Googly-Eyed Sea Creature Not So Mythical After All

A few days ago I wrote about a mythical, googly-eyed sea creature found off the coast of Russia, and a few readers were quick to dispel it's fictitious qualities. "I have seen this fish before, although I don't remember if it is a ray or a shark," one reader wrote. "Nothing new to see, move along," said another. Finally, Gadling reader "Inkling" dropped the gavel with a Wikipedia link to the skate, a "cartilaginous fish belonging to the family Rajidae in the superorder Batoidea of rays," or -- in other words -- scientific proof that this weird, Russian creature was in fact real, not a myth.

Upon reading the news of this bizarre catch, scientist and ufologists rushed to the scene to see if they too could figure out what this thing was. But according to this article, they were very disappointed when they arrived, and not because the creature was obviously a skate. They were angered because the fisherman -- apparently unafraid and quite hungry -- decided to use it as food. Yeah, they ate it.

So let me get this straight: first, they catch this thing, and they were so shocked by the fact it was "moaning like a human, not as fish, [and] weighed 200 pounds and was rotating its eyeballs," that they captured it on camera and sent the footage to the major news outlets. And then they ate it.

This stuff just writes itself.

• Previously: Mythical, Googly-Eyed Sea Creature Found in Russia