If gumbo is Louisiana’s official state dish, is BP the official state sauce?

AR: That’s great. Marine life actually are smarter than people think. When they sense danger, they go in a different direction. It’s like a fire. If you sense a fire ahead, you don’t walk toward it, you walk away from it.

SE: But what about sharks? They’ve been known to swim toward wrecks in search of carnage.

AR: I don’t know about sharks. I’m just talking about Louisiana shellfish.

SE: Nice sidestep. Is Forrest Gump your favorite movie?

AR: Ha. Yeah, both Bubba and I have a passion for shrimp. In Louisiana, we go to breakfast talking about where we’re going to go for lunch. We go to lunch talking about where we’re going to go for dinner. And it usually revolves around Louisiana seafood.

SE: So what kinds of marketing tactics are shrimpers in Louisiana using to convince a skeptical public that their shrimp won’t catch fire near an open flame?

AR: What we have is data — scientific data. So we just keep pushing that data out to the public, telling them that the seafood has been tested, and they can believe in the science. That’s the message now.

SE: That’s great news, Ashley, because I suck down shrimp like I’m Kobayashi, and I’d hate to discriminate against Louisiana’s finest. Best of luck with shrimping season, and thanks for wasting 10 minutes of your valuable time answering the questions everyone else is too polite (and intelligent) to ask.