I am the nigh— awww yisss scritches pic.twitter.com/5ydLgRVk0A
— Dea Poirier ? (@deapoirierbooks) August 30, 2017
Open Thread!
by Adam L Silverman| 121 Comments
This post is in: Faunasphere, Nature, Open Threads
I am the nigh— awww yisss scritches pic.twitter.com/5ydLgRVk0A
— Dea Poirier ? (@deapoirierbooks) August 30, 2017
Open Thread!
Comments are closed.
OldDave
I’ve shown that clip to anyone who’d stand still long enough to watch.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
it never occurred to me, not for one moment, that bats could be cute.
zhena gogolia
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Still doesn’t.
Omnes Omnibus
Rats with wings.
Adam L Silverman
@OldDave: Everybody loves scritches.
sukabi
Fruit bat.
debbie
Sorry, but eeeew.
Mnemosyne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
They can be quite cute. They apparently are not closely related to rodents and form their own class that’s related more to carnivores like lions and bears.
(Hopefully a biologist will step in and help me out here.)
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
Ahem. See above at #8.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Carnivorous bats generally aren’t. Fruit bats, like the flying fox in the video, usually are. I’m pretty sure that baby flying foxes are the cutest things in the world.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Per the canon, Dracula could turn into a bat, a rat, and some other animals. Lions and bears were not among those animals. Do you really want to argue with an expert like Stoker?
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
Dracula could also turn into a wolf. I rest my case.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus:
Oatler.
Christopher Lee showed us how they could be quite menacing unless faced with a cross, daylight or any other convenient plot device.
hovercraft
Sorry, I can’t get past my anti bat prejudice. Not cute!
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: A wolf is neither a bear nor a lion. If you want to make an argument that bats are closer to dogs and wolves than rodents, I am willing to hear out your case. Bears and lions? We in Wisconsin have seen enough of them to know.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus:
Husband:
Wife:
Major Major Major Major
Awww soooo cuuuuute. The Vancouver aquarium had a fruit bat habitat. Was pretty cool to see them out and about in their fake twilight.
cain
Haha, way to go putting a quote from Batman: The Animated Series! In one Batman comic, Batman saw his ex-gf he had feelings for kissing someone else, and his reaction was “It doesn’t matter! Nothing matters! Nothing matters, but the night, and the war that NEVER ends!” Crazy fuck.
ETA clarification, grammar, other stuff
cain
BTW if you have amazon prime, you can watch all of the Batman: The Animated series, arguably the greatest cartoon series ever made.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: It is such a fun book. Also, I have been to the historical Drac’s birthplace – an inn in Sighișoara, Romania.
efgoldman
@Omnes Omnibus:
Like this?
Major Major Major Major
@cain: it’s no Animaniacs.
lamh36
Sup guys…
Baby sis and #NiecyLayla ready to board the plane for their first trip back home to NOLA since Layla was born! Layla all smiles as usual?????
https://twitter.com/psddluva4evah/status/903444025092526082
tobie
Those bats look huge to me. Years ago I had a problem with bats in my attic and no one could figure out how they were getting into the house. To cut a long story short, the sixth and last time one flew into the house, I caught it (wearing ski gloves) and called the Baltimore health department to retrieve it. Credit to Baltimore: they tested the animal for rabies and verified within 12 hour that it was negative. But before the results of the rabies test could come in, they insisted I go to the hospital for rabies shots. I believe I got 15 or 19 injections that night followed up by single shots on three more occasions. I’ve never felt like a bat was cute after that experience.
Adam L Silverman
@cain: Just a warning: While Timm did the story and the art for the new Batman & Harley Quinn, it is very, very, very strange. It’s like a crazy 90 minute conceptual mashup of the 60s Batman TV show, Batman the Animated Series, and Timm on way too many drugs trying to be risque in the dialogue he wrote.
SiubhanDuinne
I adore bats, especially fruit bats and flying foxes, but really any of them. They are incredibly important to human comfort — they consume vast quantities of mosquitoes and other annoying bugs, and they are significant pollinators. Also, they are very cute :-)
At least three people (including one BJ FP) sent me this video on FB. Glad to know I have the reputation of being a bat fan.
dmsilev
@Mnemosyne:
Look at the clip. Ignore the wings and focus on the head; looks a lot like a small dog.
Very slightly more seriously, spending ten seconds on Wikipedia pulls up this:
( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat , scroll down to the Phylogeny section)
Mnemosyne
@lamh36:
Layla is adorable! I remember you saying that the family is expecting its first boy in quite a while — has he arrived yet?
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: I enjoyed it. Have you read Kim Newman’s Anno Dracula and the follow ons?
https://www.amazon.com/Anno-Dracula-Kim-Newman/dp/0857680838/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1504233148&sr=8-1&keywords=Anno+Dracula
I have not been to his birthplace, but I was at the castle in Germany that served as inspiration for Shelley’s Castle Frankenstein.
Omnes Omnibus
@Major Major Major Major: Exactly.
@efgoldman: No, like this.
Adam L Silverman
@tobie: They’re flying foxes, the largest type of bat.
Mnemosyne
@dmsilev:
Now I want to see a vampire movie where they can turn into dolphins. Or orcas. I’m not picky.
ETA: I read the same Wikipedia article, I just didn’t understand it.
bago
Alucard had power of wolf, power of bat, and power of gas.
Symphony of the Night is CANNON!
Anne Laurie
@Omnes Omnibus: Flying foxes. *Not* vampires, but they are the ones who spread Ebola and other hemorrhagic viruses to humans, so absolutely can be dangerous!
efgoldman
@SiubhanDuinne:
Well earned, too.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: I have read none of those. Recommend?
Adam L Silverman
@dmsilev: Actually the bat’s head in the clip up top actually looks like my oldest dog Rosie. She’s part black lab, part german shepherd. And right now she’s sound asleep.
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
Have you read Fred Saberhagen’s The Dracula Tape? Same story, but from Drac’s point of view.
I assume Adam has already read it.
efgoldman
@Omnes Omnibus
No argument from me
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: I’ve read the first two: Anno Dracula and The Bloody Red Baron. I found them enjoyable. They are basically mashups. Newman brings in a ton of vampire mythos and then mashes up Dracula in London with the Ripper killings. The second one has Dracula involved in WW I. A lot of other gothic horror characters make an appearances.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman: cool, I was just thinking I”d like to see a new version of Dracula, or any good vampire story.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: I have read more history of Vlad Țepeș than vampire fiction.
debbie
@lamh36:
Awww, she’s so much cuter than that damn bat.
cain
@Adam L Silverman:
I don’t think I’ve seen that.. dammit! Now I gotta google.
dmsilev
@Mnemosyne: Makes a hell of splash if they get their timing wrong and go whale-form while still at altitude. A splash of water if over the ocean, a splash of whale if over land (messy….).
(there’s one scene towards the end of _Moana_ which illustrates case A, and I believe Douglas Adams covered case B in one of the Hitchhiker’s Guides books)
lamh36
@Mnemosyne: oh yes. Noah was born 2 months early spent about 2 months in the NICU, but has been home now for about a month now. He’s doing great!!!
Scuffletuffle
Awwwww, too adorable! Of course, I say that to and about raccoons. And opposums too…
singing truth to power
Check out the Facebook page Batzilla the Bat – it’s a rescue page for fruit bats in Australia. Cutest little winged boogers ever – they will steal your heart. https://www.facebook.com/Batzilla-the-Bat-445796495553687/
la caterina (Mrs. Johannes)
@lamh36: Thread needs moar Layla!
Omnes Omnibus
@Scuffletuffle: Opossums? No accounting for taste, but golly.
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
You may like it — Saberhagen does a good job of finding the various inconsistencies in Stoker’s book and re-framing it with Dracula as the hero.
I suspect it was an unacknowledged source for Coppola’s version of Dracula since it has a lot of similarities in the plot. (No Keanu Reeves, thank god.)
Origuy
So this happened in rural Lake County, north of the Napa Valley:
A passing motorist was interviewed by reporters.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
Is that a warning or a recommendation? ?
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I keep meaning to read the other ones after those two, but never seem to get there.
I’m also a huge Ripper history and mythos follower. So the mashup sounded interesting. I only found a small portion, basically a short chapter, to drag and be hard to follow. The remainder was interesting, especially how Newman wove in these other characters and threads from vampire mythology and pop culture, as well as other gothic horror characters.
Mnemosyne
@lamh36:
Yay! But I have to admit, Zoe is still my favorite. They’re all cute, but she has personality plus!
efgoldman
@Origuy:
Should that be a surprise?
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: I am guessing that the answer is yes.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@lamh36: You have the cutest nieces of anyone I know, online or in 3D. And I imagine Noah is about the cutest nephew I’ve seen, also, too!
singing truth to power
And speaking of adorable, check out the hairy screaming armadillo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnl74OGBU1k It is a real thing. And way better than Trump, et al.
Adam L Silverman
@cain: Just came out last week. They had Kevin Conroy and Loren Lester as Batman and Nightwing. They got Melissa Rauch to do Harley Quinn. She was hit and miss. The entire thing is just weird. I can’t decide yet whether I like it or not. The musical scene (the video I posted the other night is the first of two songs in the musical scene) has a lot of Batman the Animated Series easter eggs in it in plain sight.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman: I’m also a huge Ripper history and mythos follower.
Yeah, that’s another good source. Someone did a mash-up of the Ripper and Holmes, didn’t they? I can almost picture scenes from a movie I think I saw Foggy Victorian London is perfect for thriller/horror stories. As clever as the new BBC Holmes show is, I miss old London as a character.
Major Major Major Major
@Origuy: Meth is a hell of a drug.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
^^0^^
divF
@lamh36: Keep those cute kid pix coming !
ETA: I’ve got a heavy work weekend ahead of me, so I can use all the cheering up I can get.
Mary G
Horrible news: two volunteer rescuers killed in Harvey floodwaters after bringing families to safety. (WaPo)
Details are horrifying. If Twitler tries to get credit for these heroes I’m going to snap.
cain
@Adam L Silverman: The one reviewer didn’t like it at all, that it was overly sexist in a time when attitudes towards women are changing. (the reviewer was male) Yeah, so the reviewer agreed with you there.
cain
@Mary G:
Oh no! I’m so sorry what brave people.. they are heroes!
Viva BrisVegas
@Anne Laurie:
In Australia, it’s lyssavirus and Hendra virus you have to watch out for. You really do not want to be handling flying foxes without good gloves, people have died.
You also do not want to live next to a roost of these things. Ten thousand bats in a tree make more noise than a jet engine and smell way worse.
At summer sunsets you can see miles long lines of these things flying across the sky as they head out to the orchards.
Frankensteinbeck
I’ve been reading this article about the planning of the Charlottesville white power rally. It’s striking me what utter fucking poseurs these people are. They drape themselves in warrior mythology, talking about guns and armor and battle plans, but they’re whiny little cowards who don’t really do any of it.
@Adam L Silverman:
Bear in mind, Dini did the writing that made Batman: TAS so famous. Timm is Dini’s preferred artist.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mary G: he didn’t say a word about the police officer who was killed on morning of his visit. It’s almost not worth typing, but just imagine if Obama had done that
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: I’m honestly not sure. Classic Timm art? Yes. Conroy and Lester voicing Batman and Nightwing? Yes. Lighter tone with humor? Sure. Completely bonkers story, dialogue, etc? Still not sure. It is just strange. Wasn’t what I was expecting. With the exception of the adult themes, including adult themed humor/double entendres, etc, it is almost closer to one of the lighter Justice League Unlimited episodes.
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: Your link brought up this nugget from my childhood. I truly was the one of the first Sesame Street kids. I was four or five when the original of this aired.
divF
@Omnes Omnibus: Oscar the Grouch. Figures.
Laura
@lamh36: That’s a lot of love heading your way.
OldDave
Random free associations about bats:
1) The Congress Avenue bridge in Austin, TX at sunset.
2) The fruit bats at Disney’s Animal Kingdom park.
3) Christopher Moore’s ‘Roberto’, companion and pet of character Tucker Case.
4) … damn, I’ve forgotten. CRS strikes again.
Mnemosyne
@Mary G:
So sad. People working in crisis mode can forget how dangerous downed power lines really are.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I know Moore’s vampire books, but that doesn’t ring a bell. Which book is that?
Omnes Omnibus
@divF: Actually, Cookie Monster was my favorite.
hovercraft
@lamh36:
Now thats cute :)
She’s growing so fast.
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Then I think you’ll like it. Holmes is in it.
piratedan
@Adam L Silverman: CowboyBeBop still rules imho, for the combination of story arcs, character development and the music, which is simply awesome.
MJS
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I read an outstanding Holmes-Ripper mash-up, but am absolutely horrible at remembering names of books or authors.
dexwood
@OldDave:
Bats leaving Carlsbad Caverns at sunset and returning at dawn. An amazing sight.
Origuy
@Major Major Major Major: That was my first thought. I’ve been to Lake County several times, before the fire two years ago. Beautiful area, but very poor.
Adam L Silverman
@cain: Given how Harley has evolved as a character in the comics it is definitely several steps backwards for the character. Of course Timm is the guy that wrote a prologue into the animated movie of The Killing Joke with Barbara Gordon/Batgirl having a sexual relationship with Batman, so he may have simply found his inner Frank Miller.
I honestly try not to go by reviewers. The art and animation are great. The overall plot is good. Some parts were excellent. But some parts were somewhere between meh and strange.
Scuffletuffle
@Omnes Omnibus: yes, had one living in my spare room one winter. I fed it cat food and was able to scritch and pet it. Still miss my baby, lol!
Frankensteinbeck
@Adam L Silverman:
I know in TAS continuity it is canon that at some point Barbara has sex with Batman, and the total failure of that relationship is why she stops officially associating with him. I’ve never seen the Killing Joke, but I provide this as possibly relevant continuity info.
Jeffro
Just as soon as we figure out how to get rid of all snakes, bats are next.
OldDave
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Tucker Case (and Roberto) first appear in “Island of the Sequined Love Nun”. They also make an appearance in “The Stupidest Angel”.
Adam L Silverman
@Frankensteinbeck: I’m aware. While Timm’s elseworld Justice League: Gods and Monsters last year was an interesting take on Batman, Wonder Woman, and Superman, he clearly would have been better off if he’d taken his idea to Dini and had Dini done the story.
Lalophobia
I find fruit bats cute, but the undisputed cutest species of bat has got to be the cotton ball bat, or the Honduran white bat.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
Adam, did you see “The Lego Batman Movie”? I watched it on an airplane and was unexpectedly charmed. I agree with the reviewers who said that it seemed that it “got” the characters far more than any of the live-action versions have.
rikyrah
@Omnes Omnibus:
Amen
Frankensteinbeck
@Adam L Silverman:
I consider that a given. Dini is good. Dini is one of the few writers who has ever been an idol for me.
rikyrah
@lamh36:
Too cute ?
Steeplejack
@piratedan:
Reminding me yet again that I need to pick up the Blu-ray set of the whole series. One of my all-time favorites.
StringOnAStick
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Island of the Sequined Love Nun. (I think). Tucker and Roberto show up in another book or two.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@OldDave: ah, Island is one I’ve missed. I can’t remember Tucker Case but a bat named Roberto is ringing a vague bell now
Adam L Silverman
@Frankensteinbeck: I’m aware and tracking. I’ve seen that episode of Batman The Animated Series and the references in Batman Beyond and Batman Beyond Return of the Joker.
My understanding is that they decided they didn’t have enough material with The Killing Joke for a movie length animated story. So they decided to do a prologue written specifically for the animated movie focusing on Barbara Gordon. Initially this was promoted and reported as a way to flesh out Barbara Gordon/Batgirl as a character as she’s not been in any of the animated movies yet. Given how problematic The Killing Joke is given its subject matter, and how the editorial decisions on it were made allowing it to be problematic, the reveal that a 20 minute tack on up front to the actual story that basically reduced Barbara Gordon/Batgirl to a lovestruck sex object struck a lot of people wrong.
I was never really a fan of The Killing Joke. I thought the art in the book was great, but the storyline has always bothered me, even with the retrospect of how Barbara Gordon was resurrected/rehabilitated as Oracle. It is one of the graphic novels I’ve never bothered to reread. So I didn’t bother with the animated movie.
Omnes Omnibus
I suppose it isn’t weird that a post with bats turns into a Batman anorak-fest around here.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: I did not. I find the Lego movies and TV shows to be annoying.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: Sorry.
Omnes Omnibus
@Omnes Omnibus: No need for apologies. This place is what is. And this twist boxed me out. It happens.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
There’s a Lego TV show?
Anyway, if you get a chance to catch it on cable some night, I recommend it. It’s obviously played for comedy and they take liberties with the canon (to say the least), but I think there’s a lot in there that “serious” Batman fans would like.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: There are several. There was a Lego Star Wars series. There are several direct to video/direct to TV Lego: Justice League and Lego: Batman family movies.
Lyrebird
@Mnemosyne:
Ninjago on Cartoon Network – Thumbs down from both kid and me. I didn’t like the art, but it appealed at first to my young child. Plot and action were way too much all-stress-and-disaster-all-the-time for the kid’s liking. I’m not crazy about the mix of cutesy ultra-Lego “people” with the level of fear and violence, but I am very picky.
Johannes
@Mnemosyne: I quite liked it. As I did Newman’s Anno Dracula series.
Mnemosyne
@Adam L Silverman:
Huh. Well, FWIW, they put their A team on the movie. TV can be … lower budget, both in terms of money and talent.
jl
I guess part of that bat is cute. I’ll go that far.
Mnemosyne
@Lyrebird:
You’ll probably like “Batman” better. They definitely emphasize humor and emotion over violence (though it’s a Batman movie, so there’s a certain amount of running-jumping-kicking-punching).
bemused senior
There is a bat rescue near by, and I enjoyed when the specixxalist brought rescued bats to teach us park docents about them. She would let them hang by their tiny claws on her bra in her cleavage to warm up. They are beautiful and velvety to touch.
Lyrebird
@Mnemosyne: Thanks for the review! someone gave us that Lego Batman movie, and kiddo (still remembering the TV show) just said nuh-uh. Maybe we’ll bring it out of the drawer again later.
The TV episode we watched had a bunch of “you’ll never see Master Wu again!” type stuff. In our extended family, both the adopted and the bio cousins have Really Not Liked that kind of plot. (can you say Bambi? Opening of Ratatouille, whoops!!!!) But maybe other kids are fine with it.
I think you would find the Ninjago plot and dialog formulaic as well. Classic Dora is terribly predictable, too, but the music is good, and they throw in little funny bits for the grownups, like “Coney Island” being filled with ice cream…
Frankensteinbeck
@Adam L Silverman:
I am reminded: I have a weird specialized recommendation. For anyone who’s into comics lore, I suggest the show Batman: The Brave And The Bold. Standalone, it is vastly lower quality than TAS. Instead, it’s a weird collection of injokes from Batman’s history, using each episode to highlight some obscure and usually goofball stupid villain from the comics.
Mnemosyne
@Lyrebird:
I don’t think it’s too spoiler-y for me to reveal that Batman wants to do everything on his own, but ends up realizing that he needs other people to help him, so a good message for the kiddos in there in addition to being an entertaining movie. And people only die in the backstory.
Adam L Silverman
@Frankensteinbeck: I enjoyed that series immensely.
Robert Sneddon
@Adam L Silverman: If you’re a Ripper “fan”, have you read Roger Zelazny’s “A Night In The Lonesome October”? It’s a strange horror/comedy mashup story told from the point of view of Jack the Ripper’s dog, Snuff about the attempt by assorted mythical monsters to either bring on or avert a Lovecraftian apocalypse while a Great Detective (who likes dressing in women’s clothing as a disguise waaay too much) and his Bumbling Sidekick interfere. It makes an excellent read during the month of October, one chapter a day.
satby
@SiubhanDuinne: I also love bats! When I lived in the country, I enjoyed sitting on my deck and watching them come out of the hollow trees where they nested and swoop around eating the hordes of mosquitoes from the wetland next door to me. I had to tell my country neighbors not to kill them; they tended to kill anything classed as a varmint as soon as they saw it, whether it was near their houses or not. They were surprised to hear that the bats ate almost their body weight in bugs every night.
Sab
satby
@Jeffro: snakes and bats keep us from being overwhelmed by bugs! Both are vital to the ecosystem.
pluky
@Mnemosyne: Bats (Order Chiroptera) are really there own thing amongst the mammals. Check out the Wiki page “Phylogeny” section.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat