so I didn’t

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault is a secure facility that stores samples from approximately one-third of the world’s most important food crop varieties. At present it holds over 20 million seeds.

Which got me to thinking while I was filling my bird feeder the other day. That’s a lot of seeds. What if I could write a story about a daring group of birds that plan the biggest heist in avian history, Ocean’s Eleven style?

Then I thought about the Svalbard part of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. Turns out Svalbard is an island that is home to Longyearbyen, the closest inhabited city to the North Pole. Which means its cold as balls there.

I’m not even sure there are birds in Svalbard, especially when there are two straight months where the sun doesn’t even rise, which would obviously be when this plucky band of birds would plan the robbery.

Talk about fucking up a good plot.

Then it hit me; penguins!

Could any reader resist a story about a plucky group of 11 penguins executing a daring robbery? It practically writes itself.

Or does it?

I didn’t want to say a ‘group’ of penguins so I googled what a group of penguins is called and found out that there are three different terms for it; a colony, a huddle or a rookery. And a fourth if you refer to group of penguins on the water; a raft.

Is four really necessary? Who has time to pick one? So I went with group and didn’t look back. Unless you consider mentioning all of the options as looking back.

Then it turns out there aren’t friggin’ penguins at the North Pole. The story would then have to include how a plucky group of Pygoscelis antarcticus made its way up to Svalbard to begin with. For those of you that recognize Pygoscelis antarcticus as the chinstrap penguin, you’ll understand that with their facial markings that make it appear that they’re wearing a tiny helmet, they were definitely the go-to penguin for this tale.

Adorable chinstraps aside, how the hell are they going to get up to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in the first place?

The enthusiasm I felt at my bird feeder began to wane. This once-breezy little story was starting to look like it would take some real effort.

And I think we all know how I feel about effort.

Not a fan.

Then came the coup de grace; penguins don’t eat seeds. They eat fish. So I was left imagining a plucky group of chinstrap penguins, exhausted after a harrowing months-long journey to Longyearbyen, pulling off this elaborate heist only to find the place stuffed with seeds and not fish. This after struggling mightily to open the three-ply foil packages that were kept in plastic tote containers on metal shelving racks using only flippers and beaks.

The disappointed looks on their little faces.

Obviously better than the faces of any other bird species that eats seeds that would have tried to pull of the caper and frozen to death long before they could even breach the first door of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, the bemused workers stepping over a formerly-plucky group of 11 birdcicles lying around the entrance, but still not the kind of material that makes a writer want to knuckle down and get a story told.

So I didn’t.