The Saga of the Squirrels

Well, here I am, sitting on the couch and watching the Vikings game and updating the blog as my chore for the week. We have been watching football as a house because Michelle has a fantasy football team. This week was Allie's birthday, so we went out downtown on Friday night, then had grocery shopping/spirituality night at a park yesterday. Tonight we are going to the Guthrie theater to see Much Ado About Nothing- $2 tickets from Margarite's work.
Well, I could follow Michelle's lead and talk about work...Work for me has been pretty busy lately, with three home dedications in a week. Soon my supervisor will be leaving on a global Habitat trip to Mozambique, so I will have a project of tracking statistics from the last four years of Habitat dedications so our affiliate can have a discussion about how dedications should look in the future. So that's exciting. But for the bulk of the post this week I'd like to update you about something more integral to the daily lives of the Winona house.
While we haven’t gotten to know many of our neighbors yet, some of the neighborhood’s furry residents are hard to ignore. The squirrels in our neighborhood are numerous and particularly bold and aggressive. We have seen them frighten away neighborhood cats (if they start menacing the Great Dane two doors down we’ll know the problem has really gotten out of hand).
We have had several encounters with the squirrels so far this year. In recent weeks, our compost has been much improved as we turned it, and added yard waste and water. Before we learned to turn our compost heap to bury food remains, the squirrels took their pick of the fruits, veggies and bread left outside. Sometimes we would see five or six squirrels perched around the compost bin’s edge, as if it were a compost-raiding conference. Once, when Michelle and I went over to the compost to inspect the compost progress, we scared away such a conference. While we were talking, we noticed liquid coming from overhead. It was a squirrel peeing from a tree that leans over our compost pile! I guess we know what its thoughts on our turning the compost are!
Squirrels also surprised us when we used to bake with the windows open. Smelling the cooling brownies or bread, the squirrels scaled the house and climbed on the screens, trying to get in. But as startling as that was, Margarite got a bigger shock when a squirrel almost climbed into the open window above our shower while she was showering. I guess the soap/shampoo must have smelled good! (Now that our fan is fixed, we close the window to prevent future such surprises.)
The latest encounter of the squirrel kind was just a few days ago.Michelle, at home alone, heard a rustling noise outside that sounded like a dog scratching at the door. She checked to see whether it was the mail being delivered, but it wasn’t. She peeked out the windows and didn’t see any dogs. After hearing the noise again several minutes later, Michelle opened the door to find two care packages from Margarite’s aunt and a squirrel resolutely digging into the top of one of the boxes (which contained cookies). After shooing the squirrel away (which took more effort than you would think) Michelle took the packages inside. Apparently she intervened in the nick of time, though, as there was already a small hole in the top.
Hopefully our squirrel population becomes less active as winter sets in, but for now, Winona house has learned one important lesson: Don’t mess with the squirrels.


-Sarah