A Healthy Scar

After weeks of trying not to pick my scabs, but picking my scabs anyway, I have finally been able to pick my scab and have solid flesh beneath.


I have a healthy scar: one that is faint but memorable. If you look very closely (in person, I doubt it would convey in this image) you can see the little "x" my Darcy made with his wicked incisors.

Although our guests have left the homestead, I am still weary of my little Darcy's behavioral problem. Since the blood-drawing bite above, he has bitten me once again for smelling too much like "the enemy."

To me, this indicates that he seems to think he's in charge of me. Although I don't mind being manipulated by my cute furry friends in the least offensive respects, I will not allow anyone to think they are the alpha over me.

In this biological niche, I am alpha. I am boss. I am the caretaker and provider. Which means Darcy better watch himself.

You Will Find this Quite Explosive Teaser

I'll be honest with you, this teaser strip has actually very little to do with the actual story I have written. The purpose of this little comic was basically for me to get a feel for a couple of characters and finally draw them out of my head.

These characters were originally created when I was in high school and they were extremely simplified versions of their 'rebooted' selves (quite literally a "U" face with lines as eyes). So it was important for me to be able to exercise their updated bodies.

Henceforth, the existence of this teaser strip. Or strip-tease. Whatever floats your boat.

He's A Persistant Fellow

Sam and I had a nice walk-about in the Bot Gardens today. Not only did we see a couple of baby deer nibbling on tree bark, the real treat was a little spat between two squirrels. Unfortunately, we were not accompanied by a camera so you folks will have to use your imagination for this one.

I couldn't tell you the relationship between these two squirrels--if there was already something established, if it was a first date, I don't know. All I know there was a boy and a girl, and the boy was attempting to court the lady and the lady was not in the mood.

The real kicker is he didn't seem to know what to even do. He would approach her, she would yell and spit at him, he would back off and look nervously about, then try it again. The female didn't leave the branch she was on, and it wasn't as if she was doing anything important either. Just whenever the fellow came up to her, and he did persistently and from all angles, she would yell at him and hiss and squeak and make other squirrel-like noises until he backed off.

Sam and I laughed about the possibilities that could be playing behind this scene.
One possibility? He was a newly made man and he was trying to prove it, but didn't know how to go about it.

Another: he and his wife were having some sort of disagreement and he was trying to make up for it, but she wasn't quite ready to forgive him yet.

Another: The female was not publicly affectionate and wasn't interested in doing that sort of thing while people were watching,


A third squirrel came out at some point. He was hanging out on another tree. Sam and I figured he was the neighbor telling them to "keep it down or I'll call the police!"

Yup. That's how our brains work.

A Group of Rats is called a Mischief

And here is what my bite looks like four days after the fact.

My knuckles are also back. I lost them for a couple of days, but there they are! All purpled and bruised up from being swollen.

Yeah, my body is great... the histamine reaction was spectacular. Plus, the antibiotics help.

So after this, it'll probably be a wrestling match with a coyote. Then I'll work my way up to lions.

An Update on the Hand that Slays Itself

 You can see that I have, indeed, stopped bleeding. This is two days after the incident. The wound is closed with clotted blood cells, both red and white. The puncture wound is quite deep and I had to get a tetanus shot! Mostly because I couldn't remember when I got my last one.

The hand on the left is the injured hand (you can tell because it is INJURED). I'm showing you a comparison of the swelling that has occurred in my mauled piece of flesh. The cleavage was just there and is not meant to be the center of the picture.