"Step Into My Parlor....."

....... said the spider to the fly.

I don’t think he meant me exactly, but I blundered in anyway, as we hiked through the woods yesterday afternoon. His parlor was strung across the path, between two trees. I didn’t know it was there until I felt its sticky walls wrapped 'round my face. Extracting myself, I fervently hoped that HE was not in my hair too.

I needn’t have worried. He was sitting, inscrutable, in an undisturbed corner, waiting for more palatable tidbits.


We kept moving, since standing still was understood, by the hordes of blood thirsty mosquitoes, as an invitation to belly up to the bar. It was hot and muggy and there was thunder in the air.

There are deer in these woods but, no matter how stealthily we step, they always hear us coming. As I fumble frantically to focus, they flick their tails and bounce away.

Once we saw a diamond backed rattler, slithering quietly through the dried leaves. I won’t mind if I don’t see him again. And there was the time we happened upon a family of armadillos, so intent on snuffling through the undergrowth for supper that they hardly noticed us.

With thunderclouds threatening, and the persistent whine of mosquitoes in our ears, we traipsed through the trees in record time. There’s always some little surprise though, to make you glad you came, even on a dull day. Yesterday it was this pristine beauty...



And these fine fellows.....


.....who were happier than we about the bounteous selection of frogs and mosquitoes.......

And, of course, the surreptious pictures I took of Spiderman's parlor.