Wake and Waddle

Blog thoughts for this here Thursday in a Japan: Which by the way, happens to be one of two scheduled trash days for our neighborhood. That’s right, we, like all of our pint sized new friends, each Monday and Thursday take part in a ritual that I have coined “the wake and waddle.” For on these days, regardless of your waking hour, you can blearily head to the street and watch people carrying many grocery sacks (of the plastic variety) to the trash drop. Which, mind you, looks much more like an oversized raccoon trap than a refuse receptacle. Until this sighting we were simply just filling Glad bags and hoping that someone would impart their waste knowledge upon us prior to our guestroom becoming over run. I would have thought one of the divers might grunt the garbage instructions in passing. However, clarity clubbed me and my fleeting grumbles on this topic as soon as I entered their guestrooms. So I promptly filled them in on what I had just discovered.
Now knowing not only when we could dump our adult sized monster accumulation of a trash, but also where and how, Maggie and I rushed into action. With a glance and a grin we were in action, transferring all of the trash from big to small bags. One became many. Then out the door we went, waddling with the best of them down our narrow lane toward the capybara trap turned trash cage. Unfortunately, getting it open required both of our brains and a secret knock.




CAPYBARA

The word capybara means “rat as big as pig”

Origin: Central & South America
Height: Up to 2 feet tall
Length: Up to 4 1/2 feet
Weighting up to 145 lbs the capy eats only veggies and, if offered, has a weakness for melon.

Capybaras are quite swift on their feet and will also have no problem swimming if they happen to fall into your pool. To take that image a bit further, if once in your pool, the capybara needs to take a capynap, it is able. For they have the ability to sleep in the water by keeping their nose above the waterline. Thus answering the “do capybaras float” question. The capybara’s lifespan is about 10 years in the wild and, like me, if they are threatened they would much rather dive in the water and hide rather then scuffle. Unfortunately for them (not me) one of their many natural predators is the anaconda.

If you have always had the desire to buy your kids an illustrated book on capybaras please don’t fret. “Capyboppy” by Bill Peet just happened to be my favorite childhood book and can be purchased by clicking on the following link:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0613100263/sr=82/qid
=1140085456/ref=pd_bbs_2/103-0398662-3858240?%5Fencoding=UTF8