Little Critters

As a kid, one of my favorite parts of holidays was the day we got to take out the giant box of Christmas books (in case you weren’t aware, my obsession with books and reading started at a very early age). One of my favorites was called “The Biggest Most Beautiful Christmas Tree.” The story chronicles the residents of a great fir tree in the forest and their quest to decorate their tree so Santa can find them. Brooke and I adored all the characters, from Mr. and Mrs. Fieldmouse, to Old Gray Acorn (the squirrel), to the chipmunk children (Nina and Nutley) and wished our dear friends from the story could one day live with us!

Aunt Mim, you are my favorite!

25 years later, it seems God finally got around to answering my prayer.

Last weekend, Josh and I stopped at the house to drop off our second hand treasures and take inventory of all the projects that needed to be completed. We got up into the man cave (which is quite awesome and will have its own post soon) when we noticed a sound above us no homeowner ever wants to hear:

******* scratch scratch- scamper scamper scamper *******

Upon walking outside to the back of the carriage house, we see that the previous owners left a gaping hole between the roof and the siding. Either we have a very fat squirrel or a petite raccoon. And with the cool weather we've been having, a warm, protected and unoccupied roof is like a free stay at the Ritz Carlton for woodland creatures.

We wished our new friend a happy stay but warned him that in two weeks, we would be evicting him if he did not find another suitable living arrangement (and by that, we meant in a tree in the yard or the nature preserve across the road). And this week, I had every intention of using this week’s blog post as an open letter to our squatter.

But all that changed yesterday afternoon. We brought our good friends, Corey and Monica to take a brief tour of the house (kudos to them for seeing the beauty in it since there is no heat, no water and spider webs in every corner you look at). When we made it out to the man cave, Corey asked if he could open the closet door. We laughed and said yes, but not to disturb our house guest inside.

Well, that door opened and holy hell, the smell emitting from that space was, how do I put it, other worldly.

WARNING- next section is not suitable to read before or immediately after eating.

It seems our forest friend got into some trouble and either tried to chew his way through the insulation or simply figured fiberglass cotton candy was a suitable dietary supplement. It appears that he lost control of his bowels and freakin’ died somewhere in the roof.

This is disgusting and yet, completely hilarious. I’m laughing as I write this because neither of us were actually shocked upon discovering a dead animal in our house. We are so immune to all the craziness this place keeps presenting to us that I am humanly incapable of being surprised anymore by our house.

So if anyone sees a Groupon for an exterminator or heavy-duty house cleaning service between now and the 25th of October, let me know.