View From the Kitchen Window

It's actually kind of gray this morning. The thermometer tacked onto the window outside reads about 37 degrees Fahrenheit. A few snowflakes settle down quietly up here in Northern Vermont. We're only 6 miles from the Canadian border. A dead or nearly dead paper birch still stands about ten feet directly in front of the window. It has a green painted bird feeder tied to a branch about as high as I can reach to refill it with nuts and seeds each morning. Little chickadees and an occasional woodpecker or bluejay jump down from the branches and take a nut and fly away.

Depending on your mood, it's a very sad morning or a so-so morning or a beautiful exciting morning.

Here's a piece I did about five years ago. I thought it was cute. Let me know what you think.

                                          The  Vermont  Potamus

The Vermont Potamus (Mustela-Pinnepedia potamus) is the only known member of a family of land-transitioned, semi-aquatic marine mammals. A truly remarkable creature in adaptability and general behavior, he still survives around some lake regions in northern Vermont. The potamus is often mistaken as a small bear or large opossum, or sometimes as a wild turkey, moose or minivan. These misidentifications are probably more due to the innate ability of the potamus to assume the coloration and character of his surroundings rather than the unfamiliarity of the observer.  Displaying a truly remarkable facility for cryptic coloration, the potamus can disguise itself in a few moments to blend in completely with whatever background he might find himself. In this way, he avoids predators or anyone else whose company he might not prefer at the moment.

     It is not known exactly why or how the potamus transitioned from the lakes, where he apparently thrived for thousands of years, eating small fish and breeding along the shores, to his current habitat where he is normally found further inland, usually near fast-food restaurants. Scientists theorize that there might be a correlation between his drift inland toward settled communities and another uncanny ability demonstrated by the potamus; namely, mimicry.

     Possessing vocal chords, the potamus normally emits cries, barks and shrieks not totally unlike that of a seal. Together with this, the potamus can and does mimic sounds he hears. He can, and will mimic the human voice with remarkable fidelity. Perhaps he was first attracted to fast-food restaurants by discarded bits of food left by some patrons. However he arrived there, he has come to frequent these places, usually hiding in the bushes, disguised as a bush or paper bag or pigeon eating a french fry. It is very difficult to see through his cryptic coloration. . Only those familiar with the potamus notice a pair of large brown eyes, which, for some unknown reason, he simply doesn’t camouflage.

     The really intriguing part of his behavior indicates a high intelligence. Some have tagged his demonstrated intelligence as clever and some as wily, shrewd, or just someone to avoid. The potamus, having acquired a taste for fast-food products, perhaps through discards, watches motorists as they pull up to the drive-in order speaker, and he listens to what they say. Perhaps the person will say “cheeseburger, fries and a chocolate frosty”. The potamus will then wait till there are no people near the speaker, often at night, stand in front of it and mimic exactly what he heard. He has watched the customer get cheeseburgers from the window. He knows what he has to do and so he goes to the drive–in window and waits for the person to open it, usually with the bag of food nearby. He then reaches in and grabs it and runs.  Certainly, they have become a nuisance and, as you might expect, many of the chains have taken steps to prevent losing food this way. The upper management for a major chain, for example, had developed a coding system to screen against the potamus. They instructed their personnel to ask the question: “Are you a potamus?”, which they had to abandon after complaints from customers and revise to “Are you a human?” which has proven effective, if awkward, at times.