Arnold Zwicky's Blog

Briefly noted. In the latest New Yorker issue (of 12/1/25), cartoonist Meredith Southland suggests a solution to the puzzle of what penguins are doing when they waddle around waving their wings in the air:

(#1) They are playing Charades! Well, life on the ice floes of Antarctic imagination offers few interesting diversions, but this communal game can occupy plenty of dark cold time

The all-time favorite penguin game, however, is Hide and Seek, a spheniscid take-off on Where’s Waldo? Sometimes known as Lost in the Crowd. Though ice-sliding and egg-rolling races are both tremendously popular. Never a dull South Polar moment.

The cartoonist has a special feeling for (anthropomorphized) animals; sometimes they are even playing games. One more in this genre, from 12/26/22:

(#2) Two hares playing Scrabble with a tortoise are overcome by ennui

This entry was posted on November 28, 2025 at 6:26 pm and is filed under Language and animals, Linguistics in the comics, Penguins, Toys and games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.