Animal farm

 

We have lived in four houses since we started this journey. Each of them has either abutted the Mata Atlantica rain forest or been square in the middle of it. The current place is square in the middle of in. Because we've lived in or near the forest, we've seen a fair number of animals in and around the house. It's super cute that the Brazilians refer to things like cockroaches, centipedes and bigass ants as animals. I think American's tend to use "animal" for furry things, like monkeys or donkeys or dogs. These animals around here, from the venomous snake in the garage to the seven thumb-size spiders hanging over our Christmas patio, are part of our life. We tell our people when they visit that it is a buggy place and we send them back on the plane with tubes of hydrocortisone cream. It is at the very least a buggy place. Our next house is going to be in the middle of a town and I expect we will have fewer animals. I know we will miss the forest terrible, it remains to be seen how much we miss the animals.