More Fun With Roadkill

We're on another quick jaunt in the lease car as Emergency Contact desperately needs to get the mileage up. Surely the need to hit a minimum on lease cars is driving global warming. It is just ridiculous how much we have to find excuses to drive it. I have mates who have lease cars and when they hear I'm going somewhere, they're clamouring to give me their keys. Quite the opposite to what we should be doing, really.

Anyway, it means we're out on the road again and, driving into the state of Victoria, I noticed a change going on with their warning signs. They've evolved to a more realistic representation of the things you can hit: the animals you know and love in black silhouette have been replaced by blobby shapes with comical detail and I can't really be sure about what I'm in danger of killing. The signs are probably more accurate, but they're not visual icons I instantly recognise.

Koalas have had the worst treatment. There are two signs for them and you can sometimes see them side by side in counterpoint argument for your attention. One has the koala in tree gripping pose... minus the tree. It's still in silhouette black and looks like an overweight deer wearing Mickey Mouse ears.

The other koala sign has the more standard shape, but has added facial details in white. They've given him eyebrows... and they are stupid. For the next eight kilometres you are in danger of running over Groucho Marx.

In addition to the signage, crows have provided roadside entertainment as well. I admire crows. I think they're kind of majestic and I've been told in many documentaries that they are ferociously smart. You most often see them out in pairs, which is kind of cute 'cause you get the sense of a husband and wife team out for a nice scavenge. But I saw a lone one yesterday, and no wonder. He was huge, hunch-shouldered and creepy. As we blew past at 110 my split-second reaction was that I'd caught Danny DeVito picking over roadkill. I've always had the feeling that you shouldn't be surprised if you did see Danny gumming through a carcass on the side of the road, he's always given me that impression, but it all happened so quickly that I almost wanted to turn around and go back to check and maybe get an autograph.