An Obstruction Of Dons

“Earth was a baking lifeless desert for 5 million years.” Or so the headline read.⁣ ⁣ The Obstruction Of Dons shakes his head. His childhood in Southern Pangea was hardly so sweltering. ⁣ ⁣ “The global wipeout that ended the Permian era, before dinosaurs, wiped out nearly all of the world's species. Mass extinctions like these in Earth's history are usually followed by a "dead zone", a period of tens of thousands of years before new species crop up. But the early Triassic dead zone lasted millions of years, not thousands.”⁣ ⁣ This, the Obstruction Of Dons supposed, was a gross exaggeration of his early years.⁣ ⁣ “The extra-long five million year dead zone was caused by screaming hot ocean temperatures in the tropics, making the land's forecast a scorching 140 °Fahrenheit.”⁣ ⁣ Perhaps it was a bit balmy, the Obstruction Of Dons conceded.⁣ ⁣ “The team figured it out by collecting data from 15,000 ancient teeth. The conodonts, tiny teeth from extinct eel-like fishes, were pulled from two tonnes of rock in South China. They form a skeleton using oxygen, and the oxygen isotopes are temperature-controlled. By examining the conodonts, the researchers were able to see how hot it was millions of years ago.”⁣ ⁣ So that’s where my collection went, the goblin muses. Salivating with delight, the Obstruction Of Dons sets his coordinates to a non-descript paleontological site, doubling as a discount wet market, in the Hubei Province.⁣ ⁣ Bounding through hyperspace, past, present, and future merge to a blur in the rear-view mirror. The Obstruction Of Dons licks his lips. The perfect ingredient; 15,000 Prehistoric Eel Teeth will all but guarantee the Obstruction Of Dons' victory at this weekend’s Neighborhood Soup-Off.⁣