Frankenlab

Guten Abend meine Freunde!

This week we welcomed several new additions to the Frankenlab, albeit temporarily, when my little birthday surprise for our resident hunchback handyman Igor went slightly awry. Knowing Igor’s soft spot for all things cute and cuddly I decided that it would be lovely to celebrate the occasion by sponsoring a troupe of endangered Antarctic penguins in his name. I jumped on the Frankenlab’s dusty old laptop, fired up my Paypal account and duly went to work funding the cutest bunch of flightless critters my credit card could muster up. Mission completed, I sat back, safe in the knowledge that my lumpy buddy would be enjoying a whole year’s worth of penguin-related goodness from his new feathered friends with tons of cute photos, light-hearted newsletters and slightly fishy correspondences winging their way from our planet’s chilliest climes.

Imagine Igor’s bemusement then when, on the morning of his special day, he flung open the doors of the Frankenlab to find our lawn full of hundreds of hungry penguins fresh from a long-haul flight from the South Pole. It turns out you really have to read the small print on these sponsorship sites to find out exactly what you’re signing up for!

Needless to say, as chuffed as Igor was with his surprise, the novelty of having an entire penguin colony under our protection soon wore off. To be honest, it wasn’t so much their insatiable appetite for tinned sardines or their tendency to huddle en-mass in the Frankenlab’s whirlpool jacuzzi that did it, but rather their surprising love of German Techno music that pumped through the building until the wee small hours of the morning. After just a day we were on the phone to the nearest Zoo to get our new friends re-housed and by late the following afternoon, the Frankenlab was blessedly penguin-free once more.

Which was lucky as, on the very next moring Elsie’s gift for Igor arrived – turned out she’d had a similar thought to me on the animal sponsorship front but her present turned out to be a little more problematic. Who would have thought Bengal tigers liked French hip hop so much, eh?

Still, it looks like we’re not the only ones having penguin problems this week as Louise and JonathanBononathan’s Frankenstory demonstrates (although I like to think out solution was a little more humane!):

There once was a boy who loved penguins. He played with them all day long. Then one day one of the penguins said to him, “Why do you love us so much?” He said to him, little penguin, I love you because….of your tuxedo bodies and ability to slide so well. I’ve always wanted to see a person slide into home plate at a baseball game in a tuxedo. Or I would love to see a penguin direct a symphony or serve orderves at a party. But the penguin was not amused. He was upset with the fact that…. he loved the penguin so much but didn’t give them enoug attention and care. The boy decided he would throw the penguins a big penguin bash. The party would have beers and toys and even a penguin stripper. The penguins were so excited. until they realized that the strippers were really bears disguised as penguins. The bears had the penguins right where they wanted them. The penguins made a run for it but were caught off by the bears. Then the bears ate all of the penguins. The end

(See the original story here)

Fear not, dear readers, as all is not lost! It seems at least one of our black-and-white friends escaped the clutches of those nasty polar bears and went on to become the hero of Sheldon and Carmen’s Frankenstory, proving that penguins can really kick ass when they need to:

As fergie the penguin descended the cavern, he knew that something truly magical awaited him at the bottom. Carefully he lowered him self down the rope. Down, down, down further he went approaching the darkness. What awaited our hero was unknown. But our hero trudged forwards none the less. He continued into the darkness, when out of the darkness came a lizard monster. He used his karate skills, but they were useless. He fell to the dirt when he remembered the words only angels and sparrows may fly for penguins are cursed to the earth and sea.” How he hated that phrase that had plagued his mind for years. The only thing left was to do what he could. He danced a Jig. It was the most beautiful Jig the moster had ever seen. So beautiful, the monster started crying. This was all our hero needed to catch the moster and save the world. He punched the monster and it landed with a thud.

(See the original story here)

Anyway, better run – the sound of Gallic rap music has just struck up from the Frankenlab and its accompanying cacophony of ominous growls suggest that Igor might be in imminent danger of losing a limb…

See you soon Frankenfans,

Zoologically yours,

Dr. Victor E. Frankenstory.