You know that time of twilight when everything is just grey? It's not really dark, but there's not enough light to really see anything, and a flashlight doesn't really help. Yeah, that time of night.
I needed to turn the water off my garden tonight. So I slapped on the flip-flops and headed up the driveway. I came over the bridge before the garden, looked up, and saw a smallish brown animal that looked like a terrier of some sort standing in the puddle made by my sprinkler. You know, a large Toto. I slowed down, because I couldn't really see well and didn't want to run into a grumpy mama coyote or some such...and then it grew. It unfolded itself, stood up, and walked on two flippin legs!
Heart attack. Right there on the bridge. I backpeadaled so fast my flipflops came off. I do believe my heart quit for several seconds. If that weren't freaky enough, then I saw another one. Then half of that second one broke off and...took off ...flying?
I think the letdown after the fright is just as bad as the fright, because as soon as I realized there were 3 Owls playing in the mud puddle from my sprinkler, I nearly died again...from adrenaline letdown. The "morphing into a biped" thing was them raising up their wings and waddling to a better place in the sprinkler.
I'm allergic to wasps, so if I get stung, I have to give my self a shot of epinephrine (Sometime I'll blog about the difficulties of doing this when you have a full-blown needle phobia). Epinephrine is pure adrenaline. Honestly, the cure for anaphylaxis feels worse than the anaphylaxis itself. After I realized that I had owls frolicking in the birdbath that was my row of newly planted beans (I wondered why my seeds weren't coming up...) the shaking that ensued rivaled that of the post-anaphylaxis epinephrine high. Ick. It leaves you totally wrung-out.
I swear, I swear. I will stop reading vampire and werewolf stories.
I will stop reading vampire and werewolf stories.
I will stop reading vampire and werewolf stories.
I will stop reading vampire and werewolf stories.
I will stop reading vampire and werewolf stories.
Riiiight.
I did come back to my senses enough to run for my camera, but even on the "night shot" I couldn't get a good picture. My hands were shaking too bad, and everything came out as a grey blur. Rats. I think they may have been our Great Horned Owls, since they were quite large, but we also have "Barn Owls", so I can't say for sure.
At any rate, the "cool factor" of watching three owls play in the "birdbath" was so totally worth the fright of thinking Dracula's minions had come for me.
