2fer, adopted by a crow. And, took a *HARD* tumble this morn, clues mounting up!
Been rummaging around in the back burner of my "brain" for days - mixed metaphor melange, gratefully not PUNS: Have put off posting, how I've been adopted by a - what, crow/raven/grackle? A "murder" of crows, a "plague" of grackles.
She's a female crow/raven/grackle - smaller. I think spring mating season is over, so she's an empty nester - HAH, fooled ya about no puns!1 So I have to schedule my outside tasks according to the blazing heat: 7:30 - 9:00 A.M. and/or 7:30 - 8:30 P.M. So a bit here or there, sometimes in the front, sometimes in the back, spread over a couple or three days. Mowing, weedeating along the fence, both sides.
So last week, this crow/raven/grackle turned up, hopping around the mower (electric, less noise so less scary to her?). No, it wasn't finding worms, since this is dry, hard ground. But the funny part, it was carrying around a twig or straw or something in its beak, not dropping it, not looking for another one, just hopping around with the thing already in its beak, like a stereotypical t.v. country character with something in teeth.
So I assumed it was a one-off. But the next session, in another part of the place there it was again, same thing. And skipping a day or two, there it was again same thing. It found me wherever and whenever.
*** As for this morning's tumble. While I've been aware that I've got creeping age and health problems, often unsteady and teetering, haven't had any severe episodes. But this morning, watering, took an unmistakable, HARD, tumble, band nerd that I am can only compare it to what TV football looks like, landed on my left shoulder and then full side. Have had increasing trouble getting up from chairs/floor holding on to things, but this was out in the open.
Hat, glasses, phone went flying, luckily not UNDER me. It was in the front yard visible to the street. Sharp pain in the shoulder, luckily on the grass, not near to hitting head on concrete, had to stop still to get (physical, not mental) bearings. So I was down for a long minute, took longer to start to get up on knees and palms. While I was down, a car at the stop sign stayed there and a guy I've never seen got out and came to the fence offering to help me up. I thanked but said I'd get there eventually. He said awwright.
Oh, forgot the *REASON*! I've chronicled last year's problems with tarantula wasps, up to paying an exterminator. This is not even tarantula mating season (October), but the wasps are back, if they ever left. I've been able to spray a couple dead over the past week, but there're more seemingly isolatedly. And while I was watering and carrying a spray can, I was chasing and being chased by one. Of course, in my flip flops (don't tell a certain somebody around here), which are slippery when wet. So the wasp was coming at me and I was scrambling and spraying, and slipped right down.
It might be said that in this case it wasn't the age/health situation exactly, but how hard I went down, how long to get up, and causing concern to some random guy who called me "Mister (Surname)," might still be a sign of things to come, sooner than much later.
I *will* say that Google is a big help with the missing words - Googling for synonyms when I can't think of the word I want.
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