Equal Opportunity Feeder

Crazy Nanny is a real animal lover. She’s got birdhouses all over the yard, much to my displeasure, and she’s always outside putting seed down for the chipmunks and other animals. For some reason, unbeknownst to everyone else…she hates squirrels. And she sure as hell doesn’t want them eating her seed. That’s for the birds and chipmunks and ducks…whatever…anybody can eat the damn seed as long as it’s not a squirrel.

I’ve told her I think she should put a sign up for the squirrels…that maybe once they read it, they’ll stop eating her seed. She just thinks I’m a smartass when I tell her that…but I don’t think it’s any more absurd than her thinking she can actually prevent the local squirrels from eating it.

‘Ol Nanny has come up with a few creative ways to chase the squirrels from the yard…but her latest is pretty interesting. It’s not creative at all actually…it’s just good old brute force. I was coming home from a coffee run a couple of weeks ago when I discovered her new method for squirrel elimination.

I had just pulled into the driveway and walked around to the other side of my car to let the dog out. The same dog from Fucking Birds that likes to chase the animals in the yard. And as we were about to head into my house (My house is a mother/daughter and Nanny has a little house on the side of ours,) I hear banging and yelling coming from the side of the house.

Panic ensues because knowing that she’s 80, I’m afraid she’s fallen or dropped something…who knows. So I go running over with the dog and there she is…standing on her front porch with my little cousin’s plastic toy bat. And she’s banging it on the porch and yelling at the squirrels. Now the dog is going crazy, chasing the squirrels all over the place. And Nanny was satisfied. The squirrels were gone and I think it’s the first time in over two years since we got Madison that Nanny didn’t yell at her for running in her flowers.

She also informed me that if the squirrels aren’t listening when she bangs the bat on the porch, she will throw it at them if she has to. Honestly, you can drive by my house and you'll most likely see a little red bat in the front yard. It's not mine.

I wonder if this shit is genetic? Can’t you see me now, a crazy old lady sitting in my rocking chair, knocking back Jack Daniel’s like it’s my job…and throwing random shit at animals in my yard. Fuck.