Bill Kirby: Why did the turtle cross the road? Maybe I should ask
"Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads."
– Henry David Thoreau
I've got a new job – a side gig, actually – turtle steward.
Three times in the last two weeks I've stopped the car or paused during one of my neighborhood walks to pick up a turtle trying to cross the road.
In general these are not high traffic areas, and if they were, I would let it go, refusing to stick my neck out for a creature that pulls its in. But it doesn't seem right for them to get mashed by a car just because they notoriously are not nature's most nimble movers.
I don't know what's behind the turtle traffic increase. Migration? Summer storms? Mating season? (Great. More work.)
MORE NATURE: Since I'm on the topic of the great outdoors, I got comments from my recent account of letting a frog inside the house pre-dawn while trying to let my terriers out. Yapping dogs, hopping frog and groggy human are a pretty funny situation if it's somebody else.
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However, it wasn't even the funniest thing nature ever did to me. Thirty-plus years ago, in my first purchased house, a blue jay somehow got down the vent into the wash room where the hot water heater, washer and dryer all occasionally worked.
There should have been some sort of screen on that vent, but the bird seemed to work its way through it and arrived indoors in bad humor.
Part of this was probably my fault because I was chasing it with a swinging broom. The house – a small ranch – only had two doors and a sliding glass door to a patio out back.
Finally, I gave up. Sat down and watched the blue jay take some tight laps around my den/living room/dining room, then land on a light shade, then wing it out the front door, which I shut quickly.
Funny? Not when it's happening to you.
Besides, I think Peggy Greco has better story. Let me let her tell it.
"Years ago," she wrote, "my sister's love-struck boyfriend bought her two 'love birds' to show his true feelings for her.
"One of them got out of the cage on the day I was baking a pineapple upside down cake. Everyone was chasing the bird around, trying to catch it, just when the oven timer went off. I took out the cake and the bird flew over and landed right on top of the cake!
"I don’t know if the poor bird got burned feet, but he was subdued enough to catch.
"Also, turns out these birds were not in love, they fought frequently and we found out later they were both males.
"We found two separate homes for them after she broke up with that boyfriend."
TODAY'S JOKE: A long-winded preacher was offended when he suddenly noticed a member of the congregation had dozed off during his sermon.
He stopped, pointed at the sleeping gentleman's son, and said, "Young man, kindly wake your father up."
"Why?" said the youngster as others began to snicker. "You put him to sleep."
Bill Kirby has reported, photographed and commented on life in Augusta and Georgia for 45 years.
This article originally appeared on Augusta Chronicle: It's turtle crossing season, so better watch the road | Bill Kirby
