Visions of Mounted Squirrel Heads...

You'll be happy to know I won't be blogging about pig heads today. Honestly, there are some blogs that I really can't explain. It's just what comes out when I type. I'm sure if I had a professional analyse my thoughts, I'd either be thrown in the loony bin or be determined criminally insane. Really, though, I'd like to think everyone has a peculiar way of thinking; I just happen to have a blog.

While I might not blog about pigs heads, I wouldn't mind blogging about squirrel heads. You see, I'm declaring war on Nutley v. 2.0. While I wasn't happy about him eating my tomatoes, I'd resolved myself to the fact that there wasn't much I could do about it in the immediate future except shoo him away if I saw him.

Last night, however, I went out to water my plants. I had recently planted a very small but cute rose in my garden that has been doing well. It has one tiny rose blooming on it and the second, and only other bud, was just opening.

Well, that is to say it was opening. Last night, I discovered that Nutley 2.0 had not only picked my rose but he'd strewn the petals over my garden. I can only blame him as I saw him boldly and brassily sitting in the exactly spot where I found the evidence just the night before as day became twilight and Nutley loomed large in the shadows of the setting sun. I'd like to think there was some more serene and pretty purpose in his scattering of rose petals but since they were chewed and regurgitated alongside the dregs of the rosebud, I don't think it's likely he was the groom in a squirrel wedding or anything like that.

I liked that rose. I was pleased because I'd rescued it from my mother's yard where it hadn't taken too well to the shade and soil where we'd originally planted it. Since I replanted it, it thrived.

I'm hoping it continues to thrive but short of a BB gun, I'm not sure how to solve the squirrel problem. A BB Gun would help and, I confess, I'm tempted. Perhaps a BB could even go astray as the neighbours' yappy dog came to torment me.

No, I'm not that mean. Besides, my mother was almost shot with a 'stray' 'BB' gun last year while she was minding her own business and weeding her garden. She was kneeling down and felt something zip by her ear. It hit the barn behind her. It scared her rather badly, as you can imagine. Shaken and scared, she told my dad who wisely called the police because it seemed that the neighbours were shooting in their yard across the street and a bullet had managed to find it's way across the road. Considering there's a good distance between my parents' house and the neighbours, it seemed a little unlikely that a little BB would have such a trajectory. The sherriff's department came and questioned the neighbours who said they had accidentally been shooting at squirrels and misfired. I don't buy that for a second, especially considering they're not the friendliest of people. The woman who lives there proceeds to wake me up whenever I'm staying overnight by screaming like a banshee at her dog or kid; I can't quite tell which one- the screaming generally sounds the same whether she's telling the dog to shut up or the kid to stop acting like a brat.

Still, whether it was a BB or a stronger bullet, I think my mother is a little more cautious. She didn't take my suggestion to wear a bulletproof vest and helmet seriously. However, I told her to stay low if she hears gunshots from across the way. I can just see her snaking on the ground, army style, to get from her flower garden to the house. Given that her miniature Yorkie is usually with her in the garden, he'd probably hamper her progress in staying low by licking her face and stifling her. So, all in all, it wouldn't be very successful or subtle. It might prevent her from getting shot by stray pellets, however.

Anyway, because of this, I'd feel bad for getting a BB gun and aiming at the squirrel. I have a lot of neighbours around. I might accidentally shoot one. Given my recent DMV Issues, I really don't need a assault with a non-deadly weapon on my record. Though, I'm happy to report, as of this morning, I'm legal to drive in the state of Indiana. Now, given that I live in Ohio, I better get things cleared up there. I see a trip to the portal to Hell in my near future. Is it bad that I'm actually happy about this?

Back to Nutley 2.0. I'm not sure what to do to him. He was shouting at me last night as I watered my yard. If you've never heard a squirrel shouting, it's a stream of hissing chattering. I recognize the sound because Nutley at USC used to talk to me sometimes. It sounds angry. I think he was annoyed that I was watering his buffet. Personally, I'd like to take Mr. Nutley 2.0 and show him who's boss but since I can neither scamper up a tree at the speed of light nor get low enough to the ground to nibble at a tomato from below, I think he has the edge. Also, he's quite big for a squirrel and can jump on me from above. Yes, I'm being held at bay by a 10 inch tall rodent. He's big for his size though. Really!

I'll have to find a way to repel him next year; I'm sure I can find solutions but given that fall is coming and Nutley 2.0 will go into hibernation, I can deal with him for now. Though I do wish he'd stop hiding his nuts under my newly transplanted plants.

And yes, I'm aware, that could be a euphemism. It is, however, meant to be read literally. I'm talking about hickory nuts and acorns. Get your mind out of the gutter.

If anyone has a squirrel deterrent, I'd gladly hear about it. I wish to defeat Nutley 2.0. I just don't know how. I will not concede defeat, however. I WILL NOT! Nutley 2.0 WILL be conquered, oh yes, he will.

On a far more serious note, I would be amiss if I didn't mention the death of Patrick Swayze. Being the daughter of a man who thinks Dirty Dancing is the best move ever and also adores Black Dog and Roadhouse, it doesn't seem right to not admit that it's a sad day. As a teen, there were many late night sleepovers with friends in which we'd stay up watching swaying to Dirty Dancing's, "I've had the Time of my Life," and miming along to the Mickey and Sylvia song. Yet when I think of "No one puts baby in the corner!" it's my dad that comes to mind. The amount of times he's sat there, remote poised, rewinding to that final dance number, a happy smile on his face, is ridiculous. He's a strange man, my father. But he does love his Dirty Dancing. Rest in peace, Mr. Swayze.

Who's going to rescue Baby from the corner now? :(

Happy Tuesday.

Hickory Nut Mystery...Solved!

Well, I think I finally solved the Mystery of the Hickory Nut.

As I suspected, I believe it is a very large grey squirrel.

The reason I suspect the squirrel is that for the last week, I have been finding half-eaten tomatoes scattered across my lawn. I am not happy about this; my tomatoes have taken forever to ripen this year anyway so over the past two weeks, I've slowly been plucking ripe tomatoes off the plant. Thus, when I find half-chewed tomato remnants taunting me on my lawn, I find it slightly irritating.

I also have a larger tomato plant that the nice old lady who lived in my house left me. It has nice, big, green tomatoes on it. Every time I go outside to check to see how they're doing, whether they're ripening, I find a new one with bite marks on it. Thus, I have to throw it away.

I used to like squirrels. When I worked at USC, I had a pet squirrel named Nutley. He would come and eat lunch with me. Actually, he would stalk me as I ate and then, finally, launch himself so that he actually landed on my backpack in which my lunch was stored. The first couple of times, it sort of...um....scared the crap out of me. I finally accepted it; Nutley would seem to wait for me. I finally learned that the only way to stop him actually trying to crawl in my backpack was to appease him with food. He rather enjoyed grapes and cheese puffs best but he didn't say no to cherries either. He just didn't like carrots which was too bad as I always had carrots.

I know; I was really just encouraging him by feeding him but there were a couple of days when he'd be on the ledge behind my head and he attempted to reach over my shoulder to eat my food. Though I appreciated his courage and gutsiness, I also didn't want the fuzzy rodent to actually get that close to me. I may have thought he was cute but I also know that squirrels are a little...uh...germy. So if it meant sacrificing a couple of grapes or cheese puffs in order to stop him divebombing my head, then I could live with that.

Of course, I don't actually know if it was the same Nutley every day. There were a lot of over-tamed squirrels on campus and they all had the same cockiness to them. I just took to calling every squirrel Nutley. It was easier.

To be honest, I'm not sure if I really liked Nutley or I just was afraid of his tendency to lurch at my sandwich. I think I mostly just tolerated him. I wouldn't, say, want to take him home as a pet or anything.

Of course, now I have my own pet squirrel. I caught him in the act on Monday. I looked out my bedroom window and I see something by my tomato plant. There, in broad daylight, was the thieving, chewing squirrel who doesn't even have the courtesy to eat the entire tomato but, instead, leaves partially eaten, fully ripe ones that would have been nice in a salad.

He was bigger than Nutley. I now think him fully capable of carrying a hickory nut. I'm planning on watching him. I've seen him before but it was always in my neighbour's yard, boldly running around the yard even though at any moment, those yappy dogs could come bounding out and chasing him.

Speaking of those yappy dogs, I was outside grilling last night. I'd like to acknowledge that it was the first time I'd ever grilled on my own grill at that house. Sure enough, a few moments after I had gone out to lay my food on the grill, out come the neighbour's dogs followed by by neighbour. He actually said, "You shouldn't be out here!"

I think he said that because it was raining. It had only started to rain after I'd planned to grill and had turned it on. I wasn't about to change my plans. Also, I love rain and see no problem in grilling in the rain.

However, the way it came out was as though I wasn't supposed to be in my own yard because it meant he had to control his dogs. It's getting to the point where I'm starting to be a little rude and I completely ignore him if I'm trying to do stuff outside. Yes, I appreciate his Dog Whisperer attempts to get his rat terrier to stop barking but it is my house, my yard and I go out there to relax. I do not want to have to make awkward conversation every time I go out there. Rant over. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest.

I digress. Back to the squirrel. I don't quite know how to save my few remaining tomatoes from the jaws of The Squirrel. I'm wondering if the hickory nuts are, perhaps, a barter. Maybe he thinks if he gives me hickory nuts, it's ok for him to snack on my tomatoes. Of course, he does take them back the next day so maybe it's just a loan.

Nevertheless, I am rather relieved that it's just an ornery squirrel and not some crazed lumberjack whose leaving me the hickory nuts as a sign that I'm next on his list to be axed. Of course, maybe a crazed lumberjack wouldn't eat my tomatoes. Maybe he could also take care of those yappy dogs.

I think I'll stick with the squirrel.

Happy Wednesday.

Suburban Life...

It feels like a Thursday today; it's a taunting day that lets you know that it's almost the weekend but it isn't here yet. We still have another day to go, another day before we can forgot the responsibility of work and spend three days in peaceful laziness.

I still haven't solved the mystery of the hickory nuts. When I got home from work last night, the nut was gone. I noticed that my grill cover has little tiny cuts in it. I'm choosing, for now, to believe these are almost like the marks of grapple hooks, that they belong to the paws of a squirrel.

I've been assured, you see, by several folks that a squirrel is strong enough to carry a hickory nut onto my grill as well as balance on the little ledge.

I hope this is the case because otherwise whoever left me the hickory nut rudely took it away again. That's not very nice.

I didn't see any more nuts last night. I'm bound and determined to keep my eyes peeled for more.

I did, however, see my neighbour's dogs last night. I'm getting to the point where I dislike those dogs a lot. I cannot go into my yard without them going ballistic and barking like crazy. My neighbour now awkwardly attempts to solve the problem by picking up the yappiest dog and holding it up for me to pet. While I salute his attempts to do something about the issue, this means I have to politely make conversation with him while petting the dog. He's not much of a conversationalist so...it's awkward.

Sometimes, I do not want to pet the dog. Sometimes, I want to just go into my yard, water my plants and ignore my neighbour. I know he's trying to solve the problem so I'm trying to do my part.

The problem is those dogs bark all the time and it doesn't seem to matter if I'm inside or out. If they hear my TV through my bedroom window which faces onto their house, they bark. If they see me in my family room moving around, they bark. If I step outside to take out the rubbish...they bark.

You get the idea. I was hoping that they'd get used to me over time. Instead, they only seem to be getting louder.

I suppose, in a way, if I am being stalked by a Crazed Lumberjack, it's probably good that those dogs are there. Maybe they'll scare him away. At the very least, maybe their barking will irritate him.

On the plus side, that bunny that seems to like eating my lawn has found a way to avoid the dogs. He aligns himself with my tool shed, which means the dogs can't see him. Then he lies down and just nibbles the grass. I'm quite fond of that bunny now. He does seem to be doing his part to keep the grass mowed for me. I appreciate that more than he knows.

It's interesting to watch my lawn. The growth rate has definitely slowed; this is a fact for which I am most appreciative. I still need to mow but not quite so frantically as before. I probably should mow before I take off for my parents for the weekend. Otherwise, it's likely I'll come back and have a mini grass-forest to take have to mow. I find it fascinating how much more my grass grows when I'm gone than when I'm living there.

I also think I might have a mole living in my garden. I keep finding holes in my lawn that look like burrow holes. Ever since The Wind in the Willows, I've wanted a mole. I find them quite adorable. Thus, so far, I don't mind having a mole. I've heard they're not good. They even have mole killer in Lowe's. I don't think I could kill a mole. It seems mean. I've already made him homeless. My grass clipping pile had burrow holes on either side and last weekend I cleared it away. I have a horrible feeling something was living there. Thankfully, I didn't come across it while I was scooping up the grass. I'm quite glad about that. I tend to be a squealer when something freaks me out and even if it was a little mole, I probably would have squealed. Then that would have made the dogs bark. Which means I'd have to go talk to my neighbour and pet the dog.

Living in suburbia is interesting.

Happy Wednesday.

The Mystery of the Hickory Nuts...

I have a mystery to solve.

It involves hickory nuts.

As you know, I recently bought my own house. I'm still getting used to being a homeowner but I'm slowly getting the hang of it...I think.

My yard was tree-less when I moved in. Last September, a couple of weeks before I moved, Ohio was hit with some massive wind-storms. There was a lot of damage to trees all over the part of the state in which I live. My current backyard did have two trees in it but they had to be chopped down because of the damage to them as did my neighbour's trees. Thus, my garden had absolutely no trees in it until Saturday on which day, I changed that by planting a little Japanese cherry tree.

I did have two trees on the strip of grass in front of my house. It's between the sidewalk pavement and the road and everyone in our neighbourhood is responsible for mowing this strip of grass. In my grass strip were two rather nice maple trees. They may not really be maple since I'm prone to only recognizing trees when they either have fruit on them or they still have the tag from the nursery where they were purchased on them. Yet, for the purpose of this blog, they're maple trees.

One day, a couple of weeks ago, I came home from work. I was talking to my mother on the phone and I looked out the front window. Something looked different. I slowly realized one of my trees was gone. It wasn't an old tree; it had only been planted a couple of weeks ago. Yet...there it was...gone...with only a stump remaining.

Naturally, I was baffled. I know that tree had been there when I'd left for work. Yet there were no traces of sawdust, no twigs, no fallen branches. It was just...gone.

I went to check out the stump. There were no clues.

I began to suspect that perhaps there was a Tree Serial Killer around, a crazed lumberjack who chopped down trees like a phantom so that all that remained was a stump.

I tested my theory on a coworker who has little time for my imagination. Thus, she suggested that I contact the City where I live and find out.

I decided that might not be a bad idea. So I emailed them, giving them my Crazed Lumberjack theory as a possible explanation. I got a polite reply that did not mention a lumberjack at all. Instead, the City Tree Person said that my tree had been damaged in the wind-storm last year and had been tagged for chopping for a while. Unfortunately, the nice lady who lived in my house before me forgot to mention that. Thus, while it may look like my tree was randomly taken, it was, in fact, scheduled to be removed.

While I was happy to find out the answer, I was a little sad that the mystery had such a simple solution.

However, I'm both pleased and a little scared to report I might have another mystery on my hands, as I mentioned in my blog opening: The Mystery of the Appearing Hickory Nuts.

For those non-nut-knowing folk, a hickory nut begins in this rather large green husk, the size of a tennis ball. When they're ripe, the husks split as the nuts fall from the tree, releasing the nuts. When they're unripe, they remain in their green tennis-ball-form, unable to be opened without force and great mess.

Last week, I was outside watering my plants when I noticed a hickory nut that was sitting in the very corner of my house on a little ledge that runs around the side of my house. It's only about two inches wide, large enough upon which to sit a hickory nut but not large enough that a squirrel could scurry around upon it. I knew that hickory nut hadn't been there before because I often go for a walk outside and look around that area to make sure there aren't any scary spiders. That night, there weren't any spiders...just a green-yellow unripe hickory nut.

Scenerios ran in my mind as to how that nut got there but I finally dismissed it, throwing the nut back into my weed patch and deciding not to worry about it unless another nut appeared.

This weekend, when I weeded, I found that nut in my geraniums and I tossed it towards the end of my yard. I tried to locate the hickory tree from which it must have fallen but I'm still not sure which tree that might be. See comment above regarding my recognition of trees.

I didn't give that hickory nut much thought again. I'd talked myself into thinking that perhaps that nut really had sat in the corner of my ledge the entire time I'd been living in my house and I hadn't noticed it.

Until last night.

I was in my kitchen, making tortilla soup and relaxing. I like making soup because it involves lots of chopping and I love to chop. I happen to glance out my window.

There, on the grill I had just moved to my deck, sat a green hickory nut.

Now, while I'd like to think there's a very muscular, very agile squirrel out there who can somehow climb onto the grill even though it's not anchored anywhere, I admit...I'm a little dubious about that theory.

My problem is that I watch too much television, too many movies and read too many books. My imagination has gone a little wild.

Firstly, I thought of some weird witchcraft. That's what I get for watching The Blair Witch Project fairly recently. In that movie, the Blair Witch Evil Thing leaves twigs outside the victim's tents. Then they die.

I'm hoping that hickory nut isn't like those twigs. That would be bad.

I looked up the meaning of a hickory nut. Apparently, it doesn't have much meaning. After much digging, I did discover that the Druids and wiccan folk believe that the hickory nut is linked to abundance, wholeness, power, presence, command, discipline, acquisition, giving of gifts, and the finding of direction.

Well, it'd be nice to find some direction, I admit. I'm just not sure how, exactly, a mystery hickory nut is going to help me find that.

Then again, it also represents a giving of gifts. Maybe someone is leaving me hickory nuts as a gift.

I even entertained the idea that the bunny that I see on my lawn every day is leaving the nuts. Naturally, the logical thought that bunnies can't climb followed shortly after. I did think for a brief moment how nice it would be if the bunny was really some prince or hero in disguise and the hickory nuts were a clue for how I could release him. That only lasted 30 seconds. I might have a vivid imagination but I'm also a realist. I'm not sure how heroic a prince might be after spending at least a couple of months hiding under my tool shed and enjoying a night snack on my lawn.

Still, despite all the ideas I came up with, I really don't have a good one for the hickory nuts that are appearing. As it got darker, I started to have a little less bravado and a little scarier thoughts. People are weird. The only way those nuts could really have got there was if a human put them there. What if that Crazed Lumberjack was not as fictional as I thought? What if someone was coming into my yard while I slept? This thought is particularly scary when you're lying in the dark, the house creaking a little because it's old with the windows open to let in the cool air. I have a one-level house. My bedroom window is right beside that grill where I found the second hickory nut.

Needless to say, I didn't sleep well. I had horrid dreams. I made sure my blinds were closed but I still felt paranoid, in case someone really was out there.

This morning, naturally, I feel a little silly for having such an overactive imagination. When I looked out of the window at the dark dawn outside, all I saw in the twilight was that bunny, having his breakfast by eating the grass at the base of my new tree. There was no lumberjack, no creature lurking in the shadows that I could see.

The hickory nut was still there.

That, at least, I hadn't imagined.

I'm sure there's a logical explanation for it. I just can't come up with one. I'll let you know if another one appears. Or if the Crazed Lumberjack shows up. Or it's a new Blair Witch. Or if the bunny turns out to be more than a bunny.

In the meantime, I think I should probably control my imagination a little better. It might make sleep easier.

But if you can come up with a theory for me on how these nuts are getting where they're getting, I'd appreciate it.

Happy Wednesday.