Today I went for my second walk in three days in Richmond Park. It's a beautiful place, one of the few areas of London that feels like it just might not be London after all. It's the biggest park in the city, and it's about 3 minutes drive from my flat!
Anyway, my current favourite thing about it is the number of animals you get to see. Squirrels, pshaw - had enough of them in my garden when I was growing up. Skylarks - not bad, but they're just birds. Not quite just birds are the ring-necked parakeets you occasionally see fluttering from tree to tree.
But the best thing, apart from the bunny wabbits (aaaw! Ickle bunny wabbits!), are the deer! In a country with bugger all interesting flora and fauna, to be able to walk within 15 feet of a herd of red and fallow deer is quite amazing. Although at this time of year it's not quite that simple. All over the park are signs which say (paraphrasing slightly) "Don't fuck with the deer, they've got babbies, really, we mean it". And there have been a couple of (what I felt were) dodgy moments when pretty bloomin' massive red deer stags were giving me seriously evil looks... Fortunately, I strode heroically on, and was thus able to deliver this missive from deepest Roehampton, etc. etc.
Still haven't seen any snakes, though. Next time...
Posted by biondino at June 16, 2002 08:45 PMI was on the train from Glasgow to Edinburgh a few months ago and, as we were zooming through the Glasgow suburbs, I saw a family of deer stood at the edge of the railway line.
It was a bit surprising. I mean, you might expect to see deer roaming across the highlands, but you don't expect to see them standing around Bishopbriggs as if they're waiting for a train.
out here in the blossoming midwest, we have deer aplenty. one of my biggest fears is that, whilst driving to or from lincoln, i'll have the music turned up much too loudly and won't see a family of deer out for their sunday outing across the highway.
once, because i'm weird and freaky, my friend amanda and i drove past the house of the first boy i ever loved. it was late, and he lived on the outskirts of town. driving down the gravel road, amanda suddenly stopped, and in the glow of the streetlights out there, three deer leaped across the road. it was quite surreal, and oddly beautiful. we wondered whether or not that should have been a sign of something, and then drove on.
it must have been a bad sign, i think, in retrosopect. like bad things come in threes.
because when i told the boy i loved him, driving on that same road in another car, he told me i was a joke.
Posted by: lindsey on June 17, 2002 06:08 AM