Llama Count

Okay, this is getting slightly ridiculous, and I'm sure people are starting to think that I have a camelid obsession. After all, since this blog's inception, there have been (counting this entry) four posts featuring llamas. That means llamas have appeared in nearly 24% of my posts thus far. It is, admittedly, rather absurd. But really, I think the llamas are hounding me, not the other way around! Cases in point:

1. Last night, I was watching the Laker game on TV with my parents. Now, my parents are avid NBA fans, and they naturally have nicknames for some of the players. These, however, are not your average sports nicknames like T-Mac, KG, or AI. These nicknames are phonetically inspired, and they may be English or Taiwanese in nature. For example, Vlade Divac's last name sounds fairly similar to the Taiwanese phrase for pork meat, so that's what we used to call him. And Gary Payton's last name resembles the Taiwanese phrase for mailbox (not the private kind like the ones in front of homes, but the big public kind outside of post offices and on busy streets). It was, then, a humorous and fortuitous "convergence of events" when both Payton and Karl Malone were signed by the Lakers for the 2003-2004 season. (For non-NBA fans, Malone's actual nickname was "the Mailman." Mailman delivers to the Mailbox, get it? It's funnier in Taiwanese.) Anyway, my dad's nickname for Lamar Odom is much simpler and more obvious: llama (of course). So, we're watching the game and cheering on Odom with calls of "llama!" when Dad segues to a discussion of real llamas, those of the animal variety. He starts telling me how he began liking llamas after seeing a llama show on TV. No, not an Animal Planet or National Geographic or PBS special about llamas. I'm talking about a llama version of the Westminster Kennel Club dog show. Dad goes on to describe how beautifully groomed the llamas were, having no idea just how prominently llamas have figured in my peer conversations (and in my blog) in recent weeks. Today, I googled "llama show," and sure enough, the first hit was for the ALSA: the Alpaca Llama Show Association. Not only do people raise llamas and alpacas for their fibers, they apparently compete with them in the animal equivalent of beauty pageants. Who knew?
   
2. Today, KPGirl sent me a link to a book cover she saw over the weekend. It is just too crazy for words, so I'll let the images speak for themselves. (In case your eyes are drawn to the other amazing gadgets, I included another picture in which the llamacycle takes center stage.)
   

As fun and surreal as all the llama sightings have been, I rather hope this is the last we'll see of these camelids for a while. When I began this blog, I had no idea it would go down this road!