Tales From The Wild Side

I'm not sure how long Glen and I have had our new phones. A month at least? And although I am making do with the camera, it simply is not as good when it comes to the close-up. And if I do get a good picture that pleases me, it's only after a whole lot of fooling with camera placement and focusing. And it's still just not as crisp as my old one. Not sure what I'm going to be doing about that. 

I mean, in some ways, that is a fine picture. But it's not what I would have gotten with my iPhone 13 camera and on top of that, it takes two hands to maneuver the iPhone Air to get any sort of macro lens effect. If there's an easier way to do it, I have not figured it out and the articles I read and the videos I watch on the subject just don't seem to have the information I'm looking for. 

What a fucking first world problem. 
Am I right?

Today has been a good day. I had a bad case of the but-firsts but mostly it was all about outside activities. My ultimate goal was to do more weeding in the garden BUT FIRST I needed to take the trash and pick blueberries and oh yeah, why not finally get those begonias and the philodendron I'd rooted into pots while I'm at it, and the porch plants were dry and needed water and so it goes. 

I think that looks pretty good and am glad to get it out of a vase where it's been rooting for months and into that pretty blue pot. I just love that plant. I think it's taken me so long to get it potted up because it's looked so pretty rooting in the orange vase in my little nursery in the laundry room. But hell. Maybe I'll just go cut another chunk off the mama plant and root that. Time to have a new baby? 
Perhaps. 
The begonias were rooted from cuttings I'd taken from my plants when they needed trimming back. Nothing special. But I've got them in a pot outside under the magnolia tree next to a giant begonia that needs some help. Poor thing. It somehow survived the last freeze we had and is trying so hard to come back but it wasn't getting enough sun. I've moved it to a slightly sunnier spot and given it some new dirt and hopefully, the two plants will inspire each other on.

So all of that stuff took awhile. When I finally got out to the garden it was late afternoon but shady in the area I wanted to weed so I didn't even need my umbrella. 
While I was outside, I did get mosquito-bit, ant-bit, and had my first yellow-fly bite of the season and those bastards are the worst. I've still got an itchy red welt from that close encounter. The ants- well, I'm not sure where they came from but somehow, I had them up my legs under my overalls and had to come inside and strip those off and put on different ones. 
I literally had ants in my pants. 
Oh dear Lord. 

And in the Oh-Dear-Lord vein, I have to tell you something I really do not want to tell you. It involves Maurice. 
First, let me say that when we were in Roseland, our lovely landlord was relating a situation where "very large mice" were getting into one of his rental houses via some sort of vent or pipe or something. And "very large mice" was a euphemism for, OKAY, OKAY! 
Rats. 
Well, last night, Maurice did her successful huntress vocalizations again and this time I could also hear the squeaking of what I assumed was a mouse. A regular sized mouse. You know- a real mouse. 
"This has got to stop!" I yelled. Glen, who was deeply asleep mumbled, "What?" 
"Maurice has a mouse and it's still alive!"
Cursing commenced. 
"Well, turn on the light," he said. 
I did. And you know, without my glasses I'm just blind and whatever Maurice had was a blur to me. She seemed to start heading towards the bed with this...whatever... in her mouth and I screamed, "NO!!!!" 
This startled her as I am not generally a screamer and she hesitated and there was more cursing and finally Glen threw a towel over the poor animal and took it outside and then he said, "I'm going to go sleep in my chair. I'm tired and I can't deal with this."
"Lucky for you!" I said. But I understood. 
So I made him close his bathroom door into the laundry room because his bathroom leads into our room and I also closed the other bathroom door that leads directly into our room so it was guaranteed that I would neither hear nor see this sort of traumatic event again. 
At least not that night. 
So anyway, this morning, Mr. Moon informed me that the animal had been a very large mouse which was disgusting. Where are these very large mice coming from? Is Maurice finding them in our house? I have seen no sign of them and there are plenty outside, I'm sure. 
However.
And then, today, after I'd eaten my lunch, I realized that there was an object under the table on the back porch which is where I practically live and guess what it was? 
An entire and whole very large mouse. 
Well fuck. 
Glen had rather jokingly told me that if there were another very large mouse incident I should use the grabbers, as we call them, those things you use to pick up trash or little branches, to pick up the rodent and take it to the woods and toss it. 
And that's what I did. 
As Lily once said when she was still living here, TOO MUCH NATURE!

Yes. That. 

So do I have a plague of very large mice or is Maurice just really enjoying nighttime outdoor hunting or, well, what? I think we have to admit that she is a dedicated and amazing hunter no matter what's going on. 

I will tell you though, that tonight those two bathroom doors will be closed so that I cannot hear her cry pitifully to be let in. Mr. Moon is up at the cabin and I really cannot deal with another live animal situation nor do I want to sleep with anything who has just caught and eaten a rodent of any kind and I am tired of being woken in the middle of the night by the sounds of murder most foul. 
This is not how I ever envisioned living out my golden years and yet, here we are. 

And here's a picture Jessie just sent to her daddy and me. 

For supper they had grouper Boppy caught and green beans Mermer grew and grits, of course. Levon is tired from basketball camp and not really that upset. He was being dramatic, as Levon is wont to be. 

I'm going to go cook a hamburger. Green beans will also be involved with my supper. 

Love...Ms. Moon