Bro, don't forget that we're both "Recovering Catholics". There are definitely lingering effects. About twenty minutes before I read your post, Diane and I were discussing an article in the Free Press about the Detroit Catholic Archdiocese that was now "allowing" Catholics to skip mass to keep COVID free. That something to the effect of, I"f you're out eating at a restaurant or some other outing rather than being at mass, you should instead be at mass" The word "allow" got to me. I started to get cheesed about the temerity of the Catholic Church to feel in charge of people. Then I thought some more about it. Instead, what compels a person to consent to having a religious body tell them what they ought to be doing? Is it simpler that way? Less scary? I am not that person. My current understanding is that once we're gone, we're gone. In the meantime I can choose the values that guide my decisions. Mainly, honesty, thoughtfulness, kindness, responsibility, family and friends. I can do my best to leave the world a little better than when I entered it. That seems like enough of a challenge for anyone. This seems like the general idea of Hubski to me as well. What's up with the snake? I can't tell the exact scale of it from the picture. It doesn't appear to be a garter or copper belly. Maybe a brown snake? I checked Wikipedia's List of reptiles of Michigan, but I'm still not sure.
It’s a hognose. Oddly enough I was on a zoom call with ecib when I happened upon it. He googled it. It hissed pretty loud, and flattened out like a cobra. It was about 2 ft long. I remember seeing one with dad long ago when we were catching crayfish. They act menacing, but apparently aren’t. Dogmatic religions are definitely in the decline, but in the US, it feels like politics are filling the void. Conviction is high, preachers disseminate opinion, and no one changes their mind.
DARNIT! I didn't even think hognose cause I was hung up on the beach aspect and hognose snakes are awesome and they totally flatten out and such.
I guess we'll never know what effect we'll have after we're gone. I doubt that the person chiseling your new arrowhead thousands of years ago thought much about making your camping trip way cooler with his/her new tech toy. Ha! Maybe years from now, if, when the world melts down, someone will return from their Mars vacation sharing some sweet data they mined on the way, called Hubski, when the world was a much simpler time.
Possibly a common water snake. Only guessing, cause I'm not a herpetologist, and the only thing I'm really going with is that it looks like it's on the beach. That said, watersnakes tend to have more "rounded" heads and the one in mk's picture looks more angular, but that could be a trick of both the angle he's taking the photo from as well as the two dark patches behind where the ears would be if snakes have ears. SIDE COMMENT Wanna know the easiest way to figure out if you're looking at a snake or a legless lizard? Look for ears and eyelids. Legless lizards have both. Snakes have neither. Back to the snake quest I don't know if mk was in Mainland Michigan or the Upper Peninsula, and I hate it when people are all like "RANGE MAPS!" as the only reason for justifying an ID, but I think since Eastern Copperheads aren't commonly found that far north, odds are it's probably not that. It looks pretty big and stout, so I think that possibly rules out both The Eastern Garter Snake as well as anything in the Brownsnake family. Both sets of snakes are much smaller and slender. So . . . I don't know definitely what it is, but I can kinda guess about what it probably isn't. Snakes are hard for me to ID anyway, because there can be a ton of polymorphic variation in a single species, so where with birds you have a pretty good idea with color patterns, that's not a lot of help with snakes. I vote watersnake, of which I'm a huge fan of, because they're gorgeous and harmless and just all around wonderful little guys and galls who just want to exist and have you be okay with that.What's up with the snake? I can't tell the exact scale of it from the picture. It doesn't appear to be a garter or copper belly. Maybe a brown snake? I checked Wikipedia's List of reptiles of Michigan, but I'm still not sure.