Featured Strange Sights For Strange Times--what Weirdness Have You Seen Lately?

I saw these shoes just sitting there beside the walking path recently on one of my morning walks. They are gone now but it was a rather odd sighting.

 

Another sighting--and meeting--on a recent morning walk on our cycling/walking path. Not so strange but truly delightful. Meet Bruce the Bulldog.

His parents were in the process of making some sort of cross out of tape on their driveway. They were planning to use different tape colors and make it look like stained glass they said. Guess I'll walk that route today and see if they finished their project.

 

Well, I walked past the in-process driveway art project this morning and Bruce's doggy mom and dad finished their "stained glass" driveway mosaic. It's quite lovely, I think!

 

Yesterday on my morning walk I saw a mama javelina and two babies crossing a residential street heading towards a steep embankment leading to a wash. Javelinas can be very quick and they were able to all but disappear into the underbrush before iI could get my iPhone out. I did manage to snap a pic of just the mama as I peeked over the edge of the embankment. She wasn't too happy about it and gave me a big snort before running off with her little ones.



For any of you who have seen my travel threads, "Javier the Javelina" is my travel mascot (thanks for the idea, @OsteKuste) because javelina are common in the American Southwest. This is Javi at last year's Distinguished Gentleman's Ride.



Here's a photo from Google Images of a mama javelina and a couple of babies. This is about the size of the babies I saw yesterday. Javelinas are fairly common around here but they hide pretty well so seeing them out and about is less common. They typically aren't dangerous but they are protective so that mama's snort yesterday was a little disconcerting. Javelinas look like pigs but are actually in the peccary family.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peccary

 

I'll have to use your joke tactic on charging wild animals, @Winglad. My joke-telling certainly makes humans fall asleep so it would probably work on wild animals, too.

Thanks for the positive comment on the first photo...that's the one I took. The second one was an image from Google Images. As I said, I did do some editing since she was a bit further away from me than you might imagine seeing that photo. That cacti in the foreground is just the type that javelina are known for eating. It's not unusual to see a prickly pear cactus paddle with a half moon shape taken out of it by a javelina having lunch. I can't imagine how they can do that since the spines on a typical prickly pear are VERY prickly indeed--and long and stout.

I did a bit of poking around to research the relationship--if any--of javelinas and wild boar. They are not really in the same family but are considered distant relatives.

 

Here are a couple of photos of my daily walk sighting today. I walked east on the Rillito River Loop path which I've not done in weeks. It is always a little surprising--although not particularly unusual--to see folks on horses in this area even though Mr. Sandi and I live smack dab in the middle of the Tucson Metro area with a population of about a million. We do live in the wild West after all.

Having had horses growing up, I always enjoy seeing them out. I do have to say, though, that this crew doesn't seem particularly concerned about social distancing based on the second photo.

 

No, SprinterII, thanks for noticing and checking in. I've been laying low re. reporting about my elbow. But just yesterday I texted with my surgeon. I had an in-person appointment with him about 2 1/2 weeks ago. In the text he advised me to keep plugging away and make slow and incremental attempts to increase my elbow mobility. Unless my ulnar nerve gets really fired up again or gets worse, that's the plan. He said that he wouldn't consider a second surgery for at least another four months to allow my injury to stabilize.That was news to me. On a positive note, I'm now more hopeful that I will start regaining mobility and keep my ulnar nerve problems at bay and not need another surgery. And I can drive my car! even with limited elbow flexion. On the negative side, it has now hit me full force that it will be a good long while before I'm able to ride my beloved motorcycles again.

 

Someone either "planted" or dropped this beautiful little painted rock on the walking path where we walk our dog each morning. It definitely brought a big smile to my face to see it.

 

There's a building on a side street where I do my morning walks that I'd never looked at before. I was curious to see what the posted sign on the window said. What a lovely neighborhood pool--now sitting empty and idly by waiting for some swimmers and waders to partake. Since the Tucson temp is predicted to hit 100ºF tomorrow, I suspect some will be tempted to find a way in.

 

This was a fun sighting on my morning walk today! This gent was coming down a neighborhood road as I was walking up and he gave me a friendly wave.

 

Not exactly "strange" sights for this time of the year here in the Sonoran Desert but definitely beautiful ones. These pics were captured over the past couple of days on my morning walks. These are prickly pear cacti.

Speaking of living in the desert, we hit 100ºF for the first time this year yesterday. Ouch.

 

@Duckadiledundee, thought of you while on my morning walk today. Here are more photos of prickly pear that we have here in the Sonoran Desert. There are many types--all beautiful but all, well, prickly! Our desert is lovely right now with lots of cacti in full bloom.

From left to right--violet, cows tongue, rabbit ear. And there are MANY more varieties all with gorgeous flowers this time of the year!



Another blooming prickly pear in front of a barrel cactus