Rodentia

I'm cheating a bit by writing this post on Saturday afternoon, and scheduling it to publish Sunday morning. That's because we have to catch an absurdly early train to get to Gatwick in time for our 9:40 a.m. flight. I don't know what I was thinking when I bought these plane tickets -- 9:40 a.m. seemed like a reasonable departure time (and the tickets were probably cheaper) but when you consider that you have to get to the airport two or three hours in advance, well, ugh.

The good news is, I reached out to the hotel in Málaga via Whatsapp and they did receive our documents and told me somewhat impatiently that I would be getting access codes to the door on the day of our arrival. So never mind that thing on their website that says we get the codes 48 hours in advance.

In other news, look! The bench outside the phone exchange on Finchley Road has been replaced! I'm shocked that they bothered to install a new one. I figured they'd just go benchless after hauling the old one away. After all, who sits in front of the phone exchange? But no, a new one was evidently warranted.

I spent yesterday packing, doing routine houseplant care and catching up on blogs. I am bringing no books but at least ten of my back issues of The New Yorker with me to Spain. I'm going to read them there and/or throw them away, one or the other.

We did nothing special for Valentine's Day, though Dave did buy me a pastry on the high street. If he's not trying to get me to drink more, he's buying me pastries. Has he taken out extra life insurance on me?!

This week's garden cam video comes from the patio, where I set up the camera right outside our bedroom door to see who or what is prowling around out there at night. Plenty of foxes, or perhaps just one very persistent fox, as well as a few unwelcome critters.

Here are some highlights:
-- At 0:20, you'll see a fox trot by with several links of sausage hanging out of its mouth. This is not the first time we've seen foxes with sausages in our garden. Someone must be feeding them, or maybe they've figured out how to raid the high street butcher's rubbish bin?
-- At 1:03, yikes! A rat! This is not terribly surprising since we live in the city, especially with foxes gnawing on sausages in the garden. But it doesn't make me happy because the last time we saw rats on the patio we had to call an exterminator and I am still psychologically scarred.
-- At 1:23, a token pigeon. I got tons of videos of solo pigeons wandering the patio in daytime.
-- At 1:44, a pair of amorous robins. That male is definitely trying to get the female's attention.
-- Random fox wanderings, and then at 2:52 it runs in at top speed and seems to be surveying the corner. Maybe it saw one of the rodents? It looks like it's in hunting mode.
-- At 4:04, a robin sings happily in the pre-dawn darkness.
-- At 4:26, the fox sneezes while sniffing the garden plants. I think it's hunting again. At least there's no coughing this time!
-- At 4:30, we get a brief daytime shot of the fox. Look at its beautiful red fur! It's easy to forget how colorful they are, looking at the pale infrared footage in my nighttime videos.
-- At 4:40, a mouse visits. I'm not sure that's any better than a rat.
-- At 5:00, I put down a bit of duck breast for the foxes. Now, before you criticize me, let me assure you I have only done this sort of thing three or four times in all the years we've lived here, and I would not have done it had I known we have rodents out there. So don't blame me for the rats. I think they're probably coming around because of the bird feeders. (You can blame me for those.)
-- At 5:12, the fox eats the duck breast and sniffs around hoping for more.
-- At 6:13, the rat is back. The camera caught no evidence that the rodents got any of the duck, thank God.
-- Two token squirrels at 6:47, the only other daytime visitors besides the pigeons and robins.
-- We finish with a last fox sighting. I think the fox is probably attracted to the patio partly because of those rodents. I hope it eats them.

Interesting that we saw no cats on the patio -- where it looks like we need them!

This coming week, I've set up the camera to film the bird feeders directly. I want to see if those rats or mice are climbing the pole and having a nosh. If so, I need to relocate the feeders away from the house. (I probably should anyway.)