On the heels of Lenore's creation comes another tree octopus tree...

For the Paseo de Marianas Christmas tree decorating contest, San Antonio Elementary School (of Saipan, not Texas) created an octopus topped tree:

A handmade octopus head atop the tree is made of paper and stuffing. The octopus head is intended to symbolize the school's mascot and the garland made of plastic was made to look like octopus tentacles.

Like all the trees in the "Green Christmas" contest, which promotes keeping the island clean and beautiful, they used only recycled materials (and some paint and glitter).

Well that settles it; two independent incidents constitute a Zeitgeist. Now that you're all rushing off to craft octopus ornaments, might I suggest hanging them on an aluminum tree (just beware of subterfuge).

A grandmother named Lenore decorated her tree with 99 octopuses, one for each of her grandchildren.

This is what Sasquatch dream of instead of sugar plums.

She made each of them herself from a pattern called Octophrost, Santa of the Sea, available for purchase from Futuregirl. (Tree Octopus ornaments! Why didn't I think of that?)

Besides being festive, it's educational for the kids, allowing them to see the population density of Pacific Northwest Tree Octopuses prior to their becoming endangered. Someday all trees in Cascadia will look like this again.

[ZPi Intercepted Transmission Begins:]

TO ALL NWO AGENTS AND BELGIAN H-1B WORKERS:

In order to better coördinate NWO agendas among agenda facilitators while cutting operating expenses, all non-field operatives will be required to construct a MindPort and deploy it in their work stations. This will allow for the direct delivery of NWO directives to the prefrontal cortices of all agents via deflection node signal propagation, decreasing the need for multiple intraoffice psychotrons across all agencies.

The MindPort device is comprised of a psychotronically transparent, paper-based protective pyramidic shell enveloping a psychotronic deflection core made of a ball of aluminium foil crumpled according to a polystochastic Riemann manifold tesseractoid with its tensor wells aligned to four eyes printed on the shell surface for easy tuning. Sector-specific crumpling instructions will be burst-fed directly to agents' motor-control centres by their immediate supervisors.

Failure to install the deflection core inside the paper shell, thus rendering the MindPort a functionless ruse that anti-mind-control agitators could use to infiltrate NWO ranks without mental synchronization and sabotage our agendas, will result in the immediate liquidation and erasure from the collective consciousness of all responsible parties.

Attachment: mindport.pdf

[ZPi Intercepted Transmission Ends.]

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Spider Mini™ supervises data entry tasks and Post-It™ management.

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Print out and assemble your own tetrakaidecahedra, approximate versions of the Kelvin Cell -- a single shape, space-partitioning cell with a minimum intercellular surface area described by Lord Kelvin.

Tetrakaidecahedra pack together to evenly fill a space. Make a whole bunch and fill your cubicle with a papery foam! If your boss protests, just remind him how much paper you are saving over cubes of equal volume. Given enough space, tetrakaidecahedra will practically pay for themselves!