My camera has been quiet for a while, but now I have a bunch of new pics from this past week and long weekend on my Flickr site, including birthday festivities, photo call from the show that my lady friend worked on, and a trip to the zoo on Saturday. There was a lot more animal activity than usual, perhaps owing to the cooler weather? Highlights included a raccoon that managed to work the lids off of two peanut butter jars to get at the treats inside, a visit with Victor the echidna, the Malayan tapirs doing lots of frolicking in their pool, and 4 highly entertaining young swamp monkeys.

Is everyone else looking forward to Thanksgiving as much as I am?

eh

So 35 is here. Like 30, I figured that it would be an anxiety-producing one, but so far...not so much. I've used it as an occasion to take stock of things, as I'm sure most people do, and maybe a little more so this year, but there's no real sense of panic, dread or anxiety. Maybe I got all that out of the way the past couple of months. I am using the occasion to bid farewell to the nicotine habit again, however, and though I may miss having a cigarette once in a while, it's definitely time to be done with that.

Right now I'm just looking forward to tomorrow night's gathering with friends and beer, which is really all I can ask for out of a birthday.

"We are not issuing a squirrel alert, but everyone is aware of the incident."

Mean Squirrel Attacks PA Letter Carrier

Where to start??

First of all, it is worth noting that Oil City is only about 30 miles from my beloved Canadohta Lake.

The article mentions that the squirrel was killed with a BB gun. By who? And how was this squirrel tracked after the attack? Did the postal carrier just happen to have a BB gun on her and then whip it out and shoot the offending squirrel after throwing it off of her person? Or is there some Oil City local with a BB gun always at the ready in case a potentially rabid animal needs to be shot? We need details.

And no thought is given to why the squirrel would have acted in this manner other than to say it would be tested for rabies, that tried and true excuse for any erratic animal behavior. Perhaps the squirrel was defending a nearby nest? This AP writer has clearly ignored the "Why?" part of the story, instead choosing to create a sensationalistic animal attack piece.

Perhaps this writer was channeling the recent episode of National Geographic Channel's "Animal Extractors," another sensationalistic (if highly entertaining) program which is basically an excuse to show a raccoon chasing people around a yard, and a man yelling "Get out of here, bear! You're a bad bear!" as part of his plan to make bears averse to human contact (along with shooting the bears with rubber bullets and sending dogs after them).

In any case, we have a new squirrel attack to add to our files. We're keeping a close eye on these things...

clam = energy

Which is worse: That there is an energy drink called Cocaine?


Or that Clamato has their own entry into the energy drink market (and yes, that is a clam on the label next to the tomato)?