Visiting A Big Village Creek Turtle After Zelda Del West Gave Me An Armadillo Leprosy Warning

Today I was visiting the Indian Ghosts who haunt Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area, blissfully enjoying the peaceful serenity I get from gazing out at the Village Creek Blue Bayou, when I looked down to be startled by the big turtle you see in the picture, looking up at me.

This turtle was unusually un-skittish. The big guy just sat there winking at me.

Last Sunday I mentioned that I was hunting for an armadillo in the Village Creek zone, for lunch, after having read that armadillos were considered a delicacy, by some, in Texas, back during the Great Depression, calling the cute critters Hoover Hogs.

I then heard from Zelda del West, who recently escaped Texas, after a multi-year exile, to now reside in Walla Walla, Washington, from whence she informed me that "...you can make an armadillo into stew using it's own armor as the pot. You should be nice to armadillos. They can also give you leprosy."

If I felt the need to be nice to all the various things from which I might catch leprosy I would exhaust myself, daily, from excessive niceness.

As for the Village Creek NHA armadillos,  I saw nary a one, again, today. Where have all the armadillos gone?

I did see an Arlington animal control officer releasing some possums from his animal control truck. I have seen this multiple times at this location. He picks the possums up by their tails, places them on the ground,  where they quickly scurry away, never to be seen, by me, again.

The closest I think I've come to a heart attack was years ago, in Mount Vernon, a town on the other side of the Cascade Mountains from Walla Walla, where a possum jumped out of my garbage can whilst I was depositing some garbage.

I know someone in Tacoma who had a horrible possum infestation in her basement. The possum infestation was so insidious that the lady moved to a new possum free location. It would not shock me to learn that the possums followed her there. Because it is well know that possums love chocolate...