Just today, the very day we posted this cartoon, I had to chase three good-sized bears away from a trash can we’d left out after a 4th of July cookout.  Irony?  Coincidence?  The law of attraction?  Or have we crossed over into ( do-do, do-do…) the Twi-Bear Zone?

Actually, in our area of Connecticut, bear sightings have become almost routine.  A week ago, I was running on a trail through the woods behind my house.  As I rounded a curve, I heard a startled GRRR!  Suddenly, a bear –probably one of the three trash burglars– dropped out of a tree just 30 feet ahead and raced away.  I imagine that he scrambled up a tree trunk when he sensed my presence but then bailed when I came up on him so fast.  To make sure I didn’t become a tantalizing moving object that the rest of his family might chase, I clapped my hands periodically for the next few hundred yards of my run.