Back to the present for a moment...

Our annual "Goat Rodeo" tradition has now become bi-annual, at the very least. We had so much fun at the last one that we decided not to wait until January to do it again. Because, as Hkygrl12 says, "what's great about hockey players is that if something's fun we just do it over and over again". We have the ice at midnight tonight for another night of idiocy. Apparently we're not all waiting until midnight to be idiots, though, as Senator, #28 and I had a scintillating email exchange this morning. It has nothing at all to do with hockey, but since it involves teammates, I'm sharing it.

Senator and I both suffer from seasonal allergies, and right now all hell is breaking loose out here in NJ, with a fine dust of pollen covering everything approximately 5 minutes after you put it outside. So it was that when I got to work sneezing and coughing and desperately looking for a Benadryl, that I emailed Senator saying "Pollen can go fuck itself". He responded that he wholeheartedly agreed, as he and Mrs Senator were both miserable as well. Then it hit me...

From: Me
To: Senator
Actually... I just realized, that's exactly what pollen is for.

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From: Senator
To: Me
That's also a good scientific observation... But #28 might challenge you that the pollen is actually fucking.

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From: Me
To: #28
CC: Senator
Hey 28-
Senator and I are having a debate and need you to mediate. I said pollen
can go fuck itself, and then realized that in actuality, that's what it's for. Senator says it's not the pollen that's doing the fucking. Your thoughts?

PS are you coming to the goat rodeo?

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From: #28
To: Me, Senator

Definitely coming to the goat rodeo. I may not get to the diner until 10:30 or so, but I will be there.

Let's talk about plant sex!

1. Pollen itself is not technically plant-sperm. The pollen grain is a structure that contains the sperm.

2. When the pollen grain reaches the plant's female reproductive structure, it germinates: it produces a pollen tube that transfers the sperm to the ovary. If the process produces an embryo, this is called fertilization.

3. If the pollen was originally produced by the organism that it fertilized, this is called self-fertilization. If the pollen came from a different organism, this is called cross-fertilization.

So is the pollen fucking? Sure, why not. I mean, we don't say "the sperm is fucking the egg," or "the sperm and egg are fucking" (at least I don't)... but since the pollen is the vessel containing the sperm...
well, it's an imprecise analogy, but as the academics say, we live in metaphors.

And in the case of self-fertilization, I might be OK saying the pollen is fucking itself, though that probably requires an additional level of poetic license.

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So, in essense, what's making us sneeze is millions of tiny little ballsacks. No wonder I'm all congested, I've got some plant's junk up my nose. Fuck Spring, man.