Hit and Run

Milwaukee has been plagued for the last year or more with an epidemic of car thefts and car jackings (which is just another reason not to live in Milwaukee, but I digress).  So yesterday, Sarah’s friend (the next door neighbor) was at the Bayshore Town Center with her sister shopping when they got rear-ended.  It was apparently and African American girl driving with a guy in the passenger seat.  Right away they pulled over and were on the phone to the police.  They stayed in the car to call, and surprisingly, the car that hit them drove away. 

That is one of the “techniques” the news has been reporting is being used to steal cars.  Rear-end someone, and when they get out to assess the damage, the person in the passenger seat of the car of the offending vehicle jumps out, jumps into the driver’s seat of the car that was hit, and both cars take off.  Sounds like they might have gotten scared off when Brit didn’t get out of the car.  I think she got lucky.  Hopefully Sarah learns a lesson from this.

New Chipmunk

For the longest time we have been chipmunk-free.  I’d have to go back and actually look thru all the previous entries, but it must be about two years at least since I have had the chipmunk traps out.  I have been noticing lately over the past week or so that there is a new chipmunk scurrying around the backyard.  It will sit under the bird feeders eating and collecting the seed that drops on the ground.  The cats will sit on the table and watch it, chirping at it the way cats do (cat people know what this is like).  I feel bad for them because I am sure they’d like to chase after it, for sure.

I have decided to just let it be rather than get the traps out.  Mainly because it isn’t digging up Kris’s flowers (that’s the squirrels doing that).  It actually lives (if you can call it living) at the next door neighbor’s.  At least I think it does.  I have seen it come out from under the shrubs in the front of their house, run across the driveway, along the pavers that are on the side of our house, under the fence, and into the backyard.  Then it will dart out under the feeders.  It has even earned how to climb the shepherd’s hook and get into the feeder to get the seed it wants.  I feel like I should reward the effort, and so as long as it isn’t digging up the shrubs, or Kris’s flowers, why should I care, right?  Congratulations Mr. Chipmunk, you get to live another day.

Bath for the Cat

Samson’s fur has been looking pretty ragged for a while so we decided it was finally time to give him a bath.  If I remember right, we have only bathed him once in the previous four years we have had him, and since he was so full of dander and shedding all over the house, I thought it was probably time.

Well, I remember why we haven’t done it in forever now, HE’S STRONG!  He fought like crazy just getting him into the sink, and then once we got him in, it was all I could do to keep him in the soapy water.  It took both hands to hold him down while Kris scrubbed and rinsed him.  It was much worse than washing a 50 lb. dog!  But it also reaffirms why we named him Samson.  The good news is that at least now he is clean and smells fresh.  The only thing left to do is watch for hairballs, because I am sure he’ll be licking himself like crazy now!