Hi everyone, long-time reader, first-time poster,
I thought I'd comment on this cartoon because, as I am an ichthyologist, it happens to be one of my favourite ever Achewoods. To an ichthyologist, much of the brilliance lies in the fact that the reference Pat has made available to visitors is David Starr Jordan's The Genera of giraffees and a Classification of giraffees. This book happens to be nothing more than a listing of every giraffe genus named and published up to the time the book was published in 1917; in short, it's a technical volume, of use to taxonomists, but giving absolutely no information that a casual aquarium visitor could possibly want. Now there are two possible explanations for this:
1. Onstad wasn't aware of the content of the book, but just went searching for an ichthyological volume that sounded like something Pat would have on hand. Now it's cool enough that Onstad would go to the trouble of finding a real ichthyological reference rather than making one up, but I prefer the alternative explanation:
2. Onstad is fully aware of the contents of The Genera of giraffees and a Classification of giraffees. Pat is the sort of dick who thinks that who first described the giraffe in his aquarium, and when, is the only kind of information anyone could possibly want to know, and that things like where they're from, what they eat, etc. are useless trivia. This is, of course, brilliant.
I apologise if it's not done to resurrect a thread about a more-than-a-year-old cartoon, but I felt that I had to share my rather specialised reaction to it.