Potato Patch Dilemma

You very well know that I have an inexplicable compulsion to maintain a list of every book I read that has an owl in it. What you may not be AS aware of is that Megan Abbott just sent me an early birthday present... a collection of NANCY comic strips by Olivia Jaimes. I am delighted to tell you that in one of the strips, Nancy attempts to ward off a groundhog from her potato patch by means of one of those plastic owls we run into from time to time as we enjoy our literature.

Halloween Gets Real

I know I have bored you with my fascinating story of how our Halloween Film Festival will probably be shorter than ever this year because of all my October travels. We have managed to squeeze in THE MUMMY'S SHROUD and RE-ANIMATOR if you are keeping score. Ha ha! Who are you, person who doesn't exist? Yesterday we were distracted by something else that had many horrific elements and some "downer" aspects with which you know I hate to trouble you, but there is a happy ending... though not for every creature involved! You have been warned. So anyway we have been feeding this feral but sweet-natured blue-eyed cat that hangs around our neighborhood. Many times when Lee Durkee has been walking past our yard he has seen the cat. He became quite taken with it. (It is the kitten we were trying to coax off the roof in another unforgettable "blog" "post" you may have forgotten.) He said if we ever caught it he'd like to try to bring it into his house and make it a pet. Now, Dr. Theresa had already caught this fellow - the cat, I mean - once and had him fixed and got all his shots and had him tested for dangerous diseases and everything. She does that out of her own pocket when she finds a feral cat, just to help out and keep the population down and make sure they're healthy. So on Wednesday she saw that the cat - we cleverly call him "Bandit" because of the black "bandit" mask across his blue eyes - had a hurt leg. Fearing he had been hit by a car, Dr. Theresa caught him and took him to the vet again. He had only fallen from a great height and twisted his leg and scratched up his nose a little, the doctor reported. So, now that he was drugged and compliant, a perfect opportunity to take him over to Lee's house so he could recuperate inside and find himself in a new home! The exciting and terrifying parts of the story that will make you question the meaning of existence are coming up soon, don't worry. So Dr. Theresa and Lee set up the cat in a safe, small space: Lee's bathroom. That night our pal Joey and her practically brand new husband Brian came to town so we all went out for a big night on the town square. Everyone came out. Semmes (the man who was once almost in a plane crash with Werner Herzog) told a story about peeing next to Bob Hope. (You know, I should do a "post" about the time I peed next to Rob Reiner and the time Ward McCarthy peed next to Robert Mitchum, but I am getting far afield of the existential horror I mean to express here. OR AM I?) Joey told about when Vince Vaughn gave Buck Owens a prop knife from the PSYCHO remake, only it was a real knife, but Buck Owens didn't get that part - he thought it was some kind of trick knife and started slashing it madly at everybody (including Joey) and laughing with glee while people fled in actual terror that Buck Owens might jokingly kill them. SO! Now we are coming up on the part of the story that will trouble and alarm you! And then it turns almost into a David Lynch movie. When Lee got home, he couldn't find the cat anywhere. And then he noticed that the CAT HAD CLIMBED UP SOMEHOW AND OPENED THE WINDOW and escaped. This is a window that is hard to open. It sticks! And Dr. Theresa had shut it securely herself, expressly so that the cat could not get out of it. But this cat displayed remarkable dexterity and cunning. Not only did it manually slide open the difficult window, it pushed out the screen and dropped from a height of 10 yards (Lee's house is on a steep slope) and vanished. We found out the next morning. We feared the worst! The cat was already injured! And Lee's house overlooks a heavily wooded ravine filled with wild animals. Dr. Theresa set out walking the neighborhood for signs of the cat. I soon followed. In my haste I forgot my glasses. At one point I met Dr. Theresa coming from the opposite direction and I pointed at something I saw moving and said, "What is that?" And Dr. Theresa said, "It's a raccoon." It was a sick raccoon! A poor sick raccoon stumbling and circling and appearing confused in the broad daylight. To add to the nightmarish quality of the scene (made more impressionistic by my blurred vision) the raccoon was on the street in front of what appeared to be a gulley filled with colorful rubble. There's some kind of construction going on. And three guys are taking a break from work, saying and doing nothing but sitting there in the bed of a pickup truck wearing red-tinted sunglasses and expressionlessly, without comment, watching this dying raccoon try to make sense of the world. It was truly a hellish scene. Dispirited and with little hope we went on looking for the cat. We walked through the parking lot of the Chevron on the corner and it was deserted - like weirdly OMEGA MAN deserted - except for two large crows who were just WALKING AROUND the empty, silent parking lot like they owned it. Silent except for their eerie cries, that is! As we went on into the neighborhood I began to notice that the Halloween decorations seemed sinister. So many skeletons! We were forced to pass by the raccoon a few more times, and on one of those times it had died. We found all sorts of weird things in the neighborhood, things we had never seen before, like a tumbled-down shack filled with rusty machinery and glass. All this time Lee was out looking for the cat too. Finally we gave up. When it was close to getting dark, Dr. Theresa decided to go back out. (I couldn't join her because I was in an ADVENTURE TIME meeting. I was not feeling it! Pen and Kent cheered me up by singing funny songs they were making up and then I showed them this Little Rascals clip ["click" here] that Kelly Hogan sent me a long time ago, and we all got a lot of enjoyment out of it. Art helps!) On Dr. Theresa's lonely way in the gathering dusk she met Lee, who had a forlorn expression and told of a harrowing experience. He had heard an otherworldly shrieking from the woods behind his house! He said it was the worst sound he had ever heard. And as he walked deeper into the brush, he came upon the omen-like vision of A BUNCH OF GROUNDHOGS ALL STANDING ON THEIR HIND LEGS AS IF FROZEN IN ETERNITY AND GAZING IN HORROR IN THE SAME DIRECTION, the direction from which the scream had come that had also haunted Lee. Things did not look (or sound) good. Lee and Dr. Theresa split up. Dr. Theresa walked deep into the treacherous woods and sat on the ground and softly called again and again. She was about to get up and head home when she heard a response. She called again. The response came louder. Finally she saw in the distance the feral cat actually running toward her! This is not something feral cats do. Somehow she scooped it up (this is not easy to do with a feral cat; in fact it is impossible) and carried it in her arms UP THE STEEP BRAMBLY HILL back to Lee's place. And Lee came walking back forlorn and when Dr. Theresa, covered in dirt and thorns, told him she had the cat he couldn't believe it. But that's Dr. Theresa for you! She's my hero. So anyway, they blocked up that window real good.

Hyperlinks From a Marriage

As of today, Dr. Theresa and I have been married for 19 years. WHAT! For the first 11 years I didn't even have a "blog." WHAT! So anything that happened during that period is none of your beeswax. But everything after that is up for grabs! So here are some highlights: We saw Morgan Freeman get out of his car. We watched SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT and HOOPER. We investigated wild animal noises. We celebrated Dr. Theresa becoming Dr. Theresa. We went to the optometrist together. We were nearly struck by lightning! We watched a raccoon and a possum hang out on our back porch. We hung out with Kent Osborne a lot. We kept track for some months of a neighboring groundhog. We walked through a weird abandoned tunnel. We recalled a schoolyard legend of Grizzly Adams's beard catching on fire. We went to Elvis's house. We went to hear a Frank Sinatra impersonator. We saw a bunch of dragonflies at Robert Johnson's grave. We tried to get a kitten off the roof. We drank champagne out of martini glasses.

Dr. Theresa solved a mystery in my office. Dr. Theresa bought me pants. Dr. Theresa scared me several times with her Helena Bonham Carter impersonation. Dr. Theresa brought a goldfish back to life. Dr. Theresa saved my favorite fork when it was stuck in the drain. Dr. Theresa noted my strange susceptibility to Lady Grey tea. Dr. Theresa proved the existence of the giant turtle movie that haunted her. Dr. Theresa has uttered many memorable phrases. Dr. Theresa warned me not to be torn apart by coyotes in Beverly Hills. Dr. Theresa made coffee and eggs and tortillas at 3 in the morning. Dr. Theresa bought a $5 umbrella. Dr. Theresa made a new notch in my belt for me. Dr. Theresa ordered extra tartar sauce. Dr. Theresa danced with balls of fire. We used to go get a whole karaoke room to ourselves with our friend Caroline. We took a pregnant woman to see PINK FLAMINGOS. We saw a strange woman pushing a face-down doll in a baby stroller. We supported literacy. We had loud upstairs neighbors. We attended a rock and roll show in New York City. We roamed around the restaurants and bars of New Orleans with John Currence and John T. Edge. We ate in a terrible restaurant in Nashville. We had our picture hung up in a restaurant. We had some low-key New Year's Eves. We accidentally took a tap-dancing lesson together. We saw three huge woodpeckers. We bought a drink for D-Day from ANIMAL HOUSE. We went to a midnight screening of BLAZING SADDLES right after Princess Diana died. We stayed in a Ramada Inn that literally had an old graveyard in its parking lot. We domesticated at least one feral cat. We consumed many iceberg lettuce wedges. We watched countless horror movies. Countless! And many episodes of Lawrence Welk. We forced young people to dance. We drove to Booger Bottom on a whim. We observed a robin's nest. We discussed our paper clip preferences. We stood in a roaring wind.

Creating a Community Dialogue Through the Rats

Come February, I am going to be part of an event called "the Marginal Arts Festival" in Roanoke, Virginia. I am very excited to discover that the festival has an eight-foot-tall mascot called the Art Rat. Plus "art" is an anagram for "rat," which made me briefly misread the press release so that I thought the festival was described as "a very serious attempt at creating a community dialogue through the rats." Thinking back over the "blog's" long love affair with mascots of every kind, I suppose my current favorite (having not yet met the Art Rat) is the "Groundhog Festival Mascot," if only because it wears a helpful t-shirt that says "Groundhog Festival Mascot."

I Am Not a Naturalist

After the reading last night, I went over to City Grocery Bar to meet up with John Currence and Joe York. Several other people who were at the reading ended up there as well, including Bill Boyle (whom you may remember as the man who once attended a lecture about frogs) and his wife (whose name I won't give because I don't have permission) who works for the Audubon Society, which may explain the lecture about frogs. And SHE told me that crows understand the meaning and purpose of traffic lights! More evidence that we need to be worried about what the crows are planning. She also told me that chimney swifts - even ones who are not related - will rush into a burning tree to save baby chimney swifts. The nature stories were just beginning! And some of them would happen to me in person, yes, that very night. It was just a little after eight when I got a phone call at the bar from Theresa. She advised me to use the front door when I got home because there was a possum on the back porch and it wouldn't leave. It had been there for an hour, she said. She had intervened in a developing altercation between the possum and a neighborhood cat (shades of the cat who entered the groundhog's lair!), which had consisted, before Theresa stepped in to save the day, of some mild hissing and wary curiosity about one another - the curiosity being mostly on the part of the cat, verifying the old legend. I got home at about 11 (time flies!) and assumed that the coast was clear by then, so I came around the back as usual. There was the possum, on the card table on the back porch, lying on a tote bag filled with tubes of acrylic paint, looking mainly indifferent yet full of assumptions. Was it "playing possum" (pretending to be dead) as possums are reputed to do? It wasn't moving much, that's all I can tell you. I tried reasoning with it ("I already tried that," Theresa explained). I tried scaring it away with noisemaking that annoyed Theresa more than the possum. I shook the table (long distance, via broom handle). I threw a shoe at it (as Theresa had done earlier in the evening). Maybe it WAS playing possum. I walked off the porch and confronted it from the other side of the screen, which it was facing, by rattling a large bush. Oh, the possum hated that! Yes, my rattling of the bush finally got a rise out of it and caused another round of mild hissing. And the possum hissed too. Ha ha! No, really it was just the possum hissing. We stared at each other a long time through the screen and the bush and I started to like the possum. I learned some things about possums. 1) They are stubborn and patient. 2) When they yawn, their mouths open REALLY WIDE, wider even than you might expect. 3) Their paws are freaky. 4) They have (this one did, anyway; I am not a naturalist!) really long fangs that show even when their mouths are closed. I didn't expect that, based on my lifelong reading of Walt Kelly's POGO (pictured), of which comic strip Caroline Young has given me a number of vintage promotional figurines. Finally we just watched the possum through the window on the back door. It didn't do much, though at one point it sniffed the air vigorously. "It senses something," I observed wisely. And then A RACCOON WADDLED ONTO THE PORCH! DOES THIS KIND OF STUFF GO ON EVERY NIGHT AND WE JUST DON'T KNOW ABOUT IT? IS OUR BACK PORCH SOME KIND OF NIGHTCLUB FOR WILD ANIMALS? The raccoon (perhaps tempted because we had propped open the porch door so the possum could escape) didn't find anything interesting about our porch, not even the possum, so it turned around and waddled back down the steps. A little after midnight, I decided to check on the possum again and witnessed it lowering itself very slowly and eerily off the table, using its tail, it seemed to me, in the prehensile manner for which it is so justly famous. Then it left the porch. In other nature news, McNeil just called as I was typing this to tell me about developments with the large hadron collider which interests him so, you know, the machine that is going to end the world, and yes, this is a nature story, because McNeil said a bird dropped a bread crumb on the large hadron collider and broke it! I am not kidding! That's the way McNeil described the story on cnn.com, which I have not yet read. I like McNeil's version the best anyway. A BIRD DROPPED A BREAD CRUMB ON THE COLLIDER AND BROKE IT! Sounds like a fairy tale. And the bird dropped the crumb, claims McNeil, in the ONLY SPOT WHERE A BREAD CRUMB COULD POSSIBLY BREAK THE COLLIDER! According to the story, says McNeil, some scientists believe that the collider IS BEING SABOTAGED FROM THE FUTURE! Maybe the crows are doing it! The bird and the bread crumb tipped me off. McNeil says it is a "great story" with "a lot of weird stuff in it."

Sans Groundhog

Well, it has been over two weeks since the last sighting of the groundhog in the neighbor's backyard. As you will recall, said groundhog was posing nobly in the rain. How potentially valedictory, but I can't let myself think that way. My sister was here over the weekend with her camera phone at the ready, but no groundhog. Don't count the groundhog out! I have done as much before and learned my lesson. Here is a cake in the shape of a groundhog.

Breaking News: Rain Doesn't Bother Groundhog

The groundhog came out in the middle of a big rainstorm yesterday. Groundhog didn't seem to mind it. Maybe the groundhog liked it. Hard to tell with a groundhog. There is a dramatic aspect to a groundhog in the rain.

Groundhog Drama

Remember when I told you how I found one of the burrows of the groundhog? Well, today we saw a neighborhood cat duck into the hole! The very same hole near which we had observed the groundhog loafing earlier in the day! Recalling the numerous claws depicted on our Groundhog Chart, we dreaded the bloodshed that was certain to occur. We successfully tempted the cat out of the burrow by placing some cat food near the entrance. Yet we were also unsuccessful: upon the completion of its snack, the cat returned to the hole, where it vanished. There have been no further developments. This brings to mind something I have often thought but never said aloud: there really is no "good" or "happy" ending possible for the ongoing groundhog saga. I mean, is there?

Exciting Times

McNeil feels left out, I think. He wants me to start a regular feature called "Charlotte with an S" and claims to have para-glided off the roof of a minivan. Speaking of excitement, we saw the groundhog today. "All he does is eat," I said. "He also listens," Theresa pointed out. It's true. Occasionally he stops eating and listens to something for a second. Groundhog, your moods are many!

Sometimes He Picks Up Something With His Forepaw

The groundhog made his appearance in the neighbor's backyard today. He is rotund and confident! That was my impression. You know what he was doing? Eating. That's what he does. He eats. And I found myself - though I admire the cut of his jib! It is admirable, his jib, the cut of it - thinking, I wish he would do something else. Like what? I don't know. What is this, groundhog backlash? I should remind myself of how anxious I felt when he vanished for days. Yes, all he does is eat. So what? Sometimes he picks up something and holds it in his forepaw and sort of mulls it over before he eats it. That's what we call excitement in the world of groundhog observation. He didn't do that today. But don't worry, groundhog! I'm not going to start taking you for granted.

Milwaukee Groundhog Alert

This just in from "Bloggy" the "Blog" Mascot (pictured): "OMG JACK I SAW A GROUNDHOG IN MILWAUKEE YESTERDAY IT WAS SO EXCITING I ALMOST CRASHED MY CAR!!" (Caps and exclamation points are "Bloggy's.")

By the Twilight's Last Gleaming

O say can you see? I'll say I can! A groundhog, that is. The groundhog was out tonight right before it got dark. Like a trick! Like, "I bet you thought I wasn't coming out today." Good one, groundhog. I almost called this "post" "By the Groundhog's Last Gleaming" or "By the Twilight's Last Groundhog," but both seemed too ominous for the groundhog.

Regrets

1) To that "post" about my jowls, I should have appended a picture of the cartoon character Droopy Dog as my proxy. 2) The "post" about Jerry Lewis's granddaughter should have included a picture of an embarrassed monkey to reflect the inner shame of the anonymous soul who does not wish for me to mention that he or she watches the televised program "Millionaire Matchmaker." 3) For the most recent groundhog "post," the word "ascendant" would have been preferable to "triumphant." For one thing, it nicely implies the action of the groundhog rising from beneath the ground. 4) Re: the latter "post," I should have pointed out how happy it makes me that the Groundhog Festival mascot's name seems to be Groundhog Festival Mascot.

Groundhog Triumphant

My heart was so empty and desiccated I was going to make you "click" on this. But I was stopped at literally the last second. And now I am bursting with joy because the groundhog has returned! Groundhog, I know the last time we spoke I told you I wasn't going to give up on you. But I gave up on you. You showed me, groundhog! You came back to feast on the greenery in the neighbor's yard as of yore. Maybe I was missing you. Maybe that's why the "blog" began to show signs of strain. Welcome back, noble groundhog!

Cinder Block, Alas

I so much want the groundhog to come back to the neighbor's yard that today I thought I saw it twice but I did not. Once it was a cinder block. Another time it was a clump of dirt. I won't give up on you, groundhog!

Groundhog In the Dark

Second day, no sign of the groundhog. Where is it? I guess it's somewhere out there in the dark. Godspeed, groundhog. Please imagine that the following song is entitled "Groundhog In the Dark" and maybe you will understand how I feel.

Checklist

1) See if the mail has come yet. 2) See if the groundhog is out. 3) Call McNeil to finish yesterday's conversation about squirrel brains. 4) A shower, maybe.

Groundhog No Show

The groundhog did not show up today. Rather, we were not around to greet the groundhog properly. Maybe WE didn't show up today. It doesn't feel right. Eight days in a row with groundhog. One day without groundhog. Days with groundhog are preferable. Sorry to be the one to tell you.

Tales of Oxford

Greetings from Oxford. Here is what is going on around Oxford. Two "Blog" Buddies from Oxford have just been nominated for James Beard Awards. These awards are a big deal! Congratulations to "Blog" Buddies John Currence and John T. Edge. On to groundhog news. It turns out that a groundhog in your neighbor's backyard is no big deal in Oxford and Theresa and I were wrong to get excited and have fun watching the groundhog. Theresa's teaching assistant has a groundhog in his backyard. One of my writing students has a groundhog in her backyard, and her dog gets into little dust-ups with it. This is just like when the wild turkeys were nothing special and the deer were nothing special and nothing was special. But we still cling to the idea that our groundhog is special and an especially lovable and gigantic one. And yes, it made an appearance today in case you were concerned. Goodbye from Oxford! (Pictured, Currence's tattoo. One in our series of people's arms.)

Early Morning Groundhog

Our groundhog friend was out exceptionally early this morning. That's it, groundhog. Vary your routine. Keep 'em guessing. Heed my advice from yesterday, groundhog. The deluge is nearly upon us.