House Sitting Wilderness Safari

That's right...I'm house sitting and dog sitting again. I don't really understand the concept of house sitting. Houses don't need to be sat, they can take care of themselves. However, it is probably a good thing that I am here. If I wasn't, how would anyone know if the flat screen was working properly. Or the jacuzzi. Or the washer and dryer (I am 5 loads and counting in the last 24 hrs). Or the elliptical machine. Or the bar. Or the pool and patio loungers. Yeah, it is a good thing I am here giving all of these things routine use and maintenance. This kind of job does not come without its share of danger and risk though, hence the title of the post...

First of all, spiders. They are everywhere (outside). All of them harmless, of course, as there are only five occurring poisonous spiders in FL: the southern black widow, northern black widow, red widow, brown widow and brown recluse. Nonetheless, I have been documenting the nocturnal activity of a ginormous and very colorful spider who routinely spins a web at dusk each night in between a tree and a lamppost on the edge of the property. This thing is big. And scary looking. The web could easily catch and contain a bat or a small bird (exaggeration). So far I have only see it get a giant moth and the other tiny bugs that flutter around lights at night. also around the house are spiny backed orb weavers, jumping spiders, long jawed orb spiders and wolf spiders. The pool cage is like a rainforest's canopy of spider webs. Blurg!

Second, a box turtle. Hank first discovered the turtle specimen. He was outside with me while I washed my car and he started barking, a lot. Hank doesn't usually bark any type of alarming, fast paced, high pitched excited bark, but he was. He was barking with his head down at something on the ground. I got scared thinking it was a snake about to strike (foreshadowing a later story - you like that?). I came around the bush to get a better look and it was a tiny box turtle scared and boxed in his shell. He was about the size of a gourmet half pound hamburger with a big sesame seed bun. I picked it up and brought it into the grass and waited for it to poke its head out. It did. You know what that means...a turtle head was poking out! That's so juvenile and hilarious. I have since seen the turtle twice more. Once in almost the exact same spot I originally saw him and once about 4 houses down in the mulch of some landscaping.

Third, an iguana, in a small palm tree right in front of the house. It was early evening. I was standing under/next to the tree and all of the sudden there was some loud rustling above my head. A two foot iguana was falling from the tree and hitting the frawns on its way down. It caught itself on the last possible frawn, right next to my head, before what would have been its five foot fall to the ground!! I screamed loud as it scurried back into the thicker foliage of the tree and ran away. I also ran away.

Fourth, a giant albino frog (the albino part was possibly because it was dead). It was on the golf course on the edge of the lake. It was pretty big, the size of my hand, but not moving. I got closer expecting it to move but it didn't. I got really close expecting it to move but it didn't. I poked it lightly with a stick expecting it to move but it didn't. I got another stick and picked it up and put it in the shallow water of the lake expecting it to move but it didn't. If it was dead, it had just died because it wasn't rigor mortis or petrified. If it wasn't dead, it is a very good actor and/or was an opossum in its former life.

Fifth, a poisonous venomous aggressive tiny snake that I tried to rescue that was stuck in the pool overflow reserve that I got scared of when it tried to attack me that I left there overnight hoping it would just drown that we eventually had to get the pool man to capture in a bucket and release outside and FAR AWAY. That little guy could not have been more that seven inches long but thought it was an anaconda or something. I didn't know snakes could suffer from Napoleon Complex (aka survival instincts I know).

Sixth, and most terrifying (cue cheesy Hitchcock suspense horror flick music),
TWO PUGS!!!!!!