����They're baaaaaaaack.

����Yep, it appears that my declaration of victory in the Great Gray Squirrel War of 2001 might have been a tad premature.

����So there goes the ticker tape parade, eh.

����I was looking out the window during a brief snow squall this morning and saw one of my nemesis calmly pillaging the big tube feeder. There was a gang of these furry thugs later in the day but my heart was too laden with grief to photograph them. There are some sights too horrible to be recorded, you know?

����We've decided that a graceful retreat is our only option, that it's best to write off this season. With over a meter of hard packed snow in the yard now it's basically a hop, skip and a jump for the squirrels to attain sunflower seed nirvana.

����We'll be re-engaging the enemy this fall with a whole new feeder location and set up. I'm not going to divulge any plans now in case one of my readers turns out to be a squirrel sympathizer.

����You can't be too careful when it comes to top drawer military strategy like this, eh.

����In other news (and try not to be jealous of the mad whirl that is my life, 'kay?) we've started our own variation of the "Where's Waldo" series, only our version is called "Where's The Freakin' BBQ?"

����Yes, we've temporarily lost the BBQ. We'll find it come spring. No. Really, we will.

����See, one of us decided they wanted the BBQ left up at the house this winter because one of us likes her chicken BBQ'd. That unnamed person promised to shovel the BBQ clear but that unnamed person didn't forsee a winter involving buttloads of snow AND a homicidal roof sluicing additional snow on the BBQ.

����In that unnamed person's defence I would also like to say that she could NOT forsee temperatures yesterday a few degrees above freezing followed today by temperatures in the -20C range which froze said snow into the consistency of concrete.

����Well, maybe she could have foreseen them if she had believed The Weather Channel, but we ALL know The Weather Channel is a sinkhole of mendacity and who really believes them? Right?

����Soooo said person lingered just a little too long at her keyboard and when she went outside to do some BBQ prospecting with her shovel found she couldn't get it through the frozen snow.

����Uh oh.

����So, um, the BBQ has disappeared. I think that little lump a ways to the left of the front steps is its probable location, but nothing will be certain until spring.

����There will be further bulletins as events progress.

--Marn

SETI@home

There has been an outpouring of sympathy for the plight of one small moose. The incredibly cute and deeply talented Paul of Rilting fame has even made a button for the Do It For The Moose Campaign.