Sally Caterpillar is dead.

This upsets me far more than it probably should.

(See my post of 25 January, if you're wondering what the hell is going on.)

I pulled her dessicated husk from the fishbowl last night. It could’ve been the heat or the dry air that killed her—her little body was designed to overwinter in the cold of winter, remember—but more likely it was simple overstimulation. Last summer we attended a lecture and demo by an expert on bats, who stressed the importance of never disturbing a hibernating bat: the strain of simply ramping its metabolism back up to a functional level often proves fatal.

Just so with Sally. Yes, Claire handled her more than she should have during her first days here—but she was probably doomed from the moment she entered the house, hitchhiking on a piece of firewood, and was roused by the warmth of the living room.

The moral, as usual: Don’t fuck with Nature.