Thursday Things: Swamp Volcano Edition
19 September 2024. Vol 6 No 38. By Dan McGirt. #267
Thursday Things is here! This week we plunge into the mystery of a swamp volcano and automate our avocados.
Handmade? Not exactly… Photo by Zoshua Colah on Unsplash
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Swamp volcano!
I love those cheesy B-movies on what used to be the Sci-Fi channel, later rebranded as SyFy. You know what I mean — the ones that are so laughably bad or ridiculous that they’re awesome. Sharknado is perhaps the exemplar par excellence of this genre. But there are many, many more.
Sometimes I joke that the producers at SyFy come up with these movies by picking words out of a hat. One hat with slips of paper naming dangerous animals and another with weather events or natural disasters. Shark + Tornado? Sharknado! They hand that to the writers and they go bang out a script.1
Or if they want to go a different route they mix two animals (Octo-Shark!) or two disasters (Meteor Blizzard!). The creative possibilities are endless.
Which brings us to Swamp Volcano!
An alert Happy Subscriber sent in a link to an article about a swamp volcano in Florida. I immediately thought it sounded like a late night movie on Syfy. But no!
The swamp volcano is real!
Or is it? Well, therein lies the mystery…
Florida swamp volcano mystery leaves scientists baffled
Baffled scientists is almost a given in any cheesy SyFy thriller. Except for that one scientist with unconventional ideas that all the other scientists laugh at. Let’s dig in!
Rumors of a volcano tucked away in the deep swamps of Florida have swirled for centuries - and still baffle scientists to this day.
Reports of pillars of smoke rising from the impenetrable jungle of Wakulla in the northwest of the state have been documented since the 1800s, Click Orlando reported.
The legend became known as the 'Wakulla Swamp Volcano' and was even covered at the time by newspapers like The New York Times.
Witnesses from as far away as Tallahassee claimed they could see columns of steam, with a visible red glow descending over the site at night.
This is a good start! I’m thinking aliens. Maybe Bigfoots. Lost tribe? Some kind of Atlantis angle?
Even to this day, few have ventured into the depths of Wakulla swamp to investigate:
Many explorers were also no doubt put off by an expedition to uncover the mystery launched years earlier in the 1870s that had ended in tragedy.
Launched by the New York Herald Tribune, it consisted of three guides and a single journalist, historian Charlie Carlson told Click Orlando.
But after fighting through alligator-infested, unmapped terrain for three days, the expedition was abandoned.
Carlson described how one of the guides fell from a tree while trying to scope the area - while the reporter went on to die from swamp fever, now known as malaria.
Meanwhile, speculation around the unexplained smoke continued to swirl - with theories ranging from secret pirate settlements to moonshine distilleries.
The pirates are a good thought. Maybe they’re immortal pirates guarding the Fountain of Youth. Has that been done? Yes. But SyFy has no shame about recycling what’s already been done better!
There is even a local legend backstory to work with:
It likely stemmed from a site located just south of Tallahassee between Sumatra and Carrabelle that is known as Tate's Hell - a 200-square-mile strip of wilderness that remains partially unmapped to this day.
The forest located on what is often referred to as Florida's 'forgotten coast' got its unusual name when a local homesteader by the name of Cebe Tate got lost in its 200,000 acres in 1870s after pursing a panther that had been hunting its livestock.
Local legend claims that when the 45-year-old emerged from a clearing near Carrabelle days later, he murmured 'My name is Cebe Tate and I just came from Hell!' before collapsing, dead.
To this day, rumors have persisted about the forest being haunted.
Gates of hell is also a good angle. We could go with more of an exorcism, cursed treasure, swamp devils, supernatural take.
There are many twisting trails to the swamp volcano!
Read the whole article for some lengthy excerpts of accounts of past searches for the swamp volcano. It’s great Ripley’s Believe it or Not fodder. (Or solid Fortean content, for those who get the reference.)
All I know is SyFy needs to jump on this.
Well, that’s enough for Swamp Volcano. Let’s pull two more words out of the Story Hat: Guacamole. Robot. Now where does that lead us?
Which way to the swamp volcano? Come closer. I’ll tell you all about it. Photo by Aldric RIVAT on Unsplash
Guacamole Robot
I love avocados. Thursday Things has covered the avocado beat more than once, from the avocado crisis of 2022 to that time avocado farmers accidentally uncovered the lost temple of the spider god, to the many health benefits of eating avocados. We love avocados!
But they can be messy and awkward to peel, can’t they? I often end up with green fingernails because of all the avocado pulp that gets stuck in them while trying to peel the skin off. (To be clear, I do wash my hands first, and after.)
Robotics to the rescue!
Chipotle’s New Guac Robots Can Peel Your Avocados in 26 Seconds
Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc.’s robots that expedite avocado mashing and burrito bowl assembly are ready to serve real-life customers.
… Known as Autocado, the guac prep robot can cut, core and peel avocados in 26 seconds on average. The newest version adjusts itself automatically to whatever size the fruit comes in.
Workers then mash the avocados by hand to make the chain’s popular guacamole add-on. Chipotle said it expects to go through 5.2 million avocado cases this year at restaurants in the US, Canada and Europe.
Two thoughts: First, I want one! I need an Autocado. I don’t need to peel 5.2 million cases of avocados, so just a scaled down one-shot version would be great.
Second: Okay, but what if the Autocado goes on a rampage and starts peeling people’s skulls like they’re ripe avocados and making them into brain guac?
Get me SyFy on the line now!
Chipotle is testing out the Autocado in a couple of locations, along with a second robot that automatically assembles salads and bowls, which make up a large percentage of the chain’s takeaway orders.
However, it seems another robotic kitchen aide didn’t make the cut: “Meanwhile, the company has said it won’t deploy a robotic tortilla maker, Chippy, because it was too hard to clean.”
Chin up, Chippy. You’ll get your chance someday.2
Thank you for reading!
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I’m still waiting for Bearicane!
Tonight on SyFy: Autocado vs. Chippy! Things are about to get messy…
Loved indulging my Fortean fantasy fascination, so ty for the escape this Thursday, Dan. Though I’m in recovery from my erstwhile avocado toast addiction, I couldn’t help the simultaneous intrigue and vague terror I experienced whilst learning about the insidious connection between my fave fix and—egads!—a scary (furry green??) “Spider God!” However, as a habitual user of the ‘good green stuff’ 🥑, I pushed through that fear and can now share a super-sophisticated, top-secret—🤫—technique for getting every last bit of mono-saturated goodness out of the wiliest of ‘cados. While it may have been heretofore discovered by the clearly clever writer and many readers of TTs, it’s worth knowing as it gets the job done and keeps one’s hands (almost) immaculate. Which is the whole point of having hands. This insider-secret requires a deft hand and superb eye-hand coordination, so if that’s not on your personal menu, don’t try this at home, folks. Go to a friend’s house.
Simple Start Tips:
Step 1: Find your “Goldilocks Zone” avocado [not too blech-y & firm, not too icky & brown—juuuust right!] and wash it thoroughly. Duh.
Step 2: Grab a good chef’s knife or, better yet, treat yourself to a Santoku blade—you’ll never go back!—and carefully create a lovely little “elliptical orbit” [that’s lengthwise, for those among us whose reference point for “elliptical” is the mind-numbing trainer at the gym] and be sure to push in a bit as you channel your inner surgeon (again, I refer you to Goldilocks) and gently but firmly begin to create two “halves,” one of which will have an adorable wooden ball sitting like a yolk in the middle of a hard-boiled egg. Surprise! A toy! A choking hazard! Choose your own adventure. But save that little ball—don’t play fetch with your teacup chihuahua. [Trust me, they can’t get their teensy jaws around it, which is obviously amusing and cruel in equal hysterical parts…you may be able to surmise which side of the fence I fall on re: this neat game.]
Step 3: After you’ve “shimmied” your sharp blade [a shiv has been known to suffice for our incarcerated fellow Haas addicts] round and round for a few fun elliptical orbits, you should definitely now have these two aforementioned halves in your hot little (or not-little) hands. If something has clearly gone awry, just throw up your hands—after placing the gooey mess you’ve just made on a safe surface—and go back to peeling with your fingers; like adorable baby chimpanzees, we’ve got those opposable thumbs for a reason! [Step 3 really isn’t a “step,” per se; it’s more of a cautionary digression. You’re welcome.]
Step 4: [or is it now 3??? All of this avocado talk is triggering me…] Save the little wooden surprise somewhere your teacup chihuahua won’t suspect and take a nice, old-fashioned grapefruit spoon or even a little melon-baller—or any small spoon, really, but doing things right is its own reward, n’est ce pas?—and simply scoop out the partial or entire contents of one or both halves. A bowl is good to have handy but I’ve never seen anyone turn a nose up at spreading that verdant veggie [Gotcha! It’s a fruit!] directly on some crispy toast of your choice or putting it anywhere else. Go nuts!
Step 5: This part is essential. Re-name that little wooden ball—I suggest the monikers “stone,” “pit” or even “seed”—and if there’s anything left in the “shell(s)” you’ve created and gutted so gracefully, plop the seed back into whatever remains and put both halves together again. [Hint: One side won’t make a fuss if sent solo on its upcoming arctic expedition, so dinna fash, Sassenach—there’ll be other Outlanders where it’s headed.] Now, refrigerate this little science experiment after first wrapping it in a damp paper or thin cloth towel or a glass container. [If you’re still using cling-wrap, I have a lovely human-made island twice the size of Texas floating around like a veritable raft somewhere between LA and Honolulu that you might be interested in checking out.]
Step 6: Relax, knowing as you devour the mesocarp—the lovely layer you covet for your guac—that you’ve kept any remaining green goodness, well…green! You betcha’! That little wooden ball that even your chihuahua can’t sink its teeth into is nature’s perfect preservative packed right inside the wrapper. Now you’ve saved yourself from having to engage in that drudgery again for at least one more slice of ($14!) toast. Pat yourself on the back. [You may even be able to skip right past washing your immaculate hands—IF you can follow simple directions and have an opposable thumb.]
Step 7: Magic # 7! Go back to peeling with your fingers. Use ‘em up while they still don’t pop and crackle each time you flex! Carpé Diem! And a melon-baller, while you’re at it.