three crab monte

Whenever you hear the strains of "Hail to the Chief," you know the president of the United States is not far behind.

In Melaque, when the rains start, you can be just as certain the march of the land crabs will follow.  Or mollos as we call them in these parts.

By now, I would normally have posted something about crabs being everywhere.  In the house.  And at least two or three days where they cover the screen door.  A movie set just waiting for the Hitchcock touch.

But not this year.  There were plenty of small crabs inside.  Usually discovered under bare feet during nighttime toilet runs.

However, there were no cinematic horror scenes on the screen door like years past (things that go bump in the night).  Perhaps all of the painting activity sent them scurrying elsewhere.

What I have been discovering are some rather odd dining remnants in the garden.  I shared one in murder at the crab house.  That was just claws left behind.  Perhaps as some kind of warning to the other crabs.

As odd as that was, take a look at the photograph at the top of his post.  The shell has been licked clean.  And after the contents were consumed, it appears as if the body parts have been re-assembled in a self-conscious mimicry of life.  Like something out of Dan Brown -- but without the irritating prose.

Whoever did it, the word spread like wildfire.  This 30 foot line of land crab were high-tailing it in the opposite direction when I caught up with them.  Probably on their way to a screen door with no paint fumes.