I rarely read beyond the headlines, because in most cases, the headline is enough.
For instance, I ran across this headline while scrolling my news feed.
MAN FOUND WITH LIVE TURTLE IN HIS PANTS BY TSA AT A NEW JERSEY AIRPORT
In this case, the headline is not enough. I, however, read no further, because I imagined the rest. First of all, a dead turtle would be even stranger. Who on earth wants to carry around any sort of dead animal, especially in your pants? A live turtle, though. Different.
So I had the following thoughts about this:
- Maybe this turtle was a support animal. Truly, there have been stranger ones. Honest to God, I was on a flight in which a woman brought a chicken on board. Maybe she was planning to kill and eat it later; I didn’t ask. But they let her do it, and these days, I bet this was her support chicken.
- Had this man been gone a long time, and he wanted to bring his kids back a present from his trip? My dad used to bring me gifts when he traveled. I got a xylophone once. It may have never entered his mind to put a turtle in his pants.
- But why hide the turtle? Oh yeah. I remember reading somewhere that you can get salmonella from turtles. Maybe this man thought that TSA knew this and would confiscate the turtle if he held it up for inspection. The lady with the chicken did this before bird flu was a threat, and she let everybody see her chicken. But turtles have always posed a salmonella threat, so I guess hiding turtles makes sense.
- But what would happen to the turtle when the man took his seat on the plane? Would he squash it to death? Or would he take it out of his pants and show it to his seat mate? Would the seat mate scream?
- Was the turtle stressed? If so, would this turtle pee or poop all over the man? Or worse, do this in the man’s pants?
- Was the man stealing the turtle for some reason? Was this a valuable turtle? Was the man planning to sell the turtle for big bucks when he landed? Who was the buyer? Is there a black market for turtles?
- I did look at the picture of the turtle (not the photo above-that one is a free stock photo). I am no turtle expert, but the turtle from the man’s pants looked like an average turtle to me. Nothing special, no colorful markings, no bumps or knobs on its shell. Maybe it was an endangered turtle. Maybe this man snatched it from a zoo or turtle conservation place?
- As I said, I didn’t read the article, and so I don’t know where the turtle is now. I am not even sure it survived. But I am hopeful that it is lolling in a nice aquarium somewhere, just enjoying the humidity.
Don’t ask me about the headline about a Cheeto shaped like a beloved Pokemon character that was auctioned off for $87,840 dollars. That is a story for another day.
