The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

A week after my birthday, my immediate family gathered together for hot dogs & cake.  My brother-in-law was not there.  He went to some motorcycle rally which apparently my sister really wanted to go to.  She expressed this to my own husband as they smoked outside.  The week of my birthday was no good because a craw fish fry was going on at the Harley Davidson dealership.

The same thing happened last year and it worked out for me because mom cooked chicken fried steak, invited me & Shawn & told no one else.  That's just fine by me.  Next year I think I'll just tell everyone to go do what they want to do; I don't want anyone mad because the day of my birth fell on an inconvenient day of the year.  More hot dogs for me!

(My mother-in-law always places my name on a cake along with our niece's on that side who has a birthday the same week as mine.  Double the cake, double the happiness.  And no one complained about there....)

Earlier that morning, I'd cleared some stuff from the kitchen and Shawn claimed to have stepped in blood.  "That's a stain on the floor," I said matter-of-factly.  "That's where the fridge was."
"No, it's wet!  I stepped in it!"  You sure did.  HA HA!

I checked the pets and no one was cut or bleeding so I kind of forgot about it.  An hour later I heard a repeated squeal coming from the back portion of the house.  We have an additional that built in the 70's.  It's complete with horrible drafts and a fire place.  It's kind of turned into a junk room because the temperatures run in the extremes in there.  I'd placed a large piece of cardboard in front of the fire place and stacked some junk in front of it.

I thought a bird had gotten in maybe.  It was such an odd sound.  The cat was poking around in the laundry room, where I had recently stacked some of Shawn's garage garbage in the back half.  She kept poking around the crates but  never found anything.  I checked the den and nothing was scurrying about.  The cardboard covering the fireplace was slightly askew.  Hmm.

Call me crazy but I know I've heard chattering or scuttling or something moving around in that den for months.  I figured it was a mouse but I was afraid to lay out traps or poison because the stupid cat would surely find it.  I mean, either the mouse or the poison.  Either one.

After the birthday festivities, we stopped off at my mother-in-law's to show of the kitchen tile we'd picked out that morning and headed home.  Once inside, I headed straight for the kitchen and dumped my stuff on the counter.  Shawn walked in and stopped at the doorway, staring toward the den, around the corner from where I stood.

"Don't come around on this side," he cautioned.
"Why?  Is there something there?" I asked.
"I don't know what it is!" he exclaimed.  "You just stay over there."
"Oh, it's probably a rat.  Is it a rat?"  This question was asked stemming from a previous occurrence of a rat making it's way through a dryer vent, getting its hind legs caught on a glue trap, and getting itself trapped within our non-functioning dryer.  Shawn The Conqueror took care of the situation while I kept the dogs away & swore we were getting a cat within the week.

"I don't know what it is!" Shawn exclaimed.
I never was too squimish.  And if I was ever to be afraid of anything, I would be more afraid of something alive, than dead.  "Well, is it alive or dead?" I asked.
"I dunno!"
"Oh, Shawn, it's probably just a rat!" I marched straight over to the back door and peered down.  "What is that?" I asked.  Something with hair lay before me.  It was most certainly dead.  And upon closer examination, it was missing its head.

Shawn took a closer look.  "It's a squirrel!"  It had no tail and it had no head.  There was no pooling blood, or any blood for that matter, no guts or anything.  Just a tiny little body with tiny hands & feet.

"That must be that 'bird' that I heard this morning.  ...And the reason the cat refused to leave the laundry room," I said.  Shawn got the critter with a shovel as I poked around the junk in the laundry for the remains of a head, fur, anything that might rot & stink.  I found nothing.  I did notice the dogs didn't eat all day.  Neither did the cat.  I don't suppose there's much meat in the head, but perhaps the fur was quite filling.  Where is the skull?  Did they eat that, too?

I'd repositioned the cardboard on the fireplace & made a mental note of the dogs' last rabies shot and suddenly realized the cat had not gotten in a couple years.  It's been a couple weeks now and she's fine.  She's no more weird that usual, anyway.

Still, you have to wonder what attracts these critters to our home specifically.  We've had opposums in the back yard, a raccoon gave birth on our roof, a massive rat got trapped in the broken dryer and now The Squirrel of Sleepy Hollow has found his way to our back door.

That squirrel is the evidence of a rodent that's been accounted for since we got Evil the Cat.  At least I say for sure she's doing her job.

                                                           TURN UP THE VOLUME!!!

I've attempted to insert my video from YouTube.  Not sure how this is gonna work.  For future reference, I've always wanted to make a video of this cat with the Jaws theme.  You ought to see the way this cat hides behind a corner & leaps 10 feet into the air at you as you come walking around.  Or the way she pretends to be sweet & loving, then suddenly grabs your wrist (a vital artery there) with blow claws and sinks her teeth in if she has time before you snatch your arm back.  She's evil, I tell ya!