Before we went out to eat on Saturday night, we met a new neighbor. A terrapin was crawling across our humble estate in L.A. (That's lower Alabama for those of you from LA (that's Louisiana for those of you from L.A.)) How do I know this was a terrapin? Because my wife said so, that's why! And you thought I was stoopid!?!
I don't think any of us knew for sure what it was. But I did a little web-based researching today. Did it help? Heck no! I'm even more confused now. One site had a paragraph-long description that stated that turtles, terrapins, and tortoises are all part of the same order of Chelonia, which includes 244 different species. Oh good, that makes it easier to figure out. The neat thing about the web is there's always somebody that can speak your language. One dude wrote this: Turtle - water-dwelling creature without claws; Terrapin - water-dwelling creature with claws; Tortoise - land-dwelling creature. That's simple enough for me to understand. So based on this definition, this chelonia was a terrapin because it had claws and lived near water...not to mention my wife said so.
Whatever you want to call it, this was one cool cucumber. He (or she...I didn't look down there) was on a mission. Nothing was going to get in his way. He had traveled across an acre lot before I was able to get the camera. After all the kids held him up, he took off on a tear. When he finally hit the brush, I quit filming. I watched him for a few more minutes, though, as he crawled through a thicket. If the hare was napping back there, there's no doubt in my mind who won the race.
3 comments:
You have fun everywhere you go don't you? :D
TMNT was on tv the other night...it made me happy. But what makes me happier is Mark Addison.
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