Wild Kingdom -- August 2008, part 2

Howdy--

Be careful what you wish for! Here I was rhapsodizing about all the wildlife when I wrote last, and then the following two things occurred, on Monday and Tuesday, respectively:

1) I let the dogs out in the morning like always, not noticing that the shed door is open. The next thing I know there are shrieks and barks from inside, and I race over (barefoot, after a night of rain, of course!) to discover that Rosie has cornered a small raccoon, Maisie close behind. Now I'm screaming, just to add to the mix. Somehow the four of us make it outside the shed (maybe the fact that I am swinging a broom at anything with fur and screaming "OFF!! OFF!!" through my tears...), and the next thing I know, Rosie has slaughtered the raccoon. I'm not sure what Stephen must have thought when he first came downstairs -- having been in the shower and missed the whole thing -- to find me hoarse and tearstained, wiping blood off Rosie's face, both dogs hyperventilating with glory, and all three of us covered in mud. Luckily, the dogs had all their shots updated before we left. And in retrospect, although it was horrible to behold, I think it was fortunate that Rosie killed it, rather than leave it half-alive on the lawn, because then what would we have done?

2) While sitting out on our balcony in the late afternoon, which we almost never do (probably to avoid being in the backyard, facing the scene of the previous day's mess), Stephen points out some bees, crawling into a small gap under the eaves of our garage roof. As we sit there and watch, we counted over fifty bees go in. Oh yes, we have a hive in our garage crawlspace! I spent part of this morning calling around to see who can take care of it, and it isn't going to be cheap, but versus going to the hospital for stings—yes, I’m allergic—is probably worth it.

And although not animal-related, we lose power intermittently due to thunderstorms at least once a week, usually for just a minute or so. However, I discovered that if you are recording six hours of obscure Rosalind Russell films overnight on TCM, and your power goes out just for a moment during the last few minutes, that nothing gets "Written to Disk" and you can't watch any of it. I guess we'll make some popcorn and revisit "His Girl Friday" for the umpteenth time.

Ah, the joys of home ownership! These are the things they don't tell you about.

Love, Rob't