a meme (yes, it's marking season) from fjm

[woolymonkey]

I know very little about some of the people on my friends list. Some people I know relatively well. But here's a thought: why not take this opportunity to tell me a little something about yourself. Any old thing at all. Just so the next time I see your name I can say: "Ah, there's Parker ...she likes money and cereal." I'd love it if everyone who's friended me did this. (Yes, even you people who I know really well.) Then post this in your own journal. In return, ask me anything you'd like to know about me and I'll give you an answer.

Comments

[woolymonkey.livejournal.com]

Hello. No, I really would like to know about the turtles!
I don't think my garden tortoise would eat meat if he got the chance but his eating habits are disgusting. I feed him lettuce, tomato, dandelion. I feed the cats cat food. The cats go in the garden. Lets just say the tortoise eats lettuce, tomato, dandelion and cat food.

[dbalthasar.livejournal.com]

A friend of mine who's a wildlife biologist thinks she's identified two species of turtles in the pond: Florida cooters, which have domed shells and are described as "conspicuous basking turtles" (and indeed are just that); and snapping turtles, which have flatter shells and grow very, very large. Both species tend to sun themselves on various dead trees that have fallen on my side. Toward the end of the summer, after several days of heavy rain, something dead washed down into the pond. Over the next 15 hours, the snapping turtles proceeded to eviscerate, dismember, and dispose of it completely. It was weirdly fascinating, and is probably going to feature in my next book, but I was taken aback at the size of the largest snappers. The biggest one I saw had a shell that was easily two feet in diameter (I think a bit larger, but they're not supposed to get bigger than that) and a beaked head like an old and evil dinosaur.

At the moment, everything seems to be in at least semi-hibernation, though it's been warm enough this winter that on the nicest days a few of the cooters will haul themselves out onto the logs to enjoy the sun.