Blobfish

Grabbed a shower, went straight to bed.

But then we headed out early on Saturday, caught up with Nick and his friend at Southern Cross Station and we caught an Uber out to Blobfish.

While you could technically, I think, get public transport out at least part of the way, The walk is very uninteresting.

It's a real hassle and the Uber wasn't that expensive.

What's the heartburn situation like at this thing? Have they got tums around or what are you doing?

No, just taking it easy.

We've been to Blobfish before.

We know that you need to break it up with those beers that aren't going to be quite as acidic.

Welcome back to Saltwater Stories.

Today we are traveling deep into the Bathiel Zone to meet the animal you just pictured in your mind, the smoothhead blobfish.

Known to marine biologists as a cycrolutes marsidus.

Right.

And our mission today is to untangle what I really think is one of the greatest biological misunderstandings of our time.

Because, I mean, if you say the word blobfish to almost anyone you meet on the street, they do not picture a sleek, tadpole-like ambush predator effortlessly mastering a high pressure environment.

No, they picture a joke.

Exactly.

And there's little, little microbes down there living their best life, eating up and doing things and all the things.

Like, one of the, uh, the creatures that was discovered in the deep ocean is known as the blobfish, and it became kind of a meme, gosh, decade, decade and a half ago, because it lives up to its name.

When you look at a picture, like if you Google blobfish, and the first picture that comes up, it looks like a cartoon, cartoon character of what you would think of when you think of the words blob and fish.

Just a little bulbous-

Mm-hmm

It doesn't look much like a blob at depth.

That's what happens after 40.

[laughs] You just turn into a blobfish.