Armadillo

This post is a bit off topic, but on Christmas Eve we spotted an armadillo. We were driving to a dinner when we saw something scrambling around on the road. At first I thought it was a rat, but as we got closer we saw it was a young armadillo. We pulled over and took some pictures. It was not too happy with us approaching and took off into the brush. It was surprizingly fast and able to jump. I heard that they can't bite, so I touched its back. It was as hard as the shell of my tortoise. The armadillo was quite small (the size of a large rat). Here are the pictures:

On the road


Leaving


Escaping into the brush

Manzi not liking James

Here is an email I got from James (by the way, it seems Manzi likes Aida like he liked me, and dislikes James as much as he disliked Cesar):

Manzi is alive

He has found a particular sound pitch that is quite painful to hear (for me, Aida says it doesn't hurt her ears), and he now delights in making it at frequent intervals.

Every morning he climbs on his bowl that he gets his fiesta in and throws a little tantrum asking for more (even if he hasn't finished what he was given the night before . . . so I am guessing that there is some particular seeds he likes better than others (the sunflowers are one I think)).

Whenever he is home with me and Aida is gone he gets a little crazy . . .

If it is just an hour or so he mainly just swears, and makes a lot of noise.

On the day before thanksgiving he went really nuts. Aida was gone the whole day. When I came home he was loud (as usual). And he was acting like he was upset at being left without human interaction for a day. I know that Aida lets him out of the cage so I thought that might be part of his agitation. I gave him a big helping of fiesta, and he was still acting a bit crazy. I opened his cage, and to my suprise he actually flew at my face squacking. His flight path was interupted, and after a very short recovery he did it again. After 5 times of this I had enough, and had to grab him with some gloves and put him back in the cage. He squacked for about 5 minutes straight, and then went on his top perch and was quiet. I covered him up for the night early. The next day I still gave him lots of fiesta and treats in his bowl (as it was thanksgiving after all).

Manzi getting comfy

My friend, Aida, who is taking care of Manzi gave me an update. She said that this past month Manzi has began imitating the phrases he hears the family use. He calls their son's name, "Gabriel" and also says the following: "Okay, lets go", "Manzi, no!"(in James' voice) and "one, one, one." Aida thinks the "one, one, one" is Manzi trying to count, but Manzi already knows how to count to three so I am not sure what it is.

Manzi will be with them for December and then my husband is returning and will take care of him until I get back in January. I am counting down the days.