Mukilteo Musings

IT MUST HAVE BEGUN WITH THE COWS

I do not know what it is about my family or maybe it is just me but animals just keep trying to move in with us.

1. COWS When I was about 10 in Helena, one morning at dawn, mooing woke me up. I looked out my bedroom window and saw cows in our front yard. We lived on the edge of town but there were no ranches for miles. I got up and went into my parents' bedroom, "Dad, there are cows in the yard."

"Go back to bed, Fuz (my nickname because of what was on my head at birth), you are dreaming," mumbled my Dad. Yea, I probably was--this wasn't the first time I'd awakened my parents because of dreams usually involving animals. No wait a minute, I'm really awake.

"Daaaad!!" I felt so gratified seeing Dad out in the yard trying to herd those cows off of our lawn. I had a wild imagination but this was for real this time.

2. DOGS Oh man, I do not even know where to begin on this one. When we lived in the middle of Kansas City, an Alaskan Malamute showed up on OUR porch and he really didn't even like our Golden Retriever, Monty. He liked me. We managed to find him a good home.

At our first house in Mukilteo just 6 blocks away, we had 5 or 6 dogs at various times just show up on our front porch. One Golden Retriever named Toby was a repeat offender. My family started to call me the dog lady of the neighborhood. The family of an old cocker spaniel I rescued from the nearby greenbelt was so grateful, we received a gift certificate for a restaurant in the mail.

The dogs around here must talk to each other because the reputation seems to have followed me to this house. We have only lived here a year and a half and I have already returned three dogs to their owners and one of them twice. I NEVER feed these animals; water, yes, but never food.

3. SQUIRRELS At our first house in Seattle, a lovely little A framed house in Seattle proper on a woodsy lot, a squirrel somehow managed to be in our house for an entire day while we were at work. Monty had obviously had great fun chasing Squirrel all over because my plants were scattered. By 6 PM, though it was boring because Monty was sleeping and the squirrel was sitting on our coffee table in the living room. "OPEN ALL THE DOORS AND GET THE BROOM!" yells Dave.

4. BIRDS Sammy and Susie Swallow at our house 6 blocks away must have had a conversation with Sally Swallow. Sammy and Susie had a nest on OUR FRONT PORCH, inside the brick portico. They could get a little owly sometimes (or should I say swallowy) and dive bomb people coming to our front door. It was embarrassing.

Sally seemed interested in building her nest in exactly the same spot inside the brick portico on THIS house. But she wanted MORE because when we opened the front door, last Saturday, she flew in our house. "OPEN THE DOORS AND GET THE BROOM!" yells Dave.

The four of us were screaming and chasing her around the house--or I should say three of us because Kaley was videoing the whole thing. After taking screens off the dining room windows, we broomed her out. She hasn't been back since and I spent a share of last Saturday cleaning purple bird poop out of my light carpet.

5. MICE AND RATS I am not even going to go there except to say that just today, the guy building our fence discovered a nest and he "took care of things" and I don't think it was with a broom.