Boom!

On this day in 2004, a whale exploded.

No, really.

Beware: that link leads to a somewhat graphic picture. It's hard for a whale to explode in a decorous fashion. I feel particularly sorry for the guy who owned that moped.

Animal combustion is, apparently, not as uncommon as you'd think. It's a large enough anomaly to attract a cult following, at any rate. Most documented ani-plosions occur naturally - here and there, though, you stumble upon truly upsetting manmade detonations. Wikipedia claims the project was called off for being too costly and slow to develop. An educated mind, however, can quickly guess the real reason: angry vampires.



Today's event was actually a tie between the above and another ghastly animal-related occurence: Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven was published today in 1845. Here's a nice little site commemorating his life and works. (Poe's, I mean. After inspiring the poem, that raven took the proceeds and retired to the tropics, where he never did another day's work in his whole darn life). Until next time...