BUGS AND CRITTERS OF ALL SORTS

I read and enjoy Dawn Meehan's blog and her new column on Babble, the link is here

http://blogs.babble.com/babble-voices/because-im-the-mom/2011/07/10/drinking-driving-and-the-dmv/

I really enjoy her humor, today's column has some things I had forgotten about having lived in a tropical local for 7.5 years, she has recently relocated her family to Florida and her paragraph " Of course, it was raining by the time it was my turn because it rains every stinking day in Florida. The heat, the rain, the cockroaches, lizards, frogs, and locusts of biblical proportions have me convinced I’ve actually moved to the Amazonian rainforest and not the theme park capital of the world. Anyway, after two hours, I left with nothing."
brought back some memories of when I first moved to Hawaii, her words made me laugh as I remember the foot long cockroaches that flew around at night and dive bombed in to attack....this west coaster wasn't used to bugs that size and aggressive ones at that. Then there were a couple of instances I had forgotten about until Dawns post jogged my memory, one was with a praying mantis, I went outside to do the laundry, or attempted too...on the other side of the screen door was this huge and I do mean huge bug...looking at me with big bug eyes...and not moving. I threw stuff at him and quickly shut the screen door as I didn't know if he flew, hopped or charged. He just batted his big bug eyes at me...so I resorted to whatever was under the sink, I sprayed him with Windex, he didn't move, Fantastic spray, still wasn't leaving, spray starch...he just batted his big bug eyes at me...nothing phased this bug.(of course for some reason we had nothing like Raid around)  In the end he won, I didn't do the wash that day (and yes, our washer and drier were outside in that mostly sunny locale but under an awning. My preying Mantis was more brownish and much larger than this one and he had big antennae coming out of the top of his head but you get the idea, picture credit is displayed on the picture.

Now on another occasion I came home late one night and when I came through the gate I could see a critter in front of the front door....the area was undercover, well lit (thank goodness) and "it" looked like a rock. As I approached slowly on tip toes it moved and let me tell you so did I. People kept telling me about these "buffo toads". They said be very careful they can kill your dogs with some kind of poison they spray...well just my luck I had to meet up with one in the wee small hours in the dark....first I tried scaring it...scared myself more than it and no it didn't move. Then I tried going back out the gate and getting rocks and throwing them at it...still he wasn't going anywhere and we had a standoff, I had no way into the house without going over him and that just wasn't happening. Eventually he hopped off into the night but I spent the next few months wondering where exactly did he hop too....(photo credit displayed on photo)

Then there was the time I discovered a bunny living in my yard. Well, what harm can a bunny do...right? Well this one was devouring all the vegetation in the yard. Our yard was completely fenced. Actually I think it was safer than Fort Knox's as the fencing was concrete block and at least seven feet tall. The big mystery was how did it get in the fully enclosed yard. Anyways, I ended up getting a trap from animal control and eventually I caught the bunny and took it to animal control to be relocated.

On yet another occasion I went out to hang laundry on the clothesline and something moved...it was a big chameleon sunning itself on my clothesline...sheesh it never ended....and then there were the odd bird noises I heard all day and night, mostly night when I was there alone....turned out they were being made by gecko's....who knew....but the gecko's I were familiar with as I had seen them in hotels in the past, if they come into your room it is said to be good luck...or at least that is what the hotel staff says, probably so you don't spazz out on them when you find them in your room...lol   So these were the down sides to living in a place that is often referred to as paradise...but luckily in Hawaii we had no snakes...many years ago they brought in mongoose to rid them of snakes so now there are no snakes....millions of mongoose but no snakes...and luckily no mongoose ever found their way into my yard. Thanks for joining me in my trip down memory lane and please visit Dawn's blog when you have a minute, she is really funny and you won't be sorry you did. Her link for her blog is

http://mom2my6pack.blogspot.com/
or just go ahead and visit her at Babble and see her column there!