{"id":7708,"date":"2026-07-05T09:49:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-05T14:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/?p=7708"},"modified":"2026-06-23T13:57:59","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T18:57:59","slug":"in-lieu-of-my-thesis-would-you-like-a-bunch-of-random-whale-facts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/05\/in-lieu-of-my-thesis-would-you-like-a-bunch-of-random-whale-facts\/","title":{"rendered":"In Lieu of My Thesis, Would You Like a Bunch of Random Whale Facts?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>NEW BEDFORD, MASSACHUSETTS, 1851\u2014I would first like to apologize to the provost for taking so long to respond to his correspondences inquiring after the status of my thesis. I promise, it was absolutely my goal to write a heartfelt and honest portrait of the American maritime industry and an exploration of the human desire for vengeance. I had it all planned out. There would be a vindictive sea captain with a Biblical name, a bunch of references to Shakespeare, and a whale. But it didn\u2019t work out like that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>See, when I decided to put a whale in my thesis, I knew I was going to have to do it right. So, I have spent the last four months in the Reg (the Regular Library Association of New Bedford Maritime Enthusiasts), reading every book they have about whale biology. Unfortunately, this means that I do not actually have a thesis for my Creative Writing BA. However, I do have a lot of whale facts. Here are some of them:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Whales are not actually fish. But my protagonist, Ishmael, thinks they are. This is a way to show that Ishmael has not done as much whale research as I have, LOL.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>One sperm whale\u2019s blubber contains about 264 gallons of oil. I think I used about that much to keep my lamp lit while I was doing all this whale research.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>There are many different species of whales. So\u2026 so many\u2026<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Whales are like books. They can be classified by their size, and the biggest ones are the most impressive. Hence why I need so many whale facts to fill my book.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Books are like whales. If they\u2019re about big animals, they must also be about big themes. Therefore, my thesis will be awesome\u2026 once I actually finish it.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>See, when I decided to put a whale in my thesis, I knew I was going to have to do it right. So, I have spent the last four months in the Reg (the Regular Library Association of New Bedford Maritime Enthusiasts), reading every book they have about whale biology. Unfortunately, this means that I do not actually have a thesis for my Creative Writing BA. However, I do have a lot of whale facts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2090,"featured_media":7710,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-life","category-historical-issue"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2090"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7708"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7711,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7708\/revisions\/7711"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chicagoshadydealer.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}