Like countless others, I was thankful to have a decent excuse not to make it to church this morning. It was the dreaded “spring ahead” time of year. So, after a leisurely start to the day, a good caffeine boost helped me convince myself that I oughtta get out and about. Since I am not a current exerciser, I took a snap shot to document my physical fitness level for comparison to my later progress. I quickly donned my tights, shorts, running shoes and a fleece to keep me comfortable on my recreational venture.
When I got down to Lake Zorinsky I saw signs warning me to keep out of the mud, ice and water that currently constitutes the puddled life blood of the once thriving urban ecosystem known to locals fondly as “Lake-Z” (or is it “Z-Lake”?) due to zebra mussel (Dreissena polymorpha) infestation. Well, that put a damper on my zest for adventure, since I had pictured myself out in the “mussel shoals” gathering the razor-sharp, dime-sized critters for my homemade table-top fountain, taking photos and otherwise indulging my curiosity.
I have often imagined people asking me, “How do you maintain your physique?” and my imagined response, “Well ,a healthy dose of monthly outdoor adventure trek/runs, bicycling and an interest in science.” So with this unwieldy mantra filling my head, I kept on my chosen, slightly revised path to excitement.
Once I emerged from the dense brambles, I quickly plucked the various stickers from my fleece and continued towards the west side of the Zebra mussel lake (known affectionately by locals, simply as “Z-Lake”). I noticed a police car and a pickup truck/trailer combo along the path on the west side of Z-Lake (known by Francophiles as zee lake). At first a assumed that a horseback rider had taken his trusty steed out for some lake bottom riding and had the animal unhappily mired in the sticky mud and fish guts of Z-Lake. But then I noticed a large squad of gawkers gathered at various vantage points across the lake. I eagerly strolled towards the crowd (an unexpected delight for me to encounter on a cool March afternoon such as this!). I took a snapshot with my trusty Nikon Coolpix of the otherworldly hovercraft which appeared to have gracefully glided across the muddy lake bottom, and was now crawling along the edge of a lake channel and sucking the zebra mussels from their recently captured-by-invasion home. I wasn’t really sure what they were doing out there, since my transition lenses become quite dark in cool weather and I had unfortunately neglected to bring my binoculars on my expedition. I didn’t let this uncertainty stop me from wildly conjecturing to a lady from the Ashland area (county 6 on the license plate) that they were out there sucking up the z-muss.
Well, I made it around the entire half of the non-cordoned off part of the lake and back to my comfortable home, only to find that I had apparently contracted a severe case of Z-musselitis. Slightly larger than dime-size, I will no doubt soon be taken into quarantine like the west-half of zee lake. I hope that this final, post-incarceration document will allow my whereabouts to be obtained with a minimal amount of investigation.
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