Rite of Fancy

Dear Henry,

Have you ever played the game Ducks and Drakes?

No?

Maybe you played the game under a different name, skipping stones.

The term "Ducks and Drakes" first appeared in English literature in 1583 and, given the description, the rules of the game haven't changed much.

The object then, as now, is to skip a stone across the water more times than anyone else.  I did notice one difference though. It was once permissible to use oyster shells, rather than stones.

Oyster shells were prohibited after the 1972 Winter Rules Committee mandated Rule I, section 3aii.

Yes, there are rules to this game, because it is, in fact, an official sport. 

During the summer months, professional players at Ducks and Drakes (or skippers, or gerplunkers) travel the country to different events, most being held in the upper-midwest,  with the Mackinaw Island's 51st Invitational being the US's crowning event.  The skip of the day in 2019 was 20 skips.

There is a bigger, worldwide compe…

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Dear Henry,

Today was, in a word, rather crappy.

A powerful windstorm (tornado?) came through our area last night and there are trees down everywhere. We were fortunate and didn't have any structural damage to our house although we did end up with at least five trees scattered about the property.

Stumbling across a coprolite article seemed like a fitting story for the day.

It seems, back in the 1960s, researchers at Texas A&M collected a couple of human coprolites (fossilized poo) from Conejo Shelter Texas and then stuck them in storage.  They were recently rediscovered (imagine finding that) and analyzed (5I was complaining about cleaning up trees). It turns out, one of the fossils is rather odd.

The sample, carbon-dated to around 1460-1520, contained the remains of a rodent, eaten uncooked and whole, and the bones, fang, and scales of a rattlesnake suggesting that it too was consumed whole and raw.

I have no idea why anyone would do such a thing (researchers are guessing a …