OUR days are numbered, all of them.
Even if you've just been born (in which case, well done for your ahead-of-the-curve reading ability) time's ticking. I'm in particularly cheery fettle today, you can tell. It's just so sad about Lonesome George, the last remaining Pinta Island tortoise.
His life was cut short at a youthful 100 years, the scraggy-necked old fella. Apparently giant tortoises can live to nearly 200. He was barely middle-aged.
I've followed George's life and loves with interest. He seemed like the kind of celebrity you could look up to. There he was carrying out his charity work (conservation, supporting his local economy) without self-seeking publicity. He just kept his head down, on the end of his 3ft neck.
He had the kind of fame only Big Brother hopefuls dream of and yet was never seen falling out of nightclubs with unsuitable ladies in the wee hours.
Perhaps if he had, though, he might not have become the last of a 10 million-year-old line.
Because that was George's problem. He didn't like the ladies. Was he gay, shy, uninterested or impotent? No-one knows, though he reportly had great affection for Fausto Llerena, his caretaker, who found his remains on Sunday lain out in the "direction of his watering hole" on Santa Cruz Island, and Lord Devon's wartime helmet, which looked like the shell of a young tortoise, and for which he had a wee fancy.
Artificial insemination, a diet, a $10,000 reward for a mate, and a Swiss zoology graduate bent on stimulating his libido while smeared with female tortoise hormones all failed to help him procreate.
He did mate with one of his two lady companions in 2008 and 2009 but the resulting eggs failed to hatch.
The "rarest animal on earth", he featured on Ecuador's bank notes and stamps.
"His life cycle came to an end," said the head of the park, pragmatically, though the cause of death is unclear. He had a unqiue personality, he had his favourites but he avoided people and liked his routines. "When he looked at you, you saw time in the eyes," said one of his keepers.
Fond of eating, tenacious, stubborn, the last of a line (me Stewart, him Chelonoidis nigra abingdoni) and unwilling to mate. I saw a lot of myself in George. Such a pity he passed so soon. We would have been perfect for each other.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article