Making Quite A Ruckus

Last night, two raccoons were fighting on my back fence like an old married couple.  I’ve never heard anything like it.  They were barking and squawking and making quite a ruckus until The Assistant started barking at them and hitting the sliding glass door.  Then they ran along the fence line with their lopping gate and climbed up the backside of our large fir tree.

I waited for thirty minutes then I let my dogs out one last time before bedtime.  The Assistant raced to the tree and started enthusiastically jumping up and down like she had treed a coon.  I slipped on my crocks and raced out back and not spotting my flat head shovel, I grabbed a black plastic empty pot on my way to the tree.  I smacked The Assistant on her bottom to get her out of the way and peered around the backside of the tree and found myself eye to eye with an irritated raccoon. 

re-enactment of event

The Assistant raced to the other side of the tree and jumped up and down.  Without thinking, I lightly smacked the raccoon’s tail and backside with the pot and said, “Go on!”  And continued to hit the tree with the pot as the raccoon scurried up the tree away from the crazy lady in her pajamas, wielding a plant pot at midnight.  Then I chased The Assistant inside and then I stepped in something squishy and my dog Maya gave me her giggly grin and I knew that I had just stepped in her fresh pile of shit.  

Rotten Fence Board

This afternoon, while I was out taking pictures of my garden, I came across this little vignette.  Can you guess what happened?

My guess is that the fence board broke under the weight of one of our resident raccoons and it fell and knocked over my big empty clay flower pot.  An easy fix. I sure hope that the raccoon has recovered from it's fall.  How embarrassing.    

I Cultivate

I cultivate my garden, and my garden cultivates me.    

-Robert Brault                 

 

Tuning Out

My brain tunes out anything that I find deeply annoying and it’s great when I want to ignore a marching band warming up or My Kid when he practices high notes on his trumpet.  But tuning things out can get me into serious trouble, especially in the kitchen. 

I simply don’t hear my kitchen timer anymore.  It can be screaming at the top of its digital lungs and it simply doesn’t sink in.  My Pirate and My Kid look at me like I’m an imbecile and say, “TIMER”.  And then I dash into the kitchen and check on whatever is on the brink of burning.

We purchased our new microwave two weeks ago and my brain has already tuned out its chime.  Isn’t that weird?  Do you do that too?  The only successful strategy that I’ve found is setting my iPhone timer to a song.  My brain can catch the music and thankfully, my iPhone timer doesn’t stop singing out until I turn off the timer.  But, I’ve had to change the timer song a couple of times so I can catch it the first time through.

Does anyone want a used kitchen timer?  I have one taking up space on my fridge next to my tomato magnet.  My Pirate claims that it still works.  

Three More Days

For the past week, I’ve lived on my pot of I Might Be Getting A Cold Soup, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and hot tea.  My spigot of snot (runny nose) has slowed to a trickle but the mucus has travelled and thickened in my lungs and ears.  I feel cranky like a monster movie villain complete with the requisite slime. 

But, I know that I’m on the mend because my dogs’ are no longer lying on top of me and The Assistant has bored of stealing my used hankies and shredding them on the floor.  I’m on the verge of feeling better.   And thank goodness for that because The Yard, Garden and Patio Show opens this Friday at the Oregon Convention Center.  This garden show kicks off my spring fever and I’m ready.

So, I only have three more days of winter and then I’ll start dreaming up a storm about the coming garden season.  I can’t wait.