Animal cloning took a dramatic ewe turn this year, prompting a lot of anxious talk about human creation and procreation. After all, it has been a very long time since Eve was "cloned" from Adam's rib, and some feel the original experiment was not altogether a roaring success because when the newly bonded mates took a bite out of the big apple and looked upon their nakedness, they were promptly evicted from Paradise. In shame.

Nevertheless, soon thereafter, all creatures great and small became obsessed with sex and eating. If any time at all is spent watching educational "nature" programming on public television, it quickly becomes apparent that the entire universe seems to boil down to sex and the conjugation of the verb "to eat" -- I eat, I have eaten, or (heaven forbid) I was eaten.

Lobsters, however, are among the minority of God's creatures that are not unduly preoccupied with sex. It's not that they think it is an activity that is naughty or nice, but rather it holds little interest for them one way or the other.

For starters, the female comes out of her shell only very briefly, so her window of opportunity is rarely open. The mating game itself lasts for just a moment but this by no means implies it is a spontaneous one night stand. Quite the contrary. Preparations must be carefully laid.

The "cock," as the male is called, first digs himself into a deep hole in the muddy waters at the bottom of the sea. And relieves himself. If the female is attracted by or to his scent she enters his space and thereupon they engage in a kind of mild boxing match that involves a lot of gentle punching and considerable waving about of all antennas -- but no biting.

After several rounds of this touchy/feely activity, the courting ritual is concluded to their mutual satisfaction. The gentleman lobster rolls the little not-yet red "hen" lobster onto her back and, as she extends her claws in ecstasy, consensual consummation is concluded. The deed is done. The hen promptly takes off, carefully carrying her cargo of live sperm.

Though the actual act only takes a few minutes, it may be a couple of years before the lobsteress elects to release the eggs and permit fertilization to take place. At that point, up to 75,000 eggs stream forth from the ducts on her legs. They end up glued to the small "swimmerets" on the underside of her tail, which is curled to form a pocket. En route to the tail, the eggs are fertilized by the stored sperm. And released. A year later the eggs hatch.

By the time a lobster reaches the dinner table, it will have shed its shell more than 20 times. The hard old shell cracks open along a line on its back and the lobster in its soft new shell wriggles out as quickly as it can. Like Adam and Eve, it has an urgent need to cover its nakedness and conceal its vulnerability.

For a creature with such an ungainly appearance, the lobster has a remarkably prim and neat sex life. But then, considering how a lobster blushes when caught on a dinner plate, perhaps we shouldn't be quite so surprised at his reserve in matters of the bedroom.