May 16 is National Sea Monkey Day

Kids of a certain age (50+, I think) will remember ads like this one for sea monkeys in all the best comic books. Instant life! For only a dollar!

Like a lot of kids, I somehow got hold of a sea monkey kit from somewhere, and mixed up my batch in breathless anticipation. I can't remember exactly how I got hold of it. I've suppressed that memory.

But I remember what happened to the sea monkeys.

Pretty much... nothing. To me, it looked mostly like cloudy water. Maybe there were some dots moving in the water. Maybe. If so, they didn't move not for long.

And yet today is celebrated, in some quarters, as National Sea Monkey Day. If you're so inclined, celebrate the first time you were scammed out of a hard-earned dollar.

I'd suggest not ordering a weiss beer as part of your celebration. The cloudy liquid may bring back unhappy associations.