. . .you're always running here and there; you feel you're not wanted anywhere. . . .

 

It was overcast today so I took advantage of the shady coolness to do some outdoor work.  Hub had stacked the winter's firewood on the basketball court, and I wanted it off of there because we're having company this summer (YOU, I hope, sometime soon) (the first batch arrives a week from tomorrow night!!) and some of them like to play basketball.  The wood was two seasons old, and NO WAY was any of it coming into the house next winter.  I mean, there was FUNGUS hanging off it.  Gross.  Not in MY house.

 

(We have an Amish woodstove down in the family room that is fantastic.  When we fire that baby up, we barely even HAVE a heating bill in the winter.)  (It heats up this entire house, and it's not a small house.)  (And, it's the kind of woodstove that insurance companies don't seem to mind.)

 

So anyway.  We already had a big pile of limbs and brush so I loaded the firewood into my ancient Mother's Day wheelbarrow and started making trips across the back yard, gradually adding to the pile.  When I got down to the last layer of logs, I saw them.

 

Mice.

 

In a yard that houses seven cats (one that lives here, six that are trespassing) there was a colony of mice living in the woodpile. 

 

And you know how when you play 'pick up sticks,' sometimes you barely move one stick and the whole thing comes crashing down?  I moved one log and they could have filmed another remake of "Willard" in my back yard.

 

Did the cats have a heyday, and chase and feast amongst the throng?

 

No.  All seven cats just sat there looking for all the world like bobbleheads in the back window of an 80-year-old redneck's '59 Chevy pickup.  One with a bumper sticker that says "You're never really alone on a farm." 

 

Fortunately, the thundering herd headed AWAY from the house, towards the woods.  None of them touched my shoes, or I might still be standing out there horror-stricken and refusing to move until the entire five acres was burned down to the dirt.

 

That was several hours ago and we haven't seen any mice in the yard or in the house.  I think they're in the next county by now.  Sorry, west-side-neighbors.

 

And what are we going to do with this humongous pile of wood in the back yard?

 

We're going to have a bonfire, maybe when YOU come this summer!