Short Takes Short Takes (November 17, 2004)

Thanks, but no thanks

Lorraine Davis, a new Menlo Park resident, stopped by the Almanac last Friday to show us photos she had taken of the mob scene at the Redwood City courthouse after the guilty verdict was announced at the Scott Peterson trial. Ms. Davis is a former freelancer and photographer for the Eureka Times-Standard.

However, since her best photo was of a bystander holding the extra edition of the Redwood City Daily News, proclaiming "Guilty" in 4-inch-high letters, we respectfully declined.
Lions? They're grrrr-eat!

Once you've had a taste of life on the Midpeninsula, you just can't bear to live anywhere else, as appears to be the case with a mountain lion -- or lions -- that seems to be frequenting a west Atherton neighborhood.

One of the furry predators leapt a 6-foot fence and landed in the back yard of Woodside resident Gaye de Benedetti last week.

She said when she spotted the cat, who was making himself at home, she stamped her feet and yelled "Shoo!" -- causing the beast to make a swift exit from her yard.

She wasn't rattled by the encounter, and said she's not nervous about going outside. She called the Almanac because she suspects the lion may be the same one that was spotted a week or so earlier on her Fox Hollow block.

Leave it to a rugged Woodsider to make Athertonians look like a bunch of nervous Nellies.

At a recent community meeting, Atherton residents complained that public officials weren't doing enough to keep their yards free of mountain lions, and reacted with disbelief when a state Department of Fish and Game official told them that mountain lions are so reclusive they can be scared off with a loud noise.

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