I found this fellow just outside my gate. He was about an inch and a half long. I’ve seen them here before but I can’t remember the name. Rotated one turn to the right, it looks like an African mask.
jdbphoto
Best for Last
Just as I’m ready to ingest
the morsel I consider best
and so picked out from all the rest
to be my last bite, savored with zest—
last memory of this gourmet fest—
from north and south and east and west,
descends each winged little pest,
radared in on diabolical quest
as though invited at my behest.
They put my appetite to the test,
settling as though to the nest,
their hairy feet intimately pressed
upon that morsel that I loved best.
I wave my hand over them, lest
they eat too much, then I confess
I guiltily consume the rest.
The prompt today is pest.
It’s that time of year when flying termites descend by the thousands, chew off their wings and go in search of delicious wood to munch. These fellas thankfully got caught in a huge rainstorm that lasted for hours, pinning them by their wings. I woke up to drifts of them in places like these steps up to the garage. Kinda ghastly, but definitely oddball.
Most things crawl before they fly, if they fly at all. The wood termites shown in the photo have flown into my pool, chewed their wings off, and are treading water or floating on their cast off wings to get to the side of the pool so they can crawl up to my wooden beams and make a meal of them. The golden orb spider spins zigzag designs in her web as she crawls to its center. I haven’t been able to determine why. The orange butterflies were on a lifejacket on a boat on the Amazon. Attracted by the bright color, they were no doubt disappointed by the taste. The tiny green moth flew down to my computer screen one night and crawled around a bit before it settled on a nice spot. The hummingbird moth larvae are fascinating in their various mutations before turning into moths. I never have been able to figure out what the crystal shapes are growing out of the one caterpillar.
Most of my bird watching takes place at the beach, thus the photos of pelicans and gulls. Except for the photo of the walking stick on the cap and the hand-held giant leaf hopper, which were both taken in the Amazon rainforest, all of the other photos were taken at my house above Lake Chapala in Mexico.
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I have seen the most unusual spiders since moving to Mexico 15 years ago. The one little black and white triangular spider, I’ve spotted at least 3 different times in the past 15 years and they always have an uneven number of legs. Must run in the family as it can’t be possible that the same spider has lived for 15 years. The Golden Orb Weaver spider is my favorite. It weaves the most interesting web. This one remained in this spot where I saw it every day on the way to my car for over a month.
https://jennifernicholewells.com/2016/10/15/jnws-halloween-challenge-spiderweb/
This beach companion was fascinated by my Diet Coke. Pedro says this is proof that they actually do slip sugar into diet drinks here.
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He ended up submerged, in spite of my best efforts to dissuade him from taking the icy dip. This called for pouring the coke and corpus onto the sand. In lieu of artificial respiration, I blew on him and from a seemingly comatose state, he came to, crawled away, and in time flew away. I wonder how many watery graves this fellow has escaped.
