First Voyage; Introduction {Video}

[whynotamus]

{There's a video feed coming in, of a large early Victorian sitting room and fireplace. The first thing one might notice, however, is not the period furniture or the formally dressed man in the middle of it, but rather the crowd of animals puttering around him. They're smaller animals, to be sure, but there are a lot of them-a dog, guinea pigs,

Comments

[rayney_day]

Doctor Dolittle? Seriously...?

[whynotamus]

Quite serious, Miss, I assure you.

[rayney_day]

You ever thought of giving them some nice, conventional names? Dave, Bob... Nancy?

[whynotamus]

Those, as you call them, "conventional" names are really quite hard for animals to pronounce. Besides, I find it much easier to allow the animals to choose their own names-and some of them come with names already.

[19centconstable]

How can a duck get seasick?

[whynotamus]

I rather wish I knew. He's quite fine flying and diving and swimming, all those wonderful duck activities, but the moment you put him on something that moves, say a boat, and he remains still, he invariably comes down with motion sickness. Dizzy and all that-terribly disorienting thing to have, for a duck, they rather depend on their movement, you see.

[19centconstable]

Doesn't everything depend on its movement? Except for maybe tortoises.

[whynotamus]

Why, yes, I rather suppose they do. Even turtles and tortoises and garden snails have to move about to find their food. I suppose it would be more accurate to say that a duck depends very highly upon its manoeuvrability. Yet a simple boat ride can put Dab-Dab quite under the weather, so to speak.