I spent 2 1/2 glorious days last week up at Peninsula State Park, catching up with old friends and soaking in the scenery. It was just glorious weather and the lilacs were rioting. The puppy adapted quickly to tent living, and with several other dogs in the group she had lots of positive role models and lots of play time. It really was a situation that just couldn't be beat. And though I hated to leave when I did, I had the consolation of knowing that the weather turned beastly cold and rainy as soon as I was out the park gate.
But I had to get home for the first day of Farmer's Market on Saturday, and it was just brutal. Cold, with threatening rain that turned out to not to be a bluff, and accompanied by the chaos that one would expect for the first attempt of the season. I was late, and my set-up didn't go smoothly, and although there was a surprising volume of customers (given the weather and the lack of actual produce this early in the season) I barely made enough to justify my efforts. When it started raining at 11:00, I packed it in despite the disapproving looks from my fellow vendors.
Luckily, Sunday's graduation events were all indoors and my baby made it across the stage without a hitch. There were a lot of misty eyes when she and the other graduates were recognized in church that morning, but the graduation itself was strangely anticlimactic; perhaps because college is looming so large in her future, and we have the strong sense that this is just another milestone towards a still distant goal.
Along with the big events, we've had a few smaller incidents this week. Somehow a (presumably mother) squirrel and her compatriots got into the roof overhanging our front porch, and from there worked their way into the kitchen soffit and the kitchen/master bath wall. We could tell that one squirrel had fallen down into a gap between a pair of studs and was trying to climb out over the weekend. Rick got into the bathroom ceiling and fished a rope down between the studs, hoping the squirrel would climb up and then get out - which may or may not have worked, since the sounds in that part of the wall were gone by Monday or so. And meanwhile, he applied some tinfoil to the trim piece they'd been climbing up to access the overhang, hoping they'd slide down and be unable to get back up. But by Tuesday or so there was more scratching and carrying on in another section of the wall, and we eventually gave up on the rope concept in favor a low, discrete hole through the sheet rock.
This little guy seemed almost too young to be away from his mother, and despite Rick's best efforts with a warming lamp and eyedroppers of preemie puppy milk, he didn't make it. The whole thing is a shame, but I'm secretly relieved we didn't end up adding a pet squirrel to the menagerie. Instead, I acquired 8 Auracanus chicks from a friend and am incubating them in the same glass cage recently occupied by the squirrel.
Most of them will go to Cousin Kate in a few weeks - but there's a dark chocolate chick with a certain air about him who reminds me a bit of our recently deceased Rudy. I'm not sure what the little guy's name is just yet, but he's probably male and he's definitely staying.
