A loud voice roars out, "Chow down!" as a huge roll of thick brown paper unfurls down the 100 foot long picnic table as a place mat, and you elbow yourself in for a Friday evening crab eating orgy at the Old Mill Crab House. With hammers pounding, shells cracking, gills flying, and yellow fat spurting, you're just starting your third crab bushel when your stomach violently lurches forcing you to lay down your mallet.

While thinking you may have overindulged you notice one crab carcass a little worse for wear, flip it over, and in horror discover half of its shell has been eaten away by the Pfiesteria flesh eating algae. Your stomach does a grinding double take at this, prompting you to rush back in your SUV to your waterfront home and race to the bathroom for a rousing and painful session of explosive diarrhea.

In the morning, despite residual stomach rumbles and a 108 degree fever, you grudgingly commit to doing the weekend chores which include dumping 30 bags of Home Depot 20-40-10 fertilizer on your bulk headed chem-lawn, test firing your yacht's diesel engine, and then overseeing the planting of soybeans in your nearby agricultural field that runs right up to the river's edge.

*Note: The previous chronicling of events affecting the Chesapeake Bay shows partly how the once clear and prolific Bay and its tributaries have been reduced to a Dead Zone. Facing an enormous onslaught from seafood over-harvesting, unrestricted development, leaking sewage systems, and nutrient runoff from homeowners, farmers, and factories, the Chesapeake Bay has run up the white flag in total desperation and declared itself a mud pit.

*** Update! *** Not to be outdone, the Wicomico River of Salisbury, Maryland has declared itself “The Ditch” after a heralding of it as such by duvafiles.blogspot.com and Wicomico Creekwatchers terming it a "slowly moving cess pool."