Big Paul, a story - Oct 8

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so here's a story for you instead:

 It was dark now. Big Paul, a veteran sheepdog, was already at guard, guarding the sheep. (Hey, what did you expect?) It was still relatively early after sunset, so everything was quiet, though not too quiet, and Big Paul could already smell someone familiar.

“Red,” Big Paul called out to that specific someone. “Come out of the grass – I can smell you!”

“Yes you can,” Red, a male red fox, did look out of the grass, though he kept his distance, given the size difference between himself and Big Paul. “So what? I am not harassing your sheep, and there are not even any lambs. Piss off!”

Big Paul frowned. “This is what I want to talk to you about,” he told Red. “Everyone and everything seem to be more on edge lately than normally; is it because of the dry spell, or not-?”

Big Paul did not finish, as a breeze brought a wisp of a scent to him – bobcat! Big Paul had his own opinion of the wildcat – unlike red foxes, bobcats were quite capable of killing even adult sheep, (if they got lucky), and this particular bobcat, after Big Paul barred her path, went after him, and almost killed him, if the sheepdog hadn’t been able to break out of her grasp and bark a frantic alarm, bringing forth his master with the gun. The bobcat got away, regardless, and Big Paul was in no hurry to relive this experience, and so he immediately whirled around, ready to bark an alarm – but there was no sign of the bobcat.

A dry branch cracked under a heavy foot – this was no fox or even wolf, let alone a wildcat. Big Paul whirled back – Red was long gone, it looked like – and came face to face with a bear.

“Hello,” he said evenly, trying to keep his voice from shaking and himself from backing away. Big Paul succeeded at this, mostly.

“A dog,” the bear – a black bear rather than brown, but it did not matter here, not particularly – did not sound impressed, for his part. “A sheepdog. Step aside, dog, for I want to eat a sheep”. Even as he was speaking, the bear was standing upright, upon his hind legs, giving himself a further height advantage – one that was uncalled and unnecessary, in Big Paul’s opinion. 

Big Paul took a deep breath. “I cannot let you do this,” he began, when the bear grabbed him with the forepaws and lifted the sheepdog up to his own eye level. 

Looking into the bear’s eyes, all but glowing from insanity and hunger, Big Pau realized that this was it, the end of the line, he was going to be eaten alive in the line of duty, and the bear’s grasp of him over the ribs was so firm that Big Paul could not even bark a warning-

The bobcat came flying out of the night, a ghost of grey and reddish-brown colors. She dug all of her claws into the bear’s shoulder and bit down with all of her disproportionate might into the bear’s ear. 

The bear roared – and unlike the bobcat, he was overly loud… or maybe it was just Big Paul’s opinions, as the infuriated giant flung him away. Still, every cloud has a silver lining, theoretically, as the sheepdog’s master appeared on the scene and discharged his gun.

The bear dropped.

On all fours.

The gun in question was loaded with small shot, more suitable for smaller animals such as foxes and bobcats, (also the occasional hare, squirrel, and gamebird, but due to his loyalty, Big Paul ignored his master’s lapses), not so much for wolves or deer, and certainly not for bears. 

To make matters worse, the bear’s hide was covered in all sorts of things, from pine needles to pine tar, and so he felt the shot, but little more – and so he charged at Big Paul’s master.

It took every bit of the sheepdog’s strength and speed to slam into the bear, only for the better to slam him away with barely a recognition before biting into the master’s gun – hard. With a fading sight, Big Paul was barely able to register-

BAH

-the herd of sheep, led by the rams, slamming hard into the bear’s flank, knocking him over and trampling him.

“Say what?” was the last thing the sheepdog thought, before he fainted.

<i>Epilogue…</i>

It was night once more. Big Paul – bandaged over the ribs – was standing watch over the sheep once more. The sheep, the entire herd, were in their enclosure once more. Red the red fox was sniffing around the neighbourhood once more.

“What happened?” Big Paul asked the fox now that the bear seemed to be gone.

“After I helped the muzzles open the sheep gate, the sheep charged and trampled the bear, distracting him long enough for the rest of the humans to arrive and deal with him,” Red replied.

“The muzzles?” Big Paul blinked as he looked around – and sure enough, there was the bobcat, flanked by two or three younger and smaller versions of her. This was not the best situation Big Paul wanted to be in.

“Bah!” one of the younger rams bleated through the fence of their enclosure. The bobcats immediately whirled around and stared at him – and the ram promptly fled from the fence.

“Listen,” Big Paul sighed. “For better or worse, I owe you one, so here’s some advice – don’t.”

The bobcats immediately whirled back to him. Unlike the ram, the sheepdog did not back down. “Listen, me and my master, we aren’t alone right now, we got back-up because of the bear attack,” he pointed, with his muzzle, at the human dwelling – lights and human voices were coming through the window, and two younger and less experienced sheepdog were playing next to it. “You won’t be able to handle everyone, especially with a sheep-“

“The summer is a bad one, and a dry one. There’s almost nothing left to eat now,” the bobcat vocally responded to Big Paul for the first time since they learned of each other, and her voice was emotionless and dry. “We have to eat or we’ll starve.”

“It is out of my paws,” Big Paul said sadly, even as he sat down onto his haunches and howled. “Ahoy there, Big Dog in the Sky! Can you help them – can you help us out, please?”

The wind picked up. It blew through the skies, bringing storm clouds with it, and then they burst with rain. The rain washed away the dust and the dirt, invigorating the plants and the small animals – frogs and toads, newts and lizards, mice and voles. When it stopped, night flowers were opening, moths were flying around, and everything felt more invigorated and lovely already. 

“…I didn’t expect this to happen,” the sheepdog told his interlocutors, but they were already gone.

<i>End?</i>

Moon Knight, Suit - April 6

 Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, so let us talk about something else. The second episode of ‘Moon Knight’, maybe?

Unfortunately, not. See, the problem with ‘Moon Knight’ is that it is about as detached from MCU, as ‘Morbius’ is; only while ‘Morbius’ is a separate universe from MCU, ‘Moon Knight’ isn’t. Hence, the notable lack of anything MCU-related in the second episode by now is becoming kind of grating.

No, seriously, when you compare ‘Morbius’ to ‘Shang-Chi’, the lack of Marvel-related Easter eggs and co. is notable…which is expected, (see above), but in ‘Moon Knight’? You would think that we would have encountered at least one Iron Man (or some other Avengers’) graffiti by now as a minimum; but no – we have a seemingly ordinary world, inhabited by Steven, an ordinary man, who abruptly finds himself in extraordinary situation, complete with Egyptian gods. The gods themselves we have discussed in the series’ premiere, and so far, there is little development… but what! The dog-headed demons are not caught by video cameras and co. so poor Steven got fired!

…Well of course they are not seen by electronic equipment, (and maybe even by muggles, cough). If they were, the situation in ‘Moon Knight’ would be different, more derived, because not unlike ‘Morbius’, the plot in ‘Moon Knight’ is also quite basic so far: it is ‘The Bourne Identity’ meeting Rick Riordan’s ‘Kane Chronicles’, save that ‘The Kane Chronicles’ have treated the Egyptian gods more respectfully, professionally as well, but that isn’t the point.

The point is that Oscar Isaac seems to be doing Tom Hardy’s shtick in ‘Moon Knight’, and then there is also Khonshu doing his thing to try to cover this rip-off up. The movies in ‘Venom’ series have their problems, and we’ve talked about this, but they’re also quite successful, and I’m guessing that MCU decided to emulate them, as Steven/Marc summon their suit in a manner not unlike how Venom takes over Eddie in the films. I am guessing that Sony and Disney/MCU have worked out their professional differences for the latter to try this sort of thing. What is left?

…I got a chance to see ‘The Bad Guys’ in not quite legal manner cough. Now there is an interesting movie, actually, as beneath the colorful candy wrapper it sought to talk about such fundamental matters as good, evil, (ok, badness) and redemption. It is quite Biblical, and there is even a ‘Mr. Snake’ to further drive that adjective home, since you cannot go badder than a snake, which stood in for ‘The Great Adversary’ in the original Book. Yet even he – the Snake character is male in the film – becomes a ‘good guy’ by the film’s finale. Hurray, but the movie’s message is marred by several issues.

Firstly, the child-friendly wrapper gets quite heavy at time from time, so the underlying message gets quite lost. And second, while venturing bravely to talk about such monotheistic issues in an increasingly polytheistic West, the movie may not have been brave enough; ‘Mr. Snake’ might be biblical, but Mr. Wolf and The Crimson Paw, (a fox), are more of fairy tale/folklore elements, and fairly baseline too. A wolf and a fox, really?! Moreover, a red fox at that – they could have used an Arctic fox or a grey fox instead; they could have used a porcupine or a coyote; but no – a fox for a wolf.

In reality, wolves ignore foxes normally, which is good, because otherwise? The former can easily overpower and eat the latter, but that is real life, where politicians – no offence, Ms. Foxington – are not necessarily ‘good guys’, eh? But real life has little connection to children films, so let’s just accept ‘The Bad Guys’ as a good film – and the ‘Moon Knight’ as a struggling MCU TV show – and move on.

This is it for now; see you all soon!

Quarantine entry #57 - May 17

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. Sometimes it isn’t so bad, as yesterday we went on a nature trail, and-?

And nothing, and everything, and all things in between. The nature trail, (actually, plural, as there were three of them, of which we completed one, and half-completed another), isn’t that different from the park back home… the park has just a paved path and as such, it is easier to get through.

…But what about the authenticity! – one can just hear the cry. True, but what authenticity? The nature trail may look real – as in wet, swampy, hard to get through, (especially for younger children), but it is largely safe, (provided that parents are there to prevent the children from getting too far into the water, period).

To elaborate: the wildlife there is safe – there are songbirds, (a cage bald eagle, raised in captivity, or two), chipmunks, (also squirrels, probably), waterfowl, (at this time of the year it were ducks), frogs, and snakes – as in garter and water snakes, naturally. The trail itself was peppered with children-friendly log piles, teepees, what else have you, so that the children wouldn’t get bored – and I doubt that there were any poisonous plants either, because children tend to put everything into their mouths, so poisonous plants are a no-no, parent supervision or not. What else?

Enter honeybees. I do not know if the Asian giant hornets were involved – we are on East coast right now, and so far, the giant hornets were found only on West coast instead – but the local honeybees were swarming, or doing something similar: a swarm of theirs was buzzing and flying around a hollow in a conifer tree.

…Honeybees, in particular North American honeybees, are not as aggressive as the Asian giant hornets, let alone the Africanized ‘killer’ bees, but when they are riled up, they can be quite aggressive on their own, especially when children are involved – hence I reckon that they won’t be around that nature trail for too long… or they will be, as the buildings were closed, and the staff appeared to be gone, period. The nature trails remain currently unsupervised, which raises, (for me), a question – how long until life finds a way and the nature trails will need to be reset? I have no idea… and this brings me back to our own park. It’s actually more dangerous than this nature trail complex, because aside from waterfowl, songbirds, squirrels and rabbits, our park also has hawks, (ok, they will never attack humans, unless the latter are bothering their nests, which is unlikely, given a number of factors), red foxes, (which can attack people, if provoked, cornered, or sick), and coyotes, (same as red foxes, but as larger animals that are more dangerous to humans, proportionally). Is it bad? Yes, but this is how nature is – it is not always safe for humans, period. What next?

Today I actually wanted to talk about pandas instead. There are two species of them – the giant panda, which is a ‘true’ bear, just the most ancient one of the modern species, and the red panda, which is a bear cousin, but has its’ own family. It is the size of a small racoon or a large marten, but just as the giant panda, it feeds on bamboo, and has false thumbs on its’ forepaws to better grip and handle the bamboo.

Pandas are not the only mammals that have false thumbs – so have the ‘true’ moles, for example, only their false thumbs have evolved to make their forepaws better digging shovels instead.

…The latest edition of Luke Hunter’s guide to the ‘true’ carnivorous mammals of the world that I had access to claimed that there are two species of the red panda rather than one, but most other sources id them as subspecies instead. There are also two subspecies of the giant panda, (aka the panda bear) – the well-known black-and-white one, and the more obscure cinnamon-brown-and-white one, which is found only in China. Isn’t real life surprising? In addition, sometimes, it does not even suck!..

…Well, this is it for now, I think. See you all soon!

Quarantine entry #45 - May 5

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and the self-quarantine and what else have you have only made it worse. Earlier today, I have come across a children’s book – ‘The Bear that Wouldn’t Share’ or something along those lines – and it rather set me off. Start rant.

What the book is about? A bear made some cupcakes; a bunch of other forest animals, including an owl and a red fox, ask him if they have any, and the bear refuses. By the standards of the children’s books, ‘Bear-Share’ made a point of pointing out that the other animals usually do not come over to the Bear’s – they are not really his friends, they just want his cupcakes. The bear refuses and goes to sleep. He wakes up, the cupcakes are gone, and no one has supposedly seen one, cough. And then he finds his son, the Baby Bear, eating one of them – apparently, the latter found them and promptly shared them with his friends, cough, because he’s a special snowflake (or whatever the lingo is) and doesn’t need dad’s permission or info, and his mom, the Mrs. Bear or whoever, isn’t around at all, (the original Bear might be divorced, widowed, whatever – how woke!). The original Bear sees this, is overcome by emotion, and asks for a piece of his final cupcake, and BB says – ‘Okay’, ‘Yes’, or something else along those lines. End recap. Pause.

Now, the thing is that sharing is good – when it is done with your friends, when it is done with those, who are in need, and so on, (just look at the COVID-19 world around us, cough). In this particular story, though, the lines are more blurry – the Bear does not appear to be truly friendly with the owl, the fox, and the rest, and as such, while sharing would be polite and kind, it was still his call. The Baby Bear took the initiative out of his paws without permission and behind his back, something that many parents would take offense about still.

…The main flaw, however, is the story’s script – if in the first half it overshares, explaining that the owl, the fox and co. aren’t really the Bear’s friends at all, then the second half undershares – i.e., the Bear sees his son, the last cupcake, and immediately understands that sharing is better than not-sharing, (all concepts of private property aside), the end. Maybe not the worst message, but the depiction of it? Sucks.

…And where’s the Mrs. Bear, anyhow? Up north with her new husband, Polar? …Yes, I understand that the ‘Bear-Share’ is a children’s book, a very young children’s book, but still, the way the story is written? Could have been better, even for the children. Anything else? (End rant).

Well, before I came across the ‘Bear-Share’ book, I wanted to talk to you about foxes – see, while the red fox and the Arctic fox are the best know, there are other vulpine species as well… pause.

Foxes of the genus Vulpes are the best-known foxes of all, they contain such ‘heavy-hitters’ as the aforementioned red and Arctic foxes, as well as the fennec and the corsac foxes, for example. Some scientists claim that they are the ‘true’ foxes out of them all, but we will not get into this issue here. Who is next?

…On the other end of the scale there the Ethiopian wolf, jackal, or fox, a wild dog much more closely related to the domestic dog and the grey wolf than to the ‘true’ foxes. Indeed, most people call it the Ethiopian wolf or jackal rather than a fox, because foxes and ‘true’ wild dogs, (aka the genus Canis), are quite different in several things, including size and behavior: even the smaller ‘true’ canids, such as the coyote and the jackals of the Old World, are notably bigger than the biggest fox – the red fox. Next?

…’True’ canids usually hunt in packs or small family units, while foxes are loners. The American foxes of the Urocyon genus, (i.e. the grey fox and its’ cousins), can even climb trees and subsist on plant matter for food, showing that they are really basal carnivores – the more derived carnivorans usually cannot eat plants… The grey fox is the biggest member of this genus, but it defers and backs down from the red fox, even though the two animals are roughly the same size and shape… Where were we?

Aside from the bat-eared fox of southern Africa, (monotypic genus Otocyon), which is an insect-hunting specialist in its own right, (not unlike the fennec of the ‘true’ foxes, but quite bigger in size that the fennec is), the rest of ‘foxes’ belong to various South American genera, which come in all shapes and sizes, though the most famous South American canids, the maned wolf and the bush dogs, aren’t called ‘foxes’ at all. (Mind you, the maned wolf is no ‘true’ wolf either, but still). They are called either ‘dogs’ or ‘foxes’, but they belong to their own genera and aren’t all that closely related to the ‘true’ dogs or foxes discussed above. Scientific classification can certainly make strange things!

…Well, this is it for now. See you all soon!

Quarantine entry #18 - April 8

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks, and so, to distract myself, I went back to DW, to its’ final season for a change. This time, I re-watched the ‘Teddy Roosevelt vs Lawrence of Arabia’ episode, and again, I was hit as to how unbalanced the entire DW became by S3.

As I said before, since S2 onwards, DW became either prejudiced or partisan in favor of the U.S., but in S2, the show did downplay this fact. In S3, it did not... and it was bad at it. In the U.S. vs. North Korea episode, the U.S. team won by half a percent. Half a percent! This sort of fudging could have satisfied neither the U.S. partisans nor the fair play team. However, in ‘Teddy Roosevelt vs. Lawrence of Arabia’ the fudging was different, as I have written before.

To recap: in the first round, the U.S. team won fairly: the British’ Vickers machine gun jammed where the U.S. Gatling gun did not. That is fair. Third round – the British Jambiya got the edge of the U.S. Bowie. Fair again. Second round – the U.S. Krag tied with the British Lee-Enfield. This is where things got murky, because the DW team justified in using the Krag over anything else by mentioning the U.S. Cuban adventure – aka an attempt by the U.S. to capture Cuba. It failed, among other things, by the Krag’s flaws, so using the Krag on the DW was the sticky point.

The most disappointing thing for me, however, was this episode’s staged fight – Roosevelt’s tactics in taking down Lawrence were very much the same as Washington’s taking down Napoleon in the S3 premiere episode. This is not too surprising – apparently, for its’ S3, DW wanted to show the American supremacy over the British and the French – but rather disappointing. In the first two seasons DW was really good, for all of its’ flaws; in S3 – not so much. Maybe that is one of the reasons as to why it went down, aka got cancelled. I still enjoyed observing the WWI tactics displayed in this episode, though. Anything else?

Yes, in fact: today I want to return to my original fiction, so here is a short drabble of a story, to give you something different:

A fox was hunting during winter - for hares, mice, rabbits, etc. Once upon a time, it came across a hare, and promptly began to chase the latter. The hare fled past a stump without paying attention... and a really big great horned owl was sitting there. It saw the hare and took off, slamming the mammal into the snow, pinning it down. Only... this was not the Mesozoic, The age of reptiles and birds, for the fox, which had generated its’ own burst of speed, had half-leapt and half-slammed into the owl, knocking it off the hare.

A great horned owl is just as formidable as its’ relatives, the eagle and the snowy owl are, but the red fox got a really good grip this time...

When the noise ended, the hare looked out of its’ snowy pit and the first thing it saw was the red fox, busy plucking and eating the big bird. It shot the hare a look over a bloody muzzle, and the hare fled, leaving the fox in the field by itself with the prize. It may be the Cainozoic now, aka the age of mammals, but the mammals were not quite equal to each other either.

End

…Did you like it? Comments and criticisms are welcome! But for now this it, see you all soon instead!