>
Character is what we are in times of crisis or when no one’s watching or some other strange set of criteria. For the last week I have been plagued by visitors in the night, sent to attack me and me alone, determined, I believe, to watch me in action and see how I respond. It feels like a psychology experiment gone bad, like the Milgram Experiment or that Stanford Prison thing. Maybe not that bad, but I still feel as if I’m being toyed with.
I lay in bed at night and I hear them coming. Whispers and clicks in the dark, the invaders peer through the inky black and wait for exhaustion to drag me into an uneasy sleep. They organize and plot and look for the perfect opening, and then they come for my socks.
These fucking squirrels.
But it’s not just the squirrels. The entire animal kingdom seems out to get me. Whether it’s rabid cats, mercenary mosquitoes, or obnoxious birds, I’m like the opposite of Dr. Doolittle.
I moved in late summer to a garage apartment, a perfect little spot for a constant traveler. It’s big by apartment standards and comfortable. There’s a place for my car and my motorcycle and all of my stuff fits exactly as it should. My bookshelf is full of the volumes I’ve collected in the last year punctuated by a thousand trinkets and memories from my travels. My desk sits on one side of the living room, my dual monitors surrounded by speakers. This is a place I can get stuff done. My bedroom faces south so the sunlight is constant. I opted not put up blackout curtains so that it would jar me out of bed and into productivity on most mornings. My brilliant plan to surface at eight or nine has been preempted though.
My apartment sits isolated from my neighbors in the middle of four intersecting backyards and one of those backyards is home to a rooster. A rooster, a rooster, a ROOSTER, inside the loop in Houston, Texas.
It’s more elusive than one would expect a rooster to be, too. It is borderline ninja and I know this because I’ve tried to kill it. I have a really hard time contemplating hurting an animal. I’ve never been hunting and I’m a total sucker for the animals of any sort. I could cause harm to a human much more easily than I ever could an animal, but it’s not a human standing in the backyard cock-a-doodle-doo-ing at 5:00 am, seven days week.
The woman that owns that house is bat-shit crazy. She won’t answer her door for me or the police. For all I know she could be dead herself. The wooden fence around her yard is painted with bright red hearts and catchy little hippie phrases like Animals Are People Too! and One Planet, One Love. The sign on the door that I have beat on every morning for the last month reads I maintain this house for the comfort of my cats. If you can’t deal with that, you can’t deal with me. She places the welfare of these animals above my own, and for that I hate this woman. She is a hopeless PETA-head, and that is why I bought the slingshot.
I’ve collected a good number of small rocks (ball bearings would look too much like evidence) and from my bathroom window I can see into her backyard. The rooster prances up and down a particular path, hidden almost entirely behind the branches of a low-hanging tree. It knows it is safe, but that hasn’t stopped me from rifling pebble after pebble through the leaves in an attempt to hit him. He of course knows this, and waits until I have shut the window and given up. Then he runs up to the fence and lets out another mad cackle before darting back to the cover of the brush. THWOP, THWOP, THWOP. Three more rocks rip through the air and hit nothing. “Goddamn bird!” I yell. “I’m gonna shoot you in your little rooster face.”
I want to drag its carcass to the hippie’s doorstep and bang away until she’s forced to answer. “Looks like people can be animals, too!” I’ll say, with wild eyes and chicken blood running down my arms. What criminal mind houses a yard full of birds and a house full of cats with such disregard for others? Probably the kind of person that would raise an army of attack squirrels. I bet my invaders are the product of her animal friendly lifestyle as well. She probably hand fed them and took them in, and now that she has sixty-three cats they need a new place to hang out, hence the velvet rope and the bouncer outside the squirrel dance club that my attic has become.
And now I am not safe inside.
A few days ago I woke up to the morning crowing and stumbled into the kitchen to make coffee. Bleary-eyed and headachey, I poured my first cup. As I started to gain my focus I noticed a sock hanging out from under the counter. “Did something happen last night that I don’t remember?” I think to myself. “Why would I take my socks off in the kitchen? Did I try to put them in the cabinet? How drunk was I? This makes no sense.”
Pulling the sock out from the opening underneath the base board, I noticed that it had several holes in it. “Squirrels,” I growl. I’ve known they were here for a while. It’s an older place and there are plenty of openings that allow them into the attic. I hear them constantly but I’ve remained unconcerned. Once I knew that they weren’t mice or rats – the piles of nuts in the attic and the sight of actual squirrels hopping from the power lines onto my roof cinched that – I just resigned myself to being a winter refuge for the fuzzy little things.
But now they’re taunting me. They’re literally stealing my socks – as if my clothes dryer wasn’t already doing enough of that. They are strategic. To get my socks requires some investigation. While I will occasionally leave a pair lying in the living room (one of the perks of bachelorhood), they usually end up in my bedroom. None of my other clothes are touched, nor are the dish towels or the beanie I left laying on my desk or the bag of Cheetos Puffs on top of my microwave. They’re selective little creatures. I mean, it takes determination to say no to those Cheetos. Cheetos are delicious.
They seem content to only drag the socks as far as the holes under the cabinets too. They don’t take them all the way inside, but leave them hanging out just enough to let me know they were there. It’s a form of counting coup, I’m afraid, and this is why I feel I’m being experimented on. It’s as if they know that I am incapable of simply trapping them or killing them. They want to see how I’ll react. They know that boredom will entice me to fight back. I have moved anything cloth-like to my bedroom now and I make sure the door is shut when I leave. Then I place one sock strategically in the middle of my dining room floor before I make my exit or turn in for the night. I have to know if they come, and come they do, but never when I can see them.
I sit on my couch and stare like a child waiting for Santa. Unable to stay awake, my eyes finally close, only briefly, and then snap open again to find the sock tucked neatly in its little cubbyhole under the sink. “How the hell did you do that?!?!” I yell. Somewhere a squirrel rolls around on the floor laughing and high-fiving his friends. I rip the sock out from the hole and throw it back on the floor. “I’m going to bed, you bastard!” I yell at nothing whatsoever. “Come get your stupid sock if you want it!” Then I wake up the next morning to find it sitting exactly where I left it. It’s no fun for them if I don’t care, it seems.
So I have to formulate a plan before I go out of town again. I have to get rid of them. I don’t know if I am up against one rogue animal or a hundred. In my mind, my walls and my attic are now one big Squirrel Kingdom. Buttons and thimbles and scores of socks line the halls of a Secret of NIMH world. Will taking one of these creatures out be enough? Should I trap one and leave it bound in the middle of my kitchen floor as a warning to other squirrels? Should I poison a sock? Buy an owl? I don’t know what to do exactly.
I know that the gauntlet has been thrown down though. They started this, this thing with the socks. “Cry Havoc,” I say, “and let slip the dogs of war!” And maybe that’s the answer – actual dogs. Or a fox. A fox would eat the squirrels and the rooster. I want to put on face paint and get a ghillie suit and hide with my slingshot. I want to set up a box and a stick with a string tied to one of my socks. I want a jet pack and some rocket skates and I want to paint a fake tunnel on my wall like Wile E. Coyote. I want to put the squirrels and the rooster and all their little friends in one big bag and toss it into the ocean – and then blow up the ocean.
I want to win.
Maybe I should focus on the flower child in the house behind me, maybe point my slingshot at her instead. Cut off the head and the monster dies, right? Maybe she’s like the Other Mother in Coraline. Who takes their animals that seriously? Seriously. These things are interrupting my lifestyle and her desire to protect them only makes me angrier. Now I want to cook steak with my windows open so she has to smell it. And I want a fur coat. And I want to beat a baby seal to death with an endangered penguin. Her “Save the animals” mission has clearly had the opposite effect on me.
But for now, I will continue to type, stopping every sentence or two to pause my music and glance into the kitchen and try to catch a glimpse of the cocky little rodent as it mocks me. Because right now I am clearly not winning. Right now I am losing.
And badly.
I can hear the squirrels flitting back and forth on the roof even now. I can hear the rooster too, cluck-cluck-clucking just feet outside of my apartment. I cut my eyes across the desk to the slingshot. “I could go outside and kill them all right this second,” I think.
And I would, too, if only I could find a pair of socks.
There’s an old horror movie called Frogs about animals ganging up on people, which I think you ought to consider remarking. Here’s the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dzl1RkBxNsY
I’ve always had roosters living in my neighborhood. It seems to be a tradition, and I suppose I don’t mind, since I’m a heavy sleeper who’s prone to be awake at dawn anyway (writing, always writing), and the sound of a crowing rooster reminds me of my grandparents’ farm in Virginia, and I loved that farm as I’ve loved few other places.
But I think the problem here isn’t the squirrels and it isn’t the rooster; I think it’s that hippie lady. If I may make an observation, Slade, there’s a certain species of ladies that causes trouble for you — the real-estate agent, the cop who arrested you, the manager of that bad comic who was on Saved by the Bell, and others you’ve mentioned who don’t come immediately in mind — and I think this hippie lady must be a witch who put a spell on the squirrels, so when you find and put on your socks, you may want to think about a different target with your slingshot. If she ever gives you a chance to see her, that is. She’s obviously, being a witch, rendered herself invisible.
What a horrible and hilarious film… I can’t let the trailer slide by without noting what is apparently a taxidermy chicken head at 1:55. What an interesting trophy to place on the wall, no? I’m passing judgment, but if I do kill this rooster after all, I would consider its head a prize for a battle well fought.
Now, more to your point. I do seem to attract a certain type of female antagonist into my life (and I can’t exclude my ex from this observation). It is more consistent than I would have thought, though when typed in the space of a paragraph it does become quite obvious. The question is, can I pull the trigger (or in this case, release the pebble)? She’s probably immune. Like you said, either invisible or, as I imagine her to be, protected by an impenetrable cloak of hippie sorcery. Goddamn hippies.
I’m glad that you are comfortable with the sound of crowing roosters. I am not. Where does the morality line blur when it comes to things like this? Maybe if i just zing her in the leg or something….
You stole my comment Duke, but I was going to mention Food of the Gods, instead of Frogs.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuSwwZ1n6KU
Giant roosters! Plus, it stars former child celebrity evangelist Marjoe Gortner! And poor Ida Lupino. What is she doing in there?
Anyway, Slade, this is High Concept gold. All you need to do is buy a copy of Final Draft and crank out a screenplay. I advise introducing a disembodied hand as well, though.
Wow. Sadly, someone will beat me to it and choose instead to just remake The Food of the Gods, or Frogs, and do it this time with all CGI. Except they’ll probably introduce a retarded little talking frog a la Jar Jar Binks.
Some of these movies were so much better with the 70’s effects. I do feel like that though, that they’re all ganging up and coming after me……..
I’m gonna have rooster nightmares all night tonight from these trailers, and I can only imagine that my mind will finally snap when I am awakened from my chicken dreams by an actual crowing one.
Hey buddy, I have plenty of experience with all that ! First off the rooster, I grew up with a best friend of mines kung foo ninja rooster. Every time anyone went into the back yard of his house the rooster would go for the face. So of course at first I ran like a little girl screaming at the top of my lungs to the joy of anyone who saw. Then I went to the Ninja school of animal attacks. HA,HA, now what rooster boy? Come for me of course he did, so I side stepped did block move with a twist so that I could grab the foot. Oooooowww they hate that but there is nothen they can do once you have the feet. Or you can just make rooster calls from the window they hate competition and will come to you with slingshot in hand. Side note, DO NOT LET HIM GET TO YOU! He will fight your face.
Ok for squirrel fun just put out a mouse trap under sock and then sit back and laugh every time it goes off. Ha HA HA HA ! . . .
Squirrels seem too smart for mousetraps.
And you fought a rooster? Did you have to put little spurs on your ankles? Did a lot of Peruvian guys form a circle and bet? That sounds awesome.
Dude! I saw Frogs at the drive-in when I was a kid. Great movie. Great movie poster, the huge frog with the human arm sticking out of its mouth
What a perfect story to read first thing in the morning!
This will keep me laughing all day.
“It’s more elusive than one would expect a rooster to be, too. It is borderline ninja and I know this because I’ve tried to kill it.”
So funny.
My neighbor had 2 chickens and a rooster when we moved in but one of my cats got to them. This same cat also took pride in her kills and would leave them on my front or back porch for all the world to see.
There was no way for me to deny her mischevious behavior.
Rats, mice, rabbits, and rooster feathers have all made it to our welcome mat and you would see Marilyn (who I called Monkey) perched proudly next to her kill, waiting for my approval.
I have contemplated getting a cat over the last week or so. Not a regular cat, but something a bit African. An ocelot or something. A bird corpse at my doorstep would make me smile endlessly. My former two cats (how this became an admission that I used to own cats, I’m not sure) were far too ineffective to ever do any damage. One was huge and refused to do much of anything ad the other had ADD.
Good for your battle-cat…. I would happily turn a Marilyn/Monkey loose.
The key to success with her was that she was the only one not fixed. I’m guessing her maternal insticts kicked in and she felt she needed to hunt on the off chance she got knocked up. She was also the smallest of all the cats. Thin and shabby looking. She had a beautiful face though with a tiny black spot above her lip like Marilyn Monroe. Fierce hunter.
You know, Daly may be on to something with the coydog. They are much easier to handle than wolf mixes. Give it a go. If not, I know a place you can get a fox or a raccoon. Raccoons will protect their territory from other animals but they also may steal your socks so maybe that’s not the way to go…
Yeah, raccoons just seem like they would be the same problem, but bigger. As for the coydog, I apparently would have to learn to be a “pack leader”. I’m reading up on them now.
As an admitted mush for pretty much all animals, I feel your pain. And as always, I laugh at your plight, as you describe the growing mania so well. Love the fantasy sequence that ends with you delivering the carcass to the woman, covered in blood and psychosis.
My suggestion is this- fight fire with fire. Get a coyote. I have a dog that’s part coyote, and the first thing she did when she arrived in my house was kill all the rats. I used to live two blocks from the beach, which is great for surfing, beach going, and entertaining. It is NOT good for avoiding rats, which live in palm trees. That’s right- those pretty tropical stalks are nothing but filthy rat colonies.
Anyway, my two golden retrievers were entirely oblivious to the rat menace, but in the course of a couple of days, Lola the Killer had all but eradicated the rat situation.
Note that a regular dog in the house won’t do- you need something that’s at least partially feral/wild. Squirrel problem = solved.
Then just walk by the rooster lady’s place with your killer once or twice a day and let it sniff the rooster. If by some accident, the coydog slips under or (with some help) over the fence and offs the rooster, what can the lady say? It was another of God’s beloved creatures that did it, and surely she can’t have any issue with that?
Think about it, brah- coydog.
http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/coydog.htm
Ooooh, a coydog. You posted this as I was typing my desire to get an ocelot in the comment above. A coydog sounds perfect, though I’m afraid it would want to howl at the moon until all hours and just extend my sleeplessness.
The problem with getting a pet is my road schedule. These things will want to eat something other than squirrel and chicken and I am not here for a week or two at a time sometimes.
Now if I could find a place that rented coyote-dogs…. now that would be something. Hippies do seem fine with animal on animal crimes. We should open a rent-a-pet business. I’m sure there is already something of the sort. I’ll Google it in a second. You can head up our West Coast office. And we’ll need to find someone to manage the warehouse full of coydogs.
A snake!!
I had a python that loved bird! Plus, they only eat once or twice a week! Problem solved!
That was supposed to say once every one or two weeks.
Hahaha… I just said “boa” jokingly below before I saw this, but their spread out feeding schedule might be just what I need with my road schedule…
The only time Lola gets hot and bothered is when she hears the coyotes in the canyon behind my house. Then she runs over to the open window and just listens intently while they kill and maim some poor canyon bunny or something. Oh, and they howl like motherfuckers when they hear a siren. Otherwise, you’re all aces.
Here’s mine:
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=21778&l=2a4f628837&id=1804157267
I would LOVE to head up the West Coast Office of the coydog business. We can run it as both a protection business and a revenge business. The possibilities are endless.
As far as the warehouse goes, what about Simon? He’s looking for a way back to the States, preferably in California. We could tell immigration that he’s a highly specialized Australian coyote keeper, whose skills are so advanced and unique that there is no American who can carry out the duties. We get a coydog keeper, Simon gets his green card, and we get paid in the meantime.
I’m really liking this…
Oh wow, she’s a beauty.
And Simon it shall be. We could even branch out into half-dingos. A ding-dog. Hahahahaha. Ding-dog. I want one.
So how do they get the coyotes and dogs to mate, without one of them getting eaten I mean?
So how do they get the coyotes and dogs to mate, without one of them getting eaten I mean?
Barry White and lava lamps, all night long.
Hahahahahahahaha.
And Boones Farm Strawberry Hill.
I’m half a mile from Mission Bay, close enough to smell it most of the time. It really wigs me out to hear coyotes at night in Tecolote canyon. You expect that sort of thing out in say, east county, but so close to the water? No, sir.
Super creepy, right Matt? I’m sure they’ve been pushed around by all the development that whenever they can get to a canyon, they just dig in for the long haul.
The freaky thing around my ‘hood is how devious they are. You’ll see one running up ahead of you, following you along your walk rather innocently, but if you keep walking, at some point you’ll see two behind you, bringing up the rear.
If I didn’t speak coyote, I’d be effed in the a.
You could get a dragon. In Eragon the baby dragon eats all the mice. (sorry, I’m short on practical suggestions and flush with useless kid movies, which I’m forced to watch on repeat from time to time.)
I want a dragon soooo bad. You’d think with all the dragonslaying I do, I could snag a stray egg or something. And even more bad ass if it sounded like Rachel Weisz.
I want a dragon too!!
I settled for a bearded dragon…
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1337167960449&set=a.1363227011909.2046261.1568636555#!/photo.php?fbid=1315300413774&set=a.1363227011909.2046261.1568636555&pid=30728535&id=1568636555
That’s about the coolest lizard I’ve ever seen. They have big puppet mouths. I want a bearded dragon and a Gila monster.
Ok, ERAGON is pretty fucking BA!
Never a useless kid movie!
C’mon, G, wake up!
The squirrels are CLEARLY the diversionary tactics arm of Underpants Gnomes, Inc.
Have you counted your underwear lately, Slade?
All present and accounted for. It’s always the socks with me, and usually the dryer takes them. The thought that it might be hiring minions is a scary one.
This begs the bigger question though: Is underpants theft a big problem in Minnesota?
Not that I’m aware of, but apparently, it plagues animated 3rd-grade coffee addicts in a fictionalized South Park, Colorado:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnomes_%28South_Park%29
Slade! I thought you, of all people, would catch that.
Not only is the episode hilarious, it’s the debut of Tweek, who quickly became my favorite character and, if not for copyright law, could easily be a co-mascot of TNB alongside TNB Guy.
In fact, he looks a lot like TNB guy.
Now I feel douchey for missing that entirely. I used to love that show and I remember that episode specifically now, precisely because of Tweek. Trey Parker and Matt Stone are balls-out geniuses.
I disconnected my cable this year though and have fallen off the SP bandwagon. I have to remedy that I think.
There have been some glorious moments in that show – particularly the way they handled the exit of Chef. Fucking brilliant, I say.
Thank you for the laugh. I live in Southern New Mexico where it is unusual for neighbors not to have chickens. In our neighborhood alone we have deer (which are pretty quiet), chickens, geese, cows, coyotes and one little fucking rat dog that barks constantly. The irony is that I can handle all the other animals but one, can you guess? I have decided after reading this that I need a slingshot. Thanks for the inspiration.
There’s a yappy dog around here somewhere too, though just on the fringes of earshot. Remember when Jim Carrey said, “You want to hear the most annoying sound in the world?” in Dumb and Dumber? Well, he was wrong.
It’s those fucking dogs…
Slingshot away 🙂
Poor Tweek never gets any script time anymore. I miss him.
Fuck that rooster. In the middle of the city? Really?
On the other hand, I like animals. I say you kidnap him in the night and drop him off on the outskirts of town at the nearest hobby farm, where people actually get up at 6 o’clock in the morning.
Slade Ham: Comedian, writer, roosternapper. For his happiness and your own.
Roosternapper.
That has such a ring to it.
My brother and I, when he was in town over Thanksgiving, contemplated a midnight chicken theft. A simple hop of the fence would have done it. No one would be upset if I did it. They would understand. They would have to. There should be no mistaking this for chicken territory. Literally, I’m barely two blocks north of I-10 smack in the center of the city. Even the rooster has to know it doesn’t belong here.
I’m getting Roosternapper business cards. And Pet-Renter ones.
You could put a little jacket on him with a note. Like Paddington Bear. No one would turn away Paddington Rooster.
Him in his little cage, in a little felt coat, on the front stoop.
“Please look after this rooster. Thank you.”
Hahahahaha. Ahhhhhahahahaa.
That just made me smile. Poor little rooster, with a marmalade sandwich under his hat.
Hahahahahaha.
He tries so hard to get things right…
Ah! Here’s the full episode: http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/151008/underpants-gnomes
Damnit, not the full episode. :-/
Hahahaha, god I love Tweek.
Buy decoy socks. Get a big bag of the irregular socks from the 99 cent store. Rub them on your feet so they have foot scent and then place them out. It’s a win-win.
I’m gonna buy some decoy socks. A big pile of them. To cover up the boa constrictor I just decided I’m going to buy.
Just be careful. No one wants to read, “When last seen, Ham was returning from a successful comedy tour. Authorities did share that they found several piles of irregular socks and a boa constrictor with quite a large lump in its stomach and several squirrels who appeared to be giggling. The SPCA has been called in to remove the animals. Authorities would not share whether they thought the lump was Mr. Ham. A police spokesman shared, ‘No one wants to jump to conclusions. Inquiries are being made with several young ladies in the area as to the whereabouts of Mr. Ham.’ “
And with my tendency to disappear for several days without warning, I would probably be fully digested before anyone even got suspicious…
The people living next door to the house I grew up in had not just a rooster but an entire chicken coop in their back yard. Lucky for us, their rooster was a lazy bastard who prefered to sleep in.
I’ve never had a major squirrel problem myself, though they did once infiltrate the crawlspace under the roof of one of the buildings at my high school, and apparently loved to compete in Squirrel Olympics whenever we were taking tests.
What I HAVE had to deal with is rats. Like Joe says, they climb trees and cross over power lines just like their squirrel cousins, and a huge colony of them infested the first house I lived in when I first moved to New Orleans. It was an eight-month battle to get rid of them, which finally culminated in my finding the decaying corpse of one under my bed (I thought it had died in the wall).
The odds are pretty good the squirrels are pilfering whatever feed your hippie uses for the rooster, which would be why there’s such a high concentration of them.
Happy hunting, amigo.
I remember having to search my Mom’s house for a dead mouse (a deadmau5?) a long time ago. I am terrified of having a dead anything in my walls. They smell like death and unhappiness.
As for the chickens, were you in a rural area or the city? I’m certain it’s illegal for this woman to have the rooster. I can’t understand why ANYONE would thing that a chicken coup is a good idea. It can’t be for the food, whether meat or eggs. I live one block from both a huge Kroger and a Popeye’s.
Many cities allow hen-keeping, because they are quiet and provide eggs, but I don’t think most cities allow roosters.
Chicken laws of some cities: http://home.centurytel.net/thecitychicken/chickenlaws.html
Houston, TX. Chickens may be kept on a lot which measures at least 65 feet X 125 feet: 30 chickens, turkeys, geese, ducks, peafowl, rabbits or guinea pigs or 40 of any combination of the above.
If this hippie gets 40 turkeys……..
Ugh.
P.S. Re: Fourth picture down in the chicken laws: Please enjoy the bird lice swarming your adorable little girl as she holds the chicken in her arms. Gross.
Ahhhhahahahahahaa.
“My family is a huge fan of your website.”
They need a new family.
If that hippie gets 40 turkeys, she’ll be utterly outnumbered and easily mauled to death within days.
Turkeys are mean-ass birds.
Damn right they are.
I would love to look out of my bathroom window to see her hippie body being hen-pecked by a rafter of turkeys (I looked it. A rafter? Odd.).
Ahh, a man can dream….
We lived on the eastern edge of town at the time. The San Diego riverbank ran right up along the rear of our property, and all sorts of critters used to turn up from time to time: skunks, raccoons, snakes. A huge white snowy owl lived in one of our trees for several years, and I’m absolutely certain it helped itself to one of my neighbor’s chickens from time-to-time. Not to mention my sister’s pet cat.
A couple of friends of mine, living more or less right smack in the middle of the city, have a skunk that’s made a home for itself under their back porch. Brazen little fucker even had the temerity to come wandering about during a cookout they were having a month or so ago. And I’ve seen a coyote wandering around in the same neighborhood.
The animals are taking over, man.
A skunk would get it, no questions asked. I’m not bathing in tomato juice. I don’t even like Bloody Maries. The animals are just taking back over I think. We’ve gotten lazy in our attempts to conquer everything. Good for them, too. They can have everything but my little apartment though. That’s the one corner of the world I will continue to defend. To the death. Like the Alamo. I just hope this ends differently than that…
Snowy owls, btw, may be the coolest looking animals on the planet. Absolutely stunning creatures.
Yeah. It used to come out and watch me while I mowed the lawn. Left owl pellets all over our back yard, too, which were always really handy for show n’ tell during science class.
Roosters should not be allowed within city limits. That’s ridiculous. I grew up on a farm, and they were annoying even in the open country. We also had a donkey that brayed obnoxiously every morning around 5 a.m. I’m glad your crazy neighbor doesn’t have a donkey too.
Havahart traps to catch the squirrels, maybe? The local animal shelter here will loan them out to people to catch feral cats and dogs, but I don’t know about squirrels. You could always lie and say they are for cat catching. (As long as Lenore’s Sugar Packet Policemen aren’t around to point fingers at you for your dishonesty, I mean.)
I hope the naughty squirrels will let you sleep tonight, Slade.
A donkey. Dear god no… those things are such jackasses.
I’m actually going to look into the Havahart traps. I have to catch one of these things for Zara anyway.
As for the morality of the lie, I wouldn’t even bat an eye in the process. Lenore’s Sugar Nazis be damned…
I’m rooting for the rooster. Sorry, it’s just the hippie lady in me.
Methinks perhaps this a little bit of karma for the vengeance you had on the real estate lady.
I think a kitty would probably solve your problem and you could board your kitty when you travel. Although your rent-a-pet idea is also pretty creative. I have blue healer that might like to eat the rooster and I’m sure my princess doggie would like to go at your squirrels.
You’re pulling for the chicken? Where is the love? That real estate lady totally started that. I should be on the good side of Karma by now, and I think that every day that goes by that I don’t sink a rock in that little bird’s head is another ten or so points to the positive in my account.
Let me know if you want to rent the dog out. I’ll have someone in our West Coast office get back to you.
Actually the visual of little old lady with hearts painted on her hippie fence kind of gave me a fright. As if it was a creepy look into what my future might hold. It scared the love right out of me.
My dogs don’t travel well. They’d want to eat you by the time they arrived. Besides you’ve moved on to other more creative ideas like the ding dog. lol.
It is creepy.. AND some of them have typos. Ex: “All livings beings deserve compassion.”
All livingS.
What the fuck does that even mean? Crazy and dumb. And they’re not even good hearts. I’m gonna sick my Ding-Dog on her.
Awesome tale! I could picture your adventures with all your furry, feathery, and flipped out neighbors! Good luck with your mini military maneuvers ; )
Thank you for the well wishes. I hope she has a group of supportive friends as well… she’s gonna need it.
Nobody paints a picture
like the Ham man.
I love Roosters.
with Dumplings
or Spanish rice.
War on brother.
Genesis 1:26 “and God gave man dominion over the animals…..”
dammit, 11! leave it to you to use the good book to justify slade’s killing thoughts.
happy?
geez, 11!
Yes indeed! I now have biblical justification for slaughter.
On the fifth day God created roosters, and on the sixth day Slade fixed that shit.
THWOP. I have permission Bird. Suck it.
‘On the fifth day God created roosters, and on the sixth day Slade fixed that shit.’
lord have MERCY! awesome. okay, here i am rollin’ again…
SUCK IT!
HA!
Danzig would straight
choke that chicken.
If you want the power
Then let it flow through
Damn skippy he would.
You got me in the mood to rock now, JMB.
Poison is not an option, it is M.A.D.
(Mutually Assured Destruction).
The swansong of the expiring rodent would be to choose a damp location within the wall next to your bed to lay down it’s mortal remains…and it would become the gift that keeps on giving, an olfactory warrior-rodent-zombie attack that cannot be defended against.
Yes, yes. I have decided that I’m doing anything but that. Just the thought is sickening….
I have never known someone who can attract the negative forces of the animal kingdom quite like you do:) It makes for good entertainment, though. You DO have your rabies shot up-to-date, RIGHT?
Nah. I’ll just go sit in another Arkansas hospital if I get bitten.
Bat Squirrel! Hahahaha
Another well done story, Slade. I feel the same way about animals and people. Both can be bastards but if I see an animal die in a movie it hits me in the gut. Yet slasher flicks are no problem. Go figure.
But if that lady ends up with 40 turkeys and NONE of them are dinner? Then she’s an asshole.
It’s awesome too that you own a slingshot. Personally I think it’s an underrated weapon. You never really run out of ammo. Just things to hit.
Btw, southparkstudios.com has every SP episode ever if you don’t have cable but want to stay current.
I’m with you. Somehow Old Yeller was heartbreaking but The Notebook was one of the funniest movies I’ve seen this decade.
Your South Park link has just cost me what would have been a productive week. I’m about to become very vegetative and useless I’m afraid.
Amen. Show me a picture of a wee doggie drawing its final breath and I’ll be an unintelligible blubbering mess for the better part of a week. Show me some ham fisted, weepy relationship crumbling onscreen, and between bites of my candy bar and the game of Wordscraper I’ve got going on my phone, I might stop long enough to make a comment about threesomes, but that would be about it.
CUPCAKE!
I can’t even read those words. I require intelligence and an environmental scan on every movie I watch, just in case there’s a potential doggy-going-to-heaven scene.
Pookie, no need to fret!
Let’s just turn that frown upside down!
God, do I want a dog now.
Ahhhhhh.
Puppies. Little fluffy angels.
The San Diego Chapter of the SHFC
Hahahahahahaha!
Pure awesome.
Cupcake,
I want a fan club too. Forget the stupid squirrels, I want a doggy fan club.
Pookie.
But.. but..they’re squirrels.
How can you be at war with squirrels? I want to be the Captain of the Squirrels. Why can’t they come and move my socks around? Hell, I’d buy them their own hosiery store if only they’d come and visit me.
I WANT A SQUIRREL!!!!!!!
WHERE’S MY SQUIRREL????
Oh, you’re going to get your squirrel. I’ll send you an entire bag full of squirrel pieces. These things are dicks. Bring a flute, O Captain, and come play the whole group of them (I tried to find the name for a group of squirrels but there’s not an official one. A dray? A scurry?) out of my house.
Take them back with you and rid New Zulland of its socks.
I don’t want squirrel pieces. I want a whole squirrel, intact.
See this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn1EAl7jdIk
There are no trained squirrels. That would at least give me hope. As for your squirrel pieces, just think of it as a puzzle. If you work really hard? Whole Squirrel 🙂
If you send me a bag of dismembered squirrels, Slade Ham – I will pay you back in spiders.
Whole spiders or spider pieces?
Whole Hairy Spiders.
Wait, will they eat squirrels?
No, just humans.
What if the squirrels have socks? They could be mistaken for human….
I want a new gravatar. A rooster, perhaps, hanging from a white picket fence with ugly hearts.
You kids have been busy! hahaha!
I may have to play on Photoshop today….
wait…squirrels eat socks? i thought goats ate socks. or moths. i didn’t know squirrels did. what kind of fucked up squirrel eats a sock?
Maybe they want to use the socks for nesting material? Mice and rats do that.
Maybe their feet are cold and their sharp teeth accidentally rip them whilst attempting to pull them on?
Or maybe they want to use as bags them to carry many acorns, like tiny squirrel Santas? Or maybe the squirrel children use them as sleeping bags for Squirrel Scouts camp? Or maybe they have paranoid squirrel schizophrenia, and they use the socks to black out their windows so the squirrel government can’t hear their squirrel thoughts?
Use them as bags, I mean. Jesus. Me want bags coffee now.
The squirrel government… next thing you know they’ll be after my aluminum foil… and my coffee bags 🙂
The goats don’t have the market cornered anymore. They used to, them and the moths, but it violated some anti-trust law and got shot down in animal court. Maybe kangaroo court.
So now the squirrels do it too.
Or maybe it’s just this one sick squirrel with a fetish.
maybe he was the squirrel that always got picked on in school, so now he’s acting out. i feel bad for him, personally. i think he just needs to be given some hamster food and a little plastic ball to wander around in.
Dammit, Lenore. The last thing I need is to start feeling sympathy for this little thing. Maybe he did get picked on in school. So what? He can’t climb a clock tower and snipe a few of his brethren like other trouble kids?
don’t you think he’d look so cute in a little plastic ball?
He really would. I can see it now, as it bounces out into traffic on the freeway… It’s adorable 🙂
don’t you dare.
Too late. It’s already been hit by a big SUV in my mind.
punishment.
I can’t be put on punishment if I’m already on punishment. That’s like a double-negative. It means I’m free again. Ha! Free to push squirrel-balls into the fast lane…..
no, i took you off punishment and then just now put you back on. you will be on super punishment if you kill a sweet little squirrel who just wants snuggles and little seeds (and socks) to eat and a plastic walking ball.
Super punishment? Why does no one punish the squirrel? All I want are my socks. I’m not even asking for seeds or snuggles or plastic balls.
Put Richrob on punishment too please.
on super punishment, there are no socks. NONE!
and yeah, richrob is on punishment, too. not sure why, but he’s there, alright.
Richrob shot some woodpeckers that were asking for it.
super punishment!!!
I refuse to go sit in the corner…
*crosses arms defiantly*
I suppose I’ll make the G-string squirrel now. Back in a jiffy.
Really? PC PETA freaks in Houston? I think the world is lost. That sort of thing is normal here in Seattle, but I thought it was legal to just shotgun what you didn’t like down there. Man. I got in trouble on facebook recently for posting “I’m getting really tired of these fully functional people bringing their ‘service animals’ into the grocery store.” It’s getting ridiculous. When we elevate the rights of animals the rights of humans goes down. Where will this lead? Doggie drinking fountains on the street while bums and people go thirsty? I’ve had enough. I’ve been thinking of starting a war on reality television. Maybe we can join forces, “The War on Squirrels and Reality Television.”
Believe it or not, we do still have the PETA-heads here. I thought we had pushed them all to Austin but clearly we missed a few. I will happily join forces with you – like a frustrated Voltron. I think all of this shit started the first time someone put a jacket on a dog. The problem is, I think I hate reality TV even more than I hate the squirrels and the PETA peeps.
Part of why I disconnected the cable….
Just put a flier on her door inviting her to the panda bear dinner you will be serving. She will be there. Then you take her fucking socks and give them to the squirrels.
She doesn’t wear socks. She plods around her animal shelter/compound barefoot. Stupid hippie…
And I have to be honest, all this talk of panda meat is making me hungry. Makes me think of that scene from Tropic Thunder.
slade:
first thanks for the laugh. NOT at you, pal, with you. Too funny. great write as usual. thanks for that.
‘I lay in bed at night and I hear them coming. Whispers and clicks in the dark, the invaders peer through the inky black and wait for exhaustion to drag me into an uneasy sleep. They organize and plot and look for the perfect opening, and then they come for my socks.’
brilliant. that truly made my day. so absurd. so slade. ha!
like some have mentioned before the problem is the woman. find a away to terrorize her. play tejano music at full blast. crank it to 11. play horror movies at full volume. one of those flicks with bloody buzz saws and screams. i just moved from a house that had a fucking rooster behind it. that bastard pissed me off. i hated him. i feel your pain.
the rooster’s death can come in the form of worms. NOL has a lizard that munches on worms. hit her up for the most delicious worms on the market. she’s in the know. buy some. coat them in some poison and chuck them over the fence. in a flash that stupid loud-beaked rooster will hit the worms and then hit the dirt. sure, not as fun as beaning the son of a bitch with a good stone, but it will be a CLEAN death. no blood. no death feathers strewn over the yard. just closed rooster eyes. closed for good.
i like squirrels. yeah, probably because they’re damn cute and are always hoping around doing stupid shit. but they are rodents. they are scavengers. they are a pest. now, listen, slade, don’t cock the slingshot full bore just go half way, aim, and hit one in the ass. give em’ a nice welt. trust me, my friend, the word will get around. okay, with that i’m out. good luck. and keep us posted.
Thanks, Reno. After my bout with the Tejano neighbors, I don’t think I could handle it on my end, regardless of how much it pissed her off. The poison worms, man. Now THAT’S the way to go. Close its eyes forever, like a Lita Ford song. G’night Sweet Rooster-Prince.
There does need to be a speed adjustment to the slingshot, more than just “my best guess”. I’d like to send it back into the trees with a message. “What happened to your leg?” his friends would ask.
“That sock guy? Yeeeah… he will FUCK you up.”
hahahahahaha!
Superworms would be your best bet. Like their name suggests, they’re huge and apparently delicious. My cats and dog both get pissy when Jose, my bearded dragon, gets the lot.
You can order them online or you can find them at your nearest PetCo. Any powdered poison would work and that would be the end of your rooster.
Also, you can buy squirrel repellant. All natural and you won’t have dead animals stinking up the place. Plus, YOU CAN’T KILL THE SQUIRRELS! They are too cute. socks are cheap.
How bout we all send Slade socks for christmas?
and whiskey in hopes he forgets about the little creatures.
You’re right. They really are too cute to kill. I will sit by my mailbox now, awaiting my socks and whiskey.
Or a box of poisoned superworms.
Whatever Santa wants to bring…
This is so funny Slade! We had squirrels once. I HATED them! It sounded like they were tap-dancing in the walls. I had visions of taking a sledge hammer, smashing open all the walls and . . . I don’t know what I’d do next, I just wanted to rip open the walls so they’d stop all that scrambling up and down them!
I’m sorry about the loss of your socks.
My mind plays such crazy tricks on me when I try to envision what they’re really doing when they make all this noise. The sound gets so amplified. I mean, I know they’re rolling nuts into the corner, but it sounds like they’re playing rugby. And inside the walls…. I don’t even know what the inside of a wall looks like.
I’m going to start collecting sympathy cards for my socks.
They’re like a bunch of drunk lunatics–keeping strange hours, always tumbling around, partying like mad! We hired someone to get rid of them. He offered two ways: live traps with food to lure them in, or the guillotine. I wanted the guillotine, that’s how pissed I was. My daughters INSISTED we use live traps. So they were trapped, driven forty miles away (apparently they’ll come back if you don’t go at least forty miles) and set free. Allegedly. My husband thinks the drive is a story–what guy in a truck full of guillotines would really drive a squirrel forty miles out into the woods?
Yeeeah, that dude just leaves and kills them. For sure.
As for the trapping thing, if I really thought that it was just one or two annoying animals, I would be all over it, and that will still most likely be my solution, but…. There are a billion of these motherfuckers in my neighborhood. They’ll just send reinforcements once I take POWs.
Partiers, all of them. From 4-6 and then again at night. Sometimes they wait until I take a shower and then come grab the sock. It would be funny if it weren’t so annoying.
Slade…
I know exactly what youre going through. I live on the 3rd floor where the squirrels get in the attic. Its fucking creepy man….especially when I come home from work around 5pm, sit on the couch and hear nothing til 10pm. wtf?? squirrels scurrying above me in the middle of the night? AAAAAGGHH! Twice my landlord has ‘fixed’ the way theyre getting in. I scattered moth balls all over the attic and purchased some device from home depot that creates a ‘silent to us but loud to them’ sound maker. Its been a month…so far, so good.
I think there’s actually some sound generator up there, but it’s obviously not working like it should. Do moth balls work?
Well….I dont know if its the sound generator or the moth balls but I havent heard anything in a few weeks. Try it, cant make things worse right?
Quite true. Someone else just told me they also sell crystalized fox pee for just this sort of thing.
One must wonder how far I’ll really go to stop them, hahaha.
crystalized fox pee? I dont know whats worse…being the collector of that or the seller? lol
I can’t bring myself to go ask for it anywhere – not that I’m even sure who sells it. Seems an odd question to ask.
lmao…shop online.
http://www.yardlover.com/urine-repellents
But then my mailman will judge me. Maybe they ship fox pee the way they do porno, hahahaha. All wrapped in black or plain brown paper or whatever.
Oh wait. That’s a lot easier to buy when it has the word “repellent” on the side,.
pretty cheap too! Good luck!
So many great lines, man. Love especially the bit about painting a hole on the wall, and how you’re using rocks instead of ball bearings because you don’t want to leave behind evidence. Hahaha.
At least the squirrels haven’t carted off your bottle of Jameson yet, right?
I have a story a bit like this. One morning, early, I noticed a weird metallic sound coming from somewhere in the attic of my house. Or it seemed like the attic. It would last for two or three seconds and stop. A few mornings with nothing, and then it would happen again. It began to happen more and more often and it was waking me up too early and I had no idea what it was. Whenever I looked for it, it would stop. It could have been a ghost waving a giant hand saw back and forth. Such a strange sound.
One morning I went outside and caught the culprit in the act. It was a woodpecker. He was happily banging away on the anti-bird housing at the opening of my chimney. By now I was suffering from insomnia and I knew he had to be stopped. I went to my dad’s house and retrieved my old pellet gun, the one with the scope on it. The next morning I went outside, ready to shoot, and then I noticed something. The woodpecker was communicating. He’d bang on the chimney, and then in the trees above me, another woodpecker would respond with his own banging. I surmised it was a mating ritual of some kind. I had the bird in my crosshairs, and I felt guilty, and I thought about not shooting it, I really did. I have a soft place in my heart for animals, all animals. But all I could see was morning after morning of not being able to sleep, and survival instinct kicked in, and I pulled the trigger.
And oh, the beautiful silence. So sweet it was. For one day.
The next morning the banging returned. I couldn’t believe it. I went outside and that’s when I realized the other woodpecker was on my chimney, communicating, looking for its friend who was longer there. I felt terrible. I really did. I knew it was awful for me to have robbed this beautiful woodpecker of its mate.
Then I put that one in the crosshairs and shot it, too.
I’m cackling at my computer, hahahahahaha. I thought of you when I wrote this actually, and HOPED that it would elicit this very story.
You are an inspiration, sir.
CLANG, CLANG, CLANG.
BANG!
That story deserves to be a post all on it’s own really.
Even better than the story is I just told it to you with no recollection of having already done so. And so begins the slow, downward spiral into dementia.
You shot a woodpecker, Richard Cox?
Two of them.
You did, Rich. It was while you were down here though, so it is quite possible that you and I were reeeeeeeally drunk. Was the rooster crowing then? That may have been what prompted it. Nevertheless, it remains the most honest story. I love it.
You can’t be mad at him Zara, hahahahaha.
Yes. Yes I can.
I grew up in Texas and went bird hunting many times as a kid, ZaraPotts, but when I was 18 or so I decided I wasn’t a fan of killing things anymore. The only thing I ever kill now are scorpions that find their way into my house. I was stung in bed by a scorpion once, so those fuckers get no mercy from me.
The two woodpeckers are an exception fueled by self preservation. I have enough trouble sleeping as it is. I can’t have a bird banging on my house every morning at 6 o’clock.
Slade, I don’t remember the rooster, but since I don’t remember telling you the woodpecker story, I cannot be considered a reliable source.
Why didn’t you catch the woodpeckers and send them over to me? I want a woodpecker.
I WANT A WOODPECKER AND A SQUIRREL AND A CHIPMUNK AND A HUMMINGBIRD AND A RACCOON.
You’ve seen the roof of my house, ZaraPotts. You tell me how I’m supposed to get up there and catch an animal with wings sitting on top of my chimney!
Get a net. Throw the net over the chimney and catch the bird. Then send it to me.
Easy.
ZaraPotts. You have a solution for everything. Just get stateside and come rid us of all of our animal woes, will ya already?
Yes. Yes I will. I will be Queen ZaraPotts -friend of woodland creatures.
I shall command my animal armies to rise up against you and Richrob and put you both in a little plastic spinning wheel.
Then you’ll be sorry.
Yes, yes. And then Lenore can push us out into traffic.
USE YOUR POWERS FOR GOOD, ZARAPOTTS!
Or else I’m bringing back Bon Jovi…..
The difference between my solution and hers is mine was actually feasible, as opposed to a magic net that I can toss 25 feet into the air and will capture a woodpecker (who is able to fly) and bring him to the ground, injury-free.
I’m also proud to say I got each woodpecker on the first shot, from about fifty feet and only able to see the top half of the bird, and I hadn’t fired a gun in at least fifteen years.
Okay. You’ve gone too far this time.
Threatening me with BJ is a step too far. I shall now loose the dogs of war.
Come, Squirrels!
Arise, Chipmunks!
Fly to me, Woodpeckers!
Cute animals of the USA, rise up and go and annoy the goddamn Texans.
Watch out.
Jesus Christ, ZaraPotts. Don’t abbreviate Bon Jovi like that! I choked on my coffee before I realized what you really meant.
And yeah, I said choked.
HAHAHAHAHAAHA. That was my plan.
Makes you want to spit, don’t it?
Spitters are quitters.
HAHAHAHA. I had to go back and read my comment. BJ? Huh? Ohhhhhh, yes. The Jovi. There’s definitely a Slippery When Wet joke here somewhere…
Ohh, you’re halfway there…
Take my hand and you’ll make it, I swear
how much buckshot can a woodpecker duck
if a woodpecker could duck buckshot?
Oh. My. GOD.
I once beat a friend with the butt of his own BB gun for training it on a furry animal in my presence.
This is not good. Not good at all.
I don’t know what to do with this information.
Aaaahhhhahahahahaha. Becky doesn’t like the dead woodpeckers?
Someone build me a real phaser and next time I’ll set it to “stun.” In the meantime, woodpeckers stay away from my house.
I vaguely remember THIS being the reason you hadn’t posted this before, hahaha.
I’m going to whistle my little squirrel flute tune and command all the gangs of squirrels to go to your house and Richrob’s house and bite you both while you sleep.
Woodland creatures are not to be molested! I don’t want to see it, I don’t want to hear about it. What people do on their own time is their business, but once they start bragging about it, all bets are off.
I told my friend, “Don’t you dare raise that gun at that animal while I’m standing here.” And he thought it was funny to taunt me. And he raised the gun and started to aim. And it ended up being not so funny for him. I, on the other hand, was very pleased with the outcome.
Those better not have been Piliated Woodpeckers, Richard. They’re endangered, you know.
I’m not sure what kind of woodpeckers they were. I hope they weren’t an endangered species. But in any case they’re especially endangered if they attack my chimney every morning before the sun rises.
I fucking knew you were going to say that.
Some super dude thing like, “Every animal that makes noise like that at 6 am outside my house is endarged! Har har har. *burp* *fart*”
My friend thought he was funny too, Buster.
That’s right.
Buster.
It made ME laugh.
Maybe you should take Richard with you as a guest performer on your Furry Creatures and Endangered Species Eradication Comedy Tour.
So… now the question is this. It is possible that the creature that is sneaking in is a rat. There are still squirrels, but I don’t think they’re going anywhere but the attic. This is speculative, but highly likely.
Hypothetically, you’re in my shoes. Kill or no kill?
Remember, we’re talking about a fucking rat.
In your house.
wait….woodpeckers have FUR??????
Here we have a glimpse into the etymology of Becky’s Brain. When her grandpa said “those little peckers are all through these woods” she naturally made the literal connection…
It’s Minnesota, Dwoz. Even the birds wear coats up there.
I do understand that birds have feathers. Sorry for the confusion. I’ll try to speak more literally in the future so you can understand, dwoz. It is also entirely possible that it was a city or town or hamlet creature and not a woodland one, lest that bit is causing you consternation as well.
I’m just now thinking that maybe the woodpecker is really a squirrel incognito. They are resourceful and devious.
I have a squirrel problem too. There’s a huge pile of dirt appearing to the side of my barn, which means that the squirrels have dug a vast catacomb underneath. I’m just waiting for the barn to disappear one day, into the massive sinkhole. Squirrels aren’t really adept with the engineering aspects of their work.
I don’t know if my experience is unique, but my horses kill rats. They stomp them. I’ve found about four rat-pancakes over the past few years in the paddocks. However, they don’t seem interested in the squirrels, or the squirrels are just too quick.
It has to be that the squirrels are too fast. Once you stomp, you can’t stop. Rat pancakes… Maybe I should get a horse for my apartment.
I am soooo tempted to post a piece that’s been spinning around my hard drive for a couple of years. It’s called “Trespassers Will Be Shot,” and it’s about shooting and/or trapping furry things, but not feathered ones.
It’s about graded responses.
Well, you have my curiosity piqued now. I will say this – clearly the audience is split on killing versus not. I think you should definitely post it.
RICHROB L COX!
I appreciate your ninja squirrel, but it is unacceptable that you know Richrob’s middle name and not mine….
That’s all I know- “L”. I wikipedia’d it. I wikipedia’d yours, too, but your middle name wasn’t there. Thus, I assumed you don’t have one.
Oh! Squirrel socks! I WANT A SQUIRREL WITH SOCKS ON!!!
Surprisingly, even in the internet age, I cannot find even one picture of that anywhere online.
How about this, ZaraPotts?
The fucking thing stole Lenore’s gloves?!?!?!
And put on heels.
Out of curiosity, what was the search string you used to find that? I tried every combination of squirrels and socks….
Did you make that abomination, Richrob???
I Googled “squirrel” and then “socks” and I did a little mumbo jumbo in Photoshop. The model’s legs were WAY thinner than the squirrel’s. And longer. Hahahaha.
So yes, ZaraPotts! I made it! Aren’t you happy??
It’s sick! Sick. Sick. Sick!
Noe noe noe! That’s what you said you wanted!
She DID ask for it.
So did you Photoshop the nuts on him too?
I did not ask for that! I was picturing a little fluffy GIRL squirrel in little white socks.
Jesus. Next you’ll put “panties” (bleurgh) on it. GROSS.
No, those were already there. But there were other squirrel photos I could have chosen. Haha.
I like how baldly you request these Photoshop terrors, ZaraPotts. What you really mean is, “Please Photoshop panties onto this squirrel so I can pretend to be even MORE offended!”
I’m on to you.
Goddamn it.
You got me.
What I really want is a picture of a squirrel in a g-string.
You know he is currently Googling pictures of g-strings and squirrels to make a new mash up. You KNOW he is.
Which has to land him on some sort of watch list i would think.
I dread to think…
He’s totally going to be on a watchlist. And about time too.
I was already on that watchlist ever since I tagged one of my TNB posts “underage Brazilian girls.”
So wait, no squirrel in a g-string?
Don’t encourage him, Slade! Don’t!!
Encourage? No. At this point I’m practically begging.
Here you go, ZaraPotts and Slade. Squirrel panties!
This is the most disturbingly awesome thing I’ve ever seen in my life.
I had to add volume to the business end of the panties to contain his swollen nad satchel.
Orrrrr…. you could have just snipped them via Photoshop and made him a girl squirrel. I mean, he’s pretty much lost all his dignity already.
You can’t beat a squirrel wearing Lenore gloves on his legs and carrying his swollen gonads around in a blue thong.
Can you?
Well, I suppose you could beat him… if that thong weren’t in the way.
Thanks for making me throw up in my own mouth and for giving me nightmare visions of my beloved squirrel friends.
HA. Now give him a lightsaber, Richard. Please?
I’m starting to feel like a monkey. Hahaha.
Squirrel in socks and panties and holding a lightsaber
Now make him hold a copy of Banned for Life.
DANCE, MONKEY!
He needs a jaunty cap. Or a viking horns helmet.
A viking horns helmet with yellow braids coming down the side.
He’ll be battle-ready.
You gave it a lightsaber. Bwahahahahahaha!
I love it when Richrob starts Photoshopping. Next thing you know, we’ll all have viking-jedi-squirrel gravitars.
Battle Squirrel Gravatars!
No way, eh, on the Jedi-Viking-Squirrel. I can’t have the same thing as everybody else!
My squirrel needs little hockey skates and a stick and a black eye. Maybe a tiger-skin cape. Oh yeah.
A cape like Beckham’s here.
http://www.runofplay.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/tiger.jpg
It should probably also have his tiny little mohawk. Or maybe the tiger’s head would be his helmet.
Hockey Goon Zulu Warrior Squirrel.
Richard? Where are you?
Richrob has his work cut out for him. I on the other hand just opted for a simple type of hero:
Jedi America
And the Gravatar! Well, played Mr. Ham.
Nice perspective on the shield, btw.
HEY
Why do you have one already????
Look out for these guys, though:
http://s-ak.buzzfed.com/static/imagebuzz/web02/2009/3/5/1/darth-squirrel-needs-love-too-21861-1236233604-5.jpg
Why, God? Why?
The Darth Maul squirrel has me in tears.
That’s the most awesome picture ever. And thanks on the shield. I originally put it on the other arm but it looked too, well, Photoshopped. God bless the transform tools. And that Darth Maul squirrel is BAD ASS.
And Zara, just get it on board. It’s so much easier if you don’t resist.
As it turns out, dressing up squirrels is a bit of a cottage industry on the internet.
http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/450_sugar.jpg
I even found one of a squirrel in tighty whities.
Is that The Golden Compass squirrel? Clearly that thing was dead before they put that ridiculous sweater on him… or else he must have killed himself shortly thereafter.
I understand virtually nothing about what is happening in that photograph.
I’m sure it’s not what it was supposed to be, but this is what it reminded me of in my head, from Pullman’s book, or rather the atrocious movie based on it:
The Golden Compass
I know the movie, but what do the hammers and the shopping cart and the Tide detergent have to do with it?
BTW, I don’t know if you can see my new gravatar yet, but I can, and the two of us discussing how any photo on earth doesn’t make sense is patently absurd, given our new identities.
I was just referring to a thing riding a polar bear. You don’t see a lot of that really.
What in god’s name is your squirrel carrying? A dual-bladed lightsaber-pitchfork? This makes me smile.
Light trident, dude.
Weapon of choice of Neptune, Shiva, and tinfoil-helmeted red squirrels everywhere.
Standard issue.
Ancient weapons and hokey religions are no match for a woodpecker with a good blaster at his side.
Okkkkieeee, Lieutenant Geekpants.
Lance Corporal Woody should look where he’s shooting! GEEZ!
I’m about to revoke your Gravatar Photoshop privileges.
You wouldn’t DARE!
Besides. It was funny. Woody. Shooting.
I was only trying to let on that I noticed you’d changed it. But fine. See if I say anything next time you get your hair cut.
Hahahahaha. LOVE it Rich. The war has begun.
Can you make me a lemur on a leopard with a lightsaber in a lagoon?
I’ll concede it was funny. 😉
I was in the middle of changing my own when you said that Gloria. A cheetah for me, but Jedi still:
My leaping Jedi Cheetah
Awesome. I guess he just flies, since he obviously can’t hit the ground with that saber in his paw.
He does indeed. Or he’s bipedal. Haven’t decided yet. It’s hard to kill a woodpecker if you can’t fly though.
Oh, and here, Gloria:
Lemur, Leopard, Lagoon, and Lightsaber
The leopard and lemur in the lagoon.
Bahahahahahahahaha.
That’s just about the greatest thing in the whole world ever.
Thanks 🙂 Whoever gave me my first pirated copy of Photoshop had no idea what they were unleashing on the world.
Oooh suddenly EEEveryone’s gotta have a big cat.
Okay. I give in.
I definitely have the best flag though.. (Thanks Slade!)
I wish he were hitchiking. Like, I looked at him standing there with his NZ flag and wanted so badly for him to be sticking his little thumb out.
“Goin’ to meet my new friend Zara! NZ or bust!”
I know! He looks so HOPEFUL!!
We do pick the strangest trends to become our gravatars. He could have been hitchhiking now that I think about it. I did him as more of a battlefield-ambassador-squirrel though. Kind of the last face you see before Becky and I come swooping in with our lightsabers.
I love you people. I think I love you more than my own children.
I am way cooler than any bunch of children… of course, there’s not way any children could ever get this drunk…
I should note that I proofread this for twenty minutes before I clicked submit…
The lemur on the leopard in the lagoon – I’ll comment more when I stop laughing…
Slingshot!
Where were you the two winters I was home-invaded by squirrels? Ohhhhh the damn squirrels…they turned me purely deranged…I even used a French style rolling pin to smash a hole in my ceiling to try and manually drag those fuckers out.
So wait… what was the resolution? I don’t even own a rolling pin. The slingshot it may be…
Hang on…we’ve HAD this conversation before. Did you mention your squirrel situations in a previous post? I am having serious deja-vu…
I’ve never brought up squirrels. Not in a post anyway. I am apt to comment drunk though, so I forget a lot of them, hahaha. I did have some in the roof of my old house, but I never wrote about it. Strange.
I don’t have the deja vu feeling though, so it may just be you.
But you have me wondering now…..
I retract my statement about not remembering. Earlier today I had a brief flash of you and I talking about this on another thread. Either about the ones in the roof or in some other context. I thought it was on my post about the Realtor and the things I was doing to scare potential buyers away, but I looked and it wasn’t there.
With that said, everyone of my posts somehow spirals wildly out of control into conversations about the most random of subjects, so it could have happened anywhere, hahaha.
If I find it, I’ll say so.
When this post gets bumped to ‘Inside TNB,’ I nominate this photo be used:
Squirrel with Machine Gun
Ohhhh, you MUST point that out to Olear. Hahahaha, that picture is perfect.
Calling Greg Olear. Greg Olear, are you there?
Greg was apparently not listening.
I like his red eyes, Jeffrey. Like he sees blood.
Squirrels — Havahart + laundry sink, you’re done.
Rooster — I think the poison suggestions are the best ones. Or a violent emetic. Or convince her to get a large drake. I had a Muscovy duck once that beat the shit out of every rooster in the village, tread on all the hens, and had the most amazing penis imaginable. The duck will silence the rooster, see? Then you deal only with quacking.
Quacking is nothing. I can deal with quacking. Plus, ducks always make me think of Mitch Hedberg. It starts about a minute in: The Ducks Would All Like Sun Chips
A big, well hung duck to kick some rooster ass is just what this neighborhood needs.
And the Havahart traps are on my to-do list tomorrow I’ve decided. Seems to be the popular opinion, and definitely the least messy. After all, a .22 in my dining room can’t be good for the floors.
The duck well-hungedness is hidden until required. If you Google “duck penis” you’ll find videos. In the meantime:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/01/science/01duck.html?_r=1
My duck had a corkscrew dick. When he was finished, he would flop over on his back, quacking, wings spread but jerking, duck feet in the air, and this amazing corkscrew penis — probably 6 inches long — draped on the ground.
It was so funny that the village kids would start to scream “the ducks are fucking!” and people would drop what they were doing and flock around to see the post-coital duck dick. I swear it’s true. The duck became a porn star because there hadn’t been any ducks in the village for many years (they don’t do well there) so most people hadn’t ever seen ducks fucking. It’s a treat.
Don, you tuck these little gems into my comments section and I don’t know that I can ever repay you for it. You do what StumbleUpon only dreams of. Two things I most certainly didn’t know:
Some ducks grow phalluses as long as their entire body.
That will get you some attention in a bar…
Female ducks seem to be equipped to block the sperm of unwanted males.
With all of our genetic engineering, this is the trait we should be attempting to breed into the next batch of humans…
Arrrgh. There’s a joke from the sixties that I can’t remember, that featured a guy with a dick so long he drapes it over his shoulder and walks into a bar . . . and then what? Shit!
I suppose I could Google “long dick jokes” + bar but that would probably generate five million hits.
Always glad to provide bizarre tidbits. Here’s another duck:
http://www.nmr.nl/nmr/pages/showPage.do?instanceid=16&itemid=1930&style=default
And finally, I won’t tell my favorite “fuck the duck” joke except I will say it ends with the Vicar saying “Oh goody. May I dangle my balls in the fruit salad?” You could look it up.
An other drake mallard raped the corpse almost continuously for 75 minutes.
Arrrgh! Hahahaha. Wow.
And a cursory search for your “fuck the duck” joke didn’t turn up the joke itself. Might have been the key words I used. It did turn up a guy’s MySpace profile though, that included this under his “General Likes” tab:
Being a dinner guest and dropping my balls in the salad bowl and yelling, “Naughty lettuce, tickling my balls. Somebody stop the naughty lettuce!”
It’s an Australian joke. As you probably know, the Aussies love to make fun of the whinging Pommies (=Brits).
I’ll tell it in shorthand.
Father is carving the Sunday duck, but it slips and slide across the table.
Father yells, “Fuck the duck!”
Son asks Mother, “What does that mean?”
Mother says, “It means he’s going to carve the duck for us to eat.”
Next week the Vicar comes to dinner (you can see this coming, right?)
Mother brings the duck out of the kitchen.
At the table, the son says, “Vicar, Daddy’s about to fuck the duck!”
And the Vicar says, “Oh goody, May I dangle my balls in the fruit salad?”
Hehehehehehe. Ahhh, thank you for that 😀
Funny shit, man. I tried to find you a clip of Bob Ross talking about his happy little squirrel friends, but there seems to be a dearth of Bob Ross videos on the interwebz.
I sympathize, truly. I have a very small planter space outside – my entire “garden” area of my own in existence in the whole world. I planted some bulbs in there at the start of fall. And SOME FUCKING SQUIRREL keeps digging up my hyacinth. I do not hurt animals, but I’m willing to irritate it a lot. My brother in law recommended wiring the bulb with a 9 Volt battery so that the squirrel gets a little jolt when the fucker tries to dig up my bulb again. But I haven’t done it. I thought about it though.
Seriously, this piece is really frickin’ funny. 😀
Oh, and great tags.
I remember your garden, or at least a very wonderful piece about it a while back. That squirrel is fucking around on your sacred ground. He deserves to have the bulb wired. Maybe you and I could start an anti-squirrel terrorism class. I, too, am hesitant to kill them. I see a day of trapping and relocating in my future I’m afraid.
But I just may hotwire my sock first, hahahaha.
I was happy with the tags as well. Thanks for noticing.
Don’t feel bad – squirrels have brought down the NASDAQ at least twice. At least it isn’t some goddamn Mynocks.
A guy I used to be friends with had a rooster. He liked the fact that it was, basically, re-affirming its own masculinity in the eyes of the neighbourhood every time it crowed. Kind of like Kool Keith:
‘Represent what? My nuts!’
I picture him a little cockier every morning. “Cockier”. Probably the origin of the word now that I think about it.
And Mynocks would suck. They’ll chew through the power cables, or so I hear.
[…] on by Slade’s piece and Richard’s comment I cry Havoc! and let slip this one. I’d like to claim I knocked it off today […]
I agree with Becky. These squirrel bastards are in league with those awful Underpants Gnomes.
I’m not really sure what to suggest as a viable means of disposing of your animal foes. Have you thought about fire? Fire kills things, and they’re fun to start.
By God, David, you may be on to something. This may be the exact motivation I needed to finally build a flamethrower. I need a winter project anyway.
Our family once owned a rooster who at some point in time developed dislike for my sister. He’d pounce on her/chase her if she was not accompanied by my father. She had to remain indoor all the time that guy was out. Dad finally killed him. It tasted good, my sister says.
And my mother has always been at war with rodents who dig up her garden nightly. (They’ve been winning, by a wide margin.)
Go after the squirrels. I have a feeling it’ll scare the rooster. Kill ’em, Slade.
Birds do that sometimes I’ve noticed – getting moody towards a particular person. My grandmother’s parrot HATED me. Always.
And I bet your sister did enjoy the rooster. Nothing tastes as sweet as victory, they say 🙂
Hey I just got here, what did I miss? Anybody up for a brief recap? From the looks of it, I was right to be scared of the light sabers.
But I do like lines like “I lay in bed at night and I hear them coming. Whispers and clicks in the dark” that accelerate the piece until you hit maniacal by the end. I grew up in a woodsy neighborhood where squirrels ruled and we the human trespassers seemed to be carefully watched from the trees at all times. I was lucky to make it out alive now that I think about it.
You missed little, Nathan. Just the typical nonsensical spiral of my comments section, hahaha. Lightsabers and squirrels began to surface after Richard Cox Photoshopped a squirrel in a bikini wearing Lenore’s socks. It was odd.
Thanks for noticing some of the lines. Aside from just the humorous angle, I really enjoyed writing it.
I know that feeling of being watched well. Woods-walking is a favorite of mine. All the creatures do seem like sentries posted to make sure that we don’t get out of line as we pass through.
You may also want to read this very funny blog post by Johnny Virgil on chipmunks and see if this will work for you: http://15minutelunch.blogspot.com/2010/06/just-chip-of-iceberg.html
It does seem that no matter how I go about trapping these things – whether I cook up a first class appetizer course or not – I’m going to have to drive them far, far away so that they don’t come back.
What a fun read. I feel his pain. Thanks for the link, Kativa.
Okay, I was going to get a squirrel-with-a-bazooka-rocket-launcher gravatar to accompany this comment, but, alas, I am not as talented with photoshop as Richard. Just imagine it. Sorry about your animal battles, but, damn it makes for a fun read! The squirrels terrorizing my home are fairly focused on my dog. I swear — they’ve learned to *imitate her bark* because doing so drives her mad.
I think I can handle these guys, at least as long as they don’t start imitating ME. You’re poor dog…
And I found THIS online. No Photoshop necessary 🙂
What!? I imagine it, and you make it a reality. Wait, wait — I’m off to make a more extensive wish list for you to work with ….
Clearly, I am doing Custom Work
Oh Slade, these things certainly happen to you simply so you can write great stories!
I just read through all the hundreds of comments — you guys are all certifiable. Thanks for all the great laughs and avatars.
I’m well versed in the Havahart traps…
Many years ago my mothers beautiful rose garden was suffering from the plague of bunnies. Because her daughter is a huge advocate for all things furry, great and small, she opted for a Havahart. It was successful almost immediately. My father was a park ranger in the summer and he decided to relocate the little bunny to the state park to live out his bunny life. He drove the little dude 21 miles to the park, walked it 20 feet or so into the woods and pointed the exit into the forest. The bunny quickly exited, pulled a u-turn and ran into the road where it was promptly squashed by an 18 wheeler.
The end.
That’s the best ending to a story ever. That’s why I have absolutely zero issues killing flies or mosquitoes. They’re lifespans are so short to begin with, does it really matter?
As for the comments, if I’m going to be certifiable, what good company to be in, no? I’m so glad you enjoyed the read.
I may have some useful advice for you. My father-in-law was a good egg. In his late 70’s he grew to love to watch the squirrels outside his window and even named a few that he’d see most often. He took to feeding them corn in a feeder something like this. http://www.bestnest.com/bestnest/RTProduct.asp?SKU=AUD-NASQCHAIR
He attached it to a large oak tree right out his front window. One afternoon his favorite little friend was sitting in the chair enjoying his corn snack when a sudden thunderstorm broke out. The tree was struck by lightning and little Frankie was fried in his little squirrel electric chair.
God speed.
You’re stories remind me of Duke’s children’s books, hahaha. They all start off happy enough….
p.s. Richard!!! Coxy!! Pecker killer!!
Wood Pecker Cox
[high five to Gloria]
“…and that is why I bought the slingshot.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
(I fucking love you, Slade.)
I fucking love you back. Madly. I’m back in the Springs at the end of April btw. You guys in?
If you didn’t hear my shout of happiness all the way over there just now, then you need to get your ears cleaned. YES YES YES.
(Oh, and prepare to be destroyed.)
Not only did I not hear them, I have absolutely zero recollection of having written that, hahahaha.
Wow.
You are so going DOWN.
🙂
It’s a squirrel thing. Eyesight and memory…not so good.
I think the Jameson might have had something to do with it…
Only thing worse than a squirrel drunk on Jameson is a squirrel fighting while drunk on Jameson. Mistakes are made. Here – hold still. I’m going to hit you with my teeny tiny nunchucks.
Can I just say that I am super mad that I didn’t think to do a ninja squirrel? That may be my Sunday project now….
It was a natural progression from the first pic Richard did with the squirrel wearing Lenore’s socks and his ball sack tied twice around its ankles. Nunchucks…nutchucks…something is wrong with my brain, Slade.
That is the understatement of the year 😉
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! THESE squirrels!
Hahaha, yes… THESE squirrels. Clearly my own arrogance just went ahead and assumed you had read it 😉
I’m locking my trapdoor now…
Damn.
I left a comment and it was eaten, (probably by a squirrel,) between you and Singapore, where I am now.
I’ll try one more time.
an air gun to scare the rooster to some other yard far, far away.
The squirrels are a bigger problem than you understand.
We had them living in our attic in the winter in Illinois one year, thinking we were giving the cute little things a warm place to stay.
They ate our phone lines.
(This was before cell phones.)
They ate our electric lines.
They ate everything.
We had to get a pest guy to evict them,
then a builder guy to close up all the holes,
then an electrician to put BACK the electricity,
then a phone guy to put back the phone wires.
You gotta get rid of the squirrels.
If they eat the lines and the power goes out and there is no light, I will resort to living like the cavemen.
Which means I will have to hunt my food.
Which means those fucking squirrels are in trouble…
Safe travels through Singapore.
But Slade,
Why not just eat them NOW,
BEFORE they eat your wires?
Then you won’t have to live like a cave man.
It’s the catching them part that is vexing me. I think I would be more motivated if I were starving to death.
Plus, I think one of them has turned into a rat. That, or it shaved its tail.
I’m having hell, AND I keep stepping in these stupid glue traps.
Oh NO!
Slade, now you are in trouble!
It is a well-known fact that when squirrels are getting ready for war,
they shave their tails!
Gird your loins for battle!
omg, sooo funny.
i’d be freaked if i knew squirrels came into my apartment. they’re just rats with fluffy tails.
I’m starting to realize that now, though I’m not convinced one of the trespassers isn’t an ANCTUAL rat.
Thanks for stopping by, stranger. Hope all is well 🙂
Cupless Bra…
The Nervous Breakdown…
glitzy dog collar…
[…]Slade Ham | The Dogs of War | The Nervous Breakdown[…]…
halsband hunter…
[…]Slade Ham | The Dogs of War | The Nervous Breakdown[…]…