OK, I know this is a long post, but I promise it's worth every minute! And I really hope you will take the few minutes to read it! Lisa Marie has both blessed and cursed us with a plethora of animals.
I will start with my wonderful bird feeder!
I strategically put the bird feeder in plain sight so I could enjoy these wonderful creatures everyday!
A few important notes about these beauties: 1. they eat more than anything I've ever met. I went through a 50 pound bag of birdseed in a month!!! and 2. They aren't very smart....they fly into the window at least twice a day. (No exaggerations! This is literal!)
Look closely at this next picture. It is not a bird, by my nemesis! A seemingly harmless little chipmunk. But in all honesty to call him little would be a lie. This little bugger has cheeks the size of his body. I despise him and every time I catch his fat little self in my bird feeder, I bang on the window, run out the door (sometimes not fully dressed) and scream to scare him off. After I make sure to scold the bush that he escaped to. I will elaborate more on him later.
I will next mention the bunnies! We see numerous bunnies, both momma and babies everyday. I often throw my old veggies out into the yard for them! They are fun to watch. I especially enjoy watching their little motor mouths work at 100 mph while they eat.
And a word for the ducks. There are a group of ducks, that call my neighbors roof home. Kind of odd, but whatever. So the other day, I'm sitting on the couch and glance out at the bird feeder as I often do, (half hoping to see the pretty birds, and half to make sure that stupid chipmunk is minding his own business.)
Anyway, I saw 8, yes 8, ducks, all male, enjoying the birdseed that had fallen off the bird feeder. It was so cool. As I walked toward the window to get a better look, they all got scared and flew off. 8 DUCKS!!!! It must have been a bachelor party or a boys night out or something......
Finally, The Hawk
Next is this beautiful Hawk!!!
So as I am walking to the laundry room I catch this unusually large bird out of the corner of my eye. I immediately stopped, and slowly backed into the kitchen to get my camera and my phone to call Ryan.
As I am shooting pictures and explaining its size and beauty to Ryan, I suddenly stop and think, what could be so appealing to this huge hawk to bring him to our yard?
The rest of our conversation played out like this,
Me- "Ryan, it's huge!! What's it doing here? Well, maybe it is eating the food I threw into the yard for the bunnies....but I don't remember throwing food in that direction.....wait a second, it's definitely eating something....I wonder what it could be......wait....is that a.....RYAN!!! It's got a bunny! It's eating one of our bunnies!"
At this point, Ryan burst into laughter as he heard and pictured me coming to this realization.
I felt kind of bad that I had lured the bunnies out of the bushes with veggies only to lead them to their certain death, but I felt a bit better as I realized that this is simply the food chain in action. It happens every day.
I will end this zoo-like post with a final story which took place about an hour after we finally got the power back on. It involved an old, "friend"
I was sitting on my computer, working on some family history, when I kept hearing something from the dining room window. At first I just thought it was those birds getting confused as they normally do. But I kept hearing it and it didn't sound like a bird hitting the window. So I leaned my chair back to take a look. I discovered, on one of the dining room chairs, a furry, little vermin, whose mug shot had already been permanately etched into my memory, under a file marked, "Nemesis". The birdseed thief was back. That fat little chipmunk.
I was filled with adrenalin as I started running after him screaming for him to get out of my house! When he ran into the kitchen and under the stove, I stopped and told myself I needed a plan. So I went back to the reading room and dumped out a medium sized plastic bin and decided I'd catch him under it. When I coaxed him out from under the stove, I chased him under the fridge, back into the dining room, into the reading room, under the red couch and finally, past a door which I'd left open for him, and accidentally into the basement. I chased him down the stairs, and midway down he decided to change his mind and run back upstairs. But as I felt him run over my foot, my reflexes, literally, kicked in. He landed on the floor of the basement and I chased him until I somehow lost him. I figured he'd either die from lack of food, or we'd meet again upstairs someday. So I shut the door to the basement and sealed it off so he couldn't get back up. And I went back to my genealogy.
About 15 minutes later, and much to my surprise, I heard more noise from the dining room. I knew there could be nothing there, but just to humor myself, I leaned my chair back again, and saw a CHIPMUNK!!!! I ran to see if the basement door was still sealed, and it was!!! An accomplice!!! This began round 2!
I couldn't find my previous bucket, so I dumped stuff out of another one. I chased him around the house again, when finally, he made a wrong move. He ran and hopped onto the bottom shelf of the entertainment center, and I knew I had him. I blocked off the right side with a puzzle box and put the open end of the bucket to cover his only way out. When he tried to run, he ran right into my bucket and I flipped it upside down so he was under it! I explained to him that there not only wasn't room for him in my house, but that he simply wasn't welcome! I slid the bucket over to the door and lifted it so it was facing outside and he BOLTED! I promptly celebrated sweet victory. I'm still not sure if there really were two, which would mean there is still one in the basement....Ryan got a friendly trap, and we shall see.
