NATURAL PERSPECTIVES:Replacement body needed to keep up

Wanted: A gently-used body for an active life.

I need a new body. The one I have is getting too old to keep up with what I want it to do. Vic says he doesn’t need a new body yet, but he could sure use an extra one to help out with his busy life. He was on a 24-hour bird-a-thon on Saturday, raising funds for Sea and Sage Audubon.

Here’s some of what my body went through last week.

On Thursday, I took an orientation crew of 14 kids from the Orange County Conservation Corps to Crystal Cove State Park. We had more than 300 purple needlegrass, deerweed and coast bush sunflower plants to install. Ralph Jimenez and I showed the kids how to plant, and they took to it like earthworms to compost.

My knees have gotten too old to bend down on the ground, so I don’t plant much anymore. I can still weed, though. Once the kids were settled into planting, I grabbed a heavy McLeod and attacked wild mustard and Malta thistle.

By the time we were ready for lunch, we had transformed a patch of weeds into a beautifully planted coastal sage scrub habitat.

As we were eating our lunches, a male roadrunner came up the path carrying a large lizard in his beak. He flew to the top of a nearby sycamore and dangled the lizard enticingly. He was hoping that a female roadrunner would notice.

Lizard display is an important part of their courtship. He was showing that he was a good provider, and at the same time he provided my kids with a lesson in bird behavior.

After lunch, we made the steep walk down to the Reef Point tide pools.

The kids used a worksheet to check off the species of plants and animals that they found in the sandy intertidal zone compared to the rocky intertidal zone.

We hypothesized that the rocky zone would have greater species diversity because the rocks provide points of attachment for plants and marine invertebrates. The corps members gathered data and analyzed it, concluding that our hypothesis was correct.

But then that old body of mine got in the way again. I lost my footing on the slippery rocks and went down unceremoniously. Fortunately, I landed on my well-padded rear and wasn’t hurt. Unfortunately, I was stuck bottom-down in a tide pool and not able to get out by myself. It took Ralph and a corps member to haul me back to standing. Now I’m expanding my embarrassment by telling you about it. Smart.

When I awoke on Friday, I was sore all over from hacking at weeds, climbing the bluffs and falling on my backside. Too bad, no time to rest. Friday was field trip day.

Laura Bandy, education director at the Bolsa Chica Conservancy, volunteered to drive a group of almost-ready-to-graduate corps members to Universal Studios Hollywood with me. We took Olivia O’Neal, Sandy Rivera, Shayne Kansana, Demetrio Quintero and Eden Andrio. Jorge Martinez also came. He is working for the corps on the Bolsa Chica crew while he attends college. This fabulous trip was made possible by a donation to the corps from one of our readers.

I used a high school lesson plan provided by Universal Studios that teaches about careers in the entertainment industry. We had a class session before the trip to discuss jobs as grips (the guys who carry things), greens workers (the people who set up plants on the sets), special effects technicians and a host of other backstage jobs. The students will prepare mock resumes for entertainment industry jobs as part of the assignment. They soon will be making resumes for real, so this is good practice.

I ranked the exhibits in order of educational value. My priorities were the studio tour, animal actors, special effects and the “Terminator 3-D” show.

We were thrilled when Olivia was chosen to be an actress on the special effects stage.

In her first scene, she was shrunk to a miniature size and forced to fend off a housecat from inside a dollhouse. In the second scene, she ate dinner with Eddie Murphy in “Big Momma.” We could see her on stage alone in front of a green screen, but in the film, she was munching on a drumstick with all of the characters that Eddie played.

In the final scene, she donned a costume to play the part of an Egyptian building a pyramid. Our hard-working corps members could perform a task like that for real, but the stone blocks on the set were made of Styrofoam.

On the sound effects stage, Shayne and Demetrio were selected to be a voice-over actor and foley artist, respectively. Shayne read his lines on cue, but, poor guy, he had to play the part of Tinkerbell! Demetrio was a straight man for the jokes of the emcee.

It was hysterical. Our kids not only got to learn how movies are made, they got to experience it.

The kids had an unexpected educational experience when they were selected to participate in a market research evaluation of a TV show pilot. After Universal Studios closed, the kids lingered at City Walk to take in the sights. They get such a kick out of my attempts to rap that Jorge and Shayne tried to teach me to hip-hop dance.

What a hopeless cause.

I fell into bed at 9 p.m. and slept for 14 hours. I definitely need a new body. I’m looking for a gently-used, early 40s model, preferably one that can dance hip-hop.