You Know You Live In South Dakota When ...

Your neighbor comes over to talk privately with the husband of the house to warn him that if we hear a gunshot sound it might be him shooting a mountain lion wandering between our houses!

So Dad and I have excitedly been on the lookout for a big cat since this afternoon. Dad thought he and Shreve heard one crunching in the snow behind our house when Shreve went out to potty tonight. I'm guessing it was a deer.

A couple years ago I got obsessed with the idea of a mountain lion hiding up in the trees around our house to the point that I did a fair amount of research and sniffing around for claw marks on all the trees. This was after our other neighbor told me that one night she was driving home and a mountain lion sauntered across the road right in front of her car, just a few houses down from us. She said he crouched down in that sort of pounce-mode stance, looked at her and then moved on.