Home Again, Home Again

I will not burden you with travel stories. Everyone has lost a bag or suffered a delay or whatever. Our trip back was not unreasonably burdened with evils...just about standard.

However, I had been receiving increasingly frantic emails from my dear friend Peter, warning me that "something" was resident in my home. Bettina the miracle-working cleaning lady has been tidying up after me and Benson (the dog) since I first took up the voyaging life. She was the one who discovered the "something" and later was the fortunate who actually viewed its disappearing, fluffy, definitely squirrel tail.

At our return, as usual, I switched on my cell phone and called first my son, then Peter, to report our safe return. Peter's news was ghastly. Bettina had had to spend the better part of the day decontaminating my home because the resident squirrel had got into the vitamin D, eaten rather more than a squirrel should, and suffered the squirrel version of dysentery...all over the house. Bed included. She and Peter had gone together to purchase a live trap, of the Havaheart brand. Perhaps the critter would be caught by the time we arrived.

We were braced for the worst.

Thanks to Bettina, what greeted us was an unoccupied Havaheart and an immaculate house.

In the morning we heard scampering. I tried putting the trap in the basement.

While we waited for the little...creature...to occupy it, we set about removing our two cars from an accumulated several feet of snow. WW's car was invisible, mine was little better. Over the course of five (5) hours, we dug, chopped, hacked, and ladled snow and ice away. I spent a lovely hour or so lying on the damp snow/ice (it was, of course, raining) chopping with a hatchet at the four inches of ice that had bound itself to all my tyres and two of WW's. Finally, we were free. He fled. It was just me...and the squirrel.

Lorna delivered Benson the next day. The trap was in the kitchen by then. I had actually seen the squirrel, vanishing into the kitchen. It liked to dance across the heating vents in the basement, but was well aware that the kitchen was the place to be. It had taken an empty jar of peanut butter, waiting to be scrubbed out for recycling, and chewed its lid off across the living room and well into the sofa. It had awoken me with the sounds of empty plastic jar clatter. An unmistakable sound. It was war. Squirrel: 1. Me: 0.

When, the next morning, I heard the scamper of tiny feet, I looked expectantly at Benson. He looked expectantly at me. Was I going to go see what was happening downstairs? He's feel safer if I did. Then we heard the clunk of the trap. A bit of scrabbling. Silence.

Somehow, that didn't seem right.

I went downstairs. The trap was conspicuously devoid of squirrel. Or bait. Squirrel: 2. Me: 0.

I reset the trap. Something similar happened the next morning. Benson, as always, offering lots of kind thoughts but no action at all. Squirrel: 3. Me: 0.

I examined the trap. Aha! Although it closed nicely, it didn't lock. The squirrel was cheerfully chewing his way through marmalade, peanut butter, and bread, then turning about to open the door and leave. He clearly thought it was an odd feeding arrangement, but food is food. I worked out what was wrong, fixed it, and prepared for victory.

Saturday morning. Benson and I hear the telltale patter. A great deal of activity in the living room. Then nothing. It was all of 7:30, he (or she) was running late. I lay rigid, hoping against hope. Ka-thwack (not the sailing sort)! A pause (obviously having a bit of a nosh) then increasingly hysterical scrabbling of small paws against metal. We had the wee bugger!

Benson would not go into the kitchen until I'd removed the squirrel. I put it on the deck, had a cup of tea, fed the dog, lined the back of the car with newspaper, and put the squirrel-full Havaheart on it. Benson was delighted we were going for a drive.

'Twas then he discovered the squirrel. Already terrified, it had to endure a lengthy drive with Benson's nose not two inches from the cage. We drove through Hudson Village, up Cote St. Charles, across the highway, through St. Lazare, and out to a long wooded stretch of road. I have rarely seen an animal travel quite so quickly. It vanished into the woods.

WW helpfully informed me that squirrels "always come home". I spent the rest of my stay waiting. I expect an email from Peter any time.

Benson still checks both the trap and the back of the car hopefully. As for me, I feel great. Squirrel: 3. Me: 1.

But I only needed one to win.