Phil

This week was GroundHog week at our Carlisle Chateau!

Turns out, that groundhogs really hibernate until mid-March (i.e., – now) which would explain why that guy in Pennsylvania always looks so cranky when they pull him out of his burrow on the 2nd of FEBRUARY!

But I appear to have gotten ahead (or behind?) the story I wanted to tell in today’s blog entry.

Earlier this week, Dad ran some errands without us while Mom was on one of her many Zoom meetings, when Zoe and I went CRAZY. She was trying to hear what the other participants were saying but with Zoe barking incessantly and me picking a fight with her (Zoe)…not over her interrupting Mom’s work call, but over who got first dibs on the critter in the backyard…Mom had to cut her call short by like over 30 minutes as she was not able to hear anything*.

When Dad returned home, we gave him an earful too…neither of our parents were apparently understanding that our backyard was in Code Red lockdown!

Until today, when we were resting quietly on some of our favorite living room furniture when Dad spotted this critter walking, nay strolling, through our yard:

This is when the dime dropped (I’ve heard this phrase used on some of the old shows we have watched but it makes very little sense to me…is this a bitcoin reference? Who uses metal coins anymore…except the jars in our house that accumulated these relicts until one of our parents return them to the bank for serious cash…or really credit card currency).

After they saw Phil, our parents wouldn’t let Zoe or I out until they did a perimeter check to make sure the invader was off our property. When we were finally released, we sniffed ever step s/he made (as in fact, Phil may be Philodendron) in our yard…not once but probably 3 or 4 times (gotta get our steps in).

At last, we were brought back inside and given a Greenie as a reward for all of our efforts. The big question now is where “Phil” has set up their den. If they are residing inside our fence, which continues to be re-enforced on a seemingly daily basis, how will our parents find them a new home in which we (Zoe and I) will not have an altercation with the beast…which is really what we would like, to be honest.

The Tempest

*Zoom now has a filter that blocks most extra-diegetic noises so the other people on Mom’s call had no idea why she was unable to follow the conversation. I hope to post more on Zoom filters in the near future.