an important mystery has been solved!!!

over a month ago, i posted this tweet:

the foot in question greatly disturbed me, to an alarming degree; it created in me some nagging, paranoid fear of an expanding unknown natural world, a cruel, heartless world in which creepy-looking, unidentifiable feet are violently severed from their bodies and horrifically displayed in my work parking lot.

here is a crappy photo of a crappy cell phone photo of the aforementioned foot (i haven't figured out how to download photos off my cell yet, sorry). the poor quality of the photo greatly dilutes the creepiness of the foot; you cannot see, for instance, the bleached bone protruding from the scaly green flesh, the torn tendons, the little curvy nails, sharp and pointy at the ends of the toe pads. 

but, just as i'd forgotten about the foot, Ben and i went to Golden Gate Park and spent an afternoon hiking and walking around Stow Lake. there, by the water, to my great surprise, disgust and horror, i saw the feet again, this time walking towards me!

all around us, these strange birds i had never before seen. they were a weird cross between a chicken, a duck, and a lizard. they had small, fat black bodies, with weak-looking wings, white beaks, red eyes. and those feet! they looked like a strange chimera of chicken and an iguana. and they enjoyed coming close to us! we'd never seen birds like these before, and we were terrified.

well, tonight, i learned what they are! i found this book online, The Birds of Golden Gate Park, by Mailliard:

i had to look pretty hard, but finally, towards the end of the water fowl section, this description:

"Can be confused with no other Park bird"

"chicken-like"

"feet lobed, greenish"

yep, that's the bird! what we saw was a Coot, or mud-hen. also, that solves the mystery of the foot i saw in the parking lot of my work... but not how it got there. my guess, after watching the seagulls get hostile with the coots, is that maybe a seagull attacked one, ripped off its foot, and then carried the foot, in its beak, further inland, dropping it in the parking lot near my car. *shudders* nature can be strange.

further question: is this where the phrase "ya old coot!" comes from?

i mean, really, can anyone look at this and honestly tell me they are not creeped out!!?

aaaggggghhh the toes!