Yes, he lives the life of a madman!

The featured performer in yesterday's odd shots was, of course, my beloved pet box turtle, Wyley (who is in need of a bath and a shell-polish -- but give him a break, he's old). He loves having room to roam in the new apartment, and he is keeping busy exploring every nook and cranny. At this moment I can hear him scratching at the base of a floor lamp he wants to climb. In all his many years, Wyley never met an obstacle he didn't want to climb. Even when it's something he could easily just walk around -- like a sneaker, for example -- he will still try to go over it whenever possible. (And after all, I guess that's the point of his walks -- it's not like he has anyplace to be.) You wouldn't think to look at him that he'd be much of an athlete, but let that be a lesson to you: never underestimate the power of a determined turtle. In fact, I think there's a fable to that effect...

On that particular afternoon, the husband was turtle-sitting, and he pulled out the camera when he noticed Wyley trying to scale the mountain of stuff near his (my husband's) desk. (Wyley doesn't have a desk of his own.) The wicker basket was particularly inviting: by hooking his long (probably too-long) claws into the loops, he could actually get off the ground and squeeze himself into the space between the basket and a nearby bag, like so:

The pictures I posted yesterday are just close-ups of that position. Anyway, after photographing that, the husband tried to deter Wyley by moving some of his stuff around, which is how the bag pictured above ended up next to a cardboard box. And Wyley turned his attention to scaling that...

I wish I could have been around to see how he managed this.

And that's our show-and-tell for today!