The Anticipated Arrival of Tomorrow

 

“We really need some rain” Bruce, a mighty, decades old oak tree said to his friend and neighbor, Piney, an equally impressive evergreen. They were situated in such a way that they overlooked the hill in front of them but couldn’t see one another.

“Yeah, besides the thirst, I’m worried the fires may start to kick up” Piney answered.

“It’s only a matter of time my friend” Bruce said.

Later that night Bruce was proven correct. First, the faint smell of smoke turned into a thick cloud and then the heat could slowly be felt. Before long, visible light from the flames was flickering dangerously close to them.

“This could be it, Bruce, after decades by your side overlooking this infinite beauty. Now we may be going back to where we came” Piney said.

“It was all worth it, my friend” was his stoic response.

The heat encroached little by little, drying out already arid bark. Just as Bruce and Piney gave up hope of seeing tomorrow, both felt what they thought was a miracle. Drops of water started to clean the blown ash from their leaves.

The drops turned into a cascade. The sounds of sizzling from suffocating fire was all around them.

“This is turning out to be quite the ripper” Bruce shouted over the howling gale winds and sheets of falling water.

“Yeah! And in little time will arrive the first tomorrow I am truly looking forward to in a while” Piney gleefully responded.

The both stood in silence, swaying in the wind, letting it take them in the direction of its desires. Deep in the Earth, their roots were quenched.

Bruce started nodding off when an extremely bright flash brought momentary day to the mountain. Bruce thought it was a dream until the air ripping boom reverberated throughout the valley.

“That one hit a little close, didn’t it Piney?” Bruce asked, now completely awake from his slumber.

There was no answer.

“Piney?”

There was still no answer.

The next morning an early hawk perched itself on one of Bruce’s high boughs. Bruce asked “Please, hawk, lend me your eyes, what has become of my friend Piney?”

The hawk turned and saw an evergreen tree split down the middle from a lightning strike. The task of bearing such news was too much for the hawk. He simply said “Sorry Bruce” and flew away. That was enough for Bruce to understand.

The Peculiar Attraction of the Peacock

The peacock is a peculiar animal in that the male is the vainer of the two sexes. In our own species, the human species, the female usually devotes more time and attention to their outer appearance. This is the domain of the male in the world of the peacock.

More odd is that the male peacock has been observed to put very little importance in the physical appearance of their female mates. They seem to care a little about height and beak size and that does not even seem to be a deal breaker.  If a female successfully plays into a male´s vanity, she can be quite short and have a relatively small beak, yet will have her target male fawn all over her.  Further research must be done but it is hypothesized that the ability to stroke the male´s ego may be the single greatest asset the female has to win over a mate.

Not much homosexuality has been observed among the peacock musters studied, but when it has, a dilemma seems to arise. Both males seek the affirmation of their aesthetic but have little to no experience in offering such affirmation so a vicious cycle has been observed to form. Homosexual peacocks go around looking for another male who will placate their need for veneration, yet do not know how to placate this need in their mate. Given this dynamic, very little homosexual copulation has been observed in the musters studied even though a clearly small subset of the population is homosexual.

There is one more curious phenomenon worth mentioning. The females observed did not demonstrate any concern for the aesthetic of the males. They have been observed to acquire the knowledge of the male´s penchant for this certain type of seduction from older females who have in turn had acquired it from even older ones. In other words, the females don´t even care what the males look like but have learned it is important to the males and have come up with strategies to conquer them using this knowledge to their advantage.

Sugar Cane Train

Train tracks that cut through a sugar cane plantation in São Paulo, Brazil.

Train a blowing through

The cane planted by phantoms

Doesn´t stop nor look

A Duck Tale

 

A handsome adolescent Mallard duck was swimming in his pond lamenting the trash floating around him that was washed in during the last rain storm. He was surrounded by empty water bottles, empty trail mix packages and cigarette butts. These were all left behind by self proclaimed “nature lovers” who entered these woods to escape their own trash filled urban streets.

A small yellow duck caught his eye. The duckling´s movements were not very natural and it seemed to be swimming on its side. The Mallard swam over to see if he could offer assistance to the possibly injured young duckling.

“Are you all right?” The Mallard asked. No response was given. The Mallard dipped his head under the water and lifted up as to right the injured duckling.

“There you go, now you are upright my little friend” the satisfied Mallard said to his new young friend. There was no response from the duckling.

“You´re welcome” the Mallard said, a little peeved by the duckling’s lack of manners. The young duckling just bobbed up and down. The Mallard shrugged and swam away.

The Mallard went on with his day not giving much attention to the young duckling. As the day started to retire the Mallard noticed that the young duckling was very close to the shore bobbing up and down and still without any sign of a mother duck.

The Mallard swam back over to see if he could be of any help to the duckling. “Where’s your mommy?” he asked. No response. The Mallard was getting impatient. “I just want to help!” he said. No response. “Let me at least help you onto the shore. It´s going to get dark soon” No response.

With that the Mallard started to nudge the yellow duckling to even more shallow waters. He didn’t notice that sprinkled into the rocks of the shallow water was a lot of broken glass. As he pushed the yellow duckling towards the shallow rocks the yellow duckling let out a pssssssst noise. The Mallard noticed a bunch of air bubbles rise from the belly of his young friend. The Mallard went into a panic. He was frustrated with the duckling but surely he didn´t want to do any harm to him.

The yellow duckling started to flatten out and sink to the bottom of the shallow water. The Mallard was very upset. He had never caused bodily harm to anything save a minnow. He started to cry out for help.

In the meanwhile on the shore, two young boys laughed hysterically as they watched a Mallard duck quacking his beak off while nudging a flat rubber ducky.