Sharks with frickin' laser beams on their heads.

In Africa, one of the most dangerous animals is the hippo. Most people would say that the most dangerous animal is a lion or a leopard, but most people would be wrong. It is the hippo. The reason it is the hippo is because hippos are quite stupid, quite large and quite aggressive. When a hippo is spooked, it runs. And if you are in the way of a hippo, you will be trampled. And if an animals isn't very smart, the chances of spooking it are quite high. If you were to run into a lion on the savanna, if it had eaten recently, it might not even make its presence known. If you got really close to it, it might release a warning roar - a sound to make even the manliest of men want to pee their pants (and yes, I do know this from experience). The warning roar simply says, "Yo, dude. Turn back the other way. Here be monsters." And if you are a sensible person, you do what the lion says because it has sharp pointy teeth.

So what is the most dangerous animal in North America? Some people might bet on the mountain lion. Others might bet on a buffalo (also large, stupid and possessing pointy horns). But today I would like to advance the goose as the most dangerous animal in North America. Apparently, geese have superpowers. They can cause planes to crash into the Hudson River upon take off.

For those living under a rock, there was another plane crash in New York City. Thankfully, unlike those other plane crashes, there were no casualities. A plane, as it was taking off from LaGuardia, ran into some birds (presumably geese) which caused an engine malfunction. The pilot - who, incidentally, it totally amazing from all reports - managed to land the plane in the Hudson River where rescue crews were able to ferry the survivors to the shore, and medical attention was given for hypothermia and other effects of the cold.

What surprises me most about this whole incident are comments like this one (sadly not isolated at all):

"Ellen Howe, a spokeswoman for the Transportation Security Administration, confirmed only that there was "no known nexus to terrorism" in the downing."

Because, you know, everything bad that happens in America is a terrorist attack, until proven otherwise. Al Queda armed those geese with frickin' laser beams on their head, and released them over the airfield so that this Airbus 360 with 126 passengers heading to North Carolina would crash.

Srsly?