Why Did the Turtle Cross the Road?

To torment me, of course. I was heading off to work the other day and had to swerve to avoid this fairly large turtle crossing the road, or should I say standing in the middle of the road, not really moving. Being the good samaritan that I am, I naturally stopped to help the thing along. This is not the first time this has happened, we've stopped to help turtles get out of dangers way in the past, except previously the turtles were small. This one was big, and for whatever reason was just standing there.

I went to pick the thing up and that only seemed to piss him off, because he started rearing his head and jerking his body, hissing all the time while clearly trying to bite me. Needless to say all my real-man training went out the window and I dropped the beast, though I'd only managed to lift him a couple of inches off the ground so his fall wasn't that bad. Gathering up my courage and wanting to help out, I tried again with the same result; the thing was vicious and clearly wanted to be left alone. I tried to encourage him along the road but seeing me as a threat he wasn't going anywhere, so I decided that the best action was no action and left him alone.

As I was driving off, however, I couldn't really bear the thought of a crushed turtle sitting on the road, so I went back for one last try and saw that he had disappeared. I was relieved on many levels, but mostly that he was (hopefully) out of harm's way. I was also relieved that I was out of harm's way and didn't have to deal with the thing.

Until the next time, thanks for reading, and thanks to Nancy Witthun for the pic.