When I got home from work tonight (e:terry) and (e:matthew) were outside looking at an owl outside the house in the tree. It was so tiny and fluffy and cute. I wanted to keep it as a pet. We couldn't take a photo with a flash because it would hurt its eyes, so here it is on the iphone. I think this is the first time I saw an owl in the city.

Wow, a year lster he is still behind the hsbc in no man's land.


This (e:paul,45553) is when the rabbit was at its most disgusting peak, in case you don't remember.

After getting back from a trip to morocco in 1996, I sent this letter to my parents. There was more to the letter but the star of the story was my expereince with these tortoises. I really love tortoises. I think I believed this story would end up in some animal rights zine. If only I had a blog back then. During the 90s, before the internet everything was in zines. Maybe some of you remember how crazy popular zines were. There were zines about everything and you would get them at local bookstores, at music shows, etc.

Here I am the year I wrote this. Before the happy trail turned into a happy rain forest.

Dear Parental Guidance and their youngest child, my biological brother,

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A TORTOISE LOVING VEGAN CRUSADER
On a 90 degree humid day in marakesh, morocco, I was pacing quickly though the market as to avoid the possible "sales confrontations" that African Markets are so famous for. I began to speed up when appoaching the leather district as it is so hard to explain dead cow in a foreign language. The glance given by the corner of my eye was caught by an odd instrument upon a store wall. It resembled a tortoise but had a leather wrapper stick attached to one end and some decorations. To my surpirse it was a highly decorated toirtse carcas. Outrageous as it may seem, western tourists pirahcse them under the pretense that it is a guitar.

I contrinued to walk along in disgust until I reached an apothecary, curious as I am a someday botanist, as to which plants were utlized as medication ,narcotics, aphrpdesiacs, etc. A hardly audible scratching noise was emminating frm a box inside the store. It reminded me of the obessessive scratching rituals my tortoises particpated in when they were restricted in territory during travel. I asked the store keeper what sort of animal he felt it was proper to keep in a small box with no air aholes. He said it was only a tortoise and they are made into some sort of aphrodesiac. I asked his price for all three. After an endles series of bargainings we decided on 350 girhma, This is approximately $35 US. He was nonetheless exceptionally surprised. The tortoises were a geochelone variety but without a texonomic guide thats as far as I could go.

I was given the tortoises in a plastic bag, similar in shape and function to a walmart bag. It was absolutely useless. Immediatly I took the tortoises out and carried them in my arms, They were three different sizes. One 7 inces, one 4 and one 3. The largest was a male, as he made certainly apparent, the other two were female I believe, having relatively small, wide tales and completely flat carpaces. Part of the bargain was that I would not tell the police where I got them if questioned. I swore on my word, with my fingers crosses of course. I brought them to a man I knew was going to the mountains on wednesday. He said he would take them, to their proper habitat and was so impressed with my convinctions that he invited me to dinner of couscous and tomato soup vegan of course.

For the two days unitl he left fo the mountains, I visited his home and brought the tortoises a bounty of food. They ate extremely well for the stress they put up with. When I left morocco I knew what I had acocomplished was only a fraction of what has to be done. In northern Africa, as well as other 3rd world reptile habitats, tortoises are currently being mutilated and gutted to make isignificant trinkets of death, such as guitars, jewlery, aphrodesiacs, etc - although international, as well as, regional law and their enfrocement have made a stance they are not enought, nor will they ever be, These tortoises are not dying because the natives subsist on "tortoise parts" and in actuality, the natives are not at fault in the issue. It is another case of eco-unfriendly tourism. The ones to blame here are the western and asian tourists who bring these horrrific souvenirs of tortured death home.

Just as in the issue of fur or the veal industry, the only way to stop the madness is to inform. So this month try and tell 10 people a week about theis issue Make it simple and to the point. Then mhave them all also promise to tell 10 people a week for only month. In no time millions of ppeopl will know and you have have made a difference.

WAIT DO NOT SEND THIS I HAVE TO CORRECT IT AND ADD MORE EMOTIONAL APPEAL!

Love,
Vegan

Butt they sell it at the venetian in Las Vegas. Small peices the size
of a golf ball cost more than $1,000 and the big ones are like $50,000
to $100,000 -so I guess they are real.

There were so many geese at the CFA yesterday.

::DOWNLOAD SOUND::

The started to get angry with me by the end

::Download Flash Video::

The squirrel never made it across West Ferry. Maybe the car was going to fast?

I was pretty moved by (e:byllic,5). I reminded of all the crazy animal cruelty kind of things I saw in my life. It seems that animal cruelty and railroad track's/urban rural strecthes go hand in hand. I remember seeing numerous dead and butchered animlals behind the grain mills on Military Rd near the end of Tremont Avenue in Kenmore.

Back then it was always blammed on the Satan worshippers. Does anyone else in Kenmore remeber the wave of "Satan worshippers" from the 80s. What was up with that? I wish I was old enought to know if they thought they were real or if it was the adults perspective n the goth kids. I remember my best Friend James' babysitter got murdered back there too.

Yet I remember spending lots of time there because it was a combination of remote from the eyes of our parents and dangerous. It also had the entrance to the sewers which which played by and inside of plenty. As far as I was concerned it was as close to being in Goonies as I was gonna get.

As an industrial wasteland, I am sure it killed many more people than the satan worshippers ever did (e:paul,397)

The most graphic memory I have was going fishing with my Dad at Buckhorn State Park. I actually spent a lot of time there because the metro bus would take us to grand island, or because we would walk over the nasty bridge from kenmore. It was pretty far. I think Grand Island was one of the only places I ever hitchhiked in Buffalo. I remember it seemed so rural to me as a kid.

Anyways, I kept seeing fur in the water floating down the river and eventually followed the floating chunks to their source. A black garbage bag full of a large chopped up dog. Who chops up a dog and sticks it in a garbage bag at a state park? That image haunted me for a long time.

(MAP TO: BUCKHORN)

As a kid, I too was repsonsibile for a bit of the cruelty. I distinctly remmebr dresing up like "indians" and making bows and arrows out of sapling branches and heavy duty rubber bands. Then me and my friends would shoot the freakin' squirrels. I remember hitting the first one and feeling like it was really wrong.

I think it was because back then all the adults I knew hated the squirrels and talked about shooting them. Eiother way it was wrong and I feel guilty now.