Irking the Sea Urchins

Picture of the Day for 10/16/2013. I visited the Smithsonian Marine Station in Fort Pierce, FL where they have a "touch" tank where you can touch/pick up several sea creatures such as sea slugs (ewww- they felt gross), shrimp, starfish, crab, conch, and sea urchins. I was particularly fascinated by the sea urchins because they figure prominently in our The Complete Stressed ER Book. Get it? URchin has a stressed ER sound. I never used to pay attention to stuff like stressed ER sounds before starting a speech therapy workbook publishing company with my sister. Now I can't help myself.

Here are the cute sea urchins as they appear in the speech therapy manual.


Here they are in the tank. Their spines feel like stiff pine needles. When you touch one, their spines grip your finger. I couldn't stop touching the poor urchin in the photos below. I was probably irritating the snot out of it. You could say I irked the sea urchin! Get it? IRked has a stressed ER sound too. Ha, ha, ha! (I suspect I've seriously irked my blog readers with my stressed ER joke!)