Wild Kingdom @ Friday, Apr. 30, 2004

My patio is becoming a wild kingdom.

There are two baby squirrels trapped out there. I live on the bottom floor so part of my apartment is below ground and my patio is basically a hole lined with brick walls. They must have either fallen in or crawled down the brick and found themselves unable to crawl back up. I spotted one yesterday but when I came home today there were two sitting just on the other side of my patio door, sopping wet and scared to death due to the fact that my cats were mere inches away, laying in wait. They're so freaking cute. PArt of me wanted to scoop them up abd save their little lives but one, they'd nver let me get close enough and two, there's that thing called rabies. Besides, I'm sure a squirrel bite sans rabies would pretty much suck too.

My grandma's neighbor, at her old house, trained a squirrel to eat from his hand. The thing would sit right on his lap and eat bird seed out of his palm. One day, after church (yes, I used to go to church) the squirrel was in my granny's yard and she gave me a handful of bird seed. At first it would only run up to my hand and take a seed or two and skitter away to eat it but after a few minutes it actually came over, put it's little paw on my hand and ate out my palm. I felt like Snow White.

Anyway, there's a small crack between my patio and the nutty next door neighbor's patio. The neighbors have two fat cats as well who are also sitting right by the door, watching. Fortunately there's a hiding place between the patios for the squirrels so they're mostly out of sight. So they're currently hiding out over there due to all the noise.

Noise? First of all, I crumbled a piece of bread under one of the chairs where it's remotely dry. Then I went out in the rain and found a tree limb behind the dumpster and leaned it against the patio wall so they could eventually climb out to freedom. That is, if the cats ever get bored with watching for them and get away from the door.

When I finighed with the tree branch I went to put my laundry n the dryer and when I came back The Big Yellow Dog that's often seen in my courtyard was peering over my pation wall, sniffing the air. He stood there for a long time and had no interest in me when I went out to pet him. I'm not usre if he's there for my cats or the squirrels.

This all makes me feel like a little kid.