Sunday, June 22, 2008

Warning Signs

Eight months ago, I moved to the second-most populated metropolis in America - Los Angeles.  Since then, I've been plagued and threatened incessantly by the very thing I thought I'd escape by relocating here -  Nature.  Inauspicious nature.  WILDERNESS WANTS TO KILL ME, even in the big city.  Some examples include:















Shark's tooth found at Redondo Beach.  This didn't initially seem ominous - but then I blithely revealed my discovery to some locals.  They all seemed uneasy, and all claimed, "WOW.  I've lived here - 10 /15/ 20 - years, and I've never found one of those at any beach in SoCal!"  Oh great.  Do I go in the water?  Or do I float a sacrificial dummy with my likeness out there first? 
















Snake in Palos Verdes - thankfully, this fellow was not of the poisonous / deadly variety, but again, associate reaction to this photo has ranged from, "I would fucking shit myself if I saw that," to, "RATTLESNAKES LIVE THERE TOO AND THEY HAVE THE ABILITY TO VAULT THEMSELVES AT YOU FROM 12 FEET AWAY.  You don't want a flying snake hitting you like an Amazonian blow dart, do you?!!?"

And, the kicker -















RIGHT IN MY OWN BACKYARD.  I think we can all agree - this squirrel has a ravenous, compulsory longing for human blood.  It just kept staring at me like that. What the...??  Squirrels are supposed to be hypersonic spazz rats with a volcanic glee for tree nuts and bird feed houses.  And when they do get mad or territorial for a brief moment, it always ends up on YouTube.  Because there is no fight in the entire animal kingdom more comical than a boxing squirrel death match.  Unless it includes the squirrel pictured above.  I don't think I could win a fight against that thing if you armed me with a sledgehammer and a can of mace.  

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