David Spates "Therefore I Am" Published Aug. 12, 2003

Rubber duckie, you're the one

The ocean is filled with majesty and mystery, opportunity and heartache, longing and hunger. They say the ocean has no memory. They say the ocean holds something for everyone. They say the ocean will cleanse your soul and refill your spirit.

They say the ocean is filled with 29,000 rubber duckies.

It's not quite as mythical and magical as cleansing one's soul, but it's true. Eleven years ago a cargo ship headed for the fruited plains of the United States lost part of its shipment during a North Pacific storm. In the lost container were -- say it with me now -- 29,000 rubber duckies, and for more than a decade these yellow, quacking vagabonds have been fearlessly bobbing atop Earth's largest body of water. Not even the S.S. Minnow was lost at sea that long.

A side note on the Minnow: It's a good thing I wasn't the eighth passenger on that particular three-hour tour. Those people on that island were much more forgiving than I. After the first dozen or so rescue attempts that Gilligan fouled up, I would have tied him to a banana tree and beaten him senseless with a bamboo golf club.

There is some good news to report on the quackers, though. Scientists expect some of the ducks may wash ashore in New England, Canada and Iceland -- that's right, in the Atlantic! Some of them are even due to hit Western Europe before their long, strange trip ends. These surviving rubber duckies are more well-traveled than most people I know, but I suspect even they wouldn't be caught dead in the Caribbean off-season.

Computer simulations show that some of the ducks have floated thousands of miles across the Pacific before settling into a nice, slow-moving ice pack around the North Pole en route to the Atlantic. Tough little birds, eh? Some of the ducks have been found in Alaska and other locales, which enabled scientists to better predict their travels and better understand ocean currents. So not only are the rubber duckies enjoying a relaxing jaunt from ocean to ocean, they're also advancing the state of oceanographic science. God bless them.

That being said, I'll let you in on a little-known financial windfall.

If you want to get your hands on a cool Benjamin, simply find one of the duckies. The U.S. company that made the toys will reward finders with a $100 savings bond. That's what I call found money. If I found one, I'm not sure I'd want to turn it in. I mean, sure, I'd alert the science community so they could add the details to their rubber duckie spreadsheet or whatever they have going, but I'm thinking a rubber duckie that rare might be worth more than a measly 100 smackers.

One word: eBay.

I have no doubt in my mind that I could inflate the bidding on a high-mileage duckie well past the $500 mark. Have you taken a look at some of the garbage that people are buying on eBay? Anyone willing to spend hard-earned money on bubblegum once chewed by a Major League Baseball player will certainly open his wallet for an incomparable treasure like this.

Who knows? Maybe you'll even come across the ultra-rare seafaring turtle, or beaver or even the frog. Most of the lost shipment included the yellow duckies we all know and love, but there were a few of the other animals in there, too. Find one of those and you can sit back and watch the eBay bids roll in, my friend. Cha-ching.

Incidentally, the duckies aren't the only doodads floating about. One scientist currently keeps tabs on Nike shoes, hockey gloves, umbrella handles, a 50-foot-long U.S. Air Force booster rocket and even Lego building blocks. According to a story in the Christian Science Monitor, researcher Charles Moore said tons of junk ends up in the Pacific gyre, a huge circular current that he likened to a "toilet that never flushes."

A toilet that never flushes? How ... nice. I just won't mention that part in the eBay auction.

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David Spates is a Knoxville resident and Crossville Chronicle contributor whose column is published each Tuesday. He can be reached at davespates@chartertn.net.