I was waiting outside the vet's office when a pickup backed in adjacent to one of the entrances, about 20 yards from me. A husband and wife in their 40's got out despite it being a blustery day with snow and let down the gate. A door opened and 2 staff members emerged carrying a doggie casket. A big dog. The wife burst into tears and went back into the cab, on the phone to someone. The husband, clearly teary-eyed, helped secure the casket in the truck bed and made small talk with the pall bearers. They returned to their offices and the couple drove off.
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Millipedes thought they had it made: their bodies contain a chemical so foul that in time, no predator would bother them. Ahhh, they thought, we have it dicked! Until...Capuchin monkeys figured out that if they cracked open a millipede and rubbed this substance over their bodies, it would serve as a great insect repellent. "Damn smart Apes!" the Millipedes cried "they ruin everything."
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While surfing YouTube, I came across a vid featuring a lady from Bavaria who was explaining the various Pagan practices and beliefs during Jule in Eastern Europe, Germany and Scandinavia. One tradition was that folks would clear away snow in the fields or leave out hay for the horses ridden by Odin or St. Nicholas as well as goodies for the riders. It struck me that while our culture retains leaving cookies and milk (and sometimes a dram of some spirit) for good Ole Santa, we don't leave anything for the reindeer. I guess the tradition of leaving food for the critters was lost thanks to Clement Moore's 1823 poem A Visit From St. Nicholas which featured reindeer landing on rooftops. Hard to drag hay up there for sure.
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My maternal grandfather was from Croatia. One of the few tales about him passed down by my mother was that on Christmas Eve, after all had gone to bed, he would get up on the roof and make some tracks in the snow. In the morning, he would beckon his children outside and show them where the reindeer had landed on their roof.
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