Wildlife: A Summary of the Past Week in Three Vignettes

I. Goats

After months of whining that I always share Beau with our friends and that he never takes me anywhere nice (other than the Chili’s on route 1 which is pretty rockin’), I was treated to a date-weekend commencing with a trip to Belkin Lookout Farm for apple picking. I was informed that there was a petting zoo which quelled my griping over the $14 per person entrance fee… which didn’t include any actual fruit. Fruit was extra.

We got our money’s worth though because we rode a little train to get from orchard to orchard which I found exhilarating. Anyone who has been on a kiddy rollercoaster with me can personally tell you that dragging me on any ride that involves drops or unreasonable speed results in my uncontrollable swearing. Kind of like that scene in The Exorcist where she cusses out the priest. Except instead of a priest it’s usually my close friends and relatives and an errant ride operator or two. In addition to this fantastic amusement, Beau managed to scarf down one Asian pear and three grapes while we hid behind trees watching for farm workers and other immigrants. By my calculations, we stole approximately $1.93 worth of merchandise.

Truly the animals were worth every cent I overpaid. I was expecting some chickens and a really exasperated looking pig. What I got was a pen of a dozen hungry goats and small children. Less adventurous types in skinny jeans and Uggs watched on in horror at the chaos of these constantly defecating creatures. I quickly grabbed Beau and pushed in front of a nine-year-old while dancing around steaming piles of pooh. I chased them around in little circles, I scratched them behind the ears, I otherwise amused myself until finally, I found the Holy Grail of the petting-zoo world: a wee little goatling baby which I played with until it started chewing on Beau’s sneakers and nipping his fingers. As I told Grasshoppah a few days ago, baby goats are adorable for many reasons but also because they don’t reject you from a job that you had two interviews for and felt promising since the employer went through the trouble in the last meeting of explaining the company's benefits package thereby causing you to waste three weeks of job searching. So there’s also that.

II. Turkey-dogs

After returning home with the Most Expensive Apples ever, we punished them for their excessive cost by making them into a pie, then decided constant consumption of pie makes us fat, so punished ourselves with exercise. We took a stroll through the park near our house which was similar to our other walks there: we discussed my continued lack of employment, the little graveyard tucked in the forest that always makes Beau say “Wow, I’ve never noticed that before!” every time we pass by it, and the cuteness of the dogs we saw. I was still remarking on the chubbiness of a huge chocolate lab and fluffiness of a miniature husky when we heard hysterical laughter behind us. The chubby lab had mounted the fluffy mini-husky and the owners were attempting to pull them apart. It’s dogs humping in the park that I find most useful in fighting off the hovering clouds of self-pity and depression. As long as I’ve got that, things can’t be all bad.

Monday I had jury duty which was disappointingly uneventful. Upon leaving my apartment for the courthouse, I saw a gigantic turkey walk down the street. It must have been as tall as my hip. But what the hell was it doing in my neighborhood? For that matter, what was that coyote doing in my neighborhood? This is a suburb of Boston, people, not Des Moines.

Anyway, it was like an acid flashback. Or a scene from The Dark Crystal. Either way, after chasing the turkey halfway to the train station and almost pursuing it into someone’s backyard, I realized that maybe I don’t get out of the house enough anymore. Mostly because I’m busy peeking out from behind a curtain waiting for more skeksis.

III. Vermin

Ninja Mouse is still terrorizing the household. While this is a useful diet aid since it makes me afraid of my own kitchen, I have come to find troublesome droppings on my counters like the trail of an overzealous 5th-grader with a bottle of jimmies. Clearly, we can no longer share this apartment. The other inhabitants work on an honor code built around not defecating on food preparation surfaces. If Ninja Mouse can’t abide by that rule, then I’m afraid it has to go.

But how to get rid of a critter whose intellect and acrobatic skills far surpass my own? As an animal-hugger, I was inclined to purchase a humane trap so I could catch it and re-release it into the wild. Unfortunately for Ninja Mouse, those traps are costly and I remain, yes, unemployed. Beau even drove me around to the local hardware stores looking for options other than the snappy-break-your-neck type traps without success. Once home, we found out that estrogen and mouse-genocide do not mix well together. I pouted and fought back tears while Beau was forced to set the traps alone. But it doesn’t matter, because after two nights of attempted murder, we haven’t caught the damn thing. It’s been eating the bait WITHOUT SETTING OFF THE TRAPS. Pitted against each other in a game of chess, I’m 90% certain that I would lose to Ninja Mouse.