Home Invasion

When I walked into our lake house on Friday night, I knew something wasn't right. The baggy of dog treats that had been on the counter was torn apart on the floor, a candle was tipped over on the ground, the blinds on one window were down, magazines that had been on the coffee table were all over the floor and our wall sconce light was turned 90 degrees. I left the evidence as it was and ran out to tell Doug that someone or something had been in our house. I strapped on some "cajones" and started tiptoeing around from room to room looking for signs of our intruder. When I got upstairs to where the master bedroom is, it was really dark but I could see that our phone was on the ground. I yelled out to tell Doug that it had been in our bedroom and all of a sudden I heard this load rustle and then crash in our room. I hightailed it downstairs and right outside and stayed there for the next hour. At this point I still didn't know what the heck it was in our house.

Dog treats


Doug opened all of the doors to the house and armed himself with a broom to see if he could scare this thing out. I watched from a nice safe distance through the screened in porch. The next thing I know, Doug flipped on our bedroom light, let out a little yelp and I see this furry little critter flying down the stairs. Doug confirmed that the furry little critter was a squirrel...my arch nemesis in the animal world (sidenote: I was attacked by a squirrel while walking in college and I have been terrified of them ever since).

After the little thing ran downstairs, Doug poked and prodded around to make sure it had gone outside and when he was sure that it had escaped through one of the doors, I let the dogs in to double check. (I didn't let them in earlier because I could only imagine the Tom and Jerry chase scene that would ensue and the destruction it would cause.) The dogs didn't even pick up a scent, so I just assumed all was good. I spent the next hour cleaning up massive amounts of squirrel poop (ewwwwwwww) and then we all went to bed, shutting our bedroom door just in case.

Those are not just specks on the woods


No, our dogs did not pee on the rug, some other furry thing did


Saturday morning Doug got up to let the dogs out and when he got to the kitchen he found a couple bowls tipped over and my packet of GU, that I had laid out for my long run, torn open and gone.

Ruh-roh...now it has lots of energy


Crap, that stupid thing was still in the house. Our dogs are useless! They did more damage to the stuffed squirrel they have. (I wonder what intruder squirrel thought of this guy as he passed him on the stairs!)


We continued to hit things with the broom, look under couches, behind the fridge, everywhere and still couldn't see or hear anything.


We did notice that the fireplace door was a little opened, so we quickly shut it and barricaded it with a big, heavy bin. And then Doug secured it with duck tape...you know, because it's just not fully secure until the silver wonder tape is on there.


Look who finally seems to smell something. Good work Ciena, only 14 hours too late.


Since we barricaded the fireplace, we haven't seen any signs of the squirrel, so either it's still in the fireplace or it found a way out. I guess when we light our first fire of the year, we'll find out if it got out or not!