Return of the Turtle People!
Monday, August 18th, 2008Life’s been a bit on top of me again, as you may surmise from the gap in my blogging. I’ve been trying hard to catch up on writing and having some difficulties with sleep patterns, in large part due to the loud construction work on the sidewalks that’ve been going on outside my bedroom window at way too early in the morning.
Anyway, today I got a lot written and the temperature and humidity weren’t bad, so I determined to get out. Loaded the famous Emma in the car and hit the ditch around 6:25.
Not much by way of birdage: some mallards, some hummingbirds, some swallows. Emma showed some interest in one pair of ducks swimming in the ditch we passed rather close by, but made no serious effort to retrieve them. To my relief.
We were walking back toward where tall trees line both sides of the ditch, a quarter-mile or so before the exit, when I noticed a man and a little boy coming up behind us on bicycles. For everybody’s convenience Emma and I crossed over to the other bank. It was not until until the man sang out a cheery, “And how are you this evening?” that I I recognized them.
Yes, they were the World’s Nicest Family. My loyal blog readers might recall them from an earlier post (it had Emma in it, so people may have actually read it): the folks with the Tortoise Dilemma.
“A beautiful evening, isn’t it?” Dad sang out as he and Bro pedaled past. “Simply beautiful.”
“Yes it is,” I called back.
Next came Mom, with Sis churning enthusiastically away on one of those bolted-on half-bicycle tandem arrangements. “Our turtle’s gone!” warbled the little girl, who apparently has the enviable gift of making whatever comes along sound like the best news possible, as happily as pie.