Sunday, February 8, 2009

new 'unusuals' of south florida

so, loren and i discovered something on one of our family walks the other day.  all of the ducks in the ponds/lakes/canals in our neighborhood are fake!  yes, fake.  floating out in the middle of the water like real ducks.  trying to trick northern virginia fools like us.  we did feel really silly that we'd always thought there were ducks all over the place.  what is really driving us crazy, though, is the fact that we cannot figure out why they are there.  it's not just for decoration, because since we discovered the fake ducks, we've been looking for them, and they are on every bit of water in all the cities all over here (and there are bits of water everywhere here in south florida).  the only thing we've come up with is that they are alligator decoys.  i really should just ask somebody, but i feel sheepish.  any ideas?

on a different subject (one dealing with cars), loren and i saw two very unusual and somewhat worrisome things in the same intersection last night while we were out and about on a date.  the first was a normal car (white crown vic) that was placed/mounted/jacked up (i'm not sure of the correct vernacular here) on huge truck tires, so that the bottom of the car was actually higher than the top of our car.  we had never seen such a thing before--even in california where the changing of tires on cars for various purposes is quite common, we never saw something this unusual.  it would have been better if it had been painted with lightning stripes or something, because then it would have at least been admitting that it was out to draw our attention, but it just acted like a normal car on crazy high wheels.  
anyway, we pulled up next to this car at a stop light, and then we noticed that the pickup (legitimate) truck in front of us had real bullet holes in the back of it.  we started wondering what section of town we had wandered into, and were very glad that we were 30 minutes from home and not closer to it.  

always an adventure, it is, moving to new places!!!!!!!!!!!

6 comments:

Annette said...

I can't wait to hear the fake ducks' purpose! Maybe the real ones get eaten by the alligators?! That's too funny. I love learning the little quirks of new places.

Marian said...

that's too funny about the ducks. and the car with the huge tires. i wonder what he was thinking?

Joanne said...

You need to start taking your camera with you on your dates to take pictures of all the crazy things.

Have you guys seen any alligators yet? My kids are wondering about the chances of them seeing one in your neighborhood.

Ellie said...

Ok, here's my guess. I think ducks are territorial so if ducks are flying over and see other ducks in a body of water they won't land there. So they put fake ducks in all the water to keep the real ducks from landing there to protect them. I am totally making this up, but don't you think it sounds like a good theory? You'll have to let us know when you find out the real reason.

becca said...

Wow, you were on a date! Nice!

I have never heard of fake ducks. I was impressed by the fake owls here in CA, but I think that's to scare away rodents. Right? Maybe the ducks are target practice (for when the pick-up trucks aren't around).

Sounds like a great place!

Sunshine said...

the territorial duck theory is correct. They have fake ducks to keep away the real ones.
In Jersey people have fake geese in their yards to keep out the real ones.
As for the car thing. Welcome to the South. Just don't follow one home:)