Last week I posted about my encounter with a solitary dozing javelina that I happened to startle while on my weekly over-a-half-marathon run in the McDowell Mountain Ranch area a few miles north of my house here in Scottsdale.
Well, Big Ugly Piggy must really have been mad at me for interrupting his nap, because he went and rustled up his whole fan damily to invade the block I live on. And in the over 11 years I've lived here I had NEVER seen javelina on my street before.
I had just set off at 4:15 a.m. under a clear starry sky and was not two houses down from my own when I suddenly heard a rustle and then a virtual stampede as at least two or three javelina came out of the bushes and started running just ahead of me. Then as the rest continued to run, one turned sideways and stared back as if deliberately blocking my path and daring me to come any closer. So I stopped, suspecting there were cubs in the area. I was right. About three cubs emerged from the bushes and headed on up to join the pack. Reassured that the cubs were safe, Mama Piggy turned away finally they all ran to catch up with the rest of the herd. After giving them a bit more of a safe head start, I finally resumed my run, stomping my feet EXTRA HARD to make LOTS OF NOISE to ensure they all kept running away from me and finally across to the other side of our closest busy street. Finally I was able to rest assured they weren't really out to get me after all, and resumed my run.
I wish I could have taken a picture of that herd running across 94th street. I even considered trying with my iPhone, but knew it was too dark and the picture would never have come out. The best I could do for the benefit of you readers out there in Malaysia who other than for my post last week have probably never seen a javelina, let alone a javelina family, was to rustle up this picture from the Internet:
Watching them all run across the street reminded me of this road sign I spotted while on vacation a few years ago.
In any case, I certainly was on a higher level of vigilance throughout the rest of this morning's run. I even hallucinated a few times and saw "javelina" that turned out to just be rocks or desert vegetation when I got closer.
So I'm a bit peeved right now at these ugly piggies for somewhat diminishing the normal level of mental zone-out that I look forward to as a major benefit of my long-distance runs. I almost wish I weren't such a cardiovascular health nut. There's a great breakfast restaurant around here called Butterfields, and if I dared to, I'd head right over there right now and order up a great big slab of bacon out of pure spite. (And yes, animal purists, I know they're not technically part of the "pig" family, but I'm going to call them piggies anyway. They're WORSE than pigs).
Ahhhhh, the bacon fantasy continues as I slug down my heart-friendly spinach, oat bran, and orange juice blender smoothie.....no, make that pork sausage McMuffins...
