Oh My Gawd!!  It is so embarrassing.  I am literally ashamed.  Gawd!!

For those of you who do not live in BC the following may seem a bit odd but it is so weird, I have to mention it.  I am talking about a recent minor arrest made into an epic media stunt.

I am ashamed of our government.  I am so ashamed of our government.  I am ashamed of our police forces.  And I am even a little ashamed of our local terrorists, too.

I am ashamed for all their picayune, mini, nano-mind set, pettiness and melodrama.  If it weren’t so embarrassing, it would make for good fodder for a Disney comedy.  What a farce!  What a joke!  What poppycock!

It is not even a tempest in a crock pot.

Two nut bars in the Valley are idiot-followers of Al-Queda and all things explosive and insane.  One of them appropriately named, Nuttal, wouldn’t ya know? These two loons gathered up some pressure cookers and, after studying up on the internet, made a few ‘nail-bombs’.  And I guess they planned to put them on the grounds of the legislature and hurt some people.  So far, pretty nutty by any standards.

I would hope that the part-time security guard there would have dealt with it.

But, No!  This was fodder for prime time.  At this stage I am just ashamed for the would-be terrorists.  I mean, really?!  Pressure cookers and nails?  Couldn’t any basic terrorist do better than that?  Where are your boxcutters, your Anthrax powders?  Haven’t you doofuses learned of Marsec?

Anyway, these mini-brains got the billing of terrorists but they were not very scary.  I doubt very much that any one of the security force couldn’t have ‘taken them down’ at any time.  Maybe the legislature Commissionaire could have done it?

But, instead, they were followed.  For months.  We (the taxpayer) spent millions.  We used up precious resources.  Like Inspector Clouseau used resources.  But it turns out they were not part of any major plots.  They were not part of any organization.  The bombs weren’t gonna explode.  They were just losers.  Complete idiots.

The Fraser Valley is full of ’em.

They were originally found out by CSIS who in turn contacted police, government security and all the Henny Penny’s in braids and epaulets who just love all this crap.

“Quick!  Get out the helicopter!  Notify SWAT!  Notify the media!  Get on your riot gear and jump on someone’s back!”

So, since February, it seems, cloaks and daggers were at work.  I guess they followed these two goofs like shadows awaiting the right time……but the right time for what? 

Well, it was too good an opportunity to squander by simply arresting them, wasn’t it?  So the police called the Premier.  And, after a nice confab, then they were arrested.  And they were arrested on the Canada Day long Weekend.

Good timing!

And our premier went to the media extolling the virtues, skills and bravery, the dedication and professionalism and……...on and on and on………about how our police and security forces who have once again protected us against terror.  She made it clear that “We will not allow this kind of threat to deter or frighten us, that we would stand resolute and strong against such terrorism and that Democracy and our values were safe!”

She did a lot on Democracy (for an unelected premier) and our values as Canadians.  She was really, really brave.

And that is the embarrassing part.  It was just a couple of kooks.  Nuts.  Goofballs.  But it was milked for propaganda purposes.  Like we are all idiots.

Two nutbars in the Valley are being used to sell us on our brave Premier and our brave fighting forces.  And our benevolent government.  Thank God for these brave souls!

But, fear not, good citizens, Christy and the Epaulets will save us.

It is truly embarrasing.

Last night a restaurant was born and it was an immaculate conception.  Chez Bunkhouse opened to rave reviews.

When I use the word ‘rave’ around here it is usually used in the context of character assassination.  Not this time.  This time ‘rave’ is used as in a celebration.  Of the mind-blowing kind.

Readers may know that we (the community) have a few communal buildings.  We have the bunkhouse and the Q-hut and a few ancillary locations that aren’t so much ‘ours’ as occupied by us (the community) on a pretty-much exclusive basis.  The Post Office, for instance, is a small, floating Federal shack on the public Federal wharf but, in reality, it is a hangout for the locals for the days when the mail plane arrives.  The bunkhouse and the Q-hut are more ‘ours’ but we tend to spread around a bit depending on the activity.

Last night the magnet was the bunkhouse. The bunkhouse is a small building that might be 1000 square feet if every nook and cranny was counted in.  It consists of a main floor in which a newly renovated and expanded kitchen shares the space with a larger room and the entry way.  Upstairs there is a small loft of sorts.  It is small but it was big enough to accommodate over thirty people and entertain them royally for four or so hours.  It became on this occasion with not just a little effort, the ultra chic, newest (and only) restaurant ‘Chez Bunkhouse’ complete with hostess, chefs and ambiance.  Haute cuisine in the forest.

Honest to God, last night Chez Bunkhouse put most of the finest eateries in most big cities to shame and it was the opening night!

A while ago a few of the local women (lamenting the dearth of good restaurants in the area) decided to do something about it. And they did.  And they did good.

Forgive me for cheating but I will quote my own (edited to preserve the anonymity promise) review written for the local paper:

Sal was returning home from the Post office yesterday when a humpback whale rose near her small boat.  It blew, it rolled and it dove.  Sal was gobsmacked.

Sal’s boat is 11 feet long maybe a bit over 4 feet wide.  It has a six to eight inch freeboard.  For me, it is just a small step up from a surfboard but for the featherweight that is my wife, it is simply ‘sporty’.  Like a Miata.  She thinks it is perfect.  She stopped the engine and watched.

And she called me on her walkie-talkie.

The whale ‘humped’ near her and dove under her boat.  She was describing it’s actions but stopped (as usual) in mid-sentence as it passed beneath her.

“Sal?  Sal?  You there?  You OK?  Sal?”

“OHhhhhh…..Myyyyyy……Gaaaaawd!”

“What?  WHAT?!!  YOU OK!!??”

My wife (bless her little heart) is of the opinion that phones, walkie-talkies and cell-phones are intrusions on real life experience.  If she is busy having a real life experience, the communication device is forgotten.  Completely.  That is to say, IF she has it turned on at all – a less than fifty-fifty likelihood.

So, I got nothing.

Silence.

Not even static.

I went for the binoculars.  Couldn’t see her.

“Sal?”

Basically whales are pretty benign creatures, Moby Dick notwithstanding.  I wasn’t really afraid for her.  But then again, it was a whale.  And Sal is a feather.  In a teacup!  And she was NOT answering her walkie-talkie.

“Sal?  Sal?  You there?”

“……………………………………………………………………………………Oh yeah.  Just on my way home.  See you in a few minutes.  Just gonna hang out here for a bit and watch the whale.  No worries…………..” 

As most readers know, we didn’t go ‘off the grid’ to do the Mountain-man thing or even to be adventurous or au naturel or anything.  I, personally, went off the grid simply because I was bored with being on the grid.  Our move ‘out’ was really a way of getting away from being ‘in’.  And Sal is just one of those supportive spouses who just sorta feels that it will all work out in the end and she’s always up for an adventure anyway so, why not?  She was not really conscious about what we were embarking on any more than I was.

And, of course, it has been an adventure.  It has been kinda mountain-manish and we are living much more naturally.  And we have grown in many ways.  So, on the surface, it may look as if it was all part of our intention.  And that our intention was to be more independent.  But it was not.  Most of the really neat off-the-grid stuff was a surprise and or a bonus.  It was all a surprise bonus, really.

I mention all this because I tend to read a lot and I am always looking for books about people who intentionally went off the grid.  Freedom seekers.  And there aren’t many.  One of the few is Chris Czajkowski.  She of Nuk Tessli fame.  The others are more accidental.  Like us.

There are the folks who think they live off the grid because they can’t afford hydro or a truck.  They may live on a road and there may be power on the pole but they don’t have it so they consider themselves off the grid.  Another was a woman who divorced her husband and was a writer on a small acreage.  She considered herself so cut off that she was off the grid.  She wasn’t.  She was just alone.  I recall another who wrote a series for a newspaper about living off the grid because the local store closed in the winter when she decided to visit and because things froze and the ferry didn’t run on time.  Poor baby.

And then there is Nick Rosen.  Nick writes about living off the grid while living in London.  He has expanded off the grid-ness to those who RV or live in cars, those who travel a lot or those who are homeless.  Nick even includes those artistic types who build homes from rubber tires and shipping containers.  Eccentric?  yes.  Off the grid?  Not necessarily.

And It all got me to thinking about what, in fact, is off the grid living…?

In theory, we are way off the grid.  I even called my blog that.  But, honestly?  Our neighbours are going into town and will pick us up some tomatoes which we forgot the last time we went shopping (last Friday).  My genset is running on gasoline that was delivered a month ago and books come by post (via the mail-plane).  Sally fussed when we last went to town because I didn’t have a ‘nice shirt’ to wear.  The dogs eat ‘produced’ dog food.  We drink wine and scotch.  Last night’s dinner was beef Stroganoff with a nice salad with vinaigrette dressing.  Sally finished her meal with a Roger’s chocolate.  Then we watched a movie.

How rough is that?!

I guess what I am saying is that living off the grid nowadays does not seem to be like it was when Chris headed out.  That kind of off-the-gridding is rare.

Then I listened to radio reports about the flooding in Alberta.  People couldn’t go home.  The authorities wouldn’t let them!  Their houses might be unsafe. Presumably the poor dears were too stupid to determine that for themselves.   Reporters were interviewing people who had no electricity.  Or water.  One woman made the news because she had not had a shower in two days!

I dunno, folks.  Maybe it is just me.  Maybe it is just the news.  Maybe it is the authorities.  I honestly don’t know.  But if living off the grid means the lifestyle I have versus the one where everyone is so incredibly dependent or obedient to the grid authorities, where their hardship is measured in showers had and or TVs not working, then there really is a difference and it has nothing to do with hardship.  It has nothing to do with challenge.  Not anymore.  Not like Chris.

Now it has more to do with personal responsibility.  And it has more to do with helplessness.

I guess what I am saying is this: you don’t have to live like a mountain man to be independent and capable.  Not anymore.  But, somehow, living on the grid seems to rob people of even a semblance of that.  Gridders (or some of them) seem to become more helpless. They seem to be more dependent on the grid.  And they become reliant and dependent on the authorities instead of themselves.

Living off the grid today can be modern, reasonable, comfortable and good.  Living on the grid today seems to foster dependence, reliance and helplessness. Who knew?

And this is something else we didn’t know about when we moved out here.  We had no idea that moving off the grid would be confidence growing, capability increasing, responsible and as independent as it is.  It is by comparison, anyway.

We are still very dependent.  We need products and services.  We need each other and our neighbours.  But, honestly?  We don’t need them as much.  Not by a long shot.

I am not really a hobby kind of guy.  Hobbies generally bore me.  I like ’em fine until I get relatively proficient at whichever one I am doing, then I plateau and soon get bored.  Then I have a bunch of crap to deal with, not to mention two or three half-completed bronze castings or whatever.  I’m just too undisciplined to hobby properly.

Plus I still harbour visions of grandeur on some kind of public or even world  scale and hobbies are counter-intuitive to that, really, don’t you think?  Think Bill Gates or Putin have hobbies?  Think Obama ties flies or makes his own beer?

So you can imagine my surprise as I contemplate my current activities…!  They are hobbies!  Even the slow-to-come workshop disguised as a studio is really just me indulging my hobby-builder thing.

I mean, I do need a studio-cum-workshop but I really could have used it before we built the house and now it is more like ’rounding out the empire’ than a really pressing need.

Well, Sal wants to see less of me so she really feels the need for it.  But I’m good.

I’ve done a bit of rustic furniture-making lately and that’s been kinda good.  But I see a plateau somewhere up ahead on all this rustic business.  Only so many rustic end tables needed in the world, eh?  Like a half a dozen?  Maybe?

And I have got a few other goofy ‘hobby-like’ things going on…..too embarrassing to admit to.…….but, I do.  Doing hobby crap is starting to be the default, go-to place for me.  How weird is that?  (Maybe I am trying to wean myself off Off the Grid?  Dunno.  Just kinda riding the horse in the direction in which it is going, ya know?)

So, anyway, how do I reconcile having a hobby (or two) when I have so much real work to do?  On the face of it, it seems ridiculous.  I only have so much energy and I am already limited by so little skill……I really should apply those minuscule resources to where they would do the most good!  Right?

Wrong.  Doing the work that needs to be done is usually a smidge on the dangerous or difficult side and that kind of stuff should be done with Sally.  I think.  Other guys chop down trees and build cabins and stuff alone but not me.  I do that kind of work with Sal.  I don’t really need her for most of it, I guess, but I like the company, the work goes quicker and she is a huge assistance.  I actually enjoy working with Sal.

Mind you, we only work for four hours at a go because she isn’t as pleased with working with me as I am working with her.  And I understand that.  I tend to get focused and a smidge irritated when things don’t go right and, of course, we are amateurs at everything we do so nothing ever goes right.  Not the first time, anyway.  By the time it is going right, we are done with that job.

But it is definitely safer working with a partner.  Ergo, when she is off doing a Sally thing, I am left alone surrounded by way too many sharp tools and so, discretion being the better part of my labour, I tend towards doing a safe hobby instead of the bigger more lethal job.  And, as Sal has been pretty busy lately with a lot of outside activities, my hobbying has been on the rise.

If Sal stays away much longer, we’ll be tripping over rustic.

God, I am weird at times!

.

Orcas last night.  Pod of half a dozen.  Cruisin’ north.  Dogs told us.

Megan can’t bark – she was lasered by her breeder before we got her so that people who attend dog shows don’t have to listen to a lot of barking (you’d think that if anyone would be tolerant of barking dogs it would be dog afficianados, wouldn’t you?).  Fid was ‘done’, too, but his larynx has mostly grown back and he is much more vocal.  Somehow, he is more auditory as well.  I think.

Meg was outside doing her regular lounge act on the settee and the rest of us were inside reading (well, Fid was licking something but we’ll leave it at that).  All of a sudden Fid perks up and ‘listens’.  Meg was miming a barking dog out the window and he must have lip read.  Or something.  Then he takes up the call and all hell breaks loose.

So we get up to have a look and, sure enough, about three hundred yards out, silently (except for ‘blowing’) the whales were coursing up the channel.

Orcas are black.  And it was late.  They are silent except for their breathing.  But somehow, I guess, Meg heard them and passed a message to Fid who, in turn, threw a holy fit in an effort to alert us.  And so we, in turn, radio’d our neighbours.  And we all looked out into the dark hearing heavy breathing.

Reminded me of my youth.

Not a lot these days reminds me of youth, tho.  Especially Father’s Day.  My kids are old enough to have kids!  Last night (just before the whales) we took the boat around to unload some heavy lumber in the lagoon.  Why?  Because the tide was up and it so much easier to unload heavy stuff when the first fifteen feet are done for you by astrophysics.

Mind you, Sal’s recent dental surgery prohibited her from heavy lifting so I had to do it all.  I hate it when that happens!

So there I am with one of five 20 foot 2 x 6 (Fir) climbing up the irregular rockface to get the 50 pound board another fifteen or so feet up the beach (for later lifting by the highline).  It is just past dusk.  ‘Hmmmm, other 65 year-olds are watching TV.  What the hell is wrong with me?’  And, after I drop the first one, I turn back in time to see Sal dragging another off the boat and lifting it to the shore so as to make it easier on me!

“Hey!!  No heavy lifting, you’ll pop a stitch!”

“Better than you having a heart attack, you old fool!  And, anyway, when you drop to the rocks below with a coronary, who do you think is going to have to drag your sorry butt from there into the boat and haul you to the hospital?  Believe me, helping you with a board is the easier option here!”

“Oh.  Well, thanks………..I think”.

Nowadays your average person can e-mail, phone, text or, I suppose, still even fax or snail-mail.  We mime, gesture, lip-read, mind-read, talk-dog and try to foresee the future.  It’s all about getting the message.

On our way back from town, down the old logging road, I turned the corner and saw two space aliens on the road!

Well, one was on the road where it widens at the turn and the other was on the little bridge over the creek that flowed into the lake.  It, she, he was looking down into it.

“What the hell is that!?” said Sal

“Vulcans”, I said knowingly.  “Get ready to be probed!”

Both creatures were dressed in black, baggy, sponge-like pajamas with a neat shiny symbol (kinda like a Hyundai) on the middle of their chests.  They had a few loose belts or tubes or hoses or something hangin’ off them as well.  They had flat lead-like plates on their suits and weird, floppy epaulets on their shoulders.  And they were kinda waddling.

I slowed the vehicle to a stop and rolled down the window.  “Pardon me”,  I said, “Klingons?  Vulcans, perhaps?”

“Well, we are aliens, alright, that’s for sure!  But not space aliens, we are Texans.  From the University of Texas.  We are divers doing research on the Stickleback in this creek.  This is one of the few places in the world we can watch them nest and breed.”  

I narrowed my eyes and affected the look of a rube-in-the-sticks (not in the least difficult once you know how), “Now that is something an alien would say to throw an earthling off the scent.  Ain’t no such thing as Texas scuba divers working in creeks!!  I know that.  Now I am really suspicious. I have half a mind to call my leader!  So, whacha really doin’ ’round here?  Gonna do some probing?”

“Unh, no.  Really.  Research on Sticklebacks.  Honest!”

We bid them good luck and left unprobed and maybe just a little disappointed.  ‘Maybe it was my breath?’

“At the very least.” said Sal

One of our neighbour-friends is from the southern States.  Louisiana.  We had just seen her on the ferry.  We really like her.  She’s a spunky, yoga, happy hippy-chick the same age as me.  Looks younger, moves younger and talks a mile.  Just spent the last five days driving like hell for almost 4000 miles and sleeping in her Toyota.  Said it was 105 degrees much of the way til she got past the Divide.  Bush fires in Colorado, near hurricane in Louisiana, tornadoes in Oklahoma.  “Geez, it’s good to see the green cool beauty of BC.  I just love it here!”

Just another town day.  But they are getting shorter and farther between.  Sal had to see the dentist at 11:00 and, while that personal hell was being handled, I handled the chores.  Left a few undone.  We were on the 2:30 ferry.  Home just after 5:00.  Total town time?  Maybe 3 hours.  Total travel, schlepping, boating, packing and town time?  7 or 8.  Feeling when it is done?  Priceless with a much heavier MasterCard.

“It sure is good to be home, isn’t it?  I mean, this is like a sanctuary, a paradise, a shelter from the madness…..right?”

“Sweetie, we’ve just been gone a few hours….”

“Yeah, I know.  But, honest to God, it feels like pure relief getting home now, don’t you think?”  

“Yeah.  It does.  I know what you mean.  I’d prefer to stay home, too, but I wouldn’t wamt to miss the aliens.”

Out here we have some paranoid whackos.  No question.  Some of them – for years – have been claiming that the Homeland Security monitors cell phone calls (all of them!), e-mails and even your everyday whereabouts by tracking your cell phone even if you are not using it.  They even claimed that the government monitors your internet activity!  All of this coming from unkempt, unwashed, needing-a-haircut, conspiracy theorists who had no such devices or even friends.  Or even indoor plumbing or a shower, for that matter.

‘Course, I considered them mad as hatters and, on so many other fronts, I stand by my judgment.

But, once again, I was wrong!  And my local crazies had at least some of it right.  My local comrades, I mean.

Edward Snowden admitted that, while working as a low level techie at Booz Allen, (a CIA consulting firm), he had access to anyone’s cell-phone records and any other information that he wanted at any time including general internet usage, Facebook and “anyone who ever used Google”.

Around the world!

I could be busted at anytime.

Therefore it behooves me to apologize now for any misstatements and prostrate myself before Big Sister asking for forgiveness for my trespasses and promising never ever to criticize government in all its myriad forms, recognizable or not, official or not, law-abiding or not, acting in the public interest or not, for as long as I live.  So help me Janet Napolitano (director of Homeland Security).  Amen.

Special and extra apologies to Dick and George for my uncalled-for remarks regarding their activities and motives regarding the Iraq war.  Sorry, guys.

I state for the official record (are you getting this?) that I have always acted alone and that no other person, place or thing (dog) has knowingly cooperated with me in my efforts whatsoever.  Although this was not by choice (it can get lonely at times), it is nevertheless true.  I have no accomplices, collaborators or co-conspirators.  Sally knows nothing!  Clueless, I swear!

Further, no animals were ever harmed in any production of anything I have ever undertaken save for mosquitos and flies, prawns and the odd fish.

I admit to being critical of government at all levels and on all things and doing so for almost all of my 65 years.  But I was only kidding.  Honest. I love you guys.  Out there protecting me and all?  Looking out for my well-being.  Gee whiz, it was just a joke!  Honestly, you just keep on watchin’ me and mining my data, you’ll see.  I’ll be good.  Honest!  Real good.  In fact, if you want any information on anyone I know, just ask.  I’ll spill my guts.  To hell with those terrorists (oops, probably shouldn’t use that ‘key’ word), eh?

Well, at least I know I got your attention. 

Listen, I got Jewish friends, Arabic friends, Chinese friends and……get this………weird conspiracy freaks hiding in the woods.  You guys want them?  I’ll cough ém up.  Easy.  Anything for security, eh?

God bless you, Janet! 

Busy, busy.  So much to do.

Some critter got in the garden the other night and vandalized it.  So, Sal had to apply triage-type care on it.  She put in some new plants from a neighbour’s garden donor bank and re-established what she could.  We felt violated.

Oooohhh…….man against nature, eh?  It can get ugly out here.  But we shall prevail!

I am a few planks short of a full load it seems.  Literally.  Can’t get started until I come up with some 16-footers I failed to order first time around.  Only need six.  “A stick!  My studio for a stick!”

Roadway slope at the end of the road was completed.  Finished pictures to follow. We still have some lower (and maybe upper) pathway improvements to do and a small ‘dock/pier’ to build but one day of work should put it right. This is a major improvement.

The locals held a talking stick circle (TC) the other day.  Fashioned after the First Nations tradition, everyone sits in a circle and passes a stick around.  Only the person holding the stick can speak.  But not everyone does.  If they have nothing to say, they just pass the stick on.  And around the stick goes for as long as it takes for all the opinions, thoughts, news and such to get around.  It’s a good idea.

Kinda.

Sal and I didn’t go to this one.  Sal was under the weather and I was dissuaded by our previous experience at the last one (a few talkers went on and on and on…….and on….and on. I seem to recall – just before I passed out – that one of them was performing a very long version of a free-form poem that he had written.) and by the fact that we had so much else to do.  Especially that day.  I really had no time to hear someone ramble on unchecked about something of no interest to me.  And, of course, I have come to learn that, armed with a stick, I can go on and on unchecked about things of no interest to others.

I would modify the traditional proceedings if it was up to me.  I would give everyone a stick but one person.  The person without a stick talks.  If they go on too long, everyone hits them with their stick.  Then the monologues would move along better.

The talking circle was a good idea in its time but forest dwellers mingle more these days and most of us have modern communication devices from radio phones to telephones to internet  We are not so reliant on such quaint or traditional methods anymore.

‘Course, nothing beats face to face communication and so the TC still has a place.  But not for me.  Not now while summer is almost full on, anyway.

Plus – I think we are all getting on and, you see, we older types tend to get set in our ways, get a bit grouchy, grow easily impatient and, quite frankly, are uncomfortable sitting for long periods of time. We have no time anymore for any nonsense.  And even if it is not such nonsense – we tend to think it is.  It is the curmudgeons way.

As a mediator for almost twenty years I also learned that no meeting, no matter how fascinating, can hold the interest of even the most focused person for more than two hours and most of us have mentally checked out after 90 minutes.  It is no accident that movies are the length they are and the last few minutes is where all the action is.

Talking circles don’t have much action.  They are not supposed to.

And, on a beautiful June Day with so much to do, would I willingly sit inside and listen to other people’s opinion’s?  I don’t think so.  Maybe I should but I barely listen to other people’s opinions at the best of times.  And even that would be with those with the best of minds.  I won’t comment on the minds in attendance at our talking circles but, suffice to say, long-winded, free-form poetry is just not an art form I have learned to appreciate.

SOoooooo…………..we have a few squirrels and they are pretty comfortable here.  They have a good time, do what they want to do, go where they want to go and, generally, don’t have a care in the world.  Our two dogs respect them and leave them entirely alone.  Our two dogs seem to respect everything and leave just about everything entirely alone.  Except dinner and a thrown stick.  If we ever get attacked by sticks or rampaging BBQ chicken, we will be able to count on Meg and Fid.

Until then?  Not so much.

We have pacifist Portuguese Water dogs.  Lovers, not fighters.  Well, sleepers, really.  Not even lovers.  And no amount of incitement-to-kill or inter-species-hate-mongering from us can change that.  We used to go “ch-ch-ch-ch-ch” and run at the squirrels pointing and yelling, “Kill, Fid! Kill the squirrel!”  (well, I said kill the squirrel but Sal would only say chase the squirrel) That would get Fid all riled up and he would run with us in the direction of the little tree rat.  As soon as we were all in hot pursuit of the trespassing squirrel, the squirrel would ‘up and stop’ resting on a railing or something, all the better to watch Fid hightail it right on by heading off into the bush pretending to be chasing something.

Sometimes I would rest on the same rail or tree and the squirrel and I would both watch Fid run around.

Some other times when Fid was just lying around being a dog, the squirrel would simply walk by within inches and they would twitch noses at each other.  They had an agreement of some kind, I am sure.  Or Fid is even stupider than I already think.

Hard to imagine.

But this didn’t stop Sal from “ch-ch-ch-ch-ing” and running in the direction of the squirrel when it was perched on her bird feeder.  And that worked for a bit.  I enjoyed the show.  It lasted until the squirrel noted the lack of killer instinct in Sal.  Then I was further entertained while she made futile charges at the squirrel-with-no-fear and would, of course, stop short, shrug and come back in the house mumbling about how stupid that squirrel was.

“I don’t think the squirrel is stupid at all.  You, on the other hand………”

She’d turn on me and chase me.  And I ran.  I saw danger in her even if the squirrel didn’t.

Sal once got a squirt gun and, when the squirrel was Bogarting the bird feeder, she would open the window and ‘spritz’ the squirrel.  After the first such surprise, the squirrel seemed to show up for food and a refreshing shower.  The squirt gun was a nice touch – for the squirrel.

I offered to get a BB gun and shoot the squirrel in the rump.  That suggestion was rejected.  Too mean!

So day-before-yesterday I got out two little 9 volt batteries, joined them to 18 volts and wired in a small swtch.  I then connected the assembly to the metal bird feeder.  ‘Course I had to shoo the squirrel off the feeder to wire it in.  The feeder already had two dark cords holding it from swaying in the wind and Sally had arranged a bundle of small branches that hung around it so the birds could perch more natural-like.  My two wires (both brown) were completely lost in the midst of the feeder surround.

Prior to my wiring in the improvised electronic device (IED) the squirrel was on the feeder like yellow on a banana.  Every day.  Since wiring in the device – which he watched me do – he has not returned.  It has been three days.  No squirrel.

I was thinking of zapping a few birds just to make sure it works but the fact is, it is working like a monitored video surveilance camera.  There may not be a need to for it to actually work if the potential perp thinks it is there and working.  Clearly my squirrel thinks it is there, working, lurking and ready to do some shocking.

How is this possible?  Squirrels understand electricity?  I mean, maybe a squirrel in Vancouver….ya know?……one that has been zapped a few times…………….maybe?  But our squirrels are rubes.  Hicks.  Squirrel bumpkins.  How did the little blighter know that the feeder was now booby trapped?

I am not sure but I am beginning to think that ol’ Mother Nature is planning a retaliatory strike and the squirrels are just part of the much larger force, Luke.

Zap