Squirrel Breaking and Entering

It was a warm day here at Wekiwa Springs State Park. Gary went out antique shopping for the second day in a row, but before he did, he opened up all my windows so I would stay somewhat cool. Early this morning, he had taken pictures of all the things he bought at the antique stores yesterday. One of those items was an old rocking chair. It was stashed out of site behind me while he was gone. Well, after Gary was out of sight, my little squirrel buddies used the rocking chair to climb up on. From there, they jumped up on the ledge of my open rear window, and ripped through the screen. I was in SHOCK!!! There was a brand new loaf of bread on the countertop, and they had a great time tearing through the package to get to the goodies inside. As you know, I LOVE squirrels, but I was just amazed that they were aggressive enough to do what they did. Although it was kind of fun watching them chow down on the bread from three of my four beds, I couldn't help but think how pissed off Gary was going to be when he got back and found the mess. There was partially eaten bread on the countertop and my lower bunk bed, and crumbs all over the place. Dirty little paw marks were on my rear wall, and all over the white pillowcase on my rear bed. There was an unwanted party going on in here, and there was nothing I could do about it. The squirrels had their fun and their fill of bread, and escaped the way they came in before Gary got back. I sat here worried that they would come back and create more mess and more damage. But luckily, they played outside and left me alone. Gary finally returned. As soon as he walked in, he noticed the bread debris everywhere. I thought for sure he would be mad, maybe even mad at me for always wanting to feed the squirrels and perhaps encouraging them to be bad. But, he took the blame for the whole thing. He told me that there wouldn't have been a problem if he hadn't have put that old rocking chair behind me. I felt immediate relief. I was worried all afternoon that I might not ever go camping again. To me, that would be worse than death! He vacuumed up the mess and threw out the chewed up loaf of bread. He cleaned up the rear wall, and changed out the dirty pillow case for a fresh one. And last but not least, he moved that old rocking chair far far away from me. From now on, I'm not going to suggest that we feed the squirrels. As much as I've always liked them to hang around close to me, I think I'll just enjoy them from a distance. I guess there's a reason that there are signs in all the parks that say "DO NOT FEED THE WILDLIFE". I just never thought that feeding a few little squirrels would hurt anything. Well, I learned a valuable lesson today, and I didn't get banned from going camping for the rest of my life. So all in all, it was a pretty good day!