Tuesday, November 29, 2011

The Grudging Respect Awards…


I have to admit to having a grudging respect for squirrels.  They are devilishly cute and fiendishly clever little buggers.  And apparently, they have a lot of power over me.  They drove me so nuts for years cleaning out our bird feeders in spite of state of the art baffles that I gave up in defeat and quit feeding the precious little songbirds that flit around our parts.
 
But the other night while I was sleeping, I had a brainstorm.  I thought of a spot on our front porch where I didn’t think the squirrels could reach.  So far, in the four days the feeder has been up, the squirrels have not figured out how to breech the feeder that’s hanging there.  They sit on the ground underneath and catch the droppings from the birds.  I’m sure this is beneath their squirrelly dignity, but it works for me.  If they haven’t figured it out in another month, I will feel that I have won and they will have to admit to having a grudging respect for me for a change.  But in my imagination, I can see the bunch of them back at their nest with their protractors and compasses out, doing calculus, trigonometry and other high forms of math I never understood.  It’s only a matter of time, I’m sure, and they will have triumphed over me one more time.


The bird feeder is right above this guy.


I also have to admit to having a grudging respect for the sock that stopped my washing machine.  Who knew a sock could do that?  I didn’t.  Our handy-dandy repairman Michael came out in the afternoon, took the front of the machine off and said, “There’s the culprit.”  And he held up a mangled sock. The fact that it was one of my “No Nonsense” socks makes it all the more remarkable and like it was meant to be.  I guess when a No Nonsense sock wants to stop a washer, it just goes ahead and does it in a No Nonsense sort of way.  Well, the good news is that the machine is working and should be with us for another ten years, according to Michael.  The bad news is that I have to go and finish the laundry.


Oh, yeah…and one more thing.  Before you admit to having a grudging respect for us because we were the first people in our neighborhood to have our holiday lights up, just know that we never bothered to take them down and half of them don’t work anyhow.




17 comments:

TexWisGirl said...

laughing at the christmas lights! and those squirrels are so dang CUTE!!! hurray for a simple sock fix! yikes!

Debbie said...

i have a huge love/hate relationship with my squirrells. the hubs has finally "outwitted" them but it was quite the battle for months!!

no comment on the christmas lights, we have a small joke we tell about "your kind"!! haha

Ginny Hartzler said...

Too funny about the sock! But I'm glad it's fixed and is as good as new now. I have done many posts on squirrels, I actually let one in the house when I was a child, I wanted a pet. My mom ran up and down the stairs with her houseccoat flying behind her, broom in her hands, screaming and chasing the squirrel. Every once in a while I would catch the words "spanking" "rabies" and "vermin".

barbara l. hale said...

LOL

Anonymous said...

hehehe I can totally relate to the holiday lights as we never take them either LOL

watch out for them squirrels... they're a clever bunch.

Karen said...

I wonder if that's where all my missing socks are???

Judy said...

What an awesome post and photos. I'm laughing about the lights...

Betty Manousos said...

what cute little guys!
love your photos...laughing at the xmas lights.

your photos were enough to add a good amount of joy to my day!
thanks

Betty Manousos said...

...but that last photo is really awesome!

Love for Food and Photography said...

Beautiful squirrels! I would really like to see them often like you. You "took" them really great, so as the bird on the feeder, and the Christmas lights.

Tammy said...

I haven't yet found the squirrel proof feeder that was actually squirrel proof. The little buggers destroy everything!!! I tried a spot on my front porch that I thought they couldn't reach only to find them crawling up the side of my house :/
Sure hope you have better luck. I'll be waiting for an update :)

Buggers that they are aside, I do really like your first shot. :)

Unknown said...

i had two of them as pets once. awesome little idiots. :D

The Nature Jotter said...

i <3 squirrel! *.*

Sara said...

Hi Barbara. Your photos are gorgeous! So happy to see you at Tangled Happy and so happy I stopped in and got to admire all the gorgeous photos found here. Wishing you a happy weekend. :)

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