January 23, 2014 will go down in history as the day the world found out that there’s a huge abandoned Russian cruise ship full of diseased cannibal rats barreling toward Europe. That’s something that’s hard to forget. One day we’ll all be sitting around the iCampfire and our grandkids will ask us what we were doing when we first heard the news, and we will tell them, because we will remember. I’m sure of this. Unless it all turns out to be fake, which would devastate me in ways you can’t even imagine.
But until we have proof — real, actual proof — that there’s not a large empty boat containing thousands of rats with a taste for each other’s flesh, I choose to believe. And I have some questions.
Aren’t we all rushing to judgment a little bit here?
I mean, have any of you been on a runaway Russian ghost ship full of cannibal rats?
If you haven’t, can you really know what it’s like?
Don’t you think there’s a chance that those rats are having the time of their lives?
Like, what if they’re all just lounging by the pool and feasting on fresh seafood that they pull from the water every morning using huge nets they constructed out of sheets and towels and stuff they found in the boat?
What if the rats aren’t even cannibals?
What if there was one rat who was a cannibal, and when the rest of them found out they were horrified, but they gave him a fair trial and sentenced him to life in the ship’s rat prison, because they decided long ago to outlaw the death penalty because it was needlessly cruel and raised troubling ethical questions about whether killing a member of society in the name of justice made them just as bad as the killer himself?
I bet we’d feel pretty bad for labeling them all cannibals then, huh?
Do you think the rats have their own version of Nancy Grace who sensationalized the trial beyond recognition?
Do you think Nancy Grace Rat has her own little rat television show on the ship’s closed circuit system where she brings on guests and then talks over them and bombards them with blindingly stupid questions like “IF HE’S NOT GUILTY, THEN WHY DOES HE NEED TO HAVE A DEFENSE ATTORNEY ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS FOR HIM?” as though she doesn’t know that any Defense Attorney Rat worth a slice of Swiss cheese would never let his client appear on television with a hostile loon like her?
Do you think Nancy Grace Rat has also been cited for prosecutorial misconduct?
What is Nancy Grace’s f*cking deal, anyway?
Seriously.
What if there’s one dude on the ship?
Do you think he made peace with the rats, or do you think they’re engaging in a never-ending battle between man and beast for control?
Do you think he’s become the King of the Rats?
Or do you think he just assumed he’d be the King, but then the rats were all “Ooooooooookay, buddy” and then they just ate him first?
What if the rats are actually zombies instead of cannibals?
What if the ship makes ground in England and London is IMMEDIATELY OVERRUN BY ZOMBIE RATS?
What kind of goddamn clown show is Syfy running that they don’t have a multi-film Zombie Rats Of London made-for-TV franchise starring Antonio Sabato, Jr. by now?
DO I HAVE TO DO EVERYTHING AROUND HERE, SYFY?
If I send over scripts for Zombie Rats Of London and Zombie Rats Of London 2: Polar Vortex by the end of next week, how soon can we get them on the air?
What would you do if you had an abandoned Russian cruise ship all to yourself?
You’d probably run around naked all day and, like, try to pee off the highest point on the boat to see if you could clear the railing and reach the ocean, right?
Who’s gonna stop you?
But what if you got sunburn on your … you know, downstairs parts?
Do rats get sunburn on the parts of their body that aren’t covered by fur?
I probably shouldn’t Google “sunburned rat penises,” huh?
I mean, I’m not planning to commit any crimes any time soon, but if I was falsely accused of something tomorrow and the police seized my computer, that’s not a search term I want them bringing up on the news, right?
How could I ever go out in public after that?
Do you think one of the rats made a tiny little captain’s hat for himself and is pretending like he’s steering the ship, and all the other rats are like, “Jesus Christ, Steve. You’re not the ship’s captain. Your little hands are too small to work any of the levers,” but Captain Steve just ignores them and is all “EASTWARD AT 20 KNOTS. FIRST MATE LOGAN, MAN THE CONTROLS. I NEED TO RADIO THE NAVY,” but his “radio” is just a staple that he pulled out of the ship’s bulletin board with his teeth and bent upwards so it looks like it has a tiny antenna?
Or do they all work together to steer the ship like the rats in the kitchen did when they were cooking in Ratatouille?
Is that how they prepare all the seafood they pull up in those nets I was talking about earlier?
Do you think rats liked that movie, or do you think they got upset at the way Hollywood depicted them?
If so, do they have a spokesman who’s always popping up on Rat CNN with a petition for everyone to sign?
Do you think the rats have seen Skyfall?
This scene probably hits a little too close to home for them, huh?
Speaking of Hollywood, doesn’t this whole thing sound kind of like the beginning of an episode of Scooby-Doo?
Like, one where they all think it’s a scary ghost ship and the rats pop up out of nowhere to scare Scooby and Shaggy, but then at the end they find out the whole thing was organized by Old Man Henderson from the amusement park, because after the ship made it to dry land he was going to turn it into a haunted house, but he needed to generate buzz first?
HOW WOULD THEY EVEN GET THE MYSTERY VAN ON THE BOAT?
Wasn’t it a little silly how Scooby and Shaggy got scared of the ghosts every single time even though they always turned out to be fake?
Do you think, if Scooby-Doo were real, the Today show would do some borderline hilarious scare segment aimed at out-of-touch parents where a 55-year-old white guy with glasses was all “They’re called ‘Scooby Snacks,’ and your child could be using them right now“?
Or do you think we’d all still be pretty hung up on the GIANT TALKING DOG WHO SOLVES MYSTERIES?
Probably that second thing, huh?
What do you think is a better name for a metal band: Cannibal Rats or Russian Ghost Ship?
Actually, isn’t Russian Ghost Ship a better name for a craft beer?
If you were out to dinner and the waitress listed off the beers they had on draft and one of them was called Russian Ghost Ship, wouldn’t you order it immediately?
Like, no questions asked?
Do any of you know how to brew beer?
If you do, ARE YOU READY TO BE RICH THANKS TO MY GENIUS BEER-NAMING IDEA?
Just to be clear, as far as this “Rats wandering around an abandoned boat” thing goes, we’re all picturing this, yes?
I thought so.