A brush with nature

I've always wondered if Africans drive home from work, see an elephant on the side of the road, and think, "oh, how boring". As Australians, we tend to take our amazing and unique animals for granted. Seeing kangaroos while driving on the highway, most people just think, "that bugger better not jump out onto the road!".

Being here in the U.S., though, I'm still discovering their natural wonders. It doesn't last long, so I guess it's something I should enjoy while it lasts. When I first arrived here, I remember sitting on my back porch and watching the squirrels for hours. I hate seeing them now, because I know I'm going to be dragged behind Bonnie as she tries in vain to catch them!

Walking an hour with Bonnie (usually) every day allows me lots of time to enjoy our area. We're very lucky, in that the land opposite our house is vacant, about the size of 3 city blocks, I guess? The richest family in Augusta currently own the land and they've done nothing with it, so it's turned into a sort of local park area. There are huge magnolia trees everywhere, and the grass gets cut regularly, so it's a wonderful place for Bonnie to meet up with all her friends.

Last Thursday evening, as we were walking through the park on our way home, Bonnie decided she was hot and wanted to just sit quietly for a moment. As we sat there, a raccoon came out of the trees, sniffed around for a little bit, then trotted off into another grove of trees. Raccoons are very shy creatures, and Dustin tells me that if you actually see one, it's probably rabid. But this one seemed like it just didn't realise we were there. It was so cute: little bandit mask, beautiful striped tail ... that was a cool moment. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccoon: the one we saw was actually much heavier than this one pictured.)

Another very cool moment happened on Sunday. Dustin and I bought some Adirondack chairs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adirondack_chair), so we were sitting in our backyard, enjoying the serenity (I can't use that word without thinking of Seinfeld!!). He was looking over at the plant bed, I happened to look up, and out of nowhere, a hummingbird appeared and hovered right above Dustin. I quickly tried to tell him to look up, but by the time the words came out, it was gone. That was very cool, because I've never seen hummingbirds at our house before. The moment actually seemed very Harry Potter-like: this tiny thing, appearing out of nowhere, then taking off before you realise it's there... sounds like the golden snitch!

Speaking of our backyard (that's a whole other story), here is a photo that I took about a month ago. 'Til next time...