Here at Rancho Roly Poly we are well into week one of basketball camp. The boy seems to like it, and today won an award for cooperation, which is always nice to hear. He also has a crush on one of the teenage coaches. Sort of a crush. A proprietary air when her name is mentioned. A six-year-old’s crush.
He could not believe it tonight when Frodo confronted the black riders at the Ford and drew his sword rather than ride away. "Why doesn’t he tell the horse to run?" Then the flash flood came and washed the riders away. Sort of like a Texas flash flood — totally unexpected.
Why Roly Poly? Our most significant, indigenous insect on the rancho, along with spiders, ants, walking sticks, tree roaches, yellowjackets, wasps and bees, is the humble crustacean. Although we tend to see more of them in the winter.
UPDATE Excellant, copyrighted rendering of the roly poly, with description. Then, the link died, and so I’m replacing it with this one, which has a good photo of the creature.
THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER 