Mystery #126 – Bulbasaur

There is a cycle to these stupid, pointless blogs. I write a bunch of them in some manic/procrastinatory spree of comedy and then post them, assuming that there may actually be someone out there who cares that I laugh whenever I see a palm tree or something. A month or two passes, no more blogs are posted, and then I start getting emails. Apparently, there ARE people in the world with nothing better to do than to read my stupid jokes. Good to know as always :) So, for those of you out there who seek order and meaning in a mysterious universe, I present:

Joey Presents: Great Mysteries of the Universe
Mystery #126 – Bulbasaur

First things first: Pokémon is awesome. If you are under the totally lame and/or incorrect delusion that Pokémon is NOT awesome, then I pity you, for your world is a cold and dark place, your reasons for living few and far between. I recommend drugs.

That being said, let’s continue! Bulbasaur has always seemed like kind of an enigma to me. Of the three traditional starting Pokémon (mention Pikachu and incur my wrath. We’re talkin’ straight up Red and Blue version here, sucka’) Bulbasaur was the biggest stretch of the imagination. Squirtle, a turtle who liked the water, wasn’t unrealistic until his third form, where he grew water guns out of his shell. This was easily accounted for because it is “awesome”. Then there’s the whole Charmander/dragon thing - never much of a problem. But here we have the humble little Bulbasaur, who right off the bat just seems… off…

The idea of a plant/animal hybrid insults the freshman bio student deep within me. I just can’t stop wondering if Bulbasaur’s cells would have a cell wall? A large central vacuole? I’m willing to assume the plant growing out of his back photosynthesizes, but what about the green spots on his body? For the love of all that is good and innocent I will avoid detailed musings about Bulbasaur reproduction and creative uses of the word “pollination”.

From my remaining fourth grade knowledge of dinosaur nomenclature, I recall that the suffix –saur comes from the Greek word for “lizard”. According to some Greek-English dictionaries I Googled, the word “bulba” is either a type of folk dance or the Ukrainian word for potato. For the sake of comedy I will assume they based the name on the latter. Another Google search supports this, as I find that potatoes indeed have buds, and Bulbasaur sports a large bud growing out of his back. Bulbasaur (or potato lizard) is obviously a potato-dinosaur hybrid. This explains why Bulbasaur was always weak to “fire” type Pokémon, not to mention “tin foil”, “sour cream”, and “bacon bit” types.