Before I get into what this entry is really about...I got a telephone call from my Urologists office.
I am scheduled for my Prostate Biopsy on Wed, 7/27 at 8:30AM. I should be done and on my way home by 9:15 I will then be able to close out another chapter in my ongoing and lengthy medical book.
When I go for my walks, I am usually not focused at all as far as my immediate surroundings go. I am usually on auto pilot and my mind is usually far far away. No sense wasting the use of my brain cells for such a mindless activity such as walking. After all... my feet know exactly what they are supposed to do and they do quite well without any additional input.
Unfortunately I am going to need to start paying more attention to what is around me while on my walks.
While on my walk the other day, I came rather close to stepping on a snake that obviously had the right of way while attempting to cross the asphalt road.
This snake was rather dark in color and had a darker colored stripe going down the length of its body.
I luckily caught a glimpse of this snakes movement which brought me quickly out of my auto pilot mode that I was comfortably in. My feet knew exactly what they needed to do and I was caught off guard at how fast my feet slammed me into the stop position.
After eying this snake and him doing the same to me, I slowly took the high road and left this snake to do whatever he had originally planned on doing.
Then yesterday as I was walking towards the point, I noticed a little masked face staring up at me from between a couple of wooden boards that help make up the fencing along the asphalt roadway.
This masked face caught me totally off guard and once again my feet decided to slam the rest of my body into a complete halt mode.
This little masked rascal quietly started chattering to me and I could see her getting up on her back legs to get a better look at me.
I slowly moved over to the fence to watch this raccoon and I could hear additional chattering coming from several different directions around this one raccoon. I could also hear some slight rustling through the brush as the rest of this raccoon family was coming to see what their mother had found.
I saw one little baby raccoon come up to its mother and heard the chattering of maybe 4 others in the area.
I decided to hurry back to our place and grab my camera for some photos of this little masked family that had found me.
By the time I had returned to the area. they was no sight nor sounds that the family was anywhere close by.
So I returned home and put my camera away...at least for the time being.
This morning when I was going for my walk, I noticed a bird...I believe it is a Sandpiper and this bird was doing all kinds of crazy movements..stretching its head up and down, fluffing up its feathers, chattering away, moving back and forth...to and fro, flapping its wings and making all kinds of weird movements and sounds.
From where I was standing, I could have swore that this feathered friend was doing some sort of wild break dancing moves but then again, the smoke was out in full force and I figured that I was suffering from some type of smoke inhaled hallucinations.
I didn't give this bird a second thought and went on my merry way.
This afternoon while on was on my second walk, I saw this bird doing the exact same thing.
I figured that maybe it was some sort of mating ritual but quickly realized that my feathers were much too short to interest this bird.
After doing its weird dance routine, this bird kept walking away from me...kind of like it wanted me to follow it.
Instead of following the bird, I went back to the area that I first saw it at and what do you know...there was this one lone egg that was laying amongst the rocks and gravel that is alongside the road. This egg really blended in well with its immediate surroundings.
As it turns out, this mother Sandpiper was only trying to protect its lone egg by making all kinds of movements in hops that I would follow it away from the egg and the rocky nest that it was settled in.
Of course I had to return home to grab my camera but this time both the egg and the mother bird were where I had left them. I was able to get a video of the mother Sandpiper doing its dance and of the egg doing nothing but lay there...as eggs usually do.
I then returned home to drop the camera off and returned to my walk.
As I reached the point...which is basically a cul de sac with the bay on one side and marshland on the other, I saw a long black in color thin stick like thing along side of the road.
As you should know by now, my feet knew exactly what to do and I found myself once again slammed into the all stop mode.
There just to the side of me was an approximately 2 foot long black snake. I believe it was a
Black Racer which I have seen lots of them from my time living in Florida years ago.
Not being a snake lover, I decided that it was not necessary to hurry home and grab the camera but I did decide to scurry away from the area...like I said...I am not a snake person at all.
So then I am finally home and preparing this blog entry...yes indeed...the one you are reading right now. It's crazy isn't it?
Anyway....I am typing away on my computer and I catch a glimpse of this dark mass moving outside of the window that is next to my computer desk.
I slowly open the drapes to see what is out there....my long lost friend...the masked critter herself...mama raccoon is just outside the window in basically the same location where the deer was the other day. This raccoon is busy moving the gravel and rocks aside so that she could get to some of the cracked corn that I had thrown out there the other day. There could not have been much left out there because the deer and the birds had been busy eating it up.
There was enough there to keep her busy long enough for me to take a couple of photos and a video of here.
Sometimes all we have to do is open our eyes and take a good look around. You might be amazed at all of the neat things that are around you just waiting to be seen.
Here are some photos of the various critters that have been seen over the last couple of days:
If you look real close you can see the tail of Mama Raccoon as she headed back into the marshland
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