Mark My Words: 🦚🐝🐍🐛

On Tuesday, I had my biweekly in-person meetings with the Utah Historical Society, where I am the only man on the Education and Engagement team. My supervisor explained to the group that she had received a grumpy email, and I chimed in to add that the email was a textbook example of mansplaining. One of my colleagues said, "Oh, now I have to know more!" And then, because I was the only man in a room full of eleven women, she said, "Explain it to us, Mark." The joke wrote itself.

I had a few interactions with wild(?)life this week as well.

Tuesday evening, because it was so hot and smoky outside, I went back to swim with the swim team, which I usually do during the winter. As I put my hand on my swim bag, I felt something sharp, as though I had just cut myself. What the heck?! There's nothing sharp on my swim bag! And then I was surprised to see that a wasp had hitchhiked onto my bag!

I don't like to kill things, but since I still needed to use my bag, and I was in a locker room where people are barefoot, I couldn't let it go. So I used my shoe to smash it and then brush it into the garbage.

On Thursday, I was working from home when my dad came into my room to tell me there was a peacock on our shed! So I went out to get pictures. But I took them from a distance because I didn't want to scare it off.

I went back into my room to keep working. But a little bit later I saw it leave our front yard and head up the sidewalk. They really are stunningly beautiful birds. No wonder they're so popular! It was so random.

And here's a picture of my splooty baby that same day.

Then that evening, I went on a walk to eradicate goatheads. As I was almost home, I apparently brushed against some plant growth, because there were dried petals on my arm. But I didn't notice that. I just noticed a sharp pain in my arm. I had been stung for the second time in a week! There was even a stinger left on my arm, so presumably it was a bee.

In the ensuing days, I felt as though I had received a shot in my arm. But instead of a vaccine, I was filled with venom.

My mom's family was in town this week, and in some of our conversations, we discussed snakes. Yesterday (Saturday), I returned to North Canyon for my first time in five weeks. Right at the beginning of the trail, I saw a good-sized snake. But it didn't have any rattles.

Then as I headed up the trail farther, I heard a rattle, and I barely saw something move off the trail and into the brush. I backtracked a bit on the trail so I could get back on the dirt road instead of the trail, until I knew I was safely past the rattler.

There were also many trees covered in caterpillars and their silk. There's a different kind of caterpillar that does this in June as well.