Obligatory disclaimer: sometimes, real life… does not suck, as earlier today I got to see both a raccoon and a striped skunk in the wild. Naturally, the two animals do not look anything similar to each other, for the pair are distant relatives at best, but moreover…
The raccoon is a tree-climbing mammal. Eyesight is
important to it for the obvious reasons, and so its’ skull has a shape that
allows for some binocular (forward-facing) vision at least. The raccoon is
equally confident on the ground, but it prefers to retreat to the nearest growing/standing
tree (or a burrow, true), than stand its’ ground and fight… on the ground,
pardon my tautology. That is good news… for both sides, for raccoons tend to
have powerful jaws, sharp teeth, and an attitude to match them. (In addition,
in Toronto, only the coyotes are bigger than they are, and coyotes do not
appear to be too interested in raccoons, you know?)
The skunk is a burrowing mammal. For it, sense of
smell is the most important, and so, it has better smell and worse eyesight
than the raccoon does; in addition, proportionally, skunks are smaller and
lighter than the raccoons are. Here, in Toronto, and the rest of Canada, the
skunk species is the striped skunk, one of the biggest modern skunk species
period, and the raccoon is decidedly bigger and heavier than it is. The skunk,
admittedly, has powerful forepaws with large claws to better dig out earthworms
and similar food items, (it doesn’t climb trees unlike the raccoon), not to
mention its’ trademark defence power of skunk spray, but the skunks in our
neighborhood apparently are the shy ones, as they tend to stay away from people
and dash from cover to cover instead.
Again, on this occasion, I saw both of these mammals
during the morning, way after sunrise, mid-September or not, so it is probable
they were not at their best or their regular, (both skunks and raccoons tend to
be more active at night instead), but still, the raccoon was slightly bolder
out of the two species. Anything else?
‘Agatha All Along’ has premiered today, (Sep 18,
2024), and what can be said about the miniseries? It is progressive. It has
same-sex couple (couples?). It has a Euro-American, an Afro-American, and an
Asian-American character – all of them are in Agatha’s entourage and are on her
side (at least initially). The series’ story is a travel story, a journey story,
a story of transformations and transitions and changes – everything that MCU
tried to be ever since the Avengers: Endgame film. The actors’ playing is very
good and confident, the roles are cast quite nicely – i.e., the actors fit the
characters – and we just saw the first two episodes out of several, so it is
too early to judge the plot in general. As for WV…
Well, Elizabeth Olsen and her Wanda are finished
with MCU for now, apparently. The character of Vision is going to get his own
miniseries in the future, but for the moment there are no details aside from a
statement that there’s going to be a series for Vision. AAA stems from WV, of
course, but aside from an obligatory homage, AAA is quickly leaving WV behind
both literally and metaphorically. Let us wish it good luck. Last time there
were witches on the TV screen, it had been the SW: Acolyte series and that had
been a failure, clear and simple. I hope that AAA will not be MCU’s version of
it.
For now, this is it. See you all soon.
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