten, swimsuit competition ten, personality ten,
Speaker 1: So four garfs, four gars We got a solid four
Speaker 1: garfs that's good. What do you think, Joey say, I'm
Speaker 1: going to say four garfs with the asterisk of I
Speaker 1: would if they're like so far, this animal is very
Speaker 1: much in the front running. But if there's another animal
Speaker 1: with an equal vote to that, can't that can swim
Speaker 1: in a giant cup of coffee, I'm probably gonna have
Speaker 1: to lean toward the other animal. Okay, okay, Also kicking
Speaker 1: Odie off the table, like he could definitely swallow Odie hole,
Speaker 1: he could swallow Odi again something you shouldn't google, and
Speaker 1: then I think sped him out off the table. Oh okay, yes, yes,
Speaker 1: that's that's that's a valid that's I guess like with that,
Speaker 1: I think it does. For kicking Odie off the table,
Speaker 1: as long as he's bringing harm to Odi, I think
Speaker 1: it's okay. So if he swallows and eats Odi, that's
Speaker 1: like the same. Yeah, it's it's a similar, right. It's
Speaker 1: sort of the inverse of the kicking off the table maneuver,
Speaker 1: but just as potentially lethal. First issue of hell can
Speaker 1: Eel Garfield is him swallowing odeon then spitting up his bones.
Speaker 1: Oh and the yeah, I love that with the cartoon bones,
Speaker 1: where like it's literally the outline of the dog and
Speaker 1: the ears are just giant earbones, right and please this
Speaker 1: is going to be called garfiel fiel yea. I like it.
Speaker 1: I like it. Our next candidate is the Tasmanian Devil,
Speaker 1: who is a carnivorous marsupial from the Australian out Back.
Speaker 1: They don't really look like the Loony Tunes taz. They
Speaker 1: are little black and they usually have like a white
Speaker 1: stripe on their chest. Furry little critter that looks like
Speaker 1: the cross between a bear and a squirrel. Uh there,
Speaker 1: About the size of a small dog. They have a
Speaker 1: thick furry tail they used to store extra fat, and
Speaker 1: they are extremely carnivorous and they have a voracious appetite
Speaker 1: and a bad attitude. They can eat up to their
Speaker 1: own body weight in one sitting, so much that they
Speaker 1: can sometimes struggle to walk and they have to waddle
Speaker 1: or rest. And relative to their size, they have the
Speaker 1: strongest bite of any mammal. Their bite relative to their
Speaker 1: body size is stronger than a tiger and they can
Speaker 1: easily crush bone. In terms of their behavior, they are pugnacious.
Speaker 1: They're not I think their reputation is maybe a little bit.
Speaker 1: They're not necessarily territorial, but they do fight over food.
Speaker 1: So most of the fights between devils is over food.
Speaker 1: And sometimes they wrestle each other too, like they all
Speaker 1: stand up on their hind legs and shove at each other.
Speaker 1: That I think that this the Tasmanian Devil really encapsulates
Speaker 1: garfields love violent love for food. I would say, um, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that this Garfield. You know, I get the
Speaker 1: impression that that that Tasmanian Devil Garfield, Tasmanian Devil Feld
Speaker 1: would um very much hate mondays in the same way
Speaker 1: that probably hates everything else. I feel like it could
Speaker 1: probably put down a an entire Panamlasania and probably also
Speaker 1: eat the pan um. You know. I guess that my
Speaker 1: my my concern on Tasmanian Devil Garfield is you know,
Speaker 1: like I know, I know that louning tunes are not
Speaker 1: a documentary, but I feel like the Tasmanian Devil and
Speaker 1: Looning Tunes is very active and it's not particularly lazy.
Speaker 1: So I guess that my concern on Tasmanian Devil felt
Speaker 1: would be like, is he lazy? Is he capable of
Speaker 1: sleeping in a box? Forets a day. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: that's that. I think that that's that's my I would
Speaker 1: like to like put forward to the group. The modern
Speaker 1: day drawing of Garfield definitely also stores fat in his tail,
Speaker 1: so that's that's that's true. That is another comparison. They
Speaker 1: don't necessarily hibernate seasonally, but they do um during the
Speaker 1: day have sort of a mini ibernation called torpore where
Speaker 1: they just sort of go into a mega sleep where
Speaker 1: they conserve their energy. One that's adorable to Oh thank god,
Speaker 1: I was gonna have to disqualify them. But they are
Speaker 1: very active at night and at dusk and down, which
Speaker 1: is called being cripuscular. So they're they're a mixture between
Speaker 1: being c puscular and nocturnal. So I think we don't
Speaker 1: but we don't see Garfield like we do see sometimes
Speaker 1: the comics where we see Garfield at night are sort
Speaker 1: of more I think demonic. Yeah, just a similar thought.
Speaker 1: Do you think that John has toxoplasmosis from Garfield? Absolutely? Definitely.
Speaker 1: Toxoplasmosis is the when you're infected by T. Gandhai, which
Speaker 1: is a small um micro organism that lives in cat poop. Basically,
Speaker 1: it can infect rats it in their brain and infect
Speaker 1: them so that they are no longer afraid of cats,
Speaker 1: and so the rats will get eaten by the cats.
Speaker 1: The toxoplasm Magondhia then completes its mating cycle inside of
Speaker 1: the cat gut and then gets pooped out and then humans.
Speaker 1: If you handle cat poop um gross. Also you can
Speaker 1: get toxoplasmosis, which generally, unless you're pregnant, doesn't have too
Speaker 1: too many symptoms, but there is a theory that it
Speaker 1: could make you horny for cats or something. I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: I mean, that does make sense that Garfield would be
Speaker 1: riddled with parasites. I buy that. Yeah, yes, yeah, it
Speaker 1: explains the cat people phenomenon. So how many how many
Speaker 1: garths Hannah, Yeah, it has many? Devil should get I
Speaker 1: think the crepuscular thing is the one hitch in bonnet.
Speaker 1: That's not a phrase. It sounds like a phrase Jim
Speaker 1: Davis would use, but it's not a phrase real. It's
Speaker 1: something John would say, A real hitch in my bonnet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I pry the Tasmanian devil Garfield off of his face.
Speaker 1: Bout that and that is definitely the first and last
Speaker 1: Tasmanian Devil Feld stripped would just be ge John opening
Speaker 1: the box and being like, welcome to your new hope.
Speaker 1: Next strip attached to face following strip, John is a
Speaker 1: skeleton and Tasmanian Devil ad um right yep rips his
Speaker 1: whole entire face off. Maybe not quite Garfield material, like,
Speaker 1: I don't think this, I don't think I think this
Speaker 1: could be a Garfield substitute, like sub in for a
Speaker 1: few strips, but maybe not in the long run. Definitely
Speaker 1: a contender, though, although although the Tasmanian Devil would be
Speaker 1: up early in the morning without coffee, which is not
Speaker 1: a Garfield trait, everything else seems to be fairly on point.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna, I'm gonna. I'm gonna give five guards five Garfield.
Speaker 1: This is a very on point. This is like gritty
Speaker 1: reboot Garfield, and I'm gonna agree with that. I think
Speaker 1: five gars Is. I think that's an accurate number for this.
Speaker 1: This is like gar Field being played by Bruce Willis. Yes,
Speaker 1: just really get very much into the spirit of Garfield.
Speaker 1: Our next contender is the reticulated Python. So the reticulated
Speaker 1: Python is the world's longest snake. It grows up to
Speaker 1: twenty feet which is about six and a half meters
Speaker 1: and weighs up to a hundred and sixty pounds. They
Speaker 1: are found all over South Asia, and pythons are a
Speaker 1: family of non venomous snakes who throttle their prey and
Speaker 1: swallow them whole. The reticulated python is called what it's
Speaker 1: called because they have these little squares of pigment that
Speaker 1: almost looked like pixels, like you printed this python with
Speaker 1: sort of a pixelated coloration, And they are quite gorgeous animals.
Speaker 1: They have these stripes and patterns, and they can also
Speaker 1: be bred to have more unusual holo morphs, including being orange.
Speaker 1: So I'm just gonna put it out there. We could
Speaker 1: get a Garfield branded reticulated python for sure, with the
Speaker 1: characteristic orange and black stripes. I would say, I do
Speaker 1: have to be honest. Unfortunately, reticulated pythons do kill people occasionally.
Speaker 1: There are only a few recorded cases of people being
Speaker 1: eaten by reticulated pythons. So, you know, John maybe okay
Speaker 1: if he keeps snake Field fed, but reticulated pythons would
Speaker 1: have no trouble eating an entire pan of lasagna in
Speaker 1: one bite. They can eat entire pigs small deer alligators.
Speaker 1: They can eat prey that weighs as much as they do,
Speaker 1: if not more. Their jaws just can completely open wide
Speaker 1: enough to swallow a human being if they want, which
Speaker 1: they have occasionally done. Uh. And another interesting sort of
Speaker 1: to me garf like aspect is that they can go
Speaker 1: weeks between feeding, just lazing around and digesting, and a
Speaker 1: particularly large meal can actually last them several months at
Speaker 1: a time, So they could eat john and then chill
Speaker 1: out for like several months, which I feel like, it's
Speaker 1: very garden It's it's this one's got a few things
Speaker 1: going for it. It's got the garfield could be orange,
Speaker 1: orange and striping. In fact, I've included a few images
Speaker 1: of these are domesticated ones are not domesticated really just
Speaker 1: pet ones. There's no way that they have not been domesticated.
Speaker 1: They would still eat you if they got the chance.
Speaker 1: They are really beautiful sort of orange with dark brown
Speaker 1: and black stripes and patterns. Other than looks, they also
Speaker 1: just like their ability to eat and to be lazy
Speaker 1: is very garf esque. Yeah, I do think that. Um,
Speaker 1: I mean, as we talked about earlier with um, you know, uh,
Speaker 1: the unfortunate passing of lineman. Garfield has taken a life before,
Speaker 1: so you know, so the python so snake Feld, you know,
Speaker 1: having no problem taking a life. I don't think is
Speaker 1: a deal breaker when thinking of a new Garfield. You know,
Speaker 1: you do want somebody who's you know, cold blooded, has
Speaker 1: like a you know, a thirst for blood that Garfield has.
Speaker 1: Smells through his tongue. Y smells through his tongue like Garfield,
Speaker 1: Like we all know Garfield, does you know? I think
Speaker 1: that he can unhinge his jaw and eat a lot
Speaker 1: of lasagna. That's the really good thing going for him,
Speaker 1: that they can have orange coloration. I think that that's um,
Speaker 1: that's a really great candidate for a future Garfield. I
Speaker 1: guess that like he the way that he eats, is
Speaker 1: it possible? Does he have to strangle era? Does he
Speaker 1: have to strangle every bit of prey? Or if he
Speaker 1: just saw play of lasagna, would he try to like
Speaker 1: wrap around it and coil around it first before eating it,
Speaker 1: or would he just go for it and eat that lasagna?
Speaker 1: That's a good question. The purpose of the strangulation is
Speaker 1: to get the prey to stop moving and sicking around
Speaker 1: so it can engulf the prey. And eat it. So
Speaker 1: I feel like with the lasagna, as long as snake
Speaker 1: field understands the lasagna is not going to move or
Speaker 1: resist being eaten, I don't think it would necessarily need
Speaker 1: that would be overkill to sort of strangle it. Only
Speaker 1: one question, where's its butt? Well, snakes have what is
Speaker 1: called a cloaca, and that is usually near the end
Speaker 1: of the snake. Now, imagine the evolutionary history of a
Speaker 1: snake is that it was essentially like a lizard with legs,
Speaker 1: and then it got longer and lost its legs. So
Speaker 1: a lizard's kloeca is right near it's like, right at
Speaker 1: the base of its tail, and so snakes khloec is
Speaker 1: also right at the base of its tail. It's just
Speaker 1: its tail looks a lot like just more snake. So
Speaker 1: it's actually does have a tail in addition to the
Speaker 1: rest of its body. To you, it's just it's hard
Speaker 1: to tell the difference between it's it's caudal vertebrae and
Speaker 1: and region and just the rest of it. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: given that, um, I'm gonna say this is a pretty
Speaker 1: good contender as well in terms of mentality, I'm not
Speaker 1: now hang on, hon, I do want to back up
Speaker 1: because I do want to know why you needed to
Speaker 1: know where it's but is in order to rate it
Speaker 1: on the guard scales, And I feel like I feel
Speaker 1: like Garfield's butt location is a very important factor when
Speaker 1: trying to figure out the new Garfield. Garfield is maybe
Speaker 1: not a maybe not purely a cat, but in his
Speaker 1: quest to upset and discuss John in every way possible,
Speaker 1: he would probably do that cat thing right, putting the
Speaker 1: butt in the face. That's a that's a very good point.
Speaker 1: And yes, a snake could could in theory do that,
Speaker 1: and it's at the base of his tail, just like
Speaker 1: Garfield's presumably, so that that's that's a. That's a good sign. Um.
Speaker 1: I made this up because I'm just very but I
Speaker 1: just wanted to know one thing. Snakes very rarely. They
Speaker 1: don't typically pass gas, but they can, and when it happens,
Speaker 1: it's very funny. I just thought you should know that.
Speaker 1: That's good to know. I don't know if I've ever
Speaker 1: seen a script where Garfield does, but yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1: I think that that Jim Davis really doesn't like going
Speaker 1: into the far territory, which I think is a shame.
Speaker 1: I think it's he's fine to go into the dog
Speaker 1: cub territory though. It's right, he's okay with like there
Speaker 1: being a jar of dog gam meats liquid dog gam
Speaker 1: meets that Johnny drinks slips right down. But you know,
Speaker 1: Garfield farting is I'm sorry. I feel like I brought
Speaker 1: us down to no. No, it's worth it's worth examining.
Speaker 1: And I think that, you know, I think that Jim Davis,
Speaker 1: I think that he's he is very inconsistent in what
Speaker 1: he thinks is appropriate for Garfield and not appropriate for Garfield.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's, you know, I think that
Speaker 1: that's a worthy conversation to have. I mean, if you
Speaker 1: get into like the you know, extended Pausing universe with
Speaker 1: pet Force and all of that, there's there's a lot
Speaker 1: more room for a lot of stuff. If you get
Speaker 1: into Garfield and Friends, there are actually a lot of
Speaker 1: adult jokes there, so and and a lot of I
Speaker 1: don't remember if there were farts, but I'm going to
Speaker 1: guess there were farts, right, I remember Garfield and Friends
Speaker 1: where Garfield just has a big set of honkers. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we all remember that episode. Yeah that was a good one. Yeah,
Speaker 1: classic classic episode. So how many garths would you give
Speaker 1: the reticulated Python. I'm I'm sort of torn because I
Speaker 1: still feel like attitude wise, maybe not perfect. But I
Speaker 1: felt the same way about the Tasmanian Devil. So I'm
Speaker 1: going to give another five five garls. That's solid. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree with the five garths number. I think I
Speaker 1: guess that. My concern is that I hope that he
Speaker 1: doesn't put too much effort into eating lasagna. You know,
Speaker 1: I'd be concerned if we cast him as Garfield and
Speaker 1: he felt the need to strangle of lasagna every time
Speaker 1: at a certain point, because like, Garfield is not gonna
Speaker 1: put that much work into every lasagna. He's just gonna
Speaker 1: put his hands in and go gobble, gobble. So you
Speaker 1: know when you give a snake like one of those
Speaker 1: frozen mouse embryos, they just gobble them. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: they know. I think they learned. They know that if
Speaker 1: it's not moving, there's not really a need. You can
Speaker 1: just get put that right there. So I heard agree,
Speaker 1: five garfs. I think that's I think that's the right
Speaker 1: the right number for this folid. Not everyone is a
Speaker 1: fan of Garfield. There was a two thousand and six
Speaker 1: scathing opinion piece published in the Journal of American Academy
Speaker 1: of Pediatrics called Sleeping with the Enemy. Garfield and the
Speaker 1: National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute apparently the National Center
Speaker 1: for Sleep Disorders Research of the National Heart, Lung and
Speaker 1: Blood Institute ran a sleep Well, Do Well Star sleeper
Speaker 1: campaign featuring Garfield as the spokescat based on his renowned
Speaker 1: ability to nap, but the author of the takedown slammed
Speaker 1: Garfield for his unhealthy eating habits, writing quote, Garfield is
Speaker 1: a poster child for cardigo vascular risk. Although I have
Speaker 1: no knowledge of his family history, he is clearly obese
Speaker 1: and sedentary. I shudder to think what his blood pressure
Speaker 1: and lipid profile are given the quality and quantity of
Speaker 1: the diet he consumes. Similarly, if he is not yet
Speaker 1: frankly diabetic, Garfield is certainly at risk of developing type
Speaker 1: two diabetes and may already exhibit impaired glucose tolerance. Sorry, Garfield,
Speaker 1: you're canceled doctor's orders. When we return, we'll talk about
Speaker 1: some animals who look like they're ripping off Garfield's trademark style.
Speaker 1: Garfield is a trademark bright orange. So why did Tiger's
Speaker 1: plagiarize Garfield's look. It seems like a silly choice for
Speaker 1: an ambush predator like a tiger whose best bet is
Speaker 1: to remain camouflage before pouncing and biting down on your
Speaker 1: neck like a tray of lasagna. But it turns out
Speaker 1: those bright orange and black stripes are actually excellent camouflage
Speaker 1: to their preferred prey, deer and bore. These prey animals
Speaker 1: are red green, color blind and struggle to see the
Speaker 1: difference between green and orange. So a tiger's orange striped
Speaker 1: fur is going to blend in very well with green vegetation,
Speaker 1: especially in a lush, shadow streaked forest where tigers live.
Speaker 1: No wonder tigers have risked the wrath of Jim Davis
Speaker 1: and pass Inc To steal that trademarked Garfield orange glow.
Speaker 1: So now I just kind of want to talk about
Speaker 1: like the aesthetics of Garfield and these animals that, even
Speaker 1: if they couldn't be cast as the new Garfield, I
Speaker 1: think that they show that they're at the very least
Speaker 1: Garfield fans with their aesthetic choices. Our first animal is
Speaker 1: the golden pheasant. Now I'm gonna be completely honest with you.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure this animal would be a good Garfield replacement.
Speaker 1: I just admire the fandom that they display, the sort
Speaker 1: of the Garfield they they understand the Garfield brand, the
Speaker 1: Garfield aesthetics. So golden pheasants are sort of like an
Speaker 1: aristocratic version of Garfield, Like you take Garfield and add
Speaker 1: some like diamonds and jewels, you know, deck Garfield out.
Speaker 1: Golden pheasants are a pheasant native to China's forests and mountains,
Speaker 1: and they are very striking looking. The females are just
Speaker 1: sort of a ashy brown color, so they're not that exciting,
Speaker 1: but the males have the striking orange and black feathers
Speaker 1: sort of like sideburns that are almost like an umbrella
Speaker 1: around its cheeks and that are striped black and orange.
Speaker 1: They have orangey red bellies and an orange cape which
Speaker 1: is a fan of feathers on its back that it
Speaker 1: can spread during mating. And I just I just appreciate
Speaker 1: the esthetics of this bird. I feel like this is
Speaker 1: a Garfield fan that uses is Garfield fan boy is
Speaker 1: um to try to impress its mates. Yeah, I think that.
Speaker 1: I think the golden feather and I get what you're
Speaker 1: talking about in that, like his um. There's coloration on
Speaker 1: his feathers that definitely definitely exudes Garfield. It definitely definitely
Speaker 1: feels like, you know, it's like a Christmas tree if
Speaker 1: Garf it was a Christmas tree. I'm not sure if
Speaker 1: I would want this animal to be the replacement Garfield
Speaker 1: or the new Garfield because like, you know, like I'm
Speaker 1: not sure necessarily, like how much Lasagna could he couldn't
Speaker 1: kick odief table, how does it feel about Monday's. But
Speaker 1: I do think that, um, the coloration shows that he
Speaker 1: would be a welcome addition to the Garfield universe. You know,
Speaker 1: I think that like, if you look at it, it
Speaker 1: definitely feels like, oh, this is a symbol of the
Speaker 1: Garfield prophecy. This means that Garfield is coming, and that's
Speaker 1: something that Yeah, it's like it's like a Garfield omen.
Speaker 1: So we don't even have to rate this. I think
Speaker 1: I think we should just name this the official Garfield omen. So.
Speaker 1: You know how if you have a bunch of crows,
Speaker 1: that's an omen I guess of the devil or something.
Speaker 1: The golden pheasant showing up is an omen of Garfield cometh.
Speaker 1: He approaches You saw Avengers endgame it's like those guys
Speaker 1: that came in advance of Thanos, and like we're like
Speaker 1: Thanos is coming. It's like this feels like this bird
Speaker 1: is that for Garfield, the Harold Harold of Garfield. And
Speaker 1: he's like, bring out your lasagna, I and tremble and
Speaker 1: I do our next candidate. Now that's what I think
Speaker 1: could actually potentially pull off being Garfield. This is the
Speaker 1: milkweed tiger moth caterpillar. So adult milkweed tiger moths are
Speaker 1: sort of plain looking moths with brown wings, but if
Speaker 1: you look closely, you can see a bit of orange
Speaker 1: and black stripes on their abdomen, which is a faint
Speaker 1: memory of the glorious Garfie caterpillar they once were. So
Speaker 1: these moths and their larval stages, the caterpillars are found
Speaker 1: all over North America, just like Garfield. Caterpillars are the
Speaker 1: larval forms of moths and butterflies, and they have one
Speaker 1: mission to get thick by eating as much as possible,
Speaker 1: so they eat neat neat. We did read that important
Speaker 1: seminal novel as children, The Hungry Hungry caterpillar very accurate.
Speaker 1: Caterpillars exist to eat as much as they can, so
Speaker 1: that they collect as much nutrients to fuel their metamorphosis
Speaker 1: into adults. The milk weed tiger moth caterpillar has fuzzy
Speaker 1: black and orange stripes just like Garfield. So I think
Speaker 1: this is a real good like they've got this, they
Speaker 1: have the look, they have the Garf look. Another cool
Speaker 1: thing which I do think is similar to Garfield is
Speaker 1: they have toxins that they've acquired from plants that they
Speaker 1: can use to cause heart problems in predators if they
Speaker 1: attempt to ingest them, just like Garfield does. Yes, m
Speaker 1: M makes a lot of sense. That is very true
Speaker 1: of Garfield. Yeah, I do. Yeah, I love the cardiac
Speaker 1: toxin that Garfield has and exudes, and that I mean,
Speaker 1: that's one reason that John is always so stressed looking
Speaker 1: is he is just getting a lot of art palpitations
Speaker 1: just by being around Garfield and trying to eat him.
Speaker 1: John may try to kiss him, but then he gets
Speaker 1: some of that that cardiac talks in on his lips,
Speaker 1: and that's just one of many Garfield's tools of torment.
Speaker 1: Caterpillars in general, I think are very Garfield like because
Speaker 1: of how voracious they are. And so I think the
Speaker 1: milk weed tiger moth caterpillar is perhaps the one that
Speaker 1: looks the looks the most like Garfield. But the monarch
Speaker 1: butterflies caterpillars are so voracious even though they don't look
Speaker 1: that much like Garfield. I think they encapsulate the spirit.
Speaker 1: More so, they um eat two hundred times their birth
Speaker 1: weight within two weeks, according to Texas Butterfly Ranch quote.
Speaker 1: Imagine a seven pound newborn child consuming one thousand, four
Speaker 1: hundred pounds of formula and a two week period. Does
Speaker 1: sound like Garfield? Yeah? That does sound like gar Field.
Speaker 1: Did they ever do a baby Garfield? Was there like
Speaker 1: a Garfield baby? Only in my dreams? Um? Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: I mean originally when you showed me this, when you
Speaker 1: showed me a milkweed tiger moth caterpillar, my initial impression
Speaker 1: was that ain't Garf. But now that you've described it
Speaker 1: to me in a specially using terms of the hungry,
Speaker 1: hungry caterpillar, I'm honestly very on board for a milkweak
Speaker 1: tiger moth. Felt. Yeah. Yeah, I'm gonna go with five
Speaker 1: Garves on this. Five gurps. That's solid. What about you, Hannah?
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with stunt double nice. This could be
Speaker 1: a stand in for Garfield, right, um indistinguishable? Right when
Speaker 1: when like they need to do another take of Garfield
Speaker 1: eating lasagna, but Garfield's already eaten five hundred pans of
Speaker 1: lasagna and he simply can't eat anymore. You get the
Speaker 1: stunt Field in who can continue to eat take after
Speaker 1: take more and more lasagna. But first, first, you take
Speaker 1: that the Garfield that could only eat five pans of lasagna,
Speaker 1: and you fire him, and you say Garfield is supposed
Speaker 1: to eat infinite lasagna, and the line get out of here.
Speaker 1: I gotta send that gar Field out to past. Oh God,
Speaker 1: is that White John's parents own a farm? Is that
Speaker 1: like all the all the old Garfields, us AC is
Speaker 1: built on the bones of all of the dead Garfields,
Speaker 1: of forty dead Garfields. They check them into a juicer
Speaker 1: and that's where we get orange juice. Oh, I mean,
Speaker 1: I do love orange juice. That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker 1: Our last candidate to replace Garfield is the Krrion Beetle. Now,
Speaker 1: I'm actually quite fond of this, and I want you
Speaker 1: to hear it out, because not only are Karen Beetles
Speaker 1: got the look of Garfield, I think I don't know.
Speaker 1: They're they're almost more friendly friendly version of Field if
Speaker 1: you really think about it. Hear me out. So, there
Speaker 1: are many species of carrion beetle, but the one I
Speaker 1: want to focus on is called Nicrophorus vespilo, which has
Speaker 1: orange and black stripes in sort of a cartoonish squiggle
Speaker 1: that looks like the characteristic squiggly pin strokes of Garfield
Speaker 1: the cartons. So I think they already have the whole
Speaker 1: Garfield mood just drawn on their shell. It's a fun
Speaker 1: and festive look for a car in beetle. And I
Speaker 1: guess the only downside to the carrion beetle is maybe
Speaker 1: they're too good of an animal to be Garfield. I
Speaker 1: gotta say they're they're sweet, kind, wonderful undertakers of the
Speaker 1: animal kingdom. They eat dead bodies. This is true. I
Speaker 1: think this is a good thing, much like Garfield. But
Speaker 1: the difference is they don't generally kill the dead carrion
Speaker 1: before they eat it. It's it's scavenging. These dead carry
Speaker 1: and so one thing they do is they will come
Speaker 1: across like something like a dead mouse or something, and
Speaker 1: then they will bury the body underground, create a din.
Speaker 1: Usually sort of using the fur of the of the
Speaker 1: dead animal to line their dinner, and they will lay
Speaker 1: their eggs, and when their eggs hatch, their larva can
Speaker 1: feed on the carcass, and both mom and dad will
Speaker 1: stay with the young and feed them. They will eat
Speaker 1: up little bits of the carrion, and the adults also
Speaker 1: eat maggots, So if you're grossed out by maggots, these
Speaker 1: adults will eat the maggots of other species of of
Speaker 1: insects and use them to feed their own cute little maggots.
Speaker 1: Another thing is that they are helpful in solving murder cases,
Speaker 1: so carrion beetles are useful for forensic entomologists. Forensic entomologists
Speaker 1: are people who study the different stages that in sect
Speaker 1: maybe at in their development in order to help determine
Speaker 1: the time a daver has been dead. So you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: I recognize how old this beetle grub is, so I
Speaker 1: know that this body has been dead for like a
Speaker 1: week or something. And so again, these garf beetles help
Speaker 1: solve crime, which I think is great. Another cool carrying
Speaker 1: beetle fact is that some species of carrying beetles have
Speaker 1: noxious but secretions that they can use to ward off predators,
Speaker 1: which I think would be in a real fun addition
Speaker 1: to sort of the garf. The Garfield franchise would be
Speaker 1: like Garfield excretes a plume of noxious fluid and John
Speaker 1: you know, makes that eek face that he makes and
Speaker 1: like passes out, and as the readers were all like, oh, Garfield,
Speaker 1: your evolutionary defense mechanism is so fun. Now that you
Speaker 1: bring that up, I kind of can't picture a Garfield
Speaker 1: without that. Um, you know, I feel like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: feel like having noxious but fumes is definitely you know,
Speaker 1: that just screams Garfield to me. I feel like this
Speaker 1: is the pet John was trying to get, Like he
Speaker 1: he's just like he went to the pet store and
Speaker 1: forgot what forgot the word for beatle. Yeah, this is
Speaker 1: what he thought he was buying. Yes, Um, it's way
Speaker 1: too helpful to be Garfield. Yeah, I guess that. That's
Speaker 1: My main takeaway is like Garfield ain't no snitch, you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Not only that, this this beetle could be Garfield's downfall. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like if this if this beetle found Lineman, Garfield would
Speaker 1: be done. Yeah, this beetle would help solve the murder
Speaker 1: of Lineman. I think this is like, this is sort
Speaker 1: of the Flanders to Garfield, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Flanders in the Simpsons was created to be a direct
Speaker 1: um opposite of Homer, you know, in every way personality
Speaker 1: and physique, And this beetle is, while it has the
Speaker 1: Q orange and black stripes of Garfield, it is such
Speaker 1: a better creature than Garfield. It probably would be kind
Speaker 1: to Normal the kitten. It would feed Normal, it would,
Speaker 1: you know, only and like if Normal was killed, then
Speaker 1: it would discreetly bury Normal's body in a very respectful
Speaker 1: way and then use Normal's body to raise it's young,
Speaker 1: which I think is beautiful. Could I picture a world
Speaker 1: where Garfield is a Carrion Beetle? Yes? Do I want
Speaker 1: to live in that world? No? Yeah? And also if
Speaker 1: if the carrion Beetle is the Flanders to Garfield, then
Speaker 1: who is Normal standing for capitalism? I was gonna say Bart,
Speaker 1: but no, it's not rascally enough to be Bart, Like
Speaker 1: Normal is okay, So if Flanders is is Homer's opposite, um,
Speaker 1: I feel like Normal is Krusty the clown, and that
Speaker 1: he is Homer at his ideal um or Garfield is
Speaker 1: an ideal. Yes, like it's that was actually um when
Speaker 1: The Simpsons was theoretically only going to go for one season,
Speaker 1: they were going to end the season by revealing that
Speaker 1: Homer is crusty, and it's just like that's why the
Speaker 1: characters like ours design so similarly, looks so similarly. They
Speaker 1: just thought it would be a fun twist if like
Speaker 1: Bart's hero was his dad, and like Bart didn't even
Speaker 1: know it. So I think that, you know, I think
Speaker 1: that that's you know, this carrying beatle is. I think
Speaker 1: the ideal of what John wants Garfield to be helpful
Speaker 1: considerate noxious butt fumes gets rid of dead bodies much
Speaker 1: more effectively than Yeah, yeah, you gotta take the bodies
Speaker 1: into lasagna first to get Garfield to eat him, which
Speaker 1: is just too many steps, right. I mean Garfield just
Speaker 1: left Lyman's whole skeleton in the basement. That's real easy
Speaker 1: for the cops to find. And I mean there's like
Speaker 1: a door down Aaron, it's just like chained to a wall.
Speaker 1: It's like not hard, right. I mean, I love that
Speaker 1: carrying beetles could be on both sides of the law,
Speaker 1: Like you want to get rid of a body, like
Speaker 1: the carrying beetle can help you, but like you want
Speaker 1: to solve them murder, the carrying beetle can help you.
Speaker 1: It just it depends on what you can do for
Speaker 1: the carrying beetle. It's a double edged beetle. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's just the duality of man, really, the duality of
Speaker 1: carrying beetles. Yeah so maybe not so, maybe this wouldn't
Speaker 1: be Garfield. This is a good Garfield uh duter agonist
Speaker 1: or anti I don't know what are or like a
Speaker 1: parallel universe where John gets a good pet into the
Speaker 1: garf verse. This is like the Miles morales of Garfields,
Speaker 1: like a kinder, better version of Garfield. I also want
Speaker 1: to see an entire Garfield series. That's just the alternate
Speaker 1: universe where he got a good pet. It's just like
Speaker 1: a very normal and very normal sweetcat. He's in just
Speaker 1: a healthy relationship with a him and that he didn't
Speaker 1: badger at her work. He's a functional adult whose life
Speaker 1: doesn't revolve entirely around his cat. I take that back.
Speaker 1: There are plenty of functional adults whose entire lives revolved
Speaker 1: around their cats. It's okay, so what what what are
Speaker 1: we going? Let's make a judgment, who Who's Who's your Garfield?
Speaker 1: Pick a Garfield? You don't You guys don't have to
Speaker 1: pick the same Garfield, but you gotta pick a Garfield.
Speaker 1: Don't think too hard, just like, let it be your
Speaker 1: gut reaction, like who is garl like think like just
Speaker 1: like who's Garfield? And let it come out pelicanel Okay,
Speaker 1: we got Palcaniel. I was actually also going to say Palconio.
Speaker 1: I feel like the Palconio did it is It's the
Speaker 1: closest to what I think Jim davis Is original intent
Speaker 1: for Garfield is is a giant sea snake with a
Speaker 1: huge mouth that looks terrifying. So so Garfield, Garfield. We've
Speaker 1: done it. We did we great, We recast Garfield, and
Speaker 1: we're gonna get some really fun I think new fresh
Speaker 1: comics from it. I think I love how we've been
Speaker 1: so in sync throughout this whole thing. I mean, I
Speaker 1: expect nothing less of the three Garf sketiers. But yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think we've I think we did it. I think
Speaker 1: this was a really good brainstorming session, and now we
Speaker 1: just gotta kick start it and make our own series
Speaker 1: of Garfield. Step aside, Jim Davis we've got the new
Speaker 1: Garfield and he's an Yo. Well, thank you guys so
Speaker 1: much for joining me today. This was so fun. This
Speaker 1: is like my dream to talk to my fellow Garfield philosophers.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say philosophers doctors of philosophy of Garfield on
Speaker 1: the show. Let's have you guys plug your stuff. So Hannah,
Speaker 1: let's start with you. I currently working on things that
Speaker 1: are not out. Um, but my Twitter handle is at
Speaker 1: h A N A M I S H E L S.
Speaker 1: I gotta spell my name and I am sorry. It's
Speaker 1: it's a long series of Ellis Island decisions and Joey,
Speaker 1: you got anything to plug? So you can follow me
Speaker 1: on Twitter at Joey Tainman. You follow me on Instagram
Speaker 1: at Joey Clift and some stuff started dropping before then.
Speaker 1: I'm um, you should check out Comedy Central's Instagram stories.
Speaker 1: I'm Indigenous People's Day because I'm doing a takeover for
Speaker 1: Indigenous People's Day to uh yeah, it's gonna be a
Speaker 1: bunch of jokes and things about native stuff. And then
Speaker 1: I'm I'm doing it to promote a list of twenty
Speaker 1: five Native American comedians you should follow in I'm Native American.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of funny Native Americans. I'm one
Speaker 1: of them, hopefully. Uh so I'm not on the list.
Speaker 1: I helped write the list, but I'm hopefully in the
Speaker 1: category of funny natives. So yeah, check that out. Follow
Speaker 1: me on Twitter, Mark the Comedy cent drum stickum Stories,
Speaker 1: follow me on instad and thanks for having me and
Speaker 1: bes always excited to talk about carb Yeah, thank you
Speaker 1: guys so much for joining me. This was this was
Speaker 1: a fun trip into the gar First, you can you
Speaker 1: follow us on Instagram at Creature Future Pod on Twitter
Speaker 1: at Creature Feet Pod. That's f E A T, not feet.
Speaker 1: That is something very different. If you're interested in my
Speaker 1: Katie thoughts, just at Katie Golden k A T I
Speaker 1: E G O L D I N. And as always,
Speaker 1: I am at pro bird writes. Uh definitely not a
Speaker 1: sentient flock of birds trying to subvert social media to
Speaker 1: convince humans to accept us as their overlords. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much to this Space Classics for their super garfi song.
Speaker 1: X Alumina. Creature Feature is a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts like the one you just heard, visit
Speaker 1: the I Heart Radio app Apple podcast or Hey guess
Speaker 1: what where have you listen to your favorite shows? See
Speaker 1: you next Wednesday, not Mondays because Mondays. Yeah I was
Speaker 1: about to say, like a good thing, it's Monday. Now
Speaker 1: we all eat our full plates of lasagna that are
Speaker 1: sitting just out of camera and with our bare hands. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's an audio medium, but we promise you no silverware
Speaker 1: track lasagna. Some more