SQUIIIIRRELS!

I'm sure you remember this scene in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, when the family discovers a squirrel in the second Christmas tree. The first one, of course, burned to a crisp when Uncle Lewis lit his cigar in front of thing--the tree, I mean. When Clark Griswold sees the squirrel, it springs forward into the living room, and his father shouts, "SQUIIIIRREL!" Everyone screams, runs. People faint. It's awesome.

So whenever I see a squirrel, the line, "SQUIIIIRREL!" pops into my head. And I kind of do want to run. I'm in the part of society that believes squirrels are simply publicly-accepted rats with bushy tails. And I never knew they made sounds until I went to college. I didn't learn this information in a class--all that stuff I forgot. But one day in the spring (or was it the fall?), my roommate came back to the dorm and told her tale of the Heckling Squirrels. They were everywhere, in the trees, on the sidewalks, in the trash cans, and it was like they were yelling at her. Creepy.

Anyway, here are the some of the trees in our backyard:























As you can see, they are quite large. And the lawn looks quite lovely, if we do say so ourselves. J.Lo just mowed on Saturday, and with that comes miscellaneous yard cleanup, so it should be spotless. As of yesterday, here is what we noticed under the largest tree:














The branches, you notice, are kind of big. What might have caused this, you ask? Tree wolves? Bender smacking her head during a particularly impressive tennis ball catch? Oh no, none of these. It is, in fact, SQUIIIIRRELS!

J.Lo proposed the idea yesterday evening, and I was skeptical. I mean, I suppose it occurred to me that the tree rats might make nests, and might choose to craft a summer home now and then. Why not. And so they use branches. That I can believe. But these freaking branches are not small. And the squirrels, they are downright wild. I saw it myself. It was crazy. K.Lo and I got back from the Target, and as we were exiting the car, I saw the apparent Evil Squirrel Gang that is terrorizing ours and our neighbor, Daryl's, yard, careen through a series of small trees that divide the two yards, rip off and chuck a few branches, and continue on their hellrasing path around the garbage cans, up the telephone pole, etc.


Bailey and Bender are as baffled as I, as they inspect the yard debris.

The SQUIIIIRRELS are also talking. They sound a little like cats. I could barely get one on camera, but you might be able to pick out the blur in the middle of this one.

All I can really say is, WTF. Squirrels! They freak me out, man. I can't wait to see this castle once they've constructed it. I wonder if they have a tour set up with HGTV, or MTV Squirrel Cribs, or whatever. They're not the most hospitable hosts, though, I have to say; they did not seem too thrilled with my own documentation. Hope they don't read the blog and get mad. That's all we need is a set of SQUIIIIRREL STALKERS.