Missy's Lunch

Like most dogs, Missy really enjoys mealtime around here. She parks herself next to Ella's chair and is usually rewarded with dropped food and hand outs from Ella. Lunch today was no exception. She enjoyed some quesadilla, cheese, and banana courtesy of Ella.

While I was cleaning up the mess, I noticed she was licking a wet spot on my jeans near my knee. I usually have something on my clothes, so I generally just ignore it. I looked down to see why she was so interested in my leg. There was a good sized amount of spit up there. Guess she needed some milk to wash down the cheese.

The Grasshopper

Today we were in the backyard. Samantha had her pink sun umbrella she got at the Cherry Blossom Festival last weekend, and has been carrying around to shield herself from the sun ever since. Suddenly, she screamed and threw her umbrella. A three inch long grasshopper had landed on it, apparently confusing the umbrella for the biggest flower ever.

I have to admit. I do not like grasshoppers. They fall into my arbitrary category of crunchy bugs. I do not like bugs that crunch when you step on them. (It's a childhood trauma from a firefly.) But, being Mommy, I had to take care of the situation. So I bravely shook that umbrella, carefully pointing it away from me. And shook it, and shook it. Those things can hang on tight. (Exactly like that firefly on my finger.) Finally, it flew off, over my head and into my leg. I jumped three feet in the air, threw the umbrella, and screamed like a little girl. (Not my proudest mommy moment. I really don't want three little girls who are scared of bugs.)

The grasshopper landed in front of us. The girls were fascinated by it. I thought it was injured from having an umbrella thrown on it. Eventually, we found a long bubble wand to poke it with. I prodded it's behind to try to get it to fly out of the yard. It flew a few feet. Ella took over the prodding. The darn thing wouldn't leave the yard. It just kept flying a few feet and landing.

That's when Tabby got in on the action. She pounced. The grasshopper flew straight up. Tabby jumped straight up, snaring it in her claws and began nibbling on it. I thought it was a goner, but then it jumped away. Tabby pounced. It jumped. Tabby pounced, playing with it. Ella chased Tabby away. It lay on the ground, I assumed mortally wounded.

The girls and I talked about predators and prey and why Tabby had attacked the grasshopper, and why we were going to let her kill it. Samantha planned how she would deliver the notification to the sisters, brothers, and babies of the grasshopper that she said would soon be arriving.

They egged on Tabby, cajoling her to finish the deed. She wouldn't. The grasshopper, not moving, was not any fun. Finally, Ella poked it again with the bubble wand. And lo! it flew a few feet, apparently unharmed by the cat.

Unfortunately, Missy had been watching us and decided to get in on the action. She pounced on the grasshopper, biting and jumping away repeatedly like it was a rattlesnake. When it tried to fly, she jumped, snatched it out of the air, and tossed it to the ground. At this point, Tabby rejoined the fray, batting the grasshopper. She and Missy tag teamed the grasshopper. When it was lying still, Missy would throw herself on top of it and roll to see if it would move. Watching the two of them cooperate was like watching the velicoraptors in Jurassic Park hunt, fascinating and scary. I now know what happened to my neighbor's bird.

Finally, the grasshopper stopped moving and they tired of playing with it. Ella, again went to prod it. The darn thing was alive! It grabbed onto the bubble wand like a drowning person grabs a life preserver. I quickly took the bubble wand and launched it over our side fence to the front yard, where I knew no one would bother it. As I watched it sail over the fence, I thought, that is one lucky grasshopper. Then I heard a crunch as it hit the side of our house.

Bye Bye Birdie

This morning I let the dog out in the backyard as usual and proceeded to get the girls breakfast and dressed for the day. This took longer than usual, and the dog was outside for a solid hour. Admittedly, I had forgotten about her until I heard her barking in the back yard. This was not her typical, hey-you-forgot-me-again bark, this was a vicious-defending-the-property kind of bark and it caught my attention quickly. (We have had numerous break-ins in the area with people going through the back yard in the middle of the day and I'm pretty sure someone has been in our garage twice in the last month.)

I went to the back and looked out the sliding glass window to see Missy, hackles raised, jumping at the side fence where our neighbors, on a ladder, were intently examining their orange tree. Not too unusual, they keep up their yard nicely and I often see them tending to their plants. I opened the door and yelled at Missy to stop and tried to get her inside. She stopped barking, but decided to keep vigil at the fence.

A short time later, we were getting into the car to take Ella to the doctor to get her face rash looked at (she has a contact allergy from something), and the wife came up to me. She wanted to look around our driveway because her two six year old finches had escaped. They had been in the orange tree, but flew away and were last seen flying over our fence toward the driveway. We looked, no such luck. I told her I'd keep an eye out for them.

After lunch, the girls and I headed out to the backyard to play. I needed to water the plants. I headed up to the top of the yard, Ella following behind, and heard the tell tale "peep peep peep" of a finch. I could tell it was in the large tree just on the other side of our back fence, but with the thick foliage, I couldn't see the bird.

I decide to go next door to see if maybe the bird would come to my neighbor. As I turned, I saw standing in the middle of our top tier, holding something over her head.

"Stick, Mommy," she said.

I looked. Sticks aren't bright orange. I go and grab it out of her hand. It's a finch leg.

"Ella, where did you get that?"

"Wight dere," she said, pointing.

I go to look. There is the rest of the bird, covered in ants, and completely featherless. Plucked like a chicken. Nothing else obviously missing.

As I'm contemplating exactly how that happened, (how could 50 lb Missy pluck a bird and not mangle it in the process, how could even Tabby manage it, very strange), Ella sticks her finger in some cat poop I had failed to pick up.

Into the house to wash hands, then back to pick up bird and poop. Then, heading over to neighbor's with the bad news.

As I'm heading over, I hear the "peep peep peep" again. I look up. Finch #2 is sitting in our tree, too high for me to reach even with a ladder. I ran into the neighbor, coming up her driveway. I tell her about the unfortunate finch #1, we go to look for finch #2, who has flown away by now.

She asked for the body. Being a veterinarian, my instincts to shield people from seeing their pets after horrible accidents kicked in. I told her I threw it in the trash, but I could get it if she wanted. She didn't.

Time Out, Tut

Last night while I was in the nursery feeding Penny and Sean was getting the older girls ready for be, we heard Missy growling and snapping, and Tut replying with his own growl. Ella walked out to see what the action was all about, and we heard the growling again. Sean went out to see what was going on and make sure Ella was not hurt. Tut was tormenting Missy. He broke it up and we continued our bedtime routines.

I moved out to the couch to finish feeding Penny and keep an eye on the situation. Tut was crouched down, ready to pounce, an evil look in his eye, while Missy sat, looking out of the corner of her eye, exposing her neck submissively toward Tut. I threw a pillow at Tut, twice, to try to get him to back away, but he persisted. Finally, he pounced, growling at Missy, who dove under the coffee table to protect herself. Then Tut started in after Tabby, chasing her around and jumping on her.

When she tired of their game and retreated, Tut turned his attention back to Missy. Crouching, ears back, growling. Missy was beside herself, not sure how to respond to this little terrorist who she could easily kill, but she knew she would get in trouble for that. So instead, she sat submissively, a worried look on her face, awaiting another attack.

Tut would not go away. We threw things at him, stomped around, physically moved him, and yet her persisted. So, into our room behind a closed door he went. Time out, Tut.