Women Are Spider Mites, Men Are Sea Hares
by Mad Dog

    See, scientists recently discovered that all false spider mites are female. They not only live without men, take the trash out without men, and repair their spider mite cars without men, they have sex without men. True, lesbians do the same things, but one way or another they still need men—or a few drops from them, anyway—if they want offspring. The false spider mite doesn’t. Eat your heart out Ellen.

    Scientists were tipped off to this when they noticed that the tiny plant-sucking insects, which are about as small as the “O” in most female orgasms, feed on the leaves of coffee, tea, papaya, and passion fruit plants. Obviously if there were males of the species they’d be all over the beer, Chee-tos, and Slim Jim plants. It turns out that the females are asexual, meaning they look like k.d. lang, their eggs develop without needing to be fertilized, and they can effectively do to themselves what so many people have told me to do over the years. And I don’t mean get a real job.

    While being a false spider mite may appeal to women, men dream of being reincarnated as a sea hare. They’re gross, disgusting, slug-like creatures—remember, we’re talking about sea hares here, not men—that are both male and female at the same time. They have group sex in chain-like clusters since they’re female in the front and male in the back. This may not be as much of a male dream as having sex with Hugh Hefner’s latest twin girlfriends, but it still fulfills a certain fantasy. Especially if the sea hares were picked up hitchhiking.

    Most women would probably like to see men be more like sea hares since it would mean not having to be bothered when the men want sex. This is a real problem because crossed mating signals are a major cause of hurt feelings, self-esteem problems, and late night masturbation in adults. The trouble arises because women are generally much more subtle about these signals than men are. Women flirt seductively, cook romantic candlelight dinners, and dress sexy. Sometimes they do this and sex actually is on their mind.

    They don’t have these problems in the animal world. When male peacocks fan their tail feathers the females don’t wonder if they’re doing it because it makes them feel good about themselves. When male dogs hump the dinner guest’s leg there’s no question what they’re after, even if they’re a touch confused about the line between animals and humans. Not to mention that they should have noticed the approach didn’t work for you the night before. Or the night before that. Or…well, you get the idea.

    Fireflies flash their lights in order to attract a mate. This “Hey, look at me!” approach must work well since there are an awful lot of them around during the summer. Before you guys consider trying this in a bar, please re-read the first sentence and notice that it says they flash a light, not just flash.

    While scientists have known for a long time how the firefly’s light works, they had no idea how it turned on and off. After looking for tiny light switches on their stomachs, remote controls in their little hands, and frayed cords that are shorting out, they discovered that the firefly actually uses nitric oxide to flash the light. Our bodies use nitric oxide too, the difference is that in us it can cause problems like hypertension and impotence, which goes a long way towards explaining why we don’t have lights flashing on and off in our stomachs. After all, impotence doesn’t do much to perpetuate a species and Viagra is a recent discovery.

    The thing to remember is that when it comes down to it, we’re not spider mites, sea hares, or fireflies—we’re humans. And it doesn’t make sense to wish we were anything else. After all, maybe they have the sex thing down to a science and we don’t, but then again we have hot shoes, crisp fried to a crackly crunch Chee-tos, and Jerry Springer. So who needs sex?

©2001 Mad Dog Productions, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
These columns appear in better newspapers across the country. Read them while trying not to think about sea hares mating.