Wordgrove Post & Review

Quoted in the Grove:
Evidence is the only good reason to believe anything.
~Richard Dawkins

The being cannot be termed rational or virtuous, who obeys any authority, but that of reason.
~Mary Wollstonecraft

Reason should direct and appetite obey.
~Cicero

EndQuote:
Truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.
~Flannery O’Connor

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Posted from the Grove:

Piffin From The Platform:

~Cruel Youth: Hatefuck   (4:04)
~Cruel Youth: Mr Watson   (3:35)

~Cruel Youth:  Diamond Days   (3:51)

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20 Latin Phrases You Should Be Using
http://mentalfloss.com/article/57898/20-latin-phrases-you-should-be-using

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Glass Table:

~Matttt: A Coyote Hounds Me

Okay, so get this. We’ve got a German shepherd that is very obedient. She weighs about 78lbs. And every night, she goes into the backyard to pee before we go to bed. And then she comes back in to get a doggie treat. So, this is a usual routine. She responds to our verbal commands all the time.

Behind our house is a decent patch of woods with a trail or two that we use to wander around and go for walks. And we have lots of various wildlife back there (coyotes, deer, turkeys, raccoons, foxes, possum, fisher cats, and the occasional bigfoot). We love the woods and even let it grow half-way across our backyard. And a number of times, we’ve had coyotes in our backyard, of course. They go through our neighborhood. And you can hear them back in the woods howling a lot.

Tonight, as Misia (pronounced ‘mee-sha’) finishes doing her business and is about to return to the back deck, I call her and whistle to hurry her up… And at that moment, a coyote lunges from the woods toward her growling. They are about 30 feet apart. And I shout in my manly roar voice, “RAAHHHH, Get outta here!” And the coyotes turns and bolts back into the woods.

Guess what the dog does?

Yep, you guessed it… She bolts after the coyote and doesn’t stop, no matter what I shout or call. She’s gone.

So, I put my flip flops on, grab a flashlight, and go marching off into the woods, calling the dog to return. And then we hear, about 200 yards off, way off to the left, a dog barking. It sounds like a small dog, and it doesn’t stop. And so, I’m thinking now that Misia is over in one of our neighbors’ back yards, further down this stretch of woods. And so, I keep marching in that direction through the woods.

Finally, I get closer to the barking; And I’m calling my dog; And sure enough, she comes slinking through the brush towards me. But this dog is following her through the woods and barking at her… definitely a much smaller dog compared to Misia; I can tell from the voice / the bark.

So, I get ahold of Misia and point the flashlight toward the dog…. It was the coyote! The coyote was barking just like a dog! (Duh… a coyote is a dog… But I had only ever heard them howl at night.) The coyote was in full alarm mode and barking at an intruder!

So… Now, I vaguely have my bearings because it’s pitch dark in the woods… It’s wet because it had been raining… I’m sliding around in my Crocs flip flops… And I don’t have a hard leash to tie around Misia’s neck to hold her close. But she is now technically back on leash and responding to verbal commands, despite this coyote barking at us non-stop… (She probably had enough of the coyote and realized that she needed to do what she was being told to do by then).

So…. we start to make our way through the woods… find a trail… and start following it. And the coyote follows us and is barking the whole way! It’s slow going because I need to tell Misia to stop and go at intervals because otherwise, she would get too far away from me… And she starts to wander in the wrong direction, and I need to call her back…

And while this is happening, the coyote gets closer, which requires me to yell at it, which confuses the dog as I’m also giving commands to the dog.

It was freaking awesome!

This coyote essentially pursued us all the way home! Barking… Getting closer… Getting chased away…. Circling us through the woods… And I really got a chance to see it up close, like 10 feet away.

Even after we got home and I got Misia inside, and debriefed with my next door neighbor, and came back to the kitchen and debriefed with my son and my wife… That coyotes was STILL back in the woods barking! It was in full alarm mode and wasn’t going to stop right away. It went on for a good 10 minutes before it finally stopped.

What a trip!

I always wondered what it would be like at night back in those woods with coyotes nearby. Well, tonight I found out what that was like.

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Prewritten for Thurs 05/24 (6:00pm PT/9 ET):   kill switch, blend

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@Writers Platform:

Prewritten: desk, morning

May 17 ~ Piffin

Morning at my desk
Writing names of loved ones lost
Mourning at my desk

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~BarTalk:
Miss Understood

Apple wormy, pay Stormy
Said he wanted her head
But not dead when he said
Have it on my desk
In the morning

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Noted

Birth script, certificate
Etched initials, desktop
Carved hearts, tree bark
Engraved dates, tombstone
Morning Road to midnight

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5-7-5 x 2

room dark, near vacant
chair overturned, desk emptied
morning get away
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Mourning Mssr. d’Esque
Died unseemly at burlesque
Smiling nonetheless

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