Happy Birthday to. . .

. . . Larry and Mrs. Larry! (Okay, since we don't know exactly when they were born, it's really their "observed" birthday, sort of like Columbus Day and Presidents' Day.)

The tortoises are now two years old and they're as personable and alert and rambunctious as ever. You think I'm kidding, I know. Tortoises? Yep. Sure, they often sit around for hours, looking like little green rocks (okay, bigger green rocks now) but then there are the times when they do not stop moving. When they push and shove the other one out of the corner. (Never mind that there are three other corners to settle in.) When they climb all over their food dish, their water dish, each other. When they look you right in the eye as if they're listening...and then yawn in your face. (Apparently, they were listening after all.)

But how you can not just love them? Look at these wrinkly faces -

So, once again, happy birthday to the little hard-shelled muses, Larry and Mrs. Larry! They're a constant reminder to me that slow and steady is a perfectly acceptable way to get where I'm going. (But that yawning in someone's face is still rude, no matter how cute you are.)