A page turns

I’m writing this on Sunday, which is my 64th birthday and the official date of my Social Security application. I think this means that I’m officially retired.

Leah and I didn’t do anything special for today. I didn’t put out a couple of pairs of pants and some shirts. I didn’t pack underwear and socks. I didn’t figure out which frozen dinners I would need. I didn’t put some cereal, skim milk and orange juice aside, or pick out some apples, or count out the cookies I would need for the coming week. I didn’t think about missile defense target models or optical signatures. I didn’t think about reports, and I didn’t think about meetings.

Instead I thought about how much more firewood I need to cut for next winter. I thought about completing the retaining wall on the uphill side of the walk I’m making around the house. I thought about replacing some boards on the deck, staining the deck, and redoing the handrails. I thought about replacing some more cracked tiles in the bathroom. I thought about whether we should complete the basement or let it remain partially finished. I thought about what we’ll do when we visit Savannah in a few weeks.

I have been effectively retired for a couple of months. Back in February on my last day in Huntsville, I finished up some work I needed to do, said ‘bye to a couple of people who happened to be in the office, and walked out the door. There was no going-away lunch or happy-retirement card. A couple of people I have known for a few years had said earlier they would miss me. The people I worked with for the last 28 years weren’t in the office, so there was no goodbye there. I did hear by email from one mentioning that I should come over for a retirement lunch some time, but that’s looking unlikely. She also emailed with some potential work I could do at home, but nothing about that lately either.

So that’s the way my work life ends, not with a bang but a whimper.

But I’m not a sentimental person, at least not about work. Maybe one day Leah and I will end up passing through Huntsville on a work day and we’ll eat lunch with some people. I’ll vote for Rosie’s or Sandoval’s. They serve good Mexican food.

Friday Felines

Smokey found a high place to keep an eye on Dusty and Rusty.

Pole cat

Pole cat

He looks kind of neat sitting up there. I wish we could find a matching cat for the post on the other side of the walk.

The spider and the ant

I found this little vignette on the screen of our living room sliding glass door.

spider and ant2

In case you’re having trouble telling, this is a spider eating an ant. I am pretty sure the ant is a carpenter ant. It’s nearly a quarter of an inch long. I’m not sure what the spider is, but I think some type of jumping spider, possibly a tan jumping spider. It’s pretty obvious that it’s not a spider that captures its food in a web.

Here it has turned the ant around.

spider and ant1

The ant was moving a little in an earlier shot, so I think it must have been caught close to the time I saw it.

I have seen a couple of carpenter ants around the house, so I was happy to see something preying on one.

Turtle twice seen

We seldom see turtles up here on the mountain, but last week I had two sightings, and I am pretty sure it was the same turtle. That’s the first time I have been able to identify the same turtle on two separate occasions.

Here he (she? I didn’t check) is on Fouche Gap Road.

turtle thursday

 

Lucy’s snout is in the picture for size reference (I guess I need another reference so you can tell how big she is; not big.) This turtle was facing the edge of the road, so I wasn’t too worried about leaving it where I found it.

Two days later we found a turtle at the same place, but heading into the road.

turtle saturday

I don’t know for sure that it was the same turtle. Here’s a somewhat closer shot.

saturday turtle 2

There is some glare on the shell, but it seems to me that the patterns on shell are the same on both occasions, so I assume it is the same turtle. I took this picture with my iPhone, so it won’t bear any more enlargement.

This section of the road is just past and on the inside of a fairly sharp curve, so it would be a dangerous place for a turtle to spend much time. I moved it just off the pavement and faced it away from the road. Of course if the turtle knew where it wanted to go, that might not have done much good.

Now that I know where to look, I’ll check this area Monday when I take that path for the dogs’ walk.

Red dirt hog

A few days ago Leah and I were privileged to sight one of the rarest animals in this area. It is so rare that most scientists insist that it does not exist today, if it ever did. Confirmed sightings in its what is considered to be its normal range are next to nonexistent. There have been only a handful of unconfirmed sightings on the mountain, and even locals dismiss those as hoaxes or misidentifications. But we saw one, and we took its picture: the Lavender Mountain red dirt hog (sus erymanthus enluvius).

Red dirt hog surfacing to breathe

Red dirt hog surfacing to breathe

While most people are aware that hogs like to wallow in mud because of a lack of sweat glands and a disposition generally disinclined to excessive concern with personal grooming, few know that many millennia ago, an isolated group of surface hogs living in the Mississippi River Valley slowly evolved so that they could burrow deep into the sediments of that region. Over the following eons, they developed the sharp digging claws and streamlined physiques necessary for spending most of their time diving deep into the earth searching for their prey, the dirt krill. Most fundamentalists deny that surface hogs could have evolved into the dirt hog and insist on a special creation, possibly by the devil, since dirt hogs were historically known to cause extensive damage to crop fields as they surfaced and dived.

Early settlers moving west across the Appalachians confused the dirt hog with the groundhog, attempting to pet them when they surfaced. That resulted in the loss of quite a few fingers and was largely responsible for the dirt hog’s reputation for viciousness. However, it is thought today that the dirt hogs in these cases actually thought they were grabbing earthworms due to their poor eyesight. Nevertheless, it is not advisable to try to pet a dirt hog.

It is thought that the dirt hog slowly colonized eastward from the Mississippi River Valley, following tributaries, until they reached the Appalachian Mountain Range. At that point they advanced southward until they reached the Gulf and Atlantic coastal plains. That then allowed them to proceed up rivers in those regions, eventually landing them as far north as this area.

However, according to the best-known and most reputable cryptozoologists, they should be confined to areas of deep sedimentary deposits, like the flood plains around larger streams and rivers. Conventional science predicts that the dirt hog cannot tunnel through rocky areas, and since they cannot survive long on the surface, they should not be able to reach the top of the mountain. This finding conclusively refutes that position.

We plan to report this sighting to the investigative branch of the National Dirt Hog Association.